Close to Home: The Wonders of Nature Just Outside Your Door

by Thor Hanson

"It's often said that knowing more about nature leads to more caring about it." In Close to Home, biologist and John Burroughs Medal-winning natural history writer Thor Hanson (Hurricane Lizards and Plastic Squid) invites readers to discover the overlooked wonders in their own backyards.

Divided into three parts--Seeing (how to look), Exploring (where to look) and Restoring (how to help)--Close to Home is an accessible read, filled with fascinating facts, stories from the field, and Hanson's own experiences.

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Cry When the Baby Cries

by Becky Barnicoat

British cartoonist Becky Barnicoat's first graphic memoir, Cry When the Baby Cries, presents quite the lachrymose cover, but readers will likely be nod-laughing as often as sharing tears. The single-page preface perfectly encapsulates what's to come: Barnicoat lies in bed as a nurse puts her crying newborn into her arms, with a reassuring, "It comes with an instruction manual, translation app, carry pouch, and 24/7 expert help and guidance." As she exits the room, the nurse adds, "LOL. Just kidding. Bye,"

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Newborns: How Baby Animals Come into the World

by Paulina Jara, trans. by Lawrence Schimel, illus. by Mercè Galí

Chilean author Paulina Jara introduces budding readers to the diverse and amazing ways animal babies can be born in Newborns, a merry and creative picture book translated from the original Spanish by Lawrence Schimel. Jara includes mammals, fish, birds, and reptiles among the 25 creatures showcased and Spanish illustrator Mercè Galí's striking illustrations lend a singular aesthetic to the book.

Young audiences will likely be captivated by the array of fascinating information included in both

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A Catalog of Burnt Objects

by Shana Youngdahl

A Catalog of Burnt Objects is Shana Youngdahl's gut-wrenching, tender response to the 2018 Camp Fire that destroyed her hometown of Paradise, Calif.

Seventeen-year-old Caprice has been dealing with her "agent of chaos" older brother since she was 10. Now he's returned from a stint in rehab for substance use disorder and Caprice is not going to let him "unbalance [her] in all the ways he used to." She plans to focus on finishing the app she's developing and get into college--and maybe fall in love with the

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Sucker Punch

by Scaachi Koul

By her own admission, Scaachi Koul's 2017 debut, One Day We'll All Be Dead and None of This Will Matter, charted her course to marrying her now ex-husband. Her follow-up essay collection, Sucker Punch, paints a painful yet darkly humorous picture of divorce that stands on its own while also working as a companion to her first book. Koul--a senior journalist at Slate, podcast host, and contributor to publications such as the New Yorker--goes beyond a typical, linear recounting of divorce by mapping her experience

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Good Soil: The Education of an Accidental Farmhand

by Jeff Chu

Journalist Jeff Chu's wise, thoughtful second memoir, Good Soil, explores love, loss, complicated identities, and the power of community through his experience working on his seminary's farm. After enrolling at Princeton Theological Seminary at the age of 39, Chu took one class--and then many more--at the "Farminary," a working farm designed to provide a hands-on place for students to wrestle with spiritual questions while getting their hands (literally) dirty. Chu's time at the Farminary would prove

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