Director of Library Operations Pamela Parker recommends Twist: A Novel by Colum McCann. Irish author Colum McCann grapples with human disconnections in his most recent novel, Twist (2025). He does so by taking us on a sea-faring adventure off the coast of Africa aboard a vessel that repairs underwater fiber-optic cables. Periodic damage to these lines threatens global communications and … [Read more...] about Books Review: Twist
Library Book Club Reviews
Book Review: The Antidote
Director of Programs and Education Martha Williams recommends The Antidote by Karen Russell. I have long been a fan of Karen Russell and her zany hyper-realism. But even if you didn’t love Swamplandia (her first novel set in a gator-wrestling theme park in the Everglades) or short stories like “St. Lucy’s Home for Girls Raised by Wolves,” where fifteen girls are painstakingly reeducated by nuns, I hope you’ll be intrigued by The Antidote—Russell’s most sweeping narrative yet. Set during … [Read more...] about Book Review: The Antidote
Book Review: Here Beside the Rising Tide
Information Systems Manager Will Duke recommends Here Beside the Rising Tide by Emily Jane. At first glance it might seem trite that Emily Jane creates a heroine, Jenn, who is a wildly successful author of “action smut,” her term, not mine; flowing hair, deep kisses, and washboard abs do have cameos in this novel. There is also, of course, a pushy editor who loves Jenn, not romantically but in a “You go girl!” way. But do any of us want to read another book about an … [Read more...] about Book Review: Here Beside the Rising Tide
Book Review: Careless People:
A Cautionary Tale of Power, Greed, and Lost Idealism Librarian Andrea Nelson recommends "Careless People" by Sarah Wynn-Williams. “They were careless people, Tom and Daisy – they smashed up things and creatures and then retreated back into their money or their vast carelessness, or whatever it was that kept them together, and let other people clean up the mess they had made.” ~ F. Scott Fitzgerald, The Great Gatsby Back when Facebook (now Meta) was young, a sign hung on the wall of … [Read more...] about Book Review: Careless People:
Finding Financial Security
Reference Librarian Buffy McDonald recommends The Total Money Makeover by Dave Ramsey. If you have been thinking about your finances lately, you may want to read The Total Money Makeover by Dave Ramsey. He has a seven-step system that has helped many people find their way out of the turmoil of financial instability. To begin with, he says, you will want to save $1,000 as quickly as you can to get a starter emergency fund in case unforeseen financial events occur. This is a way to give … [Read more...] about Finding Financial Security
Book Review: The Book Thief
Communications Manager Kyla Merwin recommends The Book Thief by Markus Zusak. “When Death has a story to tell, you listen.” This is the publisher's first note in their description of The Book Thief. And well said. Every now and then, a book lands in my lap that knocks me right off the couch. A tome that might take me two weeks to read (at 550 pages), The Book Thief instead launched me on a much longer journey—a two-month immersion of exquisite wording and finely wrought … [Read more...] about Book Review: The Book Thief
