Book Smarts – Sept/Oct 2019

Book Smarts: Sept/Oct 2019

Seeking your next good read? Emma Snyder, owner of The IvyBookshop at 6080 Falls Road in Mount Washington, offers recommendations formust-read titles for adults and children.

Fiction

“In West Mills” (Hardcover)

By De’Shawn Charles Winslow, Bloomsbury, 272 pages, $26

Set in an African-American community in ruralNorth Carolina from 1941 to 1987, “In West Mills” is a magnificent, big-heartedsmall-town debut novel about family, friendship, storytelling and theredemptive power of love.

“The Pisces: A Novel” (Paperback)

By Melissa Broder, Hogarth, 304 pages, $16

A masterful blend of vivid realism and giddy fantasy, pairing hilarious frankness with pulse-racing eroticism, “The Pisces” is a story about falling in obsessive love with a merman

Non-Fiction

“Good Talk: A Memoir in Conversations” (Hardcover)

By Mira Jacob, One World, 368 pages, $30

Written with humor and vulnerability, thisdeeply relatable graphic memoir is a love letter to the art of conversation — andto the hope that hovers in our most difficult questions. If you’ve never read agraphic memoir before, trust us: start here. A top staff pick at The Ivy.

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“The Stonewall Reader”

Edited by the New York Public Library, Penguin Classics, 336 pages, $18

For the 50th anniversary of the Stonewalluprising, an anthology chronicling the tumultuous fight for LGBTQ rights in the1960s and the activists who spearheaded it, with a foreword by Edmund White.

Young Adults (Ages 12-18)

“The Prince and the Dressmaker” (Paperback)

By Jen Wang, First Second, 288 pages, $16.99

Winner of the Teen Book of the Year Award fromthe Children’s Book Council, the only national book award chosen by teens! JenWang weaves an exuberantly romantic tale of identity, young love, art, andfamily. A fairy tale for any age.

Children’s

“Jabari Jumps” (Hardcover)

By Gaia Cornwall, Candlewick, 32 pages, $15.99

Jabari is definitely ready to jump off thediving board … right? In a sweetly appealing tale of overcoming your fears,Gaia Cornwall captures a moment between a patient and encouraging father and adetermined little boy you can’t help but root for.

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