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Featured Guide

Barbara Kingsolver, author of Demon Copperhead

DEMON COPPERHEAD is set in the mountains of southern Appalachia. It’s the story of a boy born to a teenaged single mother in a single-wide trailer, with no assets beyond his dead father’s good looks and copper-colored hair, a caustic wit and a fierce talent for survival. In a plot that never pauses for breath, relayed in his own unsparing voice, he braves the modern perils of foster care, child labor, derelict schools, athletic success, addiction, disastrous loves and crushing losses. Through all of it, he reckons with his own invisibility in a popular culture where even the superheroes have abandoned rural people in favor of cities.

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Celeste Ng, author of Our Missing Hearts

Twelve-year-old Bird Gardner lives a quiet existence with his loving but broken father, a former linguist who now shelves books in a university library. For a decade, their lives have been governed by laws written to preserve “American culture” in the wake of years of economic instability and violence. To keep the peace and restore prosperity, the authorities are now allowed to relocate children of dissidents, especially those of Asian origin, and libraries have been forced to remove books seen as unpatriotic --- including the work of Bird’s mother, Margaret. Bird has grown up disavowing his mother and her poems. But when he receives a mysterious letter containing only a cryptic drawing, he is pulled into a quest to find her.

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Laurie Lico Albanese, author of Hester

Isobel Gamble is a young seamstress carrying generations of secrets when she sets sail from Scotland in the early 1800s with her husband, Edward. An apothecary who has fallen under the spell of opium, his pile of debts have forced them to flee Glasgow for a fresh start in the New World. But only days after they've arrived in Salem, Edward abruptly joins a departing ship as a medic --- leaving Isobel penniless and alone in a strange country. When she meets a young Nathaniel Hawthorne, the two are instantly drawn to each other. As the weeks pass and Edward's safe return grows increasingly unlikely, Nathaniel and Isobel grow closer and closer. Together, they are a muse and a dark storyteller; the enchanter and the enchanted. But which is which?

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Jess Kidd, author of The Night Ship

1629: A newly orphaned young girl named Mayken is bound for the Dutch East Indies on the Batavia, one of the greatest ships of the Dutch Golden Age. Curious and mischievous, Mayken spends the long journey going on misadventures above and below the deck, searching for a mythical monster. But the true monsters might be closer than she thinks. 1989: A lonely boy named Gil is sent to live off the coast of Western Australia among the seasonal fishing community where his late mother once resided. There, on the tiny reef-shrouded island, he discovers the story of an infamous shipwreck.

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Joanna Quinn, author of The Whalebone Theatre

One blustery night in 1928, a whale washes up on the shores of the English Channel. By law, it belongs to the King, but 12-year-old orphan Cristabel Seagrave has other plans. She and the rest of the household --- her sister, Flossie; her brother, Digby, long-awaited heir to Chilcombe manor; Maudie Kitcat, the kitchen maid; and Taras, a visiting artist --- build a theatre from the beast’s skeletal rib cage. Within the Whalebone Theatre, Cristabel can escape her feckless stepparents and brisk governesses. As Cristabel grows into a headstrong young woman, World War II rears its head. She and Digby become British secret agents on separate missions in Nazi-occupied France --- a more dangerous kind of playacting that threatens to tear the family apart.

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Jodi Picoult, author of Mad Honey

Olivia McAfee’s picture-perfect life was upended when her husband revealed a darker side. She never imagined that she would end up back in her sleepy New Hampshire hometown with her son, Asher. Meanwhile, Lily Campanello and her mom relocate to Adams, New Hampshire, for her final year of high school for what they hope will be a fresh start. For just a short while, these new beginnings are exactly what Olivia and Lily need. Their paths cross when Asher falls for the new girl in school, and Lily can’t help but fall for him, too. Then one day, Olivia receives a phone call: Lily is dead, and Asher is being questioned by the police. Olivia is adamant that her son is innocent. But as the case against him unfolds, she realizes he’s hidden more than he’s shared with her.

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Sally Koslow, author of The Real Mrs. Tobias

It’s 2015 in New York City, and three women all known as Mrs. Tobias --- Veronika, the matriarch; her daughter-in-law, Mel; and Mel’s daughter-in-law, Birdie --- are trying to navigate personal difficulties, some of which are with one another. Veronika and Mel are both psychotherapists who are more skilled at helping other people than solving their own problems. Birdie, still dealing with the culture shock of moving to New York City and marrying into the Tobias clan, is pushed to her limit when her husband gets into trouble. Overwhelmed, she bolts --- along with the couple’s young daughter --- to her Midwestern hometown, hoping that space, warmth and wisdom from her own feisty grandmother will help her find a path forward.

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Lynda Cohen Loigman, author of The Matchmaker's Gift

Even as a child in 1910, Sara Glikman knows her gift: she is a maker of matches and a seeker of soulmates. But among the pushcart-crowded streets of New York’s Lower East Side, Sara’s vocation is dominated by devout older men --- men who see a talented female matchmaker as a dangerous threat to their traditions and livelihood. After making matches in secret for more than a decade, Sara must fight to take her rightful place among her peers. Two generations later, Sara’s granddaughter, Abby, is a successful Manhattan divorce attorney. When her beloved Grandma Sara dies, Abby inherits her collection of handwritten journals recording the details of Sara’s matches. But among the faded volumes, Abby finds more questions than answers.

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Elizabeth Strout, author of Lucy by the Sea

As a panicked world goes into lockdown, Lucy Barton is uprooted from her life in Manhattan and bundled away to a small town in Maine by her ex-husband and on-again, off-again friend, William. For the next several months, it’s just Lucy, William and their complex past together in a little house nestled against the moody, swirling sea. At the heart of this story are the deep human connections that unite us even when we’re apart --- the pain of a beloved daughter’s suffering, the emptiness that comes from the death of a loved one, the promise of a new friendship, and the comfort of an old, enduring love.

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Fredrik Backman, author of The Winners

Maya Andersson and Benji Ovich, two young people who left in search of a life far from the forest town, come home and joyfully reunite with their closest childhood friends. They can see how much Beartown has changed. There is a sense of optimism and purpose in the town, embodied in the impressive new ice rink that has been built down by the lake. Two years have passed since the events that no one wants to think about. Everyone has tried to move on, but there’s something about this place that prevents it. The destruction caused by a ferocious late-summer storm reignites the old rivalry between Beartown and the neighboring town of Hed, a rivalry that has always been fought through their ice hockey teams.

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