Staff Picks

We like to read, and we like to share what we read! This is a list of recent favorites. STAFF PICKS

Oryx and Crake By Atwood, Margaret 2004-03 - Anchor Books 9780385721677 Check Our Catalog With the same stunning blend of prophecy and social satire she brought to her classic The Handmaid's Tale," Margaret Atwood gives us a keenly prescient novel about the future of humanity--and its present. Humanity here equals Snowman, and in Snowman's recollections Atwood re-creates a time much like our own, when a boy named Jimmy loved an elusive, damaged girl called Oryx and a sardonic …More

The Year of the Flood By Atwood, Margaret 2010-07 - Anchor Books 9780307455475 Check Our Catalog By turns dark, tender, violent, thoughtful, and uneasily hilarious, the new novel from the author of "The Handmaid's Tale" and "The Blind Assassin" is a dystopic masterpiece and a testament to Atwood's visionary power. …More

Horns & Wrinkles By Helgerson, Joseph 2006-09 - Houghton Mifflin Harcourt (HMH) 9780618616794 Check Our Catalog Awards: Massachusetts Children's Book Award (2010) A BookPage Notable Title In the tradition of grand river adventures, Joseph Helgerson's tale is as twisty and unpredictable as the Mississippi River itself, while an unusual cast of characters adds pepper to the pot. Readers of all ages will enjoy getting in--and out of--trouble with Claire and Duke in this nimble, sharp, and funny fantasy. …More

Agents of Innocence By Ignatius, David 1997-09 - W. W. Norton & Company 9780393317381 Check Our Catalog From the acclaimed author of "A Firing Offense". Into the treacherous world of shifting alliances and arcane subterfuge comes idealistic CIA man Tom Rogers. Ordered to penetrate the PLO and recruit a high-level operative, Rogers soon learns the heavy price of innocence in a time and place that has no use for it. …More

The English Girl By Silva, Daniel 2013-07 - Harper Torch 9780062073167 Check Our Catalog Daniel Silva delivers another spectacular thriller starring Gabriel Allon, The English Girl. When a beautiful young British woman vanishes on the island of Corsica, a prime minister's career is threatened with destruction. Allon, the wayward son of Israeli intelligence, is thrust into a game of shadows where nothing is what it seems...and where the only thing more dangerous than his enemies might …More

The Great Dissent: How Oliver Wendell Holmes Changed His Mind--And Changed the History of Free Speech in America By Healy, Thomas 2013-08 - Metropolitan Books 9780805094565 Check Our Catalog A gripping intellectual history reveals how Oliver Wendell Holmes became a free-speech advocate and established the modern understanding of the First Amendment. …More

Public Enemy: Confessions of an American Dissident By Ayers, Bill Author Ayers, William 2013-10 - Beacon Press (MA) 9780807032763 Check Our Catalog In this sequel to "Fugitive Days," Ayers charts his life after the Weather Underground, when he becomes the GOP's flaunted "domestic terrorist," a "public enemy." Labeled a "domestic terrorist" by the McCain campaign in 2008 and used by the radical right in an attempt to castigate Obama for "pallin' around with terrorists," Bill Ayers is in fact a dedicated teacher, father, and social justice …More

The Sittin' Up By Moses, Shelia P. 2014-01 - Putnam Publishing Group 9780399257230 Check Our Catalog When the patriarch of twelve-year-old Bean's sharecropping community dies, Bean gets a lesson in not only what it means to lose someone you love, but also in how his family and friends care for their dead. …More

The Light Between Oceans By Stedman, M. L. 2012-07 - Scribner Book Company 9781451681734 Check Our Catalog A novel set on a remote Australian island, where a childless couple live quietly running a lighthouse, until a boat carrying a baby washes ashore. …More

Man in the Empty Suit By Ferrell, Sean 2013-02 - Soho Press 9781616951252 Check Our Catalog A time traveler celebrates his birthday partying with himself. Every year, he travels to an abandoned hotel in New York City in 2071, the hundredth anniversary of his birth, and drinks with all the other versions of who he has been and who he will be. The year he turns 39, though, the party takes a stressful turn for the worse. …More

The Cat's Table By Ondaatje, Michael 2011-10 - Knopf Publishing Group 9780307700117 Check Our Catalog Awards: ALA Notable Books (2012)Indies Choice Book Awards (2012)L.A. Times Book Prize (2011)Scotiabank Giller Prize (2011) From Michael Ondaatje: a stunning new novel--by turns poignant and electrifying--about the magical, often forbidden, discoveries of childhood and a lifelong journey that begins unexpectedly with a sea voyage. …More

Defending Jacob By Landay, William 2012-01 - Delacorte Press 9780385344227 Check Our Catalog Awards: Thriller Awards (2013) Andy Barber has been an ADA in his suburban Massachusetts county for more than 20 years. He is respected in his community and happy at home with his wife, Laurie, and son, Jacob. But after a shocking crime shatters their New England town, Andy is blindsided by what happens next: His 14-year-old son is charged with the murder of a fellow student. …More