Readers’ Advisory Committee OCTOBER 2018 STAFF PICKS Libraries To find book suggestions on the web go to www.nccde.org/libraries and click on “What Do I Read Next” for Staff Picks, Select Reads, and more... FICTION THE CACTUS BY SARAH HAYWOOD (PICKED BY KT) People aren't sure what to make of Susan Green—a prickly independent woman, who has everything just the way she wants it and who certainly has no need for messy emotional relationships. Family and colleagues find her standoffish and hard to understand. At forty-five, she thinks her life is perfect, as long as she avoids her feckless brother, Edward. She has a London flat which is ideal for one; a job that suits her passion for logic; and a personal arrangement providing cultural and other, more intimate, benefits. Yet suddenly faced with the loss of her mother and, implausibly, with the possibility of becoming a mother herself, Susan's greatest fear is being realized: she is losing control. When she discovers that her mother's will inexplicably favors her brother, Susan sets out to prove that Edward and his equally feckless friend Rob somehow coerced this dubious outcome. But when problems closer to home become increasingly hard to ignore, she finds help in the most unlikely of places. (384 pgs) AUSCHWITZ LULLABY BY MARIO ESCOBAR (PICKED BY SM) In 1943 Germany, Helene is just about to wake up her children for school when a group of policemen break into her house. They want to haul away her gypsy husband and their five children. The police tell Helene that as a German she does not have to go with them, but she decides to share the fate of her family. The entire family is deported to Auschwitz. The living conditions are extremely harsh, but at least she is with her children. A few days after their arrival, Doctor Mengele comes to visit, having noticed on her entry card that she is a nurse. He proposes that she direct the camp’s nursery. Helene, with the help of two Polish Jewish prisoners and four gypsy mothers, organizes the buildings. Though Mengele provides them with Disney movies, school supplies, and food, the people are living in crowded conditions under extreme conditions. And less than 400 yards away, two gas chambers are exterminating thousands of people daily. For sixteen months, Helene lives with this reality, desperately trying to find a way to save her children. (281 pgs) BONE ON BONE BY JULIA KELLER (PICKED BY SLS) How far would you go for someone you love? Would you die? Would you kill? After a three-year prison sentence, Bell Elkins is back in Acker's Gap. And she finds herself in the white-hot center of a complicated and deadly case -- even as she comes to terms with one last, devastating secret of her own. A prominent local family has fallen victim to the same sickness that infects the whole region: drug addiction. With mother against father, child against parent, and tensions that lead inexorably to tragedy, they are trapped in a grim, hopeless struggle with nowhere to turn. Bell has lost her job as prosecutor -- but not her affection for her hard-luck hometown. Teamed up with former Deputy Jake Oakes, who battles his own demons as he adjusts to life as a paraplegic, and aided by the new prosecutor, Rhonda Lovejoy, Bell tackles a case as poignant as it is perilous, as heartbreaking as it is challenging. (320 pgs) AN OCEAN OF MINUTES BY THEA LIM (PICKED BY BS) America is in the grip of a deadly flu pandemic. When Frank catches the virus, his girlfriend Polly will do whatever it takes to save him, even if it means risking everything. She agrees to a radical plan—time travel has been invented in the future to thwart the virus. If she signs up for a one-way-trip into the future to work as a bonded laborer, the company will pay for the life-saving treatment Frank needs. Polly promises to meet Frank again in Galveston, Texas, where she will arrive in twelve years. But when Polly is re-routed an extra five years into the future, Frank is nowhere to be found. Alone in a changed and divided America, with no status and no money, Polly must navigate a new life and find a way to locate Frank, to discover if he is alive, and if their love has endured. (309 pgs) New Castle County Libraries | Department of Community Services | Matthew Meyer , County Executive STAFF PICKS FICTION GOODBYE, PARIS BY ANSTEY HARRIS (PICKED BY SM) Grace once had the beginnings of a promising musical career, but she hasn't been able to play her cello publicly since a traumatic event at music college years ago. Since then, she's built a quiet life for herself in her small English village, repairing instruments and nurturing her long- distance affair with David, the man who has helped her rebuild her life even as she puts her dreams of a family on hold until his children are old enough for him to leave his loveless marriage. But when David saves the life of a woman in the Paris Metro, his resulting fame shines a light onto the real state of the relationship(s) in his life. Shattered, Grace hits rock bottom and abandons everything that has been important to her, including her dream of entering and winning the world's most important violin-making competition. Her closest friends – a charming elderly violinist and her store clerk step in to help, but will their friendship be enough to help her pick up the pieces? (288 pgs) BELLEWETHER BY SUSANNA KEARSLEY (PICKED BY SH) It’s 1759 and the world is at war, pulling the North American colonies of Britain and France into the conflict. Many New York merchants have secretly been trading with the French for years, defying Britain’s colonial laws. When captured French officers are brought to Long Island to be billeted in private homes it upends the lives of the Wilde family—deeply involved in the treasonous trade and already divided by war. Lydia Wilde has little time or kindness to spare for her unwanted guests. French-Canadian lieutenant Jean-Philippe de Sabran has little desire to be there. But by the war’s end they’ll both learn love, honor, and duty can form tangled bonds that are not broken easily. Their doomed romance becomes a local legend, told and re-told through the years until the present day, when conflict of a different kind brings Charley Van Hoek to Long Island to be the new curator of the Wilde House Museum. Charley doesn’t believe in ghosts. But as she starts to delve into the history of Lydia and her French officer, Charley discovers the legend might not have been telling the whole story...or the whole truth. (414pgs) THREE THINGS ABOUT ELSIE BY JOANNA CANNON (PICKED BY BS) There are three things you should know about Elsie. The first thing is that she’s my best friend. The second is that she always knows what to say to make me feel better. And the third thing… might take a bit more explaining. Eighty-four-year-old Florence has fallen in her flat at Cherry Tree Home for the Elderly. As she waits to be rescued, she thinks about her friend Elsie and wonders if a terrible secret from their past is about to come to light. If the charming new resident is who he claims to be, why does he look exactly like a man who died sixty years ago? Three Things About Elsie is a story about forever friends on the twisting path of life. As we uncover their buried secrets, we learn how the fine threads of humanity connect us all. (464 pgs) TIFFANY BLUES BY M.J. ROSE (PICKED BY SLH) New York, 1924. Jenny Bell is one of a dozen artists invited to Louis Tiffany’s prestigious artists’ colony. Jenny vows to avoid distractions and take full advantage of the wonders to be found at Laurelton Hall. But Jenny’s past has followed her to Long Island. Images of her beloved mother, her hard-hearted stepfather, waterfalls, murder, and the dank hallways of Canada’s Andrew Mercer Reformatory for Women overwhelm Jenny’s thoughts, even as she is inextricably drawn to Oliver, Tiffany’s charismatic grandson. As the summer goes on, and the competition between the artists grows fierce as they vie for a spot at Tiffany’s New York gallery, a series of suspicious and disturbing occurrences suggest someone knows enough about Jenny’s childhood trauma to expose her. Supported by her closest friend and Oliver, Jenny pushes her demons aside. Between stolen kisses and stolen jewels, the jazz plays on until one moonless night when Jenny’s past and present are thrown together in a desperate moment that will threaten her future and her very life. (317 pgs) IKE AND KAY BY JAMES MACMANUS (PICKED BY LD) In 1942, Kay Summersby’s life is changed forever when she is conscripted to drive General Eisenhower on his fact-finding visit to wartime London. So begins a tumultuous relationship that, against all military regulation, sees Kay traveling with Eisenhower on missions to far-flung places before the final assault on Nazi Germany. Based on the scandalous true story of General Eisenhower’s secret World War II love affair, Ike and Kay is a compelling story of love, duty, sacrifice, and heartbreak, set against the backdrop of the most tumultuous period of the twentieth century.