My LINKcat AccountToday is the second Thursday of the month. There are four Thursdays in this month (and almost every month when you think about it although occasionally you get a 5th Thursday thrown in just to see if you're paying attention). That means that we are half way through the month, at least as far as Thursdays go. It was a long, lonely spring, an interesting summer with nature and the weather doing their usual things while we, poor humans, did the best we could to enjoy nature and the weather and do some things that resembled normal while staying masked and socially distanced. Now, suddenly we are well into September and the days are getting shorter, the day time highs and overnight lows are steadily dropping and the pandemic continues on its merry way. It used to be once you got past Labor Day, not only had the playgrounds at the schools started to fill with children and the sounds of their voices but you put away your summer clothes and shoes ( you wore white dress shoes during the summer between Memorial Day and Labor Day) and brought out the sweaters, flannels, and corduroys. This year the playgrounds aren't filled with the sound of children playing. But the publishing houses have started flooding us not only with their fall book titles, but with many of the titles that weren't published earlier this year and which are now shipping out of those big, book warehouses somewhere out East. It's the perfect time to sit back with a pumpkin-based bakery product (doughnut, scone, cookie) and a pumpkin spice hot caffeinated beverage (or pumpkin and spice flavored barley-based adult beverage) and read. Below are some of the fall titles that recently arrived at the library. Enjoy!
New Non-Fiction
How to Lead: Wisdom from the World’s Greatest CEOs, Founders, and Game Changers by David Rubenstein. A leadership playbook by the author of The American Story shares the principles and guiding philosophies that shaped the careers of such forefront visionaries as Bill Gates, Ruth Bader Ginsburg and Oprah Winfrey.
How to Educate a Citizen: The Power of Shared Knowledge to Unify a Nation by E.D. Hirsch. The best-selling author of “Cultural Literacy” addresses the failures and consequences of America's early education system, advocating for a shared knowledge curriculum that provides an educational foundation for all students to strengthen American unity, identity and democracy.
Think Like a Feminist: The Philosophy Behind the Revolution by Carol Hay. An accessible guide to feminist philosophy and its present-day directions tackles essential questions of interest, from the role of nature versus nurture in sexual identity and how gender is connected to oppression to the role of women in perpetuating sexism.
The Writer’s Library: The Authors You Love and the Books That Changed Their Lives by Nancy Pearl & Jeff Schwager. Interviews with 23 of today's most accomplished authors reveal the books that inspired their literary careers, in an illustrated volume that includes contributions by such leading writers as T.C. Boyle, Michael Chabon and Louise Erdrich.
New Fiction
The 2084 Report: An Oral History of the Great Warming by James Powell. A gripping tale set in a climate change-ravaged world of the near future depicts characters desperate to survive rising sea levels, droughts, forced migrations, wars, limited resources and other catastrophic challenges.
The Invention of Sound by Chuck Palahniuk. A father on the brink of uncovering his missing daughter's fate and a talented Foley sound artist find themselves on a collision course with Hollywood's violent underworld. By the best-selling author of “Fight Club”.
The Brilliant Life of Eudora Honeysett by Annie Lyons. Wanting to organize an assisted death on her own terms, a world-weary octogenarian forges an unexpected bond with an exuberant 10-year-old who drags her to tea parties, shopping sprees and other social excursions.
Fifty in Reverse by Bill Flanagan. Working with a teen claiming to be a 65-year-old man who went to sleep in 2020 and woke up back in 1970, a Harvard psychologist observes the youth's haphazard efforts to readapt to high school and correct past mistakes.
Monogamy by Sue Miller. Derailed by the sudden passing of her husband of 30 years, an artist on the brink of a gallery opening struggles to pick up the pieces of her life before discovering harrowing evidence of her husband's affair.
Payback by Mary Gordon. A vengeful reality television star reconnects with a former teacher who she blames for her sexual assault years earlier, in a timely novel by the award-winning author of “There Your Heart Lies”.
What Are You Going Through by Sigrid Nunez. A woman who is content to listen to the people she encounters talk about themselves is asked by one to do something extraordinary, in the new novel by the” New York Times”-best-selling, National Book Award-winning author of “The Friend”.
The Evening and the Morning, No. 4 (Kingsbridge) by Ken Follett. A prequel to the best-selling “The Pillars of the Earth” follows the experiences of a young boat builder, a scholarly monk and a Norman noblewoman against a backdrop of the Viking attacks at the end of the 10th century in England.
Chaos by Iris Johansen. A CIA agent breaks into a billionaire's mansion to secure financing for an unsanctioned mission in Africa to rescue schoolgirl hostages, including her sister, from a cold-blooded killer. By the best-selling author of the Eve Duncan series