November Book

 The Lincoln Highway is a huge novel that is difficult to summarise in a sentence or two. It’s kind of a road trip novel, but it’s also an adventure and commentary on the plight of different people. It’s also a coming-of-age story and a family story with an element of mystery. Trust in where the author takes you, and you won’t be disappointed.

There are multiple characters in this thick novel, all with their own varied story to tell. At the centre of it all is Emmett, recently released from a juvenile work farm after the death of his father. He’s now the sole carer for his eight-year-old brother, and the bank has just taken the family farm. But he has a plan; now all he has to do is enact it. Except that he wasn’t expecting two friends from the work farm to appear at the farm wanting a ride to New York, the exact opposite direction to Emmett’s plans. What follows is an adventure for all involved that includes the railways, theft, revenge, new friends, freedom, and surprising turns of events. One of the strongest points of this 1950s novel is you are never quite sure where it will go next, so in my opinion, the less the reader knows, the more fun it is.

The story is told from multiple characters’ points of view, from Emmett to friends Woolly and Duchess. Interestingly, although Duchess is the most complex character to work out, his sections are told in the first person in comparison to everyone else in the third person. It’s also not just the major characters who tell the story; some of the supporting cast tell the story, adding a richness of perspective. The characters are all flawed, and see justice in different ways, which both adds to the charm of the novel as well as making things more complex for each of them. The reader can’t help but cheer all of them on as they seek to find what will make them happy. Some of the things that happen to them are quite amusing or devastating (poor Emmett can’t catch a trick,) which makes the story fascinating, but the ending really packs an emotional punch as the journey comes to an end. It’s made even sadder knowing that the story is coming to a close, and it’s time to leave these characters.

As always, Towles writes brilliantly. The novel does start slowly, which I’ve come to realise is pretty normal for his works, but it creates the scene for the characters to grow and take over the story. This novel is very different from Towles’ previous novels, so don’t expect a Rules of Civility or A Gentleman in Moscow. It’s different in era, tone, and expanse (this time we have the whole of America to explore), but it does have the brilliant creation of characters with a memorable story that is once again unforgettable. This would also make a great TV series.

 

October Book

 An epistolary novel, when done well, can be a succinct and fun thing to read, but can also present challenges in giving context to a backstory without being convoluted: too much detail can kill the flow of the letters. I think Virginia Evans has avoided this because the writer of the letters, Sybil Van Antwerp, is corresponding with different people, so we slowly get a sense of Sybil. She is a no-nonsense, fiercely intelligent, and steadfastly independent retired lawyer in her early seventies who maintains her privacy and uses her letter writing as a way of avoiding confrontation. Her pithy communications are never overtly rude, but the recipients will be in no doubt about her meaning.

She has regular contact with her brother, sister-in-la,w and Harry, the young son of a judge she knew when she was a lawyer. Harry is very bright, but an isolated child, and his father worries about him. Sybil’s relationship with Harry becomes a mutually important one. There is another unfinished, ongoing series of letters Sybil writes – but never posts – to an unnamed recipient, a mystery that the reader will probably guess at as one learns more about her life.

She writes letters to authors, neighbours, her gardening club, and other recipients. One thing we find out early on is that her relationship with her two children, particularly her daughter, is distant, and they have intermittent contact by email or phone. It seems her work as chief clerk to a judge came at a cost to her family life.

As old age begins to bite, Sybil realises she may have to come to terms with some of her vulnerabilities and that the eloquence of her letters is no substitute for close contact with people. I loved Sybil’s control of her life and lack of self-pity, but her later revelations and reckonings made me sad that she endured a loneliness that was masked by her stoicism and controlled by her letter writing.

The Correspondent is a terrific read with a singular main character who touches the heart of the reader.

September Book 2025

 'A hilarious and compassionate guide to rocking life with an ADHD brain. Packed with humor and genuine insights, it's the rare self-help book you'll love reading all the way to the end.'

'Few books embrace the lived experience of someone with ADHD quite like ADHD Is Awesome. This heartfelt firsthand account of what it is like to live with ADHD (and a partner or child with ADHD) dispels widely held myths and conveys evidence-based information about ADHD with honesty, compassion, and (lots and lots of) humor. Filled with relatable anecdotes and fun graphics, this book is sure to keep the attention of those with ADHD. Importantly, this book is hopeful in suggesting skills and strategies for embracing your ADHD brain so you can survive and thrive with ADHD.'

'Hilarious, smart, and oh so relatable! Penn takes us through his own lived experience of ADHD, helping the reader feel seen, supported, and celebrated. A must-read for anyone with ADHD and the ones who love them.'

'Relentlessly upbeat, chock-full of wisdom, and eminently readable, ADHD Is Awesome clearly acknowledges the reality and challenges associated with this condition--but does so in ways that are practical, snappy, and often humorous. Featuring true-to-life examples, evidence-based treatments, meditation, a host of life hacks, and self-compassion, it will strike a major chord for all experiencing ADHD in themselves or family members.'

May Book 2025

 

On the Hippie Trail by Rick Steves is a raw, funny, and thought-provoking journal of hitchhiking across Asia in 1978. At a recent talk in Hopkins, Minnesota, Chris and I listened to Rick reflect on the journey that shaped his lifelong travel ethos—and inspired this powerful book.

With warmth and conviction, Rick shared how travel—especially travel beyond our comfort zones—builds connection, cultivates peace, and changes how we see the world. Americans, he said, especially need to venture beyond the familiar. His stories, both spoken that night and written in his latest book, drive that message home.

Lessons in Travel and Writing from Rick Steves

Hitchhike from Istanbul to Kathmandu with Rick and his buddy Gene in On The Hippie Trail. Rick’s prose is easy and fluid. He uses imaginative metaphors and a conversational tone that make you feel like you’re swapping stories around a campfire. As a writer, I found his style both inspiring and instructive—especially his reminder that “when you’re right up to date, journal writing can be more vivid… you can do a better job.” That advice stuck with me. Thanks to it, I’ve returned to my 5-a-day journaling practice.

Rick doesn’t just recount a journey; he immerses you in a world that’s hard to find today. There’s no internet. No smartphones. News arrives days late through censored magazines. He and Gene navigate countries on the brink of war, dodge tainted water, and rely on friends and strangers in places where welcoming Westerners could bring serious consequences.

In 1978, fresh out of college, Rick chose to leave “the West” behind, hungry to learn firsthand about other cultures. He didn’t eschew discomfort. Instead, he leaned into it and wrote it all down. On The Hippie Trail isn’t just based on the journal he kept during his journey; it is the journal, with only minor edits. He’s been a skilled writer for a long time.   

One of the things I admired most about the book is how he balances cultural humility with unflinching honesty. He’s aware of how absurd Western travelers might seem—“strange short-panted, pale-skinned, weak-stomached, finicky people”—yet he never loses sight of the humanity all around him. Whether marveling at the serenity of pilgrims bathing in the Ganges or getting a ride on a truck held together by “field expediency,” he remains wide-eyed and respectful. 

 Rick doesn’t see travel as escapism or a checklist. “I’m an evangelist for the notion that good travel is more than bucket lists and selfies.” We couldn’t agree more.

April Book 2025

 Queen of Water by Laura Resau

Every book has its place and its audience. Although The Queen of Water is fiction, it’s based on a true story, and it reads like a biography. I think readers who enjoy biographies and those who have an interest in learning about different cultures will be most drawn to it.  

The Queen of Water is well-written, and young readers will definitely be exposed to a very different world than the one they live in. Books are great for that, in general, and Queen doesn’t disappoint. The story of Virginia Farinango is an interesting one. An indigenous Indian given away by her parents to an upper-class family, the reader witnesses the cruelties of classism and the conflict it causes in young people.

 

March Book - 2025

A Brilliant Night of Stars and Ice by Rebecca Connolly tells the true, yet largely untold, story of Titanic’s rescue ship, the Carpathia. When Captain Arthur Rostron is woken in the middle of the night with an urgent message from the Titanic, he pushes his crew and the twelve-year-old ship to their limit in a race against time to reach the sinking ship. While history has since shown there were other ships possibly closer to the Titanic, the Carpathia was, quite extraordinarily, the only ship that responded to their call for help. With hindsight being 20/20, it’s entirely possible the other ships did not believe the Titanic could ever sink, and so the message could not possibly be true. The novel even describes how, when Titanic passengers inquired as to the trouble after the engines stopped, White Star Line crew members told them there was nothing to worry about and to go back to bed.

The reader experiences the sinking of the Titanic through the eyes of a real-life third-class passenger, Kate Connolly (the author’s note mentions that the name of this person initially caught her eye because of the shared surname.) The reader doesn’t have much time to get to know Kate and her friends before the ship strikes tragedy. The actual sinking, in terms of plot, happens about 30-35% into the book. It’s hard not to have striking visuals with such a sequence, given the popularity of the 1997 film. The frantic and disturbing scene keeps the reader moving forward, wondering if the Carpathia will arrive in time despite knowing what happened.

Learning about the nature of Carpathia‘s rescue and the immediate fallout/aftermath of the sinking was interesting. This piece of history in the larger tragedy is often reduced to a footnote, as the author states in the narrative itself through the perspective of Captain Rostron. There were many historical details about the aftermath that I did not previously know, which naturally propelled the narrative forward. That said, this book wasn’t so much character-driven as it was plot-driven, given the nature of the historical incident. The characters were largely vehicles through which to experience the event.

 

February Book 2025

 

The Rosie Project

By Graeme Simsion

Professor Don Tillman is brilliant yet socially awkward. He has decided it is time to find a partner, so he puts together a sixteen-page scientific survey to find the perfect person to spend the rest of his life with. Enter Rosie Jarman, who is the farthest candidate imaginable. She is looking for her biological father. Thus begins their quests for answers to the Wife Project and the Father Project. It is an upbeat, unconventional love story that will leave you laughing and smiling.

January Book

The story behind the story that became the legendary movie The Wizard of Oz.

Letts (The Perfect Horse, 2016, etc.) builds her historical novel around Maud Gage Baum, the high-spirited wife of L. Frank Baum, who wrote the original Wizard of Oz books. In one of two intercut narratives, the 77-year-old Maud, who’d exerted a strong influence on her late husband, appears on the set of the movie in 1938; there, she encounters 16-year-old Judy Garland—cast as Dorothy—among others. The second narrative opens in Fayetteville, New York, in 1871 and traces Maud’s life from age 10: her girlhood as the daughter of an ardent suffragette; her brief time at Cornell University—she was one of the first women admitted there; her early marriage to Baum, an actor at the time; and the births of their four sons. Frank, a dreamer, was not so talented at making money, and the family endured a hardscrabble, peripatetic life until he scored as a writer. This part of the story is dramatic and sometimes-poignant, though it goes on a bit. (Read carefully, and you can spot some elements that made their ways into the books and movie.) The Hollywood part is more entertaining even if some of it feels implausible. Maud did meet Judy Garland and attend the premiere of the film in real life. But in the book she tries to protect and nurture Garland, who was at the mercy of her abusive stage mother and the filmmakers and was apparently fed amphetamines to keep her weight down. And while it’s true the movie’s best-loved song, “Somewhere over the Rainbow,” was almost cut at the last minute, the book has Maud persuading studio chief L.B. Mayer to keep it in.

Much is made in these pages about the power of make-believe, and while the book falls short of magical, it’s still an absorbing read.

December Book

Each chapter is a story from Bob’s life.

Stories like how Bob couldn’t get into law school because of his grades, so he sat outside the Dean’s office for seven days until they finally let him enroll as a student. 

The time Bob sailed from California to Hawaii…16 days, 5 guys,1 crate of canned meat. 

How Bob thought his friend was playing a prank on him…but as it turns out he was being asked to become the Ugandan consul.

I could tell you so many stories shared in this book, but I want you to experience reading them for the first time like I did. They are so good. These stories will inspire you to a life full of faith and love

Love Does will challenge you to be fully present with those around you as you engage in this thing called life. Through Bob’s stories and lessons, you’ll learn how to embrace whimsy and find a simple faith that's real.

I’ve read Love Does many times, and it’s still one of my all-time favorites. To be honest…Bob is my role model…I want to be like him when I grow up. 

Chris Baldwin

November Book

 

Based on the true story of Nancy Harkness Love, Lady Flyer transports readers to the early and exciting days of aviation. Starting with Charles Lindbergh’s solo flight to Paris in 1927 and ending in December 1944, the book follows Nancy as she strives to push women’s aviation forward.

Lady Flyer is a fascinating read. Moore balances the technical jargon and political upheaval with love and laughter, creating an all-encompassing narrative. Moore’s writing is warm and comfortable with strong pacing throughout. This isn’t the fastest-moving novel you’ll read this year, but it’s one of the better ones.

Included are; photographs of Nancy, extensive chapter notes, a tribute to women flyers who died in service, a bibliography, and acknowledgments.

INSPIRATIONAL BOOK AWARD 2024

IPPY BOOK AWARD 2024

LDSPMA PRAISEWORTHY AWARD 2024

This inspiring, unforgettable true story takes you on a journey through life in North Korea and the heart-wrenching decision two people make who will risk everything to escape.

The story of Doohyun and Jiyeon is eye-opening, heartbreaking, inspiring, and shows a person's determination when they find purpose and something to fight for. This true story explains what life in North Korea is really like. The tyranny of the government and the lies their citizens are forced to believe. So many miracles lead to Doohyun and Jiyeon meeting, falling in love, and escaping for a better life. This book is a must-read!

May Book

 

South African conservationist and Earth Organization founder Anthony spins the uplifting story of his wildlife reserve.

“In 1999, I was asked to accept a herd of troubled wild elephants on my game reserve,” writes the author at the beginning of this robust portrait of Thula Thula, the game land he owns, in cooperation with a number of Zulu tribes, in Zululand—5,000 acres of raw landscape that is thought to have been part of the exclusive hunting grounds of the Zulu king. No longer, since Anthony now runs it as a conservationist lodge, but it continues to produce colorful tales of wild discovery. Most prominent are the many fascinating stories that surround his adoption of the elephants, an unruly bunch he endeavors to make at home on the reserve. With a combination of intuition and experience, the author intelligently discusses many aspects of elephant behavior. But Thula Thula is far more than an experiment in elephant reintroduction; it’s a slice of primal Africa home to Cape buffalo, white rhinoceros, leopards, crocodile, deadly puff adders, and massive pythons. This, of course, makes it a target for poachers, and Anthony displays a manly, hardened edge. But he also demonstrates sensitivity and nuance in his dealings with Zulu tribal politics, especially when it comes to the cattle ranchers who want to take control of his land. Though the prose occasionally becomes mawkish—as in his “born-free adolescence,” remembered “as vividly as a lovelorn youth recalling his first heart-thudding kiss”—Anthony’s bone-deep mission is bracing and his courage is inspiring.

Energetic firsthand reportage from the heart of the African wild.

Summer Books

 The story of a turbulent, transformative era in America: the 1960s. The Women is that rarest of novels—at once an intimate portrait of a woman coming of age in a dangerous time and an epic tale of a nation divided by war and broken by politics, of a generation both fueled by dreams and lost on the battlefield.

“Women can be heroes, too.”

When twenty-year-old nursing student Frances “Frankie” McGrath hears these unexpected words, it is a revelation. Raised on idyllic Coronado Island and sheltered by her conservative parents, she has always prided herself on doing the right thing, being a good girl. But in 1965 the world is changing, and she suddenly imagines a different choice for her life. When her brother ships out to serve in Vietnam, she impulsively joins the Army Nurse Corps and follows his path.

As green and inexperienced as the men sent to Vietnam to fight, Frankie is overwhelmed by the chaos and destruction of war, as well as the unexpected trauma of coming home to a changed and politically divided America.

The Women is the story of one woman gone to war, but it shines a light on the story of all women who put themselves in harm’s way to help others. Women whose sacrifice and commitment to their country has all too often been forgotten. A novel of searing insight and lyric beauty, The Women is a profoundly emotional, richly drawn story with a memorable heroine whose extraordinary idealism and courage under fire define a generation.

This incredible story combines heart-stopping adventure, broken lives transformed, and the realities of spiritual warfare, all rolled together in a page-turning thriller set behind the Iron Curtain. Most riveting of all is that this is a true story, which has inspired and challenged generations of Christians since its first publication almost forty years ago.

Following the rise of Communism after the Second World War, Christians behind the Iron Curtain had never felt more alone. Persecuted for their faith they wondered whether they had been forgotten by their fellow Christians around the world.

But God was calling a young Dutchman, Andrew, to be his ambassador to the faithful. Smuggling a few, then hundreds, then thousands of Bibles across dangerous borders and into needy hands, he risked his life time and again to bring hope to those who needed it most.

This classic book has sold over ten million copies in English alone. This edition includes a new Foreword and Epilogue to update Andrew's story and underline its continuing relevance to a whole generation of readers.

 

April Book

This debut novel is somewhat whimsical and totally delightful. Set in fictional Sowell Bay near Seattle, it is a story of love, grief, the fear of aging, and friendship. And yet, it is still amusing. 

Part of the novel is told by Marcellus, a giant Pacific octopus who is somewhat sarcastic and very intelligent. He has been in captivity at the Sowell Bay Aquarium for over three years. 

Tova Sullivan is a 70-year-old woman who works nights at the aquarium. Cleaning and talking to the animals helps her stay busy and productive. Tova is grieving the recent death of her husband and the loss of her son 30 years ago. She thinks the police have it wrong when they say her son Erik’s death was a suicide.

When she is not at the aquarium, she enjoys visiting with her longtime friends known as the Knit-Wits. The local grocery store owner, Ethan, is her friend as well, but she is oblivious to his flirting. To the distress of her friends, Tova decides to sell her house and belongings and put herself in a nursing home. She tells the Knit-Wits, Mary Ann and Barbara, “I don’t have children who will come stay with me when I’ve had a fall. I don’t have grandchildren who will stop over to unclog my drain or make sure I’m taking my pills. And I won’t put that burden on my friends and neighbors.” 

Another one of Tova’s friends is Marcellus, the octopus in residence at the aquarium. The giant Pacific octopuses are ingenious creatures. Known to escape from their enclosures and search for “live food,” they can pick locks and open jars. They can even differentiate one human from another. Tova has seen Marcellus escape from his tank and has helped him return.

The book’s other narrative is about 30-year-old Cameron, who was abandoned by his mother when he was 9. He has never met his father. He lives in a trailer park in California with his aunt. Cameron has trouble holding down a job and would rather play with his rock band. Cameron finds a class ring in his mother’s belongings. When he sees it is from the high school in Sowell Bay, he is convinced his father must live there. He heads to Sowell Bay thinking his father owes him back child support.

The three characters meet through connections with the aquarium. When Tova injures her ankle, Cameron temporarily takes Tova’s job cleaning the aquarium. Tova goes to the aquarium every night to teach Cameron how to clean to her standards. Cameron finds Marcellus fascinating as well. And Marcellus studies them both.

While “Remarkably Bright Creatures” is unlikely, it is poignant and heartwarming. It reminds us that even if we do not have family, friends can be just what we need.

 

Lynda Rutledge has delivered a wonderful, bittersweet coming-of-age novel designed to celebrate hope in a hopeless world. “West With Giraffes” is an unforgettable novel of adventure, unrequited love, and the spirit of America during the bleakest period of its existence.

Belle Benchley, the first-ever female zoo director who runs the San Diego Zoo, has managed to procure two giraffes and a rhino from Africa. As the transport ship neared New York City a disastrous hurricane nearly sinks it, and the rhino is lost. The giraffes survive and are quarantined before the long trek to California.

Woody manages to procure the job of driving the truck along with Benchley's right-hand man, Riley Jones. Although only 17 and unfamiliar with driving a truck, he manages to impress Jones.

Augusta Lowe, a beautiful redhead with dreams of becoming a photojournalist for Life magazine, begins shadowing the giraffes and their transporters. America's love affair with the animals is a welcome distraction from the events of the times.

This is a beautifully written novel that has everything in it. Intrigue, guilt, desperation, redemption and a pair of the most wonderful giraffes to ever be documented.

The truly inspiring part of this book is that it is based on true events. Some names have been changed and the story is invented by Rutledge, but it reads like a true biography.

 

February Book

The pitiless dictatorship of Francisco Franco was examined through the voices of four teenagers: one American and three Spaniards.

The Spanish Civil War lasted from 1936-1939, but Franco held Spain by its throat for 36 years. Sepetys (Salt to the Sea, 2016, etc.) begins her novel in 1957. Daniel is a white Texan who wants to be a photojournalist, not an oilman; Ana is trying to work her way to respectability as a hotel maid; her brother, Rafael, wants to erase memories of an oppressive boys’ home; and Puri is a loving caregiver for babies awaiting adoption—together they provide alternating third-person lenses for viewing Spain during one of its most brutally repressive periods. Their lives run parallel and intersect as each tries to answer questions about truth and the path ahead within a regime that crushes any opposition, murders dissidents, and punishes their families while stealing babies to sell to parents with accepted political views. This formidable story will haunt those who ask hard questions about the past as it reveals the hopes and dreams of individuals in a nation trying to lie its way to the future. Meticulous research is presented through believable, complex characters on the brink of adulthood who personalize the questions we all must answer about our place in the world. 

A stunning novel that exposes modern fascism and elevates human resilience. 

January Book

  

An exceptional tribute to three generations of courageous and articulate Chinese women: the grandmother, born in 1909 into a still feudal society; the mother, a Communist official and then ``enemy of the people''; and the daughter, the author, raised during the reactionary Cultural Revolution, then sent abroad in 1978, when the story ends, to study in England, where she now, at age 39, serves as Director of Chinese Studies for External Services, Univ. of London. In recounting her grandmother's early life—the binding of her feet, her time as the concubine of a warlord, her escape with her infant daughter after his death, and her marriage to a respectable middle-class doctor—Chang provides a vivid picture of traditional China and the place of women before the Communist Revolution. After the Revolution, the position of women rose: Chang's mother, who grew up during the Japanese occupation and married a Maoist guerrilla soldier, bore five children while enduring the discipline and hardship of those early revolutionary years, and later, as a civil servant and wife of an official, acquired in the new government status and advantages, especially education for her children. Raised in this ``Privileged Cocoon'' between 1958-65, Chang was protected from the injustices that led to the Cultural Revolution—the purges, repression, public denunciations and humiliations, the confusing and arbitrary shifts in ideology that led ultimately to the conviction of her parents, idealistic but old-time Communists, as ``enemies of the people.'' As part of her ``re-education,'' Chang was sent to the countryside to live as a peasant, serving without any training as a doctor and then as an electrician before being sent abroad. A valuable historical perspective on the impact of Mao on traditional Chinese culture and character—as well as an unusual window on the female experience in the modern world. Mostly, however, Chang offers an inspiring story of courage, sensitivity, intelligence, loyalty, and love, told objectively, without guilt or recrimination, in an unassuming and credible documentary style.

November Book

 In this absorbing dual-timeline story, the landscape Morton creates is tangible, immersive, and transportive. Much of the novel takes place in the weeks around Christmas of 1959 in the fictional Southern Australian town of Tambilla—and as I read, I was there. I could see the lush foliage, hear the screech of the cockatoos, and experience the loves and losses of those whose stories Morton tells. 

This is a layered novel with many characters and plotlines all of which Morton writes effortlessly. In present day, Jess, on the cusp of 40, feels as though her professional and personal life has been a let-down. She was essentially raised by her imperious, loving, and rather controlling grandmother–Jess’s own mother, Polly, lives in Brisbane and rarely speaks to her mother or her daughter. All three, it will turn out, have a copy of Daniel Miller’s As If They Were Asleep—a (fictionalized) book whose chapters tell the story of the Turner Family Tragedy of Christmas Eve, 1959. These embedded chapters along with the sections actually set in the past, teem with the people of Tambilla whose families along with that of the Turners are shaped by long-held secrets and bone-deep love.

I had a few quibbles–all around the present-day storyline–but I forgot them as soon as I turned the page. Morton doesn’t give a resolution to all the issues Jess faces–this actually gives the story a verisimilitude lesser fiction often lacks. Additionally, one of the big reveals of the book is not, I believe, intended to be a surprise. The connection between Jess, Nora, and Polly to Isabel Turner and her family is easy to make out early on in the book. But how that outcome occurred and, even more compellingly, why are things I didn’t see until the final chapters. The enigma at the heart of the novel is complex, and heartbreaking, and will satisfy even the most critical mystery reader.

Morton limits the way humans hide truths from both themselves and others. With gorgeous prose, she slowly cracks open how, for better and for worse, families, especially mothers, love. This is a book tinged with sadness and yet, when I turned the last page, I felt elated. The hours I spent in the landscape meticulously portrayed in Homecoming were a gift. Readers of historical fiction will treasure this book.

October Book

 

The Warsaw Orphan…

Inspired by the real-life heroine who smuggled thousands of Jewish children to safety during WWII, the powerful new novel by the New York Times bestselling author.

In the spring of 1942, young Elzbieta Rabinek is aware of the swiftly growing discord just beyond the courtyard of her comfortable Warsaw home. But she has no idea what goes on behind the walls of the Jewish Ghetto nearby until she makes a discovery that propels her into a dangerous world of deception and heroism.

Elzbieta comes face to face with the plight of the Gorka family who must give up their newborn daughter – or watch her starve. For Roman Gorka, this final injustice stirs in him a rebellion not even his newfound love for Elzbieta can suppress. His recklessness puts their families in harm’s way until one violent act threatens to destroy their chance at freedom forever.

Kelly Rimmer, bestselling Australian author of Truths I Never Told You and The Things We Cannot Say, has penned her most meticulously researched and emotionally compelling novel to date.

Summer Books

In this haunting, moving and beautifully written novel, Stephanie Dray and Laura Kamoie used thousands of letters and original sources to tell Eliza Schuyler Hamilton’s story as it’s never been told before --- not just as the wronged wife at the center of a political sex scandal, but also as a founding mother who shaped an American legacy in her own right.

A general’s daughter...Coming of age on the perilous frontier of revolutionary New York, Elizabeth Schuyler champions the fight for independence. And when she meets Alexander Hamilton, Washington’s penniless but passionate aide-de-camp, she’s captivated by the young officer’s charisma and brilliance. They fall in love, despite Hamilton’s bastard birth and the uncertainties of war.

A founding father’s wife...But the union they create --- in their marriage and the new nation --- is far from perfect. From glittering inaugural balls to bloody street riots, the Hamiltons are at the center of it all --- including the political treachery of America’s first sex scandal, which forces Eliza to struggle through heartbreak and betrayal to find forgiveness.

The last surviving light of the Revolution...When a duel destroys Eliza’s hard-won peace, the grieving widow fights her husband’s enemies to preserve Alexander’s legacy. But long-buried secrets threaten everything Eliza believes about her marriage and her own legacy. Questioning her tireless devotion to the man and country that have broken her heart, she’s left with one last battle --- to understand the flawed man she married and imperfect union he never could have created without her.

When Martha Skelton finds herself falling in love with a shy young burgess named Thomas Jefferson, it feels like an inconvenience. Widowed at twenty-two, Martha has no desire to lose the independence she has gained in the wake of her husband's death. But she cannot deny her feelings indefinitely. Despite her intentions, her friendship with Thomas develops into an intense and all-consuming love. History casts a shadow on Martha's newfound joy. Through her father's slave and mistress, Betty Hemings, she comes to understand the true nature of slavery, an institution she has always taken for granted. As Betty's revelations tear down the walls of her ignorance, Martha begins to work with her husband to end the despicable practice forever. This story is essentially true. Thomas Jefferson was such an obsessive record-keeper that we know what he was doing nearly every day of his adult life, and all the public things he is quoted as saying in My Thomas come from his contemporary writings. Martha's marriage to Thomas spanned the decade from 1772 to 1782, so it put her at the center of the audacious grab at freedom that was the American Revolution. Jefferson's writings suggest that if he had not been widowed, he would have retired from politics following the war and devoted himself to finding a way to end slavery that could have truly and forever healed the separations between the races. It is hard to read Martha's story now and not think about what might have been. 

 

May Book

You can’t make a living being an author of uplifting novels without experiencing pain, regret, anguish, and sadness. So, a successful writer like Catherine Ryan Hyde doesn’t offer her readers a Pollyanna version of life, nor any toxic optimism. No, Hyde understands that life is too often like walking through mud with snowshoes on. Her novels reflect the sharp needles that surround us in life, and the secret map to avoid those cuts and slashes, and discover redemption in the most unlikely of ways.

So Long, Chester Wheeler, published in December 2022, is a novel torn from the maelstrom we call the news cycle and carefully caressed by the author to release revelations about the spiteful virulence life can inflict, and how we deal with them.

April Book

 

The backstory of finding Elizabeth Smart and how growing up in the Mormon culture pushed the author to develop the exact kind of intuition that was needed to help manage Elizabeth’s kidnapping and rescue while the world watched.

Chris Thomas is not yet 30 years old when he finds himself managing the immense pressure, eccentric personalities, and extenuating circumstances of an international story, where one small misstep could adversely impact the search for a missing teenager and the reputation of her family. Now, 20 years later, Thomas takes listeners behind the scenes, providing new details, perspectives, and commentary on finding Elizabeth Smart.

In the process of reflecting on Elizabeth’s search and rescue, Thomas discovers how growing up in the culture of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (commonly known as Mormon) helped push him to develop the exact kind of intuition needed to manage Elizabeth’s kidnapping and rescue, and to do so while the world watched.

Unexpected juxtaposes crucial events from the Smart case with Thomas’ experience growing up in the Latter-day Saint culture, including coming to understand the secret of a broken war hero before it was too late.