Thursday, January 31, 2013

Book Review-Mr. Penumbra's 24 hour Bookstore





How can you resist a book titled Mr. Penumbra's 24 hour bookstore?  Especially if you like books.
The book starts out with Clay Jannon desperate for a job.  He's been working as a graphic designer for a bagel shop in San Francisco, but the shop closed, leaving Clay without a job (or a portfolio of work that would help him get another job.)  He applies for jobs, but has no luck.  One day, while wondering around the city, he notices a bookstore with a help wanted sign.  Mr. Penumbra's 24 Hour Bookstore is not your normal indie shop.  It is very narrow and very tall.  When Cal walks in, Mr. Penumbra asks what he is seeking.  Clay tells him he is seeking a job, and is hired, after he proves he can climb the impossibly tall ladder and retrieve a dusty old book.  Clay is assigned to the night shift. He notices that not many people come to the 24 hour bookstore, and those that do actually don't buy books.  Part of the store is a lending library.  Clay has been told not to look in these books, and to write down the descriptions of the people who check them out.  And they are a weird bunch.  Clay decides to try to get more customers, so he sets up an ad plan in Google.  Shortly after that a young woman named Kat appears.  She works at Google and helps Clay debug a program he is working on.  She and Clay hit it off, and the action of the book really takes off.  Together, they create a 3-d model of the store and the habits of the borrowers.  From there, they find out more about Mr. Penumbra and the secret society he belongs to.
There is a lot of high-tech in this book, both current and harking back to Gutenberg's time.  Google is almost a character.  It is a fun romp through book lore and current technology.    The author blends the old and the new and shows how they can live side by side:  one doesn't displace the other, but instead the two together can create something bigger than either one alone.

Mr. Penumbra's 24 Hour Bookstore
Mr. Penumbra's 24 Hour Bookstore
By Sloan, Robin
2012-10 - Farrar Straus Giroux
9780374214913 Check Our Catalog 2013 Alex Award Winner

A gleeful and exhilarating tale of global conspiracy, complex code-breaking, high-tech data visualization, young love, rollicking adventure, and the secret to eternal life--mostly set in a hole-in-the-wall San Francisco bookstore. …More


Complimentary Reads
City of Dark Magic
City of Dark Magic
By Flyte, Magnus
2012-11 - Penguin Books
9780143122685 Check Our Catalog

…More


One Extraordinary Day: One Encounter Will Change Everything
One Extraordinary Day: One Encounter Will Change Everything
By Myra, Harold
2008-08 - Tyndale House Publishers
9781414323589 Check Our Catalog

David feels little control over his life these days, but a chance encounter in the woods with a mysterious stranger changes his life forever. …More


Soft Apocalypse
Soft Apocalypse
By McIntosh, Will
2011-04 - Night Shade Books
9781597802765 Check Our Catalog

…More


The Stockholm Octavo
The Stockholm Octavo
By Engelmann, Karen
2012-10 - Ecco Press
9780061995347 Check Our Catalog

For fans of Patrick Suskind's classic "Perfume" comes a dazzling debut, set during Stockholm's opulent Golden Age that brilliantly interweaves history, romance, and intrigue, in which one man's fortune holds the key to a nation's precarious fate. …More


Tell the Wolves I'm Home: A Novel
Tell the Wolves I'm Home: A Novel
By Brunt, Carol Rifka
2012-06 - Dial Press
9780679644194 Check Our Catalog 2013 Alex Award Winner

In this striking literary debut, Brunt unfolds a moving story of love, grief, and renewal in 1987 as two lonely people become the unlikeliest of friends and find that sometimes you don't know you've lost someone until you've found them. …More


The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle
The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle
By Murakami, Haruki
Translator Rubin, Jay
1998-09 - Vintage Books USA
9780679775430 Check Our Catalog

Japan's most highly regarded novelist now vaults into the first ranks of international fiction writers with this heroically imaginative novel, which is at once a detective story, an account of a disintegrating marriage, and an excavation of the buried secrets of World War II.
In a Tokyo suburb a young man named Toru Okada searches for his wife's missing cat. Soon he finds himself looking for his wife as well in a netherworld that lies beneath the placid surface of Tokyo. As these searches intersect, Okada encounters a bizarre group of allies and antagonists: a psychic prostitute; a malevolent yet mediagenic politician; a cheerfully morbid sixteen-year-old-girl; and an aging war veteran who has been permanently changed by the hideous things he witnessed during Japan's forgotten campaign in Manchuria.
Gripping, prophetic, suffused with comedy and menace, The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle is a tour de force equal in scope to the masterpieces of Mishima and Pynchon.
…More


Want to see all the staff picks?  In Encore (our catalog) search for HPL Staff Picks.
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HPL's New Books


Below is a partial list of our new books. To see the full list, download the Excel file for: 2012.  To see new books from other years try:  2011, 2010, 2009, 2008, 2007, or 2006.



Want to see all the staff picks?  In Encore (our catalog) search for HPL Staff Picks.
To sign up for this, or any of our newsletters, check out our Newsletter sign up page.

A Christmas Bride
A Christmas Bride
By Mallery, Susan
2012-10 - Harlequin Hqn
9780373778027 Check Our Catalog

"New York Times"-bestselling author Mallery brings fans home for the holidays with these two classic romances that will warm readers' hearts. Includes "Only Us: A Fool's Gold Holiday" and "The Sheik and the Christmas Bride." Reissue. …More


Against the Odds
Against the Odds
By Martin, Kat
2012-12 - Harlequin Mira
9780778314226 Check Our Catalog

All of Sabrina Eckhart's financial problems can be solved if she finds a hidden silver mine in the West Texas desert. The man with the skills she needs is private investigator Alex Justice, a former pilotNand current pain in the neck. Original. …More


Life! Death! Prizes!
Life! Death! Prizes!
By May, Stephen
Author May, Matt
2012-12 - Bloomsbury Publishing PLC
9781620400012 Check Our Catalog

…More


The Pink Palace
The Pink Palace
By McCaulsky, Marlon
2008-04 - Triple Crown Publications
9780979951756 Check Our Catalog

They say you can't judge a book by its cover and I guess you can say the same thing about strippers, too.
On the surface I'm Mo'Nique, the hottest stripper dancing at The Pink Palace, but on the inside I'm really just Janelle Taylor, a teenage runaway trying to survive in Atlanta.
You might wanna call me a hoe but I'm the one your man is spending his whole paycheck on! This isn't the life I envisioned for myself but it's the path I was forced to take in order to get by.
Nobody say the real me until I met Tommy, a sexy hustler from Chicago. At first he was just another trick, but for some reason I can't stay away from him. Am I really falling in love with a trick? The closer I get to Tommy, the more I feel like he's keeping something from me. Is having true love too much to ask for a girl like me? …More


Aura Brown: Life Choices
Aura Brown: Life Choices
By Menchan, Angelia Vernon
2012-04 - Createspace
9781475211672 Check Our Catalog

…More


Dangerous Melody
Dangerous Melody
By Mentink, Dana
2012-10 - Love Inspired
9780373445134 Check Our Catalog

…More


Lost Legacy
Lost Legacy
By Mentink, Dana
2012-05 - Love Inspired
9780373444885 Check Our Catalog

…More


A Lawman's Christmas
A Lawman's Christmas
By Miller, Linda Lael
2012-10 - Harlequin Hqn
9780373777877 Check Our Catalog

With the heart of a cowboy, Clay McKettrick plans to start a ranch and finally settle down. He isn't interested in uprooting Dara Rose and her children, but he is interested in giving her protection, friendship--and passion. And when they say I do to a marriage of convenience, the temporary lawman's Christmas wish is to make Dara Rose his permanent wife. …More


The Labyrinth of Dreaming Books
The Labyrinth of Dreaming Books
By Yarnspinner, Optimus
Translator Moers, Walter
Translator Brownjohn, John
2012-11 - Overlook Press
9781468301267 Check Our Catalog

It has been more than 200 years since Bookholm was destroyed by a devastating fire, as told in Moers' "The City of Dreaming Books." Hildegunst von Mythenmetz, hailed as Zamonia's greatest writer, is on vacation in Lindworm Castle when a disturbing message reaches him, and he must return to Bookholm to investigate a mystery. …More


The Secret Keeper
The Secret Keeper
By Morton, Kate
2012-10 - Atria Books
9781439152805 Check Our Catalog

From the "New York Times"-bestselling author of "The Distant Hours." During a party at the family farm in the English countryside, 16-year-old Laurel Nicolson has escaped to her childhood tree house. She spies a stranger coming up the road and sees her mother speak to him. Before the afternoon is over, Laurel will witness a shocking crime that challenges everything she knows about her family and especially her mother. …More


Looking for Yesterday
Looking for Yesterday
By Muller, Marcia
2012-11 - Grand Central Publishing
9780446573351 Check Our Catalog

Three years ago, Caro Warrick was acquitted for the murder of her best friend Amelia Bettencourt, but the lingering doubts of everyone around Caro is affecting her life. Sharon McCone is confident that she can succeed where other detectives have failed (though at times it's hard to shake her own misgivings about what happened), but when Caro is brutally beaten right at Sharon's doorstep, the investigation takes on a whole new course. How many more people remain at risk until Amelia's murderer is finally caught? …More


Cat Bearing Gifts: A Joe Grey Mystery
Cat Bearing Gifts: A Joe Grey Mystery
By Murphy, Shirley Rousseau
2012-11 - William Morrow & Company
9780061806940 Check Our Catalog

Molena Point's ever-growing cadre of talking cats is on the job when vagabonds threaten the felines' human companions. …More


Betrayal on the Border
Betrayal on the Border
By Nelson, Jill Elizabeth
2012-11 - Love Inspired
9780373445165 Check Our Catalog

…More


Critical Condition
Critical Condition
By Orchard, Sandra
2012-10 - Love Inspired
9780373445110 Check Our Catalog

…More


Wyoming Fierce
Wyoming Fierce
By Palmer, Diana
2012-10 - Harlequin Hqn
9780373776962 Check Our Catalog

A "New York Times"-bestselling author returns to Wyoming with a new romance featuring one of the ruggedly handsome Kirk brothers. Original. …More


Political Suicide
Political Suicide
By Palmer, Michael
2012-12 - St. Martin's Press
9780312587550 Check Our Catalog

From the "New York Times"-bestselling author of "Oath of Office" comes a gripping thriller at the crossroads of politics and medicine. Dr. Lou Welcome is back in this heart-stopping medical thriller. A desperate phone call embroils Lou in scandal and murder involving the "society doc." …More


Diary of a Stalker
Diary of a Stalker
By Parks, Electa Rome
2012-01 - Urban Books
9781601623324 Check Our Catalog

An exciting, erotically charged novel, "Diary of a Stalker" tells the story of a bestselling author who gets more than he bargained for when he becomes involved with an obsessed fan. …More


Lone Wolf
Lone Wolf
By Picoult, Jodi
2012-10 - Emily Bestler Books
9781439102756 Check Our Catalog

Edward Warren left his family after an irreparable fight with his father, and learns that his dad lies comatose in a hospital, gravely injured. Edward wants to terminate life support and donate his father's organs. Is he motivated by altruism or revenge? To what lengths will his sister go to stop him from making an irrevocable decision? …More


Two Graves
Two Graves
By Preston, Douglas J.
Author Child, Lincoln
2012-12 - Grand Central Publishing
9780446554992 Check Our Catalog

After his wife, Helen, is abducted, Special Agent Pendergast furiously pursues the kidnappers, chasing them across the country and into Mexico. But then, things go terribly, tragically wrong; the kidnappers escape; and a shattered Pendergast retreats to his New York apartment and shuts out the world. But when a string of bizarre murders erupts across several Manhattan hotels, NYPD Lieutenant D'Agosta asks his friend Pendergast for help. …More


The Doctor's Defender
The Doctor's Defender
By Reed, Terri
2012-10 - Love Inspired
9780373445080 Check Our Catalog

…More


Shiver
Shiver
By Robards, Karen
2012-12 - Gallery Books
9781451678673 Check Our Catalog

From "one of the most popular voices in women's fiction" ("Newsweek") comes aheart-pounding new novel of romantic suspense. …More


Face the Fire
Face the Fire
By Roberts, Nora
2002-05 - Jove Books
9780515132878 Check Our Catalog

The final book in Nora Roberts's bewitching New England-set Three Sisters Island trilogy brings to a close the saga of modern-day witches Nell Channing, Ripley Todd, and Mia Devlin. …More


First Impressions
First Impressions
By Roberts, Nora
2012-10 - Silhouette Books
9780373281640 Check Our Catalog

"New York Times"-bestselling author Nora Roberts offers this two-in-one volume of holiday tales sure to warm the heart. Includes the classic story "First Impressions" accompanied by "Blithe Images." Reissue. …More

Tuesday, January 29, 2013

The Reader's Shelf


From Library Journal

Winter's Tales:  Warm up with these reads




1222
1222
By Holt, Anne
2012-08 - Scribner Book Company
9781451634723 Check Our Catalog

…More


The Voyage of the Narwhal
The Voyage of the Narwhal
By Barrett, Andrea
1999-09 - W. W. Norton & Company
9780393319507 Check Our Catalog

Delving into the history of Arctic exploration, this book follows the crew and commander of a ship searching for the open polar sea, as seen through the eyes of a scholar-naturalist. 16 steel engravings. Map. …More


The Terror
The Terror
By Simmons, Dan
2009-01 - Little Brown and Company
9780316008075 Check Our Catalog

Based on the true story of two ice ships that disappeared in the Arctic Circle during the Sir John Franklin Expedition in 1845, "The Terror" is a deeply absorbing story that combines awe-inspiring myth, grinding horror, and historically accurate adventure ("Seattle Times"). …More


61 Hours
61 Hours
By Child, Lee
2012-08 - Bantam
9780345541598 Check Our Catalog

…More


The Dark Is Rising: The Complete Sequence
The Dark Is Rising: The Complete Sequence
By Cooper, Susan
2010-08 - Margaret K. McElderry Books
9781442412538 Check Our Catalog

Cooper's award-winning Dark Is Rising sequence can be found for the first time in one brilliant volume. Includes "Over Sea, Under Stone; The Dark Is Rising; Greenwitch; The Grey King;" and "Silver on the Tree." …More


Winter's Tale
Winter's Tale
By Helprin, Mark
2005-06 - Harvest Books
9780156031196 Check Our Catalog

A breathtaking novel by the author of "A Soldier of the Great War," this is a book about the beauty and complexity of the human soul, about God, love, and justice. …More


A Mind of Winter: Poems for a Snowy Season
A Mind of Winter: Poems for a Snowy Season
By Nason, Thomas
Introduction by Hall, Donald
Selected by Atwan, Robert
2011-10 - Beacon Press (MA)
9780807069202 Check Our Catalog

…More