It was a simple thing. One day Nella was selling herbs, teas and tinctures to help women. The next, it seemed, she had closed the front of her apothecary shop and begun to sell poison out the back alley. When a young girl asks for a poison to kill Nella must decide how far she will go. Caroline arrives in London, alone, after finding out her husband has been having an affair. There is nothing that ties her to Nella except a small blue vial she finds in the river upon her arrival. Author Sarah Penner deftly weaves the story of two women in London, born decades apart. Without ever meeting, Caroline and Nella will fight to survive and to redefine themselves. This book is beautiful, magical, and empowering.
-Chrissy
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Ivy is a thief- taught by her Grandmother to skim what she needs and wants from society. She yearns to be something other than a mediocre Chinese immigrant and more than anything she yearns for Gideon Speyer to know who she is. But her harsh parents are poor and Gideon is not. They exist in entirely different social circles. Fate brings Gideon crashing back into her life in her 20s and she is all too willing to believe they are meant for each other. But fate is cruel. While accompanying Gideon on a family vacation Ivy comes face to face with someone from her past who knows Ivy for the thief she is- and accepts her. Ivy will be forced to choose between passion and her carefully laid plans. One false move and Ivy’s world could come crumbling down. This is an amazing story of race, class, love, and the power of lies.
-Chrissy
Cam is in love with Kaia. She is smart, beautiful, determined, and a passionate activist. The only problem is … she is dating Steve Stevenson. Steve is everything Cam isn’t- a jock, a jerk, and the most popular guy in high school. In other words, Cam is screwed. To make matters worse, Steve is diagnosed with cancer. Cam makes perhaps the biggest mistake of his life and offers to help Kaia raise money for Steve’s cancer treatments. Can Cam prove to Kaia that he is the guy for her? Or will Steve succeed in humiliating him and prove, once and for all, that Cam is a loser. Stay tuned for shark tanks, bee beards, and diaper scandals. Things are about to get REAL.
-Chrissy
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At the heart of this novel is a story about love, siblings and the flawed memories that we use to structure our lives. Laura is an artist in a creative slump. Her mother Genevieve has dementia. Bea, her older, overbearing sister has a perfect life. Their brother Phillip is something they don’t talk about anymore, not since he went missing in Thailand years ago. Their relationship is at once filled with animosity and a longing for something more. When Laura receives an email from a stranger claiming to have found her brother, Bea is outraged and knows its a scam. Laura is not convinced. She decides to travel to Thailand without telling anyone to see if this stranger really could be Phillip. The fallout from this rebellious act is far reaching and brings to light family secrets best left buried. Neither Laura nor Bea are prepared to learn the truth about what happened in Thailand and Phillip- if it is Phillip-may be the only person who can bring their fractured family back together.
-Chrissy
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Graham and Annie have an idyllic life. Graham owns a small bookstore and has a larger than life personality that draws everyone to him. Annie is a professional photographer with her first solo show in almost six years. They are comfortable and certain in their love for one another. Their life - and the elaborate dinner parties they host - is the envy of their friends. But when Graham suddenly dies and Annie discovers he was having an affair she is beside herself with rage and confusion. The life she was so sure of feels like a farse, a lie. What does a person do in the face of uncertainty, of betrayal, and of death? Annie is at times despondent and furious; at others she is mired in the pain of losing her best friend and the fear she may never have truly known Graham. Slowly she recreates her own sense of self and finds the strength to remember Graham as a man who was flawed yes, but who was generous, loyal in his own way, and kind.
-Chrissy
When Link is found dead in the middle of a forest, the town of Twin Cities is shocked and dismayed. Stranger still … Link drowned … where there was no lake. Noemi Amato knows more than she is letting on but who would believe her if she told the police or Link’s family that a lake appears and disappears in the woods? When Noemi begins to receive ghostly texts from someone claiming to be Link she can’t help but wonder if someone is messing with her or if Link really is communicating with her from the grave. Noemi is convinced she is supposed to explore the lake and returns to the woods with her friends determined to try and find out what happened the night Link died. A dangerous game of cat and mouse plays out with Noemi, her friends, and an eerie presence in the woods that governs the lake. The stakes are high - Noemi must trade her freedom for the life of her friends.
-Chrissy
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Sometimes we make a mess of our own life. Usually we start off with good intentions but somewhere along the way we lose sight of the path. Ariel left six years ago and never looked back. Never called, never visited, even though her chest ached with missing home. Until that is, her mother's barn is set on fire and Ariel learns that the sanctuary is utterly and completely bankrupt. What follows is a slow, stumbling and erratic return to home. Ariel and her mother Mona approach one another with a weary exhaustion born of mistakes and poor decisions. Yet humans are animals and we all need love and sanctuary. Together, mother and daughter rediscover The Bright Side. This story is raw and powerful and messy. I cannot wait to reread it.
-Chrissy
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Mallie has it all, or at least she has all she needs. A supportive brother, a boyfriend she loves, a chosen family and a larger than life glow that everyone around her basks in. But then IT happens. One night while she is waiting to give her brother a ride home Mallie is attacked, raped, and suffers a terrible head injury. Mallie is deep in a coma she may never wake from when her family discovers that her rapist has left her pregnant. What follows is a terrible decision that tears her family apart and divides the town. Mallie wakes to a world gone mad and the aching knowledge that she will never be the same. This story is beautifully rendered and asks hard questions about choice, right and wrong, and the power of forgiveness. Mallie’s story is not about fate. It is about what happens when a person refuses to give up.
-Chrissy
This is a wonderful timeless tale of two families mixing and melding, and the struggles that children in blended families often face. When Jen’s mother separates from her father Jen finds herself in a whirlwind that takes her from her father and the city she loves to a country home with a brand new way of life. Jen struggles to find her place in her new home, doesn’t like her mother’s new boyfriend Walter and is convinced she will never make friends with Walter’s children. But as the summer ambles along Jen discovers a love for the animals that surround her, an appreciation for the farm her mother starts, and maybe, just maybe, forms a bond with her new sisters that will help her discover her voice, her place and a new sense of self.
-Chrissy
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Loosely based on a true story three men and nine children set off across the channel to a stac, an almost barren island, for three weeks to harvest birds, collect eggs and feathers for their village; an occurrence that happens every spring and is a rite of passage for the young boys that live on St. Kirta. Their fellow villager drops them off and plans to be back in a few weeks to pick them up. But the boat never returns. Abandoned by their village, the “fowlers” are forced to try and survive on an island bereft of fresh water, trees, or any real food source save what they can catch with their own hands. What follows is an amazing story of human ingenuity and strength. This is an emotional powerhouse of a book and speaks to the soul of what drives every one of us.
-Chrissy
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On Wolf Days Jack and her brother Birdie go on adventures with their mother to find new and exciting things in the world. When their mother dies in a car accident, Jack and Birdie find themselves living with an uncle they barely know. Uncle Carl takes care of them as best he can with Honey Buns and frozen pizza and quesadillas from Rosie’s food truck. After they miss too many days of school, the administration decides it's best they live with their Uncle Patrick. Uncle Patrick is solemn and quiet and doesn’t appreciate Birdie’s penchant for purple and sparkles or striped leggings. Jack struggles to make friends, struggles to protect Birdie from the kids at school, and struggles to make sense of her Uncle Patrick. It will take time and mistakes, a little bit of heartbreak and a healthy dose of hope but together Carl and Rosie, Patrick, Birdie and Jack learn to create a new definition of family.
-Chrissy
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This story is horrifying and deeply disturbing. I found myself wishing I had never picked it up and yet incapable of walking away from it. Katz does a wonderful job of allowing Thomas to tell his own story with simplicity and grace. With every shared memory, Thomas paints an idyllic scene of a good man, a beautiful family, a life well lived. He cares for his wife Miriam, his daughter Ava, his twin sisters and his mother. He works hard to protect them from the harsh reality of the world, and all he is asking for is to be treated with the respect he deserves. But can the reader trust Thomas? The tension builds throughout the novel and by the end of the book the reader will find themselves dreading the truth and wishing that Thomas was at least an honest man.
-Chrissy
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Morgan and Eric have been friends since they were kids, best friends in fact. When Morgan’s mom dies Eric is the only person who can console him. When Eric’s parents start to fight more often, the arguments growing louder and more frequent, Morgan keeps him sane. But as the two boys meander their way towards high school Morgan quits the football team and Eric can tell that Morgan isn’t telling him everything. How can he? How can Morgan explain - to Eric of all people - that Morgan isn’t sure he wants to be…a he? This is a wonderful story of a young person finding the courage to transition from male to female and the amazing and supportive love between two friends who are perhaps more than friends.
-Chrissy
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In Brown’s new novel protagonist Nina Ross has made a career out of finding rich people on social media and slowly but surely conning them; stealing their money, their antique furniture, their expensive clothes. All this she does to help her mother who is dying of cancer and can’t afford the medical treatments she needs. When the police come snooping Nina decides to skip town with her friend Lachlan and try her largest con yet; the target - the sister of her childhood ex-boyfriend. But what starts as a simple operation to gain access to the family safe quickly goes awry. Suddenly Nina finds herself in jail, double-crossed by Lachlan and forced to enlist help from the very woman she was trying to rob. This fast-paced novel kept me guessing until the very end.
-Chrissy
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Becky Gerard knows her daughter Meghan is sick, even if no one else will believe her. The problem is that none of the medical tests the doctors and hospitals have done show anything abnormal. Becky feels like she is fighting a losing battle - against the doctors, against the specialists, against her own husband Carl. When doctors accuse Becky of Munchausen by proxy - poisoning her own daughter - Becky feels her world spinning out of control. Suddenly Carl is blaming her for their daughter’s mysterious illness, her marriage is falling apart, and the court awards temporary custody of Meghan to the psychiatric ward of White Hospital. Becky isn’t crazy but love can make a person do crazy things. Love leads her to kidnap her own daughter, to threaten the doctors, and to swear revenge on anyone who gets in her way. Will Becky’s love save Meghan? Or will her love turn toxic? This book is an absolute page-turner and kept me guessing until the very end.
-Chrissy
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When the oceans have risen and our cities are washed away what will be left? What will we hold dear? Myra and her daughter Pearl know all too well the dire reality climate change brings. In the aftermath of the 100 year flood people are carving out an existence on boats, on mountaintops, in small colonies bereft of hope and fighting disease and hunger. Suddenly a single seed can mean the difference between life and death. When Myra learns that her eldest daughter may still be alive and trapped on a breeding ship she will stop at nothing to save her. Enlisting the help of strangers they meets along the way Myra and Pearl embark on a journey that will test the very marrow of their strength and resilience. Is Myra willing to lose one daughter to save another? And is her stubbornness a form of courage or desperation? More importantly, will it spell the death of everyone they meet along the way?
-Chrissy
Linus Baker lives a boring life. As a case worker in the Department in Charge of Magical Youth he goes to work every day, has memorized the code of conduct, and refuses to become emotionally involved in his work. His greatest comfort is to listen to records late at night in his living room accompanied by a cat who doesn’t really like him. All of this changes when Linus is hand selected to assess if six magical children on a remote island will destroy the world. These six children turn Linus’s drab world upside down. He sweats in the woods on ridiculous adventures, holds their hands as they cry, learns to laugh at himself and, more importantly, he learns how to love. If you’re searching for a novel to warm the cockles of your heart, look no further. Linus and his gang of magical children will not disappoint. I burst into laughter reading this book many times and was devastated when I turned the last page.
-Chrissy
Death is never straight forward. Alex Stern, cursed with the ability to see ghosts, knows this only too well. After somehow surviving a multiple homicide, she is hired to help monitor the occult activities of Yale’s most secret societies. Upon her arrival Alex’s predecessor vanishes, and Alex finds herself thrust into a murder investigation that just doesn’t make sense. Haunted by her own violent past Alex slowly realizes that at Yale nothing is what it seems, she has no idea who she can trust, and she is caught in a deadly game that she may not survive. Dark, magical, and compelling, Leigh Bardugo’s novel, The Ninth House, is everything you could ask a fantasy novel to be.
-Chrissy
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I absolutely fell in love with this novel. Violet, the descendant of a lone shipwreck survivor, is filled with all of the angst, sarcasm, fear and confidence a 16 year old in NYC can possess. When her younger brother, Sam, tries to kill himself Violet is shipped off to Maine to spend the summer with her Uncle Toby. She arrives in Maine intent on disappearing but instead finds herself volunteering at an aquarium, slowly making friends with a local band of misfits and embarking on an impossible mission to find her grandmother’s shipwreck. Violet is a wonderful, flawed protagonist and her search to find the truth about her grandmother leads her to discover the ability to forgive her parents, her brother, and ultimately herself.
-Chrissy
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Teenagers are already dealing with so much. Family expectations, cultural expectations, peer pressure, SATs, hormones, and the ageless need for self exploration and discovery. Veronica is navigating all of these obstacles her senior year like a champ and may even be her class valedictorian. But one fateful morning her world comes crashing down and Veronica is left scrambling for something or someone to keep her afloat. Author, Jenni Hendriks, weaves a powerful story of a 17 yr old who must grapple with being pregnant and navigate the difficult reality of how one decides to be UNpregnant. This book is funny, serious, poignant and just GOOD. What a wonderful way to explore the political landscape we find ourselves in from a teenager's perspective.
-Chrissy