What’s the Cook Library Staff Reading This Month?

Jo with Nelson DeMille

Are you looking for a good book? Then you’ve come to the right place! The July staff reading list, compiled from all our library employees, is posted on our Books/Movies/Music page. The books are separated by Fiction, Mysteries and Suspense, Nonfiction, and Biography/History.

Here are some books and authors that caught my eye, among the many listed.

Nelson DeMille: I was so thrilled to meet this great suspense author recently when he appeared at an authors’ event hosted by Vernon Area Public Library District and supported by Cook Library. He is smart (he belongs to Mensa!) and charming. The Fiction Department decided to read DeMille for its most recent genre study, so you will see several of his books on the Mysteries and Suspense list. Some staffers read books from his John Corey series, including the latest, Radiant Angel. I chose one of his older books, The Gold Coast, which imagines what happens when a mobster moves into a high society neighborhood. I gave it 4 stars out of 5 on Goodreads.

Another Visiting Author: Several staffers really enjoyed Annie Barrows’ new book, The Truth According to Us. Barrows, who co-wrote The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society with her aunt, visited Cook Library last month to talk about her new book, which was inspired by family stories she heard growing up.  Staffers gave the book 4 stars on Goodreads.

Women’s Lit: Eight Hundred Grapes by Laura Dave got 4 stars from Jane and was the number-one pick in July for LibraryReads, where librarians across the country pick their favorite books coming out that month. The publisher calls it “a heartbreaking, funny, and deeply evocative novel about love, marriage, family, wine, and the treacherous terrain in which they all intersect.’’

For Sci Fi and Fantasy Buffs: Ann is reading the Peter Grant series by Ben Aaronovitch that has been called the adult’s Harry Potter.  I am a huge Harry Potter geek and this series is on my to-read list. The first is called Midnight Riot, which the publisher described this way: “As a wave of brutal and bizarre murders engulfs the city, Peter is plunged into a world where gods and goddesses mingle with mortals and a long-dead evil is making a comeback on a rising tide of magic.’’

Nonfiction Rave: Andrea gave 5 stars to Being Mortal: Medicine and What Matters in the End by Atul Gawande. and said it should be required reading for everyone. She calls it “A thought-provoking, perspective-changing book.”

For some laughs: The Biography/History section features Jen Lancaster’s new book, I Regret Nothing, got 4 stars from Haley, who said it “made her snort out loud a couple times.’’She said she liked it better than Lancaster’s previous book, The Tao of Martha. The publisher describes it as “the author’s haphazard attempts to make and fulfill a bucket list involving humiliating experiments with tattoo removal, eating pasta in Rome, and navigating a menagerie of rescued pets.”

Memorable Memoirs: For a more serious memoir, Laura gave 4 stars to Under the Same Sky by Joseph Kim, which she calls “a heartbreaking memoir of a boy growing up in North Korea and his eventual escape to the United States.’’ Susie also gave 4 stars to the memoir, Life from Scratch: A Memoir of Food, Family and Forgiveness by Sasha Martin. The publisher’s description: “Over the course of 195 weeks, food writer and blogger Sasha Martin set out to cook–and eat–a meal from every country in the world. As cooking unlocked the memories of her rough-and-tumble childhood and the loss and heartbreak that came with it, Martin became more determined than ever to find peace and elevate her life through the prism of food and world cultures.’’

And this is just a glimpse of what we are reading. Happy book hunting!