Under The Influence...
/Of Librarians & Booksellers…
Librarians and booksellers are prophets and matchmakers. They are archivers of secrets, distillers of vast knowledge and key holders to the treasure chests of the world. And the bricks and mortar dwellings they inhabit are bursting at the seams with tales waiting to be told. Bustling with the hushed chatter of bookish people and overflowing with literary riches we are enticed to steal away with or lie our way through to borrowing. Armed with the weapons to ready our minds for battles of wit and words.
And they are a safe haven for any who need it.
As a latchkey kid growing up, I whiled away most of my waking hours in a tiny library with dust in the air and a slightly musty scent. I thought it was heaven on earth. I went every single day in the summers and every weekend during the school year to stock up on as much reading material as they would allow. Once I was of age to start earning money of my own, bookstores got added to the mix.
In high school I would cut class to go to…you guessed it, the library. I didn’t want to read what teachers told me I should, to learn within the confines they laid out. I wanted unfettered access to the boundless choice from shelf upon shelf crammed tight with books.
I was known in these places in a way I wasn’t anywhere else before, and truth be told, maybe since. At times it feels almost as if I have lived a life by association, forming bonds with paper characters and unmasking the hidden lives I longed to live.
To compile this notable list, I spoke with several librarians and booksellers. With them I shared my deep gratitude and indebtedness and with you I share the gift of the books of their choosing.
Books With Buzz…
Tomorrow And Tomorrow And Tomorrow – Gabrielle Zevin
Exiting the subway Sam spots Sadie amid the hordes of people waiting for the train. As he calls her name, she ignores him at first. Once she acknowledges him their destinies are forever intertwined. These lifelong friends, often in love, but never lovers, come together as creative partners in the world of video game design. Ultimately their success will bring them joy, fame, tragedy, and betrayal.
Librarians & Booksellers Say: An exquisite gem of a novel that we didn’t know we’ve been waiting for.
This Time Tomorrow – Emma Straub
On the eve of her 40th birthday, Alice’s life isn’t exactly terrible. She likes her job and her apartment and her romantic status, even if none if it has turned out exactly how she expected. But as she struggles with her father’s illness, she starts to wonder if something is missing. The next day when she awakes, she is 16 again, with nothing but infinite potential in front of her. As she gains new perspective, she finds herself considering if there is anything she would change?
Librarians & Booksellers Say: A moving love letter to father’s and daughters.
The Time Trails – Jon & Dayna McConnell
Walkman-toting, guitar-playing Finn Mallory blames himself for his parents’ deaths and would do anything to turn back time and set things right. So, when he’s recruited into a secret club at his new school that specializes in competitive time travel games, Finn sees a world of opportunity open before him. The games, however, are far from benign. Competition is cutthroat. Scenarios are rigged. And the timekeepers have no qualms about using players to suit their own plans.
Librarians & Booksellers Say: A fun, light read.
A Very Typical Family – Sienna Godfrey
Natalie is the reason her older brother and sister went to prison over 15 years ago. She fled to California that fateful night and hasn’t spoken to anyone in her family since. On the same day her boyfriend steals her dream job out from under her, she finds out that her mother has died and the only way to claim her inheritance, which she is in desperate need of, is to come together with her siblings. But going home again is never easy and nothing is ever how you remember it. Messy and lovable characters jump off the page!
Librarians & Booksellers Say: Darkly funny and full of heart.
The Most Likely Club – Elyssa Friedland
In 1997 grunge is king, Titanic is a blockbuster and Thursday nights are all about Friends. And four best friends are about to graduate high school and set the world on fire. They are going places, just like their yearbook says. In turn they will cure cancer, open a Michelin star restaurant, land on the Forbes 100 and run the world. Fast forward twenty-five years later to the dreaded high school reunion, and nothing has gone according to plan. Middle age be damned they decide its finally time to go after those teenage aspirations.
Librarians & Booksellers Say: A charming and witty ode to friendship.
Memphis – Tara M. Stringfellow
Ten-year-old Joan, her mother and her younger sister flee their father’s explosive temper and seek refuge at her mother’s ancestral home in Memphis. As she grows up Joan discovers that this was far from the first time that violence had altered the course of the family’s trajectory. While finding solace in her artwork, she meets a woman who tells her stories of the perseverance of her people, the impossible choice of those in similar situations to her mother and how others putting their dreams on hold enabled her to pursue her own. Unfolding over seventy years, this is the definition of a family saga.
Librarians & Booksellers Say: Hopeful and heartbreaking, full of both joy and sorrow.
Notes On Your Sudden Disappearance – Allison Espach
For much of her life, Sally has been mystified by the things her older sister, Kathy, seems to have been born knowing. She has all the answers about life and love and their mutual crush, Billy. By the summer before Sally is to start eighth grade, their infatuation with Billy is all they seem to have in common. Soon Sally is watching from afar as Kathy and Billy grow closer, until an expected tragedy leaves Sally’s life forever intertwined with his.
Librarians & Booksellers Say: A breathtaking story of two broken people who feel the pull of each other with a force that cannot be denied.
True Biz– Sara Novic
A revelatory novel that plunges the reader into the halls of a residential school for the deaf where they will meet Charlie, a rebellious transfer student who’s never met another deaf person before; Austin, the school’s golden boy, whose world is rocked when his baby sister is born hearing; and February, the hearing headmistress and child of deaf adults who is fighting to keep the school open. As a series of crises threaten to unravel each of them, they find themselves inextricably connected. True Biz is defined in ASL as really, seriously, definitely, real talk.
Librarians & Booksellers Say: An utterly unique coming of age story.
Crooked Hallelujah – Kelli Jo Ford
It’s 1974 in the Cherokee Nation of Oklahoma and fifteen-year-old Justine is growing up in a family of tough, complicated, and loyal women, presided over by her mother Lula, and her Granny. After her father abandoned the family, Lula became a devout member of the Holiness Church, a community that Justine finds stifling and terrifying. Despite her efforts to be a devoted daughter, an act of violence sends her on a different path forever. With lush prose, the author takes the reader on the journey of these women as they navigate the struggles that life puts in their path.
Librarians & Booksellers Say: A spellbinding and soulful narrative.
Hidden Gems…
The Babysitter – Joyce Carol Oates
In the waning days of the turbulent 1970s, in the wake of unsolved child-killings that have shocked Detroit, the lives of several residents are drawn together with tragic consequences. There is Hannah, wife of a prominent local businessman, who has begun an affair with a darkly charismatic stranger whose identity remains elusive; Mikey, a canny street hustler who finds himself on a chilling mission to rectify injustice; and the serial killer known as Babysitter, an enigmatic and terrifying figure at the periphery of elite Detroit. As Babysitter continues his rampage of abductions and killings, these individuals intersect with one another in startling and unexpected ways.
Librarians & Booksellers Say: A slow burning domestic noir by a master author.
The Latecomer– Jean Hanff Korelitz
Following the story of the New York based Oppenheimer family, from the first meeting of parents Salo and Johanna, under tragic circumstances, to the birth of triplets during the early days of IVF. As they grow, the three triplets feel no strong familial bond and cannot wait to go their separate ways. Desperately lonely, their mother makes the decision to have a fourth child, despite being unsure what the arrival of this latecomer will do to the already fractured family.
Librarians & Booksellers Say: Expertly woven story of family dynamics and fate.
Secret Lives – Mark de Castrique
At 75 years old, Ethel is used to being underestimated. She is petite and frail and looks like someone’s grandma. Certainly no threat to anyone. Or is she? Turns out she runs a boarding house for government agents and when one of her boarders is murdered, Ethel springs into action. Much to the surprise of her visiting cousin Jesse. As he watches in awe the unlikely pair form a bond and set out to solve the crime.
Librarians & Booksellers Say: Zany and suspenseful with a badass heroine.
How To Be Eaten – Maria Adelmann
In present day New York, five women meet in a support group to process their traumas. Bernice grapples with the fallout of dating a sociopathic billionaire. Ruby, once devoured by a wolf, now wears him as a coat. Gretel questions her memory of being held in a house made of, you guessed it, candy. Ashlee, the winner of a dating competition, wonders if she will ever find her happily ever after. And Raina, whose love story will shock them all. Dark, edgy, with wicked spins on classic fairy tales!
Librarians & Booksellers Say: Vivid and delicious reimagining’s.
Department of Rare Books And Special Collections – Eva Jurczyk
Preferring to blend into the background, Liesl finds herself thrust into the spotlight when her boss has a stroke, and she discovers that the library’s most prized manuscript is nowhere to be found When another librarian goes missing after Liesl tries to raise the alarms, she begins to unspool the pasts of her colleagues as it becomes apparent one of them must be responsible for both crimes. Books, and those that care for them, know how to keep their secrets.
Librarians & Booksellers Say: A literary mystery full of clever winks to book lovers.
Lean Your Loneliness Slowly Against Mine – Klara Hveberg
Rakel has always been more comfortable with numbers than with people. A gifted woman with a talent for math, she has never mastered the art of making friends. When she arrives at Oslo university she meets Jakob, an older teacher who is fascinated by her quick mind, who he compares to another woman he taught, Sofia, who went on to become the first female professor of mathematics. As you might expect the two become lovefs, but as the years pass and Rakel academic career soars, she begins to question her choices in love and in life.
Librarians & Booksellers Say: A brilliantly written story about love, loss and loneliness.
The Christie Affair – Nina de Gramont
In 1925, Miss Nan O’Dea infiltrated the wealthy, rarefied world of author Agatha Christie and her husband Archie. In every way, she became a part of their life, at first both and then, just Archie. Soon she becomes his mistress, luring him away from his devoted wife, desperate to have him all to herself. Desperate people do desperate things, and it turns out Nan had a plan all along.
Librarians & Booksellers Say: The author becomes a character in a tale not unlike one of her own.
The Dictionary Of Lost Words – Pip Williams
Esme is born into a world of words. Motherless and irrepressibly curious, she spends her childhood in the Scriptorium, an Oxford garden shed in which her father and a team of dedicated lexicographers are collecting words for the very first Oxford English Dictionary. As Esme sits under the sorting table, unseen and unheard day after day, a slip of paper containing the word handmaid flutters down to lay at her feet. She snaps up the slip and learning that the word means “slave girl”, begins to collect the other slips that contain words that have been discarded or neglected by the dictionary men. As an adult she takes these unrecorded words and seeks out others to compile her own dictionary.
Librarians & Booksellers Say: Inventive and irresistible story about the power of language.
The Lost For Words Bookshop – Stephanie Butland
Loveday Cardew prefers books to people. If you look carefully, you might glimpse the first lines of novels she loves the most tattooed on her skin. But there are things she will never, ever show you. But then into her safe haven, the bookstore where she works, come a poet, a lover and three suspicious deliveries. Has someone discovered her secrets?
Librarians & Booksellers Say: A delightful and witty tribute to books and the spaces in which they are housed.
Overdue Reads…
Ex Libris – Ross King
Responding to a cryptic summons to a remote country house, bookseller Isaac finds himself responsible for restoring a magnificent library pillaged during the English Civil War. The books of which have slipped from the public eye into an underworld of spies and smugglers. With each book full of ciphers and codes, Isaac soon finds himself with an elaborate mystery to solve. One only a book person can decipher!
Librarians & Booksellers Say: Clever and intricate novel that remained mostly overlooked as the world flocked to books like the Da Vinci Code.
Midnight In The Garden Of Good & Evil – John Berendt
Shots rang out in Savannah’s grandest mansion in the early morning hours of a spring day in 1981. Was it murder or self-defense? For nearly a decade, the shooting and its aftermath reverberated throughout the hauntingly beautiful city. The authors narrative reads like an engrossing novel as he skillfully interweaves a hugely entertaining account of life in the Old South and the unpredictable twists and turns in a real-life landmark murder case.
Librarians & Booksellers Say: Spellbinding and seductive, a must read for true crime lovers.
Motherless Brooklyn – Jonathan Lethem
Lionel is an orphan whose Tourettic impulses drive him to bark, count, and shred our language in startling ways. Together with three veterans of the St. Vincent’s Home for Boys, he works for small time mobster Frank Minna’s limo service/detective agency. And if the tasks he set them are not exactly legal, so be it. But then Frank is stabbed, and everything goes topsy turvy in Lionel’s world.
Librarians & Booksellers Say: An original and wickedly funny homage to the classic detective novel.
The Shining – Stephen King
A caretaker and his family move into an isolated hotel over winter, but when they get snowed in, things go very wrong. Very, very wrong. Jack Torrance’s job at the Overlook Hotel is the perfect chance for a fresh start. As the off-season caretaker, he’ll have plenty of time to spend reconnecting with his family and working on his writing. It’s nice to have dreams, right up until the point they turn into nightmares!
Librarians & Booksellers Say: A masterclass in writing from a master of the craft.
The Shell Seekers – Rosamunde Pilcher
A story of one family, mothers and daughters, husbands and lovers, and the passions and heartbreaks that have followed them for generations. When Penelope’s grown children find out what their grandfathers prized painting, The Shell Seekers, is worth, each offers up an idea of what she should do with it. As she considers their suggestions, she reflects back on her life.
Librarians & Booksellers Say: A rich family saga that epitomizes the term.
Where The Heart Is – Billie Letts
Isn’t seven supposed to be a lucky number? Seven months pregnant Novalee is heading for California with her boyfriend when she finds herself abandoned and stranded at a Walmart in Oklahoma. With just $7.77 in change to her name she is overwhelmed. But Novalee is about to discover that this small town is full of down to earth and deeply caring people willing to help a homeless, jobless girl secretly living in a Walmart.
Librarians & Booksellers Say: Charming, heartwarming, and funny.
Honor Among Thieves – Jeffrey Archer
In spring 1994, a sinister plot is being masterminded in Baghdad. Saddam Hussein seeks to embarrass the U.S. by stealing a treasured historical document and destroying it before the global media. The story takes place across four continents, spinning a deadly web of corruption and terror that two agents will have to battle against.
Librarians & Booksellers Say: Ingeniously and brilliantly plotted novel by a master storyteller.
The Red Tent – Anita Diamant
The story of Dinah, whose life if only hinted in the Bible in a brief and violent detour within the Book of Genesis that tells the tale of her father Jacob and his twelve sons. The author imagines the traditions and turmoil of ancient womanhood, the world of the red tent. A place for women. A place of ritual, friendship, and celebration. A place of truth. A place where hiding is not required.
Librarians & Booksellers Say: Fascinating and utterly unique.
The Ocean At The End Of The Lane – Neil Gaiman
Returning to his childhood home to attend a funeral, a middle-aged man is drawn back to a place once alive with monsters and magic; to a past where the impossible is all too frighteningly real. A fairy tale for all ages.
Librarians & Booksellers Say: A remembrance of the magic we can only find as children.
