All Features

2019: Most anticipated children’s books

Feature by Hilli Levin

From award-winning authors and illustrators to up-and-coming stars of the kidlit world, there are plenty of stellar picture books and middle grade novels to look forward to in 2019. From reluctant readers to voracious bookworms, there’s something for every young reader in your life.

PICTURE BOOKS

Another by Christian Robinson 
March 5 | Atheneum
In this playful wordless picture book from Caldecott and Coretta Scott King Honor-winner Robinson, readers follow a young girl and her cat as they journey through a portal to an upside-down dimension. 

Tomorrow Most Likely by Dave Eggers and Lane Smith
April 2 | Chronicle
Bedtime books are always one of my personal favorites, so I can't wait to read what this dream team has cooked up. Instead of focusing on getting to sleep, a young boy imagines all of the fun and adventures that the next day could bring.

A Piglet Named Mercy by Kate DiCamillo and Chris Van Dusen 
April 2 | Candlewick
In this prequel to the popular Mercy Watson series, the life of a sweet couple is shaken up when a charming little piglet named Mercy shows up on their doorstep in this new picture book from Newbery Medal-winning author DiCamillo. 

High Five by Adam Rubin and Daniel Salmieri
April 16 | Dial
If you know a child who adored the bestseller Dragons Love Tacos, then you’ll want to pick up a copy of the newest picture book from this hilarious duo. Just expect to be giving out a lot of high fives after reading this one aloud.

This Book of Mine by Sarah Stewart and David Small
August 27 | FSG
The Caldecott Honor-winning author and illustrator of The Gardener return with this “celebration of the power of reading, of the ways in which books launch our adventures, give us comfort, challenge our imaginations and offer us connection.”

MIDDLE GRADE

Pay Attention, Carter Jones by Gary D. Schmidt 
February 5 | Clarion
With interest in Mary Poppins renewed thanks to the 2018 film, the Newbery-winning author’s latest book about a fumbling American boy whose grandfather sends his family a plucky English butler is sure to be a favorite.

Eventown by Corey Ann Haydu
February 12 | Katherine Tegen
After a family experiences a tragedy, they pack up and move to a little utopia known as Eventown. Everything seems perfect until 11-year-old Elodee starts uncovering some dark secrets that might threaten the townspeople's lives as they know it.

The Moon Within by Aida Salazar 
February 26 | Arthur A. Levine
This gorgeous novel-in-verse follows Celi Rivera as she attempts to make sense of her Xicana / Puerto Rican heritage, her changing body, her place in the world, her friends, her family and her hopes for the future.  

The Size of the Truth by Andrew Smith
March 26 | Simon & Schuster
The bestselling author of Winger’s first foray into middle grade is a quirky (what else?) story about a young boy battling PTSD who befriends a talking armadillo named Bartleby and ventures underground to hang out with him. Hilarity is sure to ensue. 

The Line Tender by Kate Allen 
April 16 | Dutton
This talked-about debut that has grabbed the attention of some bestselling authors follows 12-year-old Lucy Everhart as she attempts to sort through her grief after the loss of her marine biologist mother. During one summer in Maine, Lucy learns about sharks and reconnects with her mother as she attempts to sort through her unfinished research on Great Whites. Each chapter begins with a detailed sketch of a different shark species, meaning young readers are sure to get swept up in this immersive novel.

From award-winning authors and illustrators to up-and-coming stars of the kidlit world, there's plenty of stellar picture books and middle grade novels to look forward to in 2019. From reluctant readers to voracious bookworms, there's something for every young reader in your life.

Romance

Romance: February 2019

Feature by Christie Ridgway

Say You’re Sorry, Karen Rose’s latest tale of romantic suspense, is complex, thrilling and impossible to put down. FBI Special Agent Gideon Reynolds, who escaped a dangerous cult as a child, has been dodging a friend’s attempts to set him up with talk radio host Daisy Dawson. But when Daisy is attacked one night, Gideon is brought in on the case. There’s an instant attraction between Gideon and Daisy, but they quickly realize something else is simmering—the solution to the identity of a serial killer who’s been on the hunt for many years. In addition, the cult resurfaces and comes into play, which leads Gideon to reveal more of his past than he ever has before. Rose has a knack for building a community into her stories, family and friends who support as well as complicate the mission of the lead couple. Her characters are special and memorable, not because they’re superheroes, but because they’re authentic people with flaws and strengths. By exposing their frailties, Rose highlights her characters’ courage and compels readers to both worry about and root for them. This is an engrossing and exciting start to a new series, and one that busts genre stereotypes along the way.

Two high-powered Texans must run a gauntlet of family dysfunction and machinations before earning their happy ever after in The Fearless King by Katee Robert. Journey King thrives in her position as COO of the family business until her sadistic and dangerous father returns to Houston and tries to wrest away her control. At a loss to understand his motives, she turns to powerful Frank Evans, who can dig up dirt on anyone. Frank has no love for the King family, but he admires Journey, and the sexual chemistry between them is off the charts. However, the deeper Frank goes into the family’s history, the louder his internal alarm bells ring. But Frank has faced down racial and social prejudice in his past, and he’s not about to give up in the face of this new challenge—even if it turns out that both he and Journey are putting themselves at risk. There’s glitz, glamour and machinations aplenty in this soapy, highly entertaining tale of big Texas business and the larger-than-life King family.

A personal and professional partnership is forged in Alexandra Ivy’s You Will Suffer. Against the wishes of her status-conscious parents, lawyer Ellie Guthrie has returned to rural Curry, Oklahoma, to establish her law practice. Ellie enjoys working away from the eye of her judgmental father, but there’s another man who seems to be watching over her—a former FBI agent who owns the ranch next door. While Ellie outwardly bristles at Nate Marcel’s protective attitude, she secretly finds everything about him sexy. He’s also convenient to have around when vandalism and then murder come to Curry. The little village surrounded by wide-open spaces doesn’t seem a likely place for danger and mayhem, which makes the escalating violent crimes all the creepier. Everybody knows everybody—or so they think. Who could be the dangerous perpetrator in their midst? The cozy, small-town trope is turned on its head as Ellie and Nate work together to unravel ugly secrets and bloody deeds. 

Longtime friends become lovers in 99 Percent Mine by Sally Thorne. Globe-trotting photographer Darcy Barrett is back home to oversee the renovation of her late grandmother’s cottage. Darcy is as reluctant to see it change as she is to face her childhood friend Tom Valeska, the man hired to flip the house. Though Darcy has loved Tom all her life, he’s been engaged to another—a fact that has fueled her incessant need to get away. But as she works on the remodel with a newly single Tom, might they find a path to transforming their platonic relationship as well? Told from Darcy’s fresh, irreverent point of view, this delightful romance is peppered with witty dialogue, sweet love scenes and clever descriptions. One character smells like a birthday candle; conversing with another is “like trying to thread a live worm onto a hook.” But beyond the smart wordplay, there are lovably imperfect characters like Darcy’s twin, Jamie, who is yet another obstacle for the would-be lovers to overcome. Readers of romantic comedy should snatch this one up!

A dashing Scot and a strong-willed heroine take the reader on a thrilling historical adventure in The Wrong Highlander by Lynsay Sands. Lady Evina Maclean heads out in search of Rory Buchanan, a renowned healer, after her father falls ill. When she and her men come upon him bathing, an unfortunate altercation leaves the man unconscious, and Evina decides she’ll save time by taking him directly back to her family castle. If some might consider that kidnapping, she’ll worry about it once her father is well. But then she realizes she’s brought home the wrong Buchanan. Conran, Rory’s twin, isn’t all that happy about his predicament. But he’s intrigued by the red-haired, plain-speaking beauty and uses the knowledge he’s gained from assisting his brother to tend to her father. Soon the older man is on the mend and working on his own scheme—to make a match between the unaware pair. But danger lurks in the castle, jeopardizing everyone just as love begins to blossom between Evina and Conran. Swordplay, mistaken identity and secret passages add to the romantic fun.

 

This article was originally published in the February 2019 issue of BookPage. Download the entire issue for the Kindle or Nook.

Say You’re Sorry, Karen Rose’s latest tale of romantic suspense, is complex, thrilling and impossible to put down. FBI Special Agent Gideon Reynolds, who escaped a dangerous cult as a child, has been dodging a friend’s attempts to set him up with talk radio host…

RomanceWestern Romance

Spotlight: Western romances

Feature by Savanna Walker

Turns out, you can buy love. Two new romances blend old-fashioned sweetness with rip-roaring adventure, breathing new life into one of the oldest tropes of the Western romance: the mail-order bride.

Sarah M. Eden mines the mail-order bride plot for gentle comedy and goodhearted character growth in her kisses-only inspirational romance, Healing Hearts. Gideon MacNamara is the beloved doctor of the small Wyoming town of Savage Wells. Unlucky in love and desperately in need of professional assistance, he requests an arranged bride with medical experience, hoping to kill two birds with one logical, unromantic stone. When Miriam Bricks arrives, believing she’s been hired for a position as a nurse and only a nurse, she’s quite confused as to why all the townspeople are so happy to see her. And why they’re all dressed for a wedding. After the confusion is cleared up, Gideon pushes past his embarrassment and offers Miriam a job in his office. The pair are refreshingly mature as they work through their awkward situation, and Gideon’s defense of Miriam to his disappointed patients is particularly charming.

If you’re looking for a bit more, shall we say, illicit take on the trope, Linda Broday’s The Outlaw’s Mail Order Bride should be right up your alley. Clay Colby is certain his intended will take one look at the burned-out remains of his home and hightail it back to wherever she came from. But Tally Shannon has demons of her own and nowhere else to go. Both have a price on their heads, and they vow not to turn each other in while they attempt to make their marriage work. Broday’s earthy, no-nonsense characters fit the rugged setting perfectly, and it’s a pleasure to watch these two lonely, cynical souls forge a powerful, passionate partnership.

 

This article was originally published in the February 2019 issue of BookPage. Download the entire issue for the Kindle or Nook.

Two new romances blend old-fashioned sweetness with rip-roaring adventure, breathing new life into one of the oldest tropes of the Western romance: the mail-order bride.

NonfictionLiteratureBlack History

You will know us by the strength of our voices

Feature by Vanessa Willoughby

Black history is so much more than the collective memory of trauma. It would be fundamentally wrong, if not outright degrading, to conclude that that the identities of black men and women are simply limited to their resilience. These four books showcase the rich spectrum of black identity.

The sacrifices that black women make in order to practice resistance and seek social and political freedom are too often diminished by the expectation of selfless service. However, in DaMaris B. Hill’s poetry collection A Bound Woman Is a Dangerous Thing: The Incarceration of African American Women from Harriet Tubman to Sandra Bland, she utilizes the powerful narratives of black women from history such as Harriet Tubman and Fannie Lou Hamer, alongside rarely celebrated figures relegated to the shadows, to give these women a chance to exist beyond the roles of activist or martyr.  By utilizing biographical research and black-and-white archival photos, in conjunction with her verse, Hill creates an intimate atmosphere that allows for a rich exploration of fully formed heroines. Hill recognizes that these women don’t have to be perfect representations of freedom fighters in order to garner respect, sympathy and admiration. While racism and bigotry may have bound these women physically, mentally and/or emotionally, their narratives are not bound by struggle. For Hill, these women are not anyone’s mules: They are soothsayers, truth-tellers, mavericks and revolutionaries.

For author, professor and acclaimed academic Emily Bernard, facing adversities as a black woman in America has spawned the invaluable and hard-won ability to take control of her own narrative. Black Is the Body: Stories from My Grandmother’s Time, My Mother’s Time, and Mine consists of 12 personal essays brimming with equal parts hope and fury, joy and pain. Whether exploring the delicate dynamics of her interracial marriage, the haunting memory of being stabbed by a white man while she was a graduate student at Yale or the process of adopting her twin daughters from Ethiopia, Bernard’s writing is intimate, honest and unafraid of diving into gray areas. Although society at large may deem the black body—and by extension, blackness—as synonymous with suffering, Bernard’s collection doesn’t shy away from the fact that sometimes scars are proof of life beyond the state of survival.

The official start of the civil rights movement is often linked to the day that Rosa Parks refused to give up her seat and move to the back of the bus in Montgomery, Alabama. Yet in Unexampled Courage: The Blinding of Sgt. Isaac Woodard and the Awakening of President Harry S. Truman and Judge J. Waties Waring, U.S. District Judge Richard Gergel highlights a horrifying case of racial violence and brutality that propelled President Truman to directly address civil rights issues, namely the violence facing black veterans returning from World War II. On February 12, 1946, decorated black veteran Sgt. Isaac Woodard was on his way home to South Carolina via a Greyhound bus. Following a disagreement with the bus driver, Woodard was removed from the bus in Batesburg, South Carolina, by the town’s two-man police unit. Without allowing Woodward to finish explaining his side of the events, Chief Lynwood Shull struck Woodard in the head with his police baton, placed the veteran under arrest, repeatedly beat him to the point of unconsciousness and left him in a county jail cell overnight. Woodard was beaten so severely that the violence resulted in permanent blindness. Gergel’s reconstruction of this moment in history is both enraging and heartbreaking. With a clear-eyed view of the ripple effect of shocking acts of violence, Gergel traces how the blinding of Woodard ignited black communities, the NAACP and sympathetic allies to seek justice and demand that Truman take action. Combining research and a deep knowledge of the country’s legal system, Gergel exposes America’s longstanding legacy of brutalizing black bodies to preserve a vision of America fueled by the destructive force of white supremacy.

Despite their scars, not all historical heroines should be considered tragic figures. For black women at the turn of the 20th century, their struggles involved indignities faced not only because of the color of their skin but also because of their gender. Yet the double-edged sword of being both black and female couldn’t keep some women from pursuing self-autonomy and self-governance, as chronicled in Wayward Lives, Beautiful Experiments: Intimate Histories of Social Upheaval. Guggenheim fellow, author and Columbia University professor Saidiya Hartman sheds light on women who refused to conform to societal bonds and malicious institutions that were determined to keep them downtrodden, enslaved and hopeless. For Hartman, the purpose of this meticulously researched collection is not to wallow in despair, but to celebrate and lift up the plethora of black women who are largely absent from history books. Hartman argues that by rejecting the expectations of their gender and race, these women are unrecognized revolutionaries who were committed to self-discovery in spite of the obstacles obstructing their paths.

 

ALSO IN BOOKPAGE: Read a Q&A with Emily Bernard for Black Is the Body.

This article was originally published in the February 2019 issue of BookPage. Download the entire issue for the Kindle or Nook.

Black history is so much more than the collective memory of trauma. It would be fundamentally wrong, if not outright degrading, to conclude that that the identities of black men and women are simply limited to their resilience. These four books showcase the rich spectrum of…

NonfictionMemoir

Let’s talk about love in all its many forms

Feature by Hilli Levin

We all should be so lucky to find love—in family and friends as well as in romantic partners. These six new books fit into anyone’s life, regardless of relationship status. 

How to be Loved: A Memoir of Lifesaving Friendship
By Eva Hagberg Fisher

Eva Hagberg Fisher built a career writing about architecture in her 20s, but her raw and honest debut memoir, How to be Loved, is quite a departure from chronicling design and the hottest goings-on in New York real estate. Fisher doesn’t sugarcoat her journey from a confused social climber who was struggling with addiction to a person who discovers, for the first time in her young life, true friendship with Allison, an older woman in her recovery group. Fisher confesses to being selfish and withholding for most of her early adult life, seeing her relationships with men and women as means to an end, whether that end be social status, housing when she was jobless or artistic fulfillment. But when Fisher was diagnosed with a brain tumor, it was Allison, steadily coping with her own cancer diagnosis, who gently but persistently loved and cared for her. Allison showed Fisher a way to engage with another person to an extent she didn’t know was possible, which in turn helped prepare her for her relationship with her current husband. Grab a box of tissues for this one and have your best friend on speed dial. You’ll definitely want to call them after you turn the last page. 

Hard to Love: Essays and Confessions
By Briallen Hopper

As Fisher’s memoir proves, romantic partnerships aren’t the only life-altering relationships built on love. And in Briallen Hopper’s first collection of essays, Hard to Love, she takes a deep dive into many essential but far less glamorized types of relationships: found families, platonic friendships, emotional connections with inanimate objects, fandom (you’ll never look at the classic Ted Dansen-helmed sitcom “Cheers” or its theme song the same way ever again) and the hard-won beauty of learning to love yourself. And yes, Hopper even spares some ink to cover marriage and romance, but as a whole, this is a refreshing collection that probes the expanse of the human heart.

Love Understood: The Science of Who, How and Why We Love
By Laura Mucha

If you have a dogeared copy of Aziz Ansari’s 2015 bestseller, Modern Love, then British poet and artist Laura Mucha’s Love Understood, a well-researched and deeply human study of the intricacies and science of love, is right up your alley. After observing her grandparents’ strong, decades-long relationship, Mucha decided to spend some time trying to figure out how love works. She interviewed strangers from all over the world in order to better understand love’s common themes, and she presents their stories alongside related scientific studies. You’ll find sections on dating, love at first sight, monogamy, cheating and how people heal from lost love. 

How to Date Men When You Hate Men
By Blythe Roberson

Do you struggle to connect with men in the midst of our inescapably patriarchal society? Well, Blythe Roberson, New Yorker contributor and researcher for “The Late Show with Stephen Colbert,” definitely has her fair share of complaints. In her hilarious and relatable How to Date Men When You Hate Men, the 27-year-old chronicles her many false starts (like many Millennials, she’s never had a boyfriend in the traditional sense), rants about rape culture, parses her “type,” offers her own thoughts on the complicated dance of defining the relationship, champions the pleasures of being single and more. It’s a very funny read from someone who has many thoughts on love but never claims to be an expert.

Eight Dates: Essential Conversations for a Lifetime of Love
By John Gottman & Julie Schwartz Gottman

John and Julie Gottman know that a strong and healthy relationship is built on the small, everyday gestures and moments of intentional connection. So they’re burning a candle for one of the most overlooked aspects of modern relationships: date night. “Make dedicated, non-negotiable time for each other a priority, and never stop being curious about your partner,” they write in the introduction to Eight Dates. If you’re really looking to see some results, then this is the book for you—the Gottmans’ ideas are based on hard data and proven studies. Although the dates all focus on different topics of conversation, they apply to any relationship, young or old.

You Always Change the Love of Your Life (for Another Love or Another Life)
By Amalia Andrade

If you’ve ever gone through a breakup, you probably know that you’ll get the same pat advice over and over again. Looking for a new, more hands-on approach to processing your feelings and dealing with heartbreak? Chilean-born author and illustrator Amalia Andrade’s You Always Change the Love of Your Life blends charming, down-to-earth advice with cheeky cartoons, illustrations, journal prompts, soul-warming recipes, playlists and more.

 

This article was originally published in the February 2019 issue of BookPage. Download the entire issue for the Kindle or Nook.

We all should be so lucky to find love—in family and friends as well as in romantic partners. These six new books fit into anyone’s life, regardless of relationship status. 

How to be Loved: A Memoir of Lifesaving Friendship
By Eva Hagberg…

FictionSpeculative Fiction

Spotlight: Visions of the future

Feature by Annie Peters

Speculative fiction allows the constants of our reality to change, giving readers a glimpse of how those shifts might affect their own lives. This trio of novels use time travel and prophesy to craft compelling, all-too-human stories.

In Kate Mascarenhas’ superb debut novel, The Psychology of Time Travel, four female scientists in 1967 discover the secret of time travel. At the news conference announcing their discovery, however, one of the women, Barbara, has a mental breakdown that threatens to undermine the value of their discovery. To protect their work, the other three scientists exile Barbara from the project. 

Jumping to 2017, Barbara, now a grandmother, receives a newspaper clipping of a murder that will occur in the future. Her granddaughter, Ruby, is convinced that one of the scientists is trying to warn Barbara of her impending murder. Ruby must follow this clue from the future to unravel the mystery and save her grandmother.

Mascarenhas conjures a world in which time travel not only exists but also has its own legal system, currency and lingo. She meticulously weaves the stories of multiple female characters as they—both older and younger versions of themselves—jump back and forth in time to create a delightfully complex, multilayered plot. To all of this, Mascarenhas adds a thoroughly satisfying murder mystery. The Psychology of Time Travel heralds the arrival of a master storyteller. 

Mike Chen’s Here and Now and Then provides another enjoyable venture into time travel. In this novel, Kin Stewart is caught between two worlds separated by almost 150 years. Originally a time-traveling agent with the Temporal Corruption Bureau in 2142, Kin becomes stranded in 1996 when a mission goes awry. Breaking bureau rules, Kin takes a job in IT and starts a family as his memories of 2142 degrade. When an accident alerts a retriever agent to return Kin to 2142, where only two weeks have passed, Kin must confront his divided loyalties between his adolescent daughter, who may be eliminated as a timeline corruption, and the family he cannot remember in 2142. 

Although Chen’s novel is set in a futuristic world, it is ultimately about the bond between a father and his daughter. While Kin’s dilemma is one that readers will never face, they will be drawn in by the human questions at its heart.

In Sharma Shields’ The Cassandra, young Mildred Groves has the gift of prophesy—and the curse that no one wants to heed her warnings. Mildred escapes an abusive home and takes a job as a secretary at Washington’s Hanford research facility in 1945, where workers are sworn to secrecy as scientists create “the product”—plutonium for the first atomic bombs. At first, Mildred is happy to be a part of something so big and important. However, as the product comes closer to completion, she begins to have nightmarish visions of the destruction that will be wrought on the people of Hiroshima, Nagasaki and the Hanford facility. She feels compelled to warn those in power, even as her own well-being disintegrates. But to what end? 

Shields has written a brilliant modern retelling of the classic myth of Cassandra. While this is not an easy novel to read, as the imagery becomes increasingly gruesome, it is a pleasure to be immersed in a myth so deftly woven into an apt historical context. The Cassandra should not be missed by those interested in Greek mythology, the Hanford project or beautifully crafted stories. 

 

This article was originally published in the February 2019 issue of BookPage. Download the entire issue for the Kindle or Nook.

Speculative fiction allows the constants of our reality to change, giving readers a glimpse of how those shifts might affect their own lives. This trio of novels use time travel and prophesy to craft compelling, all-too-human stories.

In Kate Mascarenhas’ superb debut novel,…

Children's & YAPicture BookMusicBlack HistoryBiography

Immersive stories to open conversations

Feature by Autumn Allen

Five new picture books teach young readers about the struggles and triumphs of black people living in America.

James E. Ransome, a prolific and award-winning illustrator, proves that his words are just as powerful as his art in The Bell Rang. Ransome’s free verse follows a week in the life of a young girl who begins and ends each day with her loving family. As slaves on a plantation, the family faces difficulty and danger, but they also have joy, love and community—things we don’t often associate with the lives of the enslaved. The striking artwork captures cuddles and kisses, smiles and games, gift-giving and preaching. Natural colors, silhouettes, expressive faces and the use of the implied space beyond the page bring the enslaved community to life. The family’s routine is interrupted when the narrator’s brother runs away and a search is called; dogs are pictured and a whip is mentioned, but violence is not pictured. Overall, this is a unique and valuable story that centers on the endurance and humanity of enslaved people, and ends on a firm note of hope.

How exciting can a story about a female postal worker be? Very exciting, if it’s Tami Charles’ Fearless Mary: The True Adventures of Mary Fields, American Stagecoach Driver. Mary Fields, a former slave, rode into the segregated Wild West alone in 1895. When she saw an opening for a stagecoach driver to deliver mail and packages into the mountains, she knew she was qualified and could handle the dangers of the job. Charles’ action-packed text sets Fields’ stunning achievements against the historical backdrop in order to shape a thrilling story that shows another side of America’s western expansion. Claire Almon’s illustrations have an animationlike aesthetic that serves the story well, keeping the pace moving. Readers will watch with amazement as Fields uses her reading skills, her trained eagle and her weapon to excel at her daring job, never losing a package.

Carole Boston Weatherford’s verse and Frank Morrison’s graffiti-inspired art form a winning combination in The Roots of Rap: 16 Bars on the 4 Pillars of Hip-Hop. Reaching back past DJ Kool Herc, the book begins with “Folktales, street rhymes, spirituals” and the poetry of Langston Hughes and Paul Laurence Dunbar. Weatherford then nods to James Brown and funk before painting a portrait of New York City’s rap scene in the 1970s and beyond. The rhythmic text simply begs to be read aloud—but don’t turn the pages too quickly, as the rich, expressive art deserves to be savored. With glowing brown skin tones, warm reds and cool blues, Morrison immortalizes key figures and scenes of the musical genre’s lineage and its attendant art forms, including graffiti and break dancing. Children will delight in this book’s immersive sights and sounds, while adults will smile with recognition at how old-school names connect to the language of today’s hip-hop.

In Olugbemisola Rhuday-Perkovich’s Someday Is Now: Clara Luper and the 1958 Oklahoma City Sit-ins, young readers can learn about children between the ages of 6 and 17 who staged protests in 1958 with the help of an inspiring educator named Clara Luper. Luper taught young people about speaking up, and as a leader in the NAACP, she taught the steps of nonviolent action. With some trepidation, she supported a group of young people as they forged ahead with their demonstrations, insisting that “someday is now.” Jade Johnson’s illustrations make the protests accessible, and the meaty text addresses the difficulty of standing up, the sweet rewards that can follow and the need to keep going after a win. It’s perfect inspiration for our difficult times.

Janet Collins was the first African-American prima ballerina for New York’s Metropolitan Opera, and her success in dance was all the more satisfying because of the obstacles she overcame along the way. In lyrical verse, Brave Ballerina: The Story of Janet Collins by Michelle Meadows takes readers through Collins’ path: her supportive family, her mother who paid for her lessons by sewing costumes, a dance class that would not accept her because she was black and one ballet teacher who did. Ebony Glenn’s illustrations lend impact to each moment: sadness when Collins is accepted into a dance company and then told to lighten her skin, hope when she finds a class, and finally joy when she dances on stage in 1951—with her natural skin tone. The graceful lines of the illustrations will have young ballet fans twirling and, more importantly, believing that hard work pays off. There is an abundance of ballet-themed children’s books, but few are as delightful as this one.

 

This article was originally published in the February 2019 issue of BookPage. Download the entire issue for the Kindle or Nook.

Five new picture books teach young readers about the struggles and triumphs of black people living in America.

James E. Ransome, a prolific and award-winning illustrator, proves that his words are just as powerful as his art in The Bell Rang. Ransome’s free…

RomanceWestern Romance

Friends-to-lovers, under fire

Feature by Dolly R. Sickles

Friends always make better lovers. It’s probably a scientific fact, somewhere. But in the world of romance, it’s a truth that can be proven time and again. Lovers come in all shapes and sizes, for any length of time, but if you want a lasting relationship with staying power, friendship is the key. (And apparently, being named “Hunter” also helps.)

Connie Mann kicks off her new Florida Wildlife Warriors series with Beyond Risk, a satisfying mystery with a robust cast of characters, a small-town feel and the wild, adventurous forest around the Ocklawaha River. But what really sets it apart is the tight camaraderie of the Tanner family, and the friendship between Charlee Tanner and Hunter Boudreau that develops with natural grace into a satisfying romance.

The story opens on the one-year anniversary of a tragic paddling trip Charlee led, in which someone drowned. Her big family of law enforcement and Fish and Wildlife Conservation (FWC) officers are on hand to usher her off on a new paddling adventure, but it’s Hunter’s presence that she’s most drawn to, as “he’d also stood between her and the world, giving her a safe space to heal.” If only the big, bad, former Marine and FWC hottie could keep that barrier between her and the world, he might be able to save her from a stalker before her life flips upside down again. Mann proves that she knows her subject matter by interjecting as many dangers from the natural world—snakes, alligators and the river itself—as from violent offenders, but she also fills the story with so many characters that it’s sometimes difficult to keep up. Look beyond the multitude of clients, family and community members and focus on the easy way Charlee and Hunter migrate from friends to lovers. There’s nothing risky about that.

Lora Leigh and Veronica Chadwick dish up another friends-to-lovers romantic suspense in One Tough Cowboy, a love story between a sexy cowboy and the girl that got away.

In this instance, the sexy cowboy, Hunter Steele, is also a sexy small-town sheriff and the girl that got away is Samantha Ryder, who moved to Detroit with her family at eleven and is now a police officer. After three deaths in Deerhaven, California, Hunter and Samantha reunite. One of the dead is his uncle, another is her aunt, but all three victims have died from suspicious, supposedly accidental pain medication overdoses. The similarities are just too coincidental for them to be random, and with the mayor’s wife being the third victim, it all adds up to some serious small-town corruption. Chadwick is a new to this reviewer, but Leigh’s trademark drama and sexy romance is easily identifiable and as heart racing as ever. The pair’s Moving Violations series is off to a red hot start.

So if you don’t want to just “love the one you’re with,” look a little deeper into those you consider your closest friends. Could be true love’s been with you all along. And if you find someone named Hunter, grab him!

Friends always make better lovers. It’s probably a scientific fact, somewhere. But in the world of romance, it’s a truth that can be proven time and again. Lovers come in all shapes and sizes, for any length of time, but if you want a lasting relationship with staying power, friendship is the key. (And apparently, being named “Hunter” also helps.)

Fiction

Why we need fairy tales more than ever

Feature by Katherine Reay

Make this your New Year’s resolution: Author Katherine Reay calls for more reading of fairy tales in 2019.

A recent article in Quartzy noted how little Bill Gates reads fiction, and the writer made a solid case for the scientific benefits of reading literature. I’d like to up the ante and suggest that among all genres, fairy tales may be more important to us now than ever before.

I confess I’ve always adored fairy tales. I read them as a child, read them to my own kids, and even invented a few along the way. My son still talks of Filbert, the good-hearted dragon I sent into battle each bedtime against his nemesis, Peroxio.

What is it about this fictional world, where good always triumphs over evil, which keeps us reading or watching night after night? After all, the tenets of the Marvel world remind us of the schema and structure, and the pitfalls and triumphs, found within traditional fairy tales.

The swoonworthy, sensitive men of action certainly have something to do with it. And imagining ourselves in the roles of these beautiful women of action—not the passive damsels in distress of the past—entices us as well. Who wouldn’t want to save the universe as I suspect Captain Marvel just might? I wouldn’t mind Black Widow’s roundhouse kicks either. But high stakes drama and outstanding computer graphics don’t tell the whole story.

I believe the answer in our loyalty to traditional and to new fairy tales lies in the story behind the story. In our fast and shifting world, we instinctively search for stable ground, and throughout the ages, fairy tales have provided just that: something pure and moral and comforting to cling to. These stories give us glimpses of truth in a society that often distorts right and wrong. We may adapt the plots, the characters and the fantastical settings, but the core remains the same. There is good and evil in the universe, hard choices need to be made, daily living requires courage, and there will always be consequences for the wrong actions.

The Brothers Grimm instinctively understood this and first published Nursery and Household Tales in 1812, codifying and uniting German culture and oral tradition. And this desire for stability, community and common ground is no less needed today than during Napoleon’s sieges. Our lives suggest this, and we ask ourselves, Will right prevail? Can dreams come true? Does true love exist, and can it withstand anything we throw at it? These are large and looming questions, and simply because we don’t chat about them over coffee doesn’t mean they don’t dwell in our heads and in our hearts. We yearn for the faith that good will triumph and the conviction that true love lasts.

The clarity that fairy tales provide instinctively feels right to us, but such truths are rarely witnessed on a daily basis. C.S. Lewis describes in his essay “Myth Became Fact” that the rich, imaginative atmosphere provided by fairy tales and myths is a perfect conduit through which truths flow and are found. They provide a context for the unknown and, to our linear and limited minds, the unbelievable. There is an experiential quality to myths that marry thought to experience.

So perhaps I can use this line of thinking to justify my love for myths, fairy tales and everything Marvel creates—after all, I am intimately involved in one, and should bring to that one all my wonder, gratitude, imagination and awe. And there’s a little left over for the other for the other fairy tales, too—as, and I stand with Lewis and his assertion: “When I was ten, I read fairy tales in secret and would have been ashamed if I had been found doing so. Now that I am fifty I read them openly.” (From “On Three Ways for Writing for Children.”)

With every story read or movie watched, I’m reassured by glimpses of truth and clarity, standing apart in the daily wave of propaganda directed at us. I suspect I’m not alone in feeling this way, for clearly my sole adoration cannot have made them so popular and numerous. We trust good will prevail, love will last eternally, and some things in life are worth fighting, even dying, for. We trust, stepping into the imaginative experience, that we, too, can defeat the villain.

Make sure you add some fairy tales and retellings to your 2019 TBR list. Check out these wonderful adaptations, and don’t forget to revisit the beloved original stories:

Scarlet

Marissa Meyer’s Scarlet
(Little Red Riding Hood)

 Princess of the Midnight Ball

Jessica Day George’s Princess of the Midnight Ball
(The Twelve Dancing Princesses)

The Goose Girl

Shannon Hale’s The Goose Girl
(The Goose Girl)

A Princess in Theory

Alyssa Cole’s A Princess in Theory
(Cinderella)

The Silent Songbird

Melanie Dickerson’s The Silent Songbird
(The Little Mermaid)

Katherine Reay is the national bestselling and award-winning author of Dear Mr. Knightley, Lizzy and Jane, The Brontë Plot, A Portrait of Emily Price, The Austen Escape and The Printed Letter Bookshop (May 2019). All Katherine’s novels are contemporary stories with a bit of classical flair. Katherine holds a BA and MS from Northwestern University, graduating Phi Beta Kappa, and is a wife, mother, former marketer and avid chocolate consumer. After living all across the country and a few stops in Europe, Katherine now happily resides outside Chicago, Illinois. You can meet her at www.katherinereay.com; Facebook: KatherineReayBooks; Twitter: @katherine_reay; or Instagram: @katherinereay.

Make this your New Year’s resolution: Author Katherine Reay calls for more reading of fairy tales in 2019.
Fiction

NYC crime stories

Feature by G. Robert Frazier

One night can change everything. For better. For worse. Forever.

The characters in two new novels from Karen Ellis and Andrea Bartz experience the immediate and long-term ramifications of ill-spent nights to drastic effect. In Ellis’ novel, Last Night, the distinctly different lives of Titus “Crisp” Crespo and Glynnie Dreyfus intersect in unexpected and unfortunate ways when they attempt to purchase weed from a shady supplier. Meanwhile, Lindsay Bach struggles to piece together the fleeting memories of a tragic night ten years earlier in which a college friend, Edie, committed suicide in Bartz’s The Lost Night. Both novels offer mystery, suspense and unforgettable characters caught up in situations that swiftly spiral beyond their control.

In Last Night, Crisp is an intelligent 19-year-old high school valedictorian with plans to enter Princeton on a scholarship in the fall. The novel opens as Crisp makes deliveries on his bike through the streets of New York on the eve of his graduation, only to see him unjustly arrested for arguing with a police officer who tickets him for riding his bike on the sidewalk in an obvious case of racial profiling. While spending time in a detention facility, he spies a neighbor, affluent white girl Glynnie, sunbathing on a nearby rooftop. Ashamed and unable to face his mother and grandparents once released, Crisp and Glynnie strike up an unlikely friendship that ultimately leads them in search of weed from a dealer in the Brooklyn projects. Crisp inwardly knows he’s making a mistake, but he is reluctant to abandon Glynnie. Plus, the trip to the projects offers Crisp a chance to find his father, whom he has never had the chance to know. Needless to say, Ellis heaps further misfortune on the pair as their drug buy goes horribly awry.

While the pair of friends struggles to regain control of their lives, their absence at home does not go unnoticed, leading to a pair of investigations by local detectives to find them. The detectives’ inquiries ultimately cross paths as they pool their skills to bring the teens home safely, and Ellis swiftly ratchets up the tension and the stakes in this gripping thriller.

The Lost Night, on the other hand, imbues its reader with a more subtle mystery that unravels piecemeal over time. As the tenth anniversary of her friend Edie’s suicide nears, Lindsay fails to recall precisely how she spent that fateful night. Plagued by alcoholism and faulty memories, Lindsay obsessively questions her friends and Edie’s relatives, only to discover inconsistencies, suspicion and revelations she never suspected. Her persistent desire to learn the truth tests her own conclusions, her friendships and the nature of the event itself. Could Edie have been murdered? Could one of her friends been involved? Or worse, was Lindsay herself part of the deed or involved in a cover up?

Bartz, who is a Brooklyn-based journalist, crafts an intense, emotionally gripping novel pitting memory and reality against each other. Readers, in turn, are left to wonder along with Lindsay whether she is being wholly truthful about the events of that night—recalling other recent unreliable narrators like Amy Dunne in Gone Girl or Rachel in The Girl on the Train—or whether Lindsay was deliberately misled.

Both Last Night and The Lost Night are set in Brooklyn, and their respective authors contrast their characters’ social and cultural differences to full effect. Both books will keep you awake long into the night.

One night can change everything. For better. For worse. Forever.

Romance

Digital Dalliances: Not Dead Yet

Feature by Savanna Walker

Every month, we review the hottest new romance releases in our Romance column. But why let the print books have all the fun? In Digital Dalliances, we highlight digital-only releases guaranteed to heat up your eReader.

In a magical version of modern-day Toronto, Wes Cooper is a supernatural anomaly. After being brought back to life by a witch after his untimely death in the 1930s, Wes has the abilities of a ghost—he can walk through walls, shift into the spiritual “otherplane” and even sometimes teleport from one place to another—while still being able to live a physical life on earth. He’s transferred these abilities into a very lucrative career as a thief, and due to his immortality and somewhat misanthropic nature, his only friend is one of the descendants of the witch who resurrected him.

It’s a limited life, but Wes enjoys his work and especially enjoys being able to live a safe, out life as a gay man given that his experience growing up in the 1930s was far more precarious. But Wes is thrown into the orbit of his biggest regret, Detective Hudson Rojas, when he witnesses a bizarre murder while on a job. Hudson and Wes broke up in the ‘80s over Hudson’s dangerous undercover work and his refusal to live openly as a couple. But with a potentially supernatural murderer on the loose in Toronto, Hudson needs Wes’ particular set of the skills to solve the case.

You will either buy the premise of a not-ghost, as Wes is called, or you will not. I very much hope you do, because Not Dead Yet is an emotionally grounded supernatural love story with a fantastic sense of humor. Burke fully commits to her premise and finds all sorts of fun world building details and applications of Wes’ powers to play with, in addition to exploring his and Hudson’s very different experiences as gay men. Both have experienced oppression and lived a majority of their lives in the closet, as well as experiencing the AIDS epidemic. But Wes’ relative anonymity made his coming out a somewhat easier process, whereas Hudson had to grapple with the public-facing nature of his job as well as its extremely masculine culture. There’s a fabulous reveal almost halfway through that adds a whole new element to the central relationship, but be warned, this reveal is spoiled in the synopsis for the upcoming second book.

Not Dead Yet has a superb sense of timing, balancing Wes and Hudson’s emotional, awkward reunion with a pleasingly twisty, increasingly complicated supernatural mystery. She has a seemingly unerring instinct for when to slow down the action and when to ratchet it up, in terms of both suspense and romance. Burke also makes the very canny decisions of infusing the proceedings with as much humor as possible. There’s a prison break sequence of sorts later on in the book that’s an absolute scream and gloriously succeeds in easing the tension just when things are looking very grim. Also, I’m 99% sure the title is a Monty Python reference, which is just utterly wonderful if true and perhaps the best selling point I can think of for this delightful romance.

His eyes were the first thing I noticed after taking in the uniform. They were a deep, rich brown. Later, I’d try to find the perfect description for them. Russet, maybe, or chestnut, with the barest hint of smile crinkles at the corners. They were so damned warm and welcoming, as though he’d seen me—really seen me, and not only the external trappings of slightly out-of-date bell bottoms, dark blond hair I’d let grow wild into a big halo of waves, and a tight orange polyester shirt with a few buttons opened to display my one chunky gold necklace.

He’d followed me around the store—not in a creepy stalker way, but in a laughing sort of “our baskets have matching ingredients” kind of way. It was utterly charming and clear he wasn’t disappointed to keep bumping into me. Behind his bushy eyebrows and mustache, he was so happy and friendly and nice, and I felt bubbly and excited in a way I’d nearly forgotten. Eventually I asked what he was making—spaghetti—and he asked me—chili—and somehow we decided that my chili sounded better than his spaghetti, and he joined me for dinner. Afterward, we kissed, and I remembered exactly what those bubbles in my gut meant—anticipation, attraction, desire. For the first time in nearly fifty years, I found myself wanting to have sex, and that need to connect with this man who’d enticed me so thoroughly with his warmth and joy of life only intensified the next few times we saw each other. After a month of spending Hudson’s days off together, we finally gave into the mad attraction and made love on my couch, listening to Meat Loaf, of all things. Me getting physical even that quickly was rare—as in, it had only happened once before. So the connection I’d felt with Hudson was special. Incredible. Startling. I thought I’d found forever.

Not so much.

In a magical version of modern-day Toronto, Wes Cooper is a supernatural anomaly. After being brought back to life by a witch after his untimely death in the 1930s, Wes has the abilities of a ghost—he can walk through walls, shift into the spiritual “otherplane” and even sometimes teleport from one place to another—while still being able to live a physical life on earth. He’s transferred these abilities into a very lucrative career as a thief, and due to his immortality and somewhat misanthropic nature, his only friend is one of the descendants of the witch who resurrected him.

Mystery

Joanne Fluke’s Chocolate Cream Pie recipe

Feature by Joanna Fluke

Baking whiz and amateur sleuth Hannah Swensen’s love life has been totally upended, but that doesn’t mean she won’t be able to solve the latest murder in Lake Eden. In anticipation of Joanne Fluke’s 24th Hannah Swensen mystery, Chocolate Cream Pie Murder, we’re sharing the titular recipe as it appears in the novel.

Chocolate Cream Pie

This pie is a pudding pie with whipped cream and does not bake in the oven.

The Crust:

8-inch or 9-inch prepared crushed chocolate wafer or crushed Oreo pie crust.

Hannah’s First Note: You can also use a prepared crushed cookie pie crust, a graham cracker pie crust or a shortbread pie crust. You can even use a regular pie crust as long as you bake and cool it first.

The Chocolate Filling:

6 large egg yolks (save the whites to make your favorite meringue cookies)

¾ cup white (granulated) sugar

2 tablespoons cornstarch

3 cups light cream (half-and-half)

1 cup mini semi-sweet chocolate chips, finely chopped (measure AFTER chopping)

½ stick (4 Tablespoons, ¼ cup, 1⁄8 pound) salted butter

The Whipped Cream Topping:

1 and ½ cups heavy cream

¼ cup powdered (powdered) sugar

½ teaspoon vanilla extract

Decorations: (optional)

shaved chocolate curls

maraschino cherry halves

butterscotch or caramel ice cream topping to drizzle on top
 

Directions:

Place the egg yolks in a medium-size saucepan off the heat.

Whisk the egg yolks until they are well combined.

Add the white, granulated sugar and the cornstarch.

Whisk everything together, off the heat, until the ingredients are well incorporated.

Turn the stovetop burner on MEDIUM-HIGH heat and add the 3 cups of light cream (half-and-half) SLOWLY, whisking continuously while the mixture is heating.

Whisk and cook until the mixture is slightly thickened. (This will take from 3 to 4 minutes.)

Stirring constantly, boil mixture for 3 minutes.

Hannah’s Second Note: This is much easier to do if you have a hand mixer turned to LOW speed, but you’ll have to make sure that all areas of the saucepan are being mixed. If you miss an area, your chocolate filling may scorch and you’ll have to start over!

Whisk in the finely chopped mini chocolate chips and the half-stick of salted butter. Keep your whisk moving the entire time!

Lower the temperature of the burner to LOW and continue to whisk until the mixture is as thick as pudding. This should take about 5 to 6 minutes.

When the chocolate mixture has thickened, remove the saucepan to a cold stovetop burner and let it sit for five minutes.

Use a heat-resistant rubber spatula to transfer the contents of your saucepan to the pie crust of your choice and smooth the top with the heat-resistant spatula.

Cover the surface of the chocolate layer with plastic wrap and place your partially completed Chocolate Cream Pie in the refrigerator to chill for at least 2 hours. (Overnight is even better, too.)

To Make the Whipped Cream Topping:

Hannah’s Third Note: If you’re tired or in a hurry and want a shortcut, simply thaw a small tub of Original Cool Whip and stir in butterscotch ice cream topping or caramel ice cream topping. It will hold its shape better than homemade whipped cream and you can put it on your chilled filling an hour or so before your guests arrive, rather than whipping the cream at the last minute!

Using an electric mixer, whip the heavy cream until stiff peaks form.

Turn the mixer off and sprinkle the powdered sugar on top of the whipped cream.

Mix on HIGH until the powdered sugar is mixed in.

With the mixer running on HIGH, sprinkle in the half-teaspoon of vanilla extract and mix it in.

When everything has been thoroughly incorporated, shut off the mixer and take out the bowl with the whipped cream topping. Give it a final stir with a rubber spatula and set it on the kitchen counter.

Get the pie crust with its chocolate filling out of the refrigerator and set it next to the mixer bowl with the whipped cream topping.

Peel the plastic wrap off the chocolate filling and use the rubber spatula to transfer mounds of whipped cream to the surface of the chocolate filling.

Work quickly to dot the entire surface of the chocolate filling with whipped cream. Continue transferring the whipped cream until the mixer bowl has been emptied.

Using the rubber spatula, spread the mounds of whipped cream together to cover the entire surface of your Chocolate Cream Pie. Make sure the whipped cream topping goes all the way out to the edge of the pie crust.

Using the flat edge of the rubber spatula, press it against the surface of the whipped cream topping and pull it up quickly. This should cause the whipped cream to form a point on top. Make “points” over the entire surface of your Chocolate Cream Pie.

Choose the decorating topping you wish to use on top of the whipped cream. You can use more than one topping to really make it look fancy.

If you choose shaved chocolate, use a sharp knife to “shave” the edge of a bar of sweet chocolate. Place the shaved pieces in a bowl and, using your impeccably clean fingers, sprinkle the shaved chocolate over the surface of your pie.

If you choose chocolate curls to decorate the top of your pie, simply run a sharp knife down the long edge of a bar of sweet chocolate. If you don’t lift the knife blade, it will form a curl of chocolate. Use these chocolate curls to decorate the top of your Chocolate Cream Pie.

Maraschino cherries are always colorful on top of a pie. Cut the Maraschino cherries in half vertically and transfer the halves to the surface of the whipped cream topping, rounded side up. Make a large circle of cherry halves around the edge or a design of your own making using the cherry halves.

If you choose butterscotch or caramel ice cream topping, simply drizzle it all over the surface of your pie in a pretty design.

Refrigerate your Chocolate Cream Pie for at least 2 hours before serving.

To serve, cut your Chocolate Cream Pie into 8 pieces and remove the pieces with a triangle-shaped spatula. Place each piece on a dessert plate and serve with a carafe of strong, hot coffee or tall glasses of milk.

Yield: This pie will serve 8 people . . . or 7 if you invite Mother. She’ll tell you she couldn’t possible eat more of something so rich, but you won’t have to twist her arm to get her to agree to a second helping.

Recipe from Chocolate Cream Pie Murder by Joanna Fluke, copyright 2019; used with permission of Kensington. All rights reserved.

Baking whiz and amateur sleuth Hannah Swensen’s love life has been totally upended, but that doesn’t mean she won’t be able to solve the latest murder in Lake Eden. In anticipation of Joanna Fluke’s 24th Hannah Swensen mystery, Chocolate Cream Pie Murder, we’re sharing the titular recipe as it appears in the novel.

FictionMysteryDebut Fiction

March: The Hold List

Feature by the editors of BookPage

Brooklyn
By Colm Tóibín

To be fair, there is sadness in Tóibín’s story of Eilis, a young Irish woman who emigrates to New York City—homesickness has never been so effectively portrayed. But as Eilis adapts to a dizzying amount of opportunity and freedom, she sees how her new life can be more fulfilling than anything she could have attained in Ireland. Brooklyn is masterfully understated, and Tóibín’s ability to capture his protagonist’s emotional state is astonishing. The tentative warmth of new love, the longing for a family across an ocean and the rush of liberation are nearly tangible on the page, and Tóibín’s evenhanded depictions of both Ireland and America give the novel a lingering, melancholic beauty.

—Savanna, Assistant Editor

Conversations with Friends
By Sally Rooney

 

Friends become lovers, lovers become friends—Rooney’s debut novel is an introspective tale of fleeting pleasures, female sexuality, chemistry and miscommunication, as readers are invited to explore between the cracks of a 20-something woman’s relationships. Frances performs her spoken-word poems in Dublin with her best friend and former lover, Bobbi, and at one of these events they meet an enigmatic photographer named Melissa. Frances and Melissa’s husband, Nick, soon become entangled, and Frances finds herself sinking into a dark place, as her life becomes a web of messy emotions and convoluted motives. The drama is a slow build, the humor is sly, and the dialogue is on point.

—Cat, Deputy Editor

The Commitments
By Roddy Doyle

Doyle is known for his ability to spin an incisive yarn about the painful challenges of modern life and the struggles of the Irish people, like his Man Booker Award-winning novel, Paddy Clarke Ha Ha Ha. But his 1987 debut, The Commitments, is decidedly lighter fare. There’s just something about a story of disaffected youth who forge a bond through a shared love of music and pop culture that’s simply irresistible to me, and if you feel the same way, then you’ll inhale this story of a bunch of cheeky, working-class Dubliners determined to bring soul music to their fair city. It’s a rollicking and irreverent story steeped in the 1960s sounds of Motown. Be prepared to fall in love with these brash and complicated lads.
—Hilli, Assistant Editor

Himself
By Jess Kidd

A darkly comic murder mystery set in a small Irish village, Kidd’s debut also has a macabre twist. Her handsome sleuth Mahony, who rolls into town to catch his mother’s murderer, can see and talk to the dead. His unjustly slain mother, Orla, had the same powers—which may or may not have led to her death while Mahony was still an infant. To catch the killer, Mahony teams up with one of the town’s many eccentrics, former actress Mrs. Cauley, and they hatch a plot straight out of a Shakespearean drama. They’ll put on a play and place their suspects in the cast. If you’ve read or seen Hamlet, you know things aren’t going to go well. In Kidd’s hands, the chaos is glorious.

—Savanna, Assistant Editor

Broken Harbor
By Tana French

If you haven’t read French’s bestselling six-book Dublin Murder Squad series, now is the time, as Starz is planning an adaptation of the first two books, but it’s not necessary to read them in order. Broken Harbor (the fourth book) is my personal favorite. It’s more of a classic murder mystery than some of the others (and not nearly as emotionally eviscerating as In the Woods), and I loved the narrator, Detective Mick “Scorcher” Kennedy, who was a bad guy in Faithful Place but gets a second chance during this investigation of a grisly triple homicide in Dublin. Add in Scorcher’s sister, a troubled woman who dregs up some unsavory childhood memories, and readers are in for a hell of a ride. It’s chilling, creepy and addicting—a perfect police procedural.
—Cat, Deputy Editor 

There’s no shortage of brilliant Irish books, but they can tend to be a wee bit bleak. (It’s either the weather or the centuries of oppression.) So we’re sharing a few of our favorite stories set on the Emerald Isle that are a bit lighter. With humor, magic, young love and classic mystery, any of these books would be perfect for reading with a pint or whatever libation tickles your fancy.

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