Read each book and vote for your selection for this year’s ONE COUNTY, ONE BOOK! We will host programs and book discussions based on the popular vote winner.

BEHOLD THE DREAMERS Vote for your favorite by Imbolo Mbue book online at scpl.org (Fiction) or at an Jende Jonga and his family come to the United States from Cameroon hoping to OCOB Ballot Box raise their children with all the dreams this country holds. Feeling fortunate to secure found at: a chauffeuring position with a wealthy financial executive, Jende and his wife all SCPL locations begin to establish their way, only to become entwined in the troubles of the rich Whitney Book Corner and powerful. SCCC 2017 winner of the Pen/Faulkner Award for The Open Door Bookstore Fiction; named one of the best books of the year by NPR, Book Review, San Francisco Chronicle, The Guardian, St. Voting ends Nov 9th! BOOK Louis Post-Dispatch, Chicago Public Library, BookPage, Refinery29, Kirkus Reviews “A debut novel by a young woman from If the title you are SELECTION Cameroon that illuminates the immigrant experience in America with the tenderhearted looking for is not in, wisdom so lacking in our political discourse... Mbue is a bright and captivating storyteller.” ask a staff member to GUIDE — reserve it for you! “Who is this Imbolo Mbue and where has she been hiding? Her writing is startlingly beautiful, eBook & Audio Book thoughtful, and both timely and timeless. She’s taking on everything from family to the Great editions also available on: Recession to immigration while deftly reminding us what it means to truly believe in ‘the American Dream.’” —, National Book Award–winning author of and Another Brooklyn. BETWEEN THE WORLD JUST MERCY: MANHATTAN BEACH AND ME A Story of Justice and Redemption by Jennifer Egan by Ta-Nehisi Coates by Bryan Stevenson (Fiction) (Non-Fiction) (Non-Fiction) This is the story of a feisty young woman, Written as an autobiographical letter to his Stevenson, founder of the Equal Justice who goes from being her father’s constant teenage son, Coates relates his experience Initiative, retells the stories of his tireless companion during the Depression, to as a youth growing up in Baltimore. He work defending wrongly accused, mostly working at the Brooklyn Naval Yard as the illustrates how history has shaped the minor aged, clients. He exposes the first female diver, repairing American war experience of navigating today’s world and challenges of maneuvering through an ships during WWII. Anna becomes the sole institutions as a black man, providing a unfair and unmerciful criminal justice supporter for her mother and disabled vision forward for his son. system, especially when the accused are sister after her father’s disappearance. Her poor, uneducated black Americans. natural curiosity to find him draws her into Winner of 2015 National Book Award for connections she knew from her childhood, Nonfiction; finalist for the 2016 Pulitzer Prize 2015 Winner of Carnegie Medal for Excellence leading her to complex consequences. for General Non-Fiction. In Fiction and Nonfiction; 2015 Winner of Dayton Literary Peace Prize for Non-fiction; Winner of the Andrew Carnegie Medal for “I’ve been wondering who might fill the winner of the NAACP Image Award for Excellence in Fiction; 2018 winner One Book, intellectual void that plagued me after James Non-fiction; named one of the Best Books of One New York; named one of the Best Books Baldwin died. Clearly it is Ta-Nehisi Coates. the Year by The New York Times, The of the Year by NPR, Esquire, Vogue, The The language of Between the World and Me, Washington Post, , The Washington Post, The Guardian, USA TODAY, like Coates’s journey, is visceral, eloquent, and Seattle Times, Esquire, Time. Time, a New York Times Notable Book. beautifully redemptive. And its examination of the hazards and hopes of black male life is as “You don’t have to read too long to start “Egan’s most remarkable accomplishment yet... profound as it is revelatory. This is required cheering for this man. . . . The message of this At once a suspenseful novel of noir intrigue, a reading.” — book . . . is that evil can be overcome, a gorgeously wrought and richly allusive literary difference can be made. Just Mercy will make tapestry, and a transporting work of lyrical “Powerful and passionate . . . profoundly you upset and it will make you hopeful.” beauty and emotional heft, Manhattan Beach moving . . . a searing meditation on what it —Ted Conover, The New York Times is a magnificent achievement.” means to be black in America today.” Book Review –Priscilla Gilman, The Boston Globe —Michiko Kakutani, The New York Times “Searing, moving... Bryan Stevenson may, "A novel that deserves to join the canon of “Part memoir, part diary, and wholly necessary, indeed, be America’s Mandela.” New York stories." it is precisely the document this country needs —Nicholas Kristof, The New York Times –Amor Towles, New York Times Book Review right now.” —New Republic “Inspiring... a work of style, substance and clarity... Stevenson is not only a great lawyer, he’s also a gifted writer and storyteller.” —The Washington Post