by Pico Iyer
Pico Iyer's illustrious writing career has taken him around the world many times, but one of his favorite places appears to be a tiny monastery high above the Pacific Ocean. Aflame: Learning from Silence is a love letter to a place to which Iyer has returned over and over for more than 30 years, seeking solace and renewal in the consolations of solitude.
The location that has played such a central role in Iyer's spiritual and emotional life is the New Camaldoli Hermitage, established in 1958 in California's
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by Caroline Eden
Caroline Eden's fourth book, the sumptuous Cold Kitchen, harvests memories and recipes from her travels in Central Asia and Eastern Europe. The dozen chapters--three per season--cover an archetypal year.
Eden (Red Sands) cooks and reminisces from the basement kitchen of her Edinburgh apartment. When wanderlust strikes, she revisits favorite places via their cuisines. In Proustian fashion, smells and tastes evoke other times and places. As she prepares a watermelon, feta, and mint salad, she remembers asking
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by R.W. Alley
Famously, when Fred Rogers was a kid confronted with upsetting scenes in the news, his mother told him to look for the helpers. In that spirit, R.W. Alley presents his Breezy Valley at Work picture-book series, which showcases anthropomorphized animals giving their all to their communities. Following the launch title, Firefighters to the Rescue!, comes the winsomely demystifying Hospital Heroes Save the Day!
Breezy Valley Hospital is a hive of activity. Readers meet the hospital workers: "Greeter Owl makes
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by Traci N. Todd, illus. by Eleanor Davis
In the radiant Make a Pretty Sound, author Traci N. Todd (Nina) and illustrator Eleanor Davis (Flop to the Top) reverently capture the legacy of singer/songwriter Ella Jenkins, who revolutionized children's music. Todd frames the story by beginning with Ella's childhood in Chicago's Bronzeville neighborhood and closes with an elderly Ella, who traveled "farther than she has ever been" to perform onstage for children in Indonesia.
Todd and Davis explore the influences that shaped young Ella into the renowned
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by Therese Bohman, trans. by Marlaine Delargy
A pair of bibliophiles discover common ground in unexpected areas in Andromeda, a sharp, observant novel by Therese Bohman (Eventide), translated from the Swedish by Marlaine Delargy. In 2009, university student Sofie Andersson lands an internship at Rydéns, a Stockholm publishing house that "looks like a ship moored in the city center." Sofie's only previous job experience may have been as a maid, but she shows poise when she tells editor-in-chief Gunnar Abrahamsson, a man close to retirement age and
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by Gigi Griffis
A wild thing of a girl furiously protects her own against men worse than monsters in this savagely feminist YA horror tale inspired by mysterious attacks in France's history.
Sixteen-year-old Joséphine, a shepherdess in 1765 Gévaudan, lives in a village terrorized by a brutal beast. Many think it's a deadly animal, others a devil, and a dangerous few claim it's a witch. A mob of men murdered someone suspected guilty, yet the attacks continue. Joséphine, however, is more concerned with
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by Colette Shade
Y2K, Colette Shade's debut collection of 10 perceptive essays, contrasts the promises and pitfalls of what she calls "the Y2K era," 1997-2008.
Shade, an adolescent at the turn of the millennium, recalls the thrill of early Internet use and celebrity culture. Her dot-com entrepreneur uncle invested $100,000 toward her college education and retired at 45. It seemed life could only get better, but this was a "dream state," Shade writes: "We dreamt we were ascending into the future" and "everyone could get rich
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