World Book Night: The Fifth Batch

With this five I have now read twenty-seven of the thirty-five WBN choices; the final eight will have to wait for me a while as Victoria and I began our re-read of the Harry Potter series yesterday, and I’ll be in a state of Potter mania for the bulk of the summer!

Rebecca Lee’s Bobcat and Other Stories has left me with a hunger for short works. The stories in this collection are wonderful. With such a small amount of space Lee was about to fully draw me in to each story and make me care about the lives of her characters. All the while I was lingering over various lines and phrases simply admiring the prose. I’m definitely looking forward to reading more by Lee and I thank the WBN committee for introducing me to these stories!

Can something be both idyllic and jaded? If so, Tales of the City by Armistead Maupin is a wonderful mingling of the two. This novel of an almost-but-not-quite magical apartment building in San Francisco in the 1970s was such an entertaining read. This book is full of wit, heart, and sass – it’s just a good time.

The Tipping Point by Malcolm Gladwell is one of those books you have to talk about. I have probably mentioned some element of this book in conversation every day since I started reading it. The idea of “little things” making a “big difference” and just what makes things tip is compelling and so interesting to talk about. Definitely a good choice for book clubs (of which it has been a staple for a while now) as it is sure to get conversations going.

 

Victoria Bond and T.R. Simon have created a perfect middle grade mystery in Zora and Me. Using facts from Zora Neale Hurston’s early life they imbued this novel with a pitch perfect sense of time and place. The imagination at the center of this story fully realizes the spirit of Zora and her tall tales – child readers will enjoy the fun and fear of the mystery while adult readers see a portrait of the child Zora who will continue to challenge established ideas, create great stories, and teach us much about race and history through her collections of folklore. And adult readers get to enjoy the fun too.

Reading Sunrise Over Fallujah by Walter Dean Myers was a jarring experience. Myers lulls readers with the monotony and boredom of everyday life for soldiers in Iraq; then just as you settle into that idea of life catastrophe strikes. The sheer psychic rift of inaction shifting dangerously fast into violent action was the greatest thing I took from this novel. While it is still difficult for me to imagine the life of a solider I feel that this novel helped put me into their frame of mind.

World Book Night: The Fourth Batch

World Book Night has come and gone. I had a blast distributing my books; each year the process has been a little different, and I look forward to next year’s excitement!

Unfortunately, I didn’t complete the list before going out into the world on the Bard’s day, but I’m still reading my way through.

Peter Heller’s The Dog Stars is a post-apocalyptic novel with strong prose and a disregard for writing conventions thus it is frequently compared to McCarthy’s The Road but in my opinion it lacks the overall impact of the earlier novel. Hig is a pilot using a single prop airplane and a cache of weapons to maintain control of small plot of land against marauders and cannibals. Heller describes the relationship between Hig and his dog so well that it is almost painful – this relationship is the final shred of Hig’s humanity and it is stirring and beautiful.
 

Middle grade fantasy is probably one of my favorite genres and The Ruins of Gorlan by John Flanagan is a really fun addition to the category. This novel about a young apprentice to a ranger (a sort of magician/knight) is perfect of fans of Harry Potter and Percy Jackson. Super quick, fun read!

I spent most of my time reading This Boy’s Life by Tobias Wolff wishing that I could talk to my grandfather about it. My grandfather used to tell me about his “wild days” with his brothers – sneaking out and wreaking havoc, and this novel about a boy transitioning from childhood to adulthood in the 1950s is something he would have understood and recognized. Wolff looks back on his memories and was able to extract exactly how he was developing into his adult self and describe all of the difficulties and confusion therein.
 

Me and Earl and the Dying Girl by Jesse Andrews falls into another category of young adult fiction that I love – books about outsider teens! This is sad and funny and self-deprecating with a perfect sarcastic tone, but it is ultimately life-affirming (in a totally knowing and nonobnoxious way). Great YA especially for film nerds.

Sadly, Carl Hiaasen’s Hoot may be my least favorite from this batch. This is a novel about a kid fight to save a rare species of owl in the Everglades. The environmentalism is never overbearing and I can see the humor in it, but it never really touched me on either level. I feel like Hiaasen has taken his brand of Florida quirk a little too far for me.

World Book Night: The Third Batch

Five more down, another eighteen to go! Let's get on with the show.

Katherine Paterson's Bridge to Terabithia was a reread for me, but I haven't read it since the fifth grade so it felt pretty new. I absolutely hated this book as an elementary schooler; for the life of me, I cannot remember why. Adult me really enjoyed it. I was thisclose to crying by the end, which is really saying something when you consider my frozen, icy heart.


The Lighthouse Road by Peter Geye feels like the literary pick thus far. I feel like every year the committee picks a literary novel that has a strong sense of place (somewhere in America) and each year I've been a little bored by them. This book isn't bad at all and it was a quick, entertaining read - it just felt a little meh...


I am so happy that the WBN choosers chose a graphic novel this year! Make this a thing that happens every year! I hearts and flowers love literary graphic novel especially autobiographical (or semi-autobiographical) ones and Same Difference by Derek Kirk Kim is no different (ugh, sorry). Great novel about being young and stupid and how we learn and grow.

Another thing I hope World Book Night includes every year - poetry collections! Philip Smith edited this year's collection of the 100 Best-Loved Poems. You can't go wrong with a best-loved edition; even if it is missing some of my favorites like Poe's "The Bells" (my all time favorite poem). A memory for you: my mom used to read that poem to us as kids. It was pure perfection and I wish I had a recording to imbed here. I just remember thinking how cool the poem was and how awesome my mom was. So, I don't really hold it against Smith for not including this poem, but he should meet my mom.
 

I didn't really love Pride and Prejudice so it is no surprise that I didn't love Sharon Lathan's Miss Darcy Falls in Love. It's a good regency romance, just not my thing (and holy copy editing errors, Batman!). The plot revolves around Mr. Darcy's younger sister, Georgiana, and her love triangle. And there's music...and sex. I did not need to read about Georgiana Darcy having sex. But that's just me. However, there was a slow burn to this romance that was fun to read considering so many romance stories revolve around characters who have just met but will now die without each other. This love is based in a great friendship and partnership - and that's awesome.

World Book Night: The Second Batch

I am all sorts of behind on my World Book Night reading this year. I fear Victoria may have jinxed me by sharing my progress with our mailing list along with the words “will she finish in time?”

The Zookeeper’s Wife by Diane Ackerman is definitely one of those cases of the truth being even more riveting than fiction. Ackerman writes the story of Antonina Zabinski the wife of a Polish zookeeper during World War II. The Zabinskis spent the war years hiding Jews in their villa and helping the underground in Warsaw. The book is often devastating and the sheer absurdity of the war and the actions of the Nazis are laid bare, but what triumphs over all of that is the survivor spirit of the Zabinskis and the Poles described throughout the book. Ackerman writes of interviews given by Jan Zabinski wherein he expresses that he and his wife were not heroes. They merely "did it because it was the right thing to do." Jan said "I only did my duty." To know both such courage and conviction...I can only imagine.

I was so looking forward to Eleanor Brown's The Weird Sisters. I love books about readers, and a book about three sisters raised by a Shakespearian scholar seemed right in my wheelhouse. Alas, it was not meant to be. I grew weary of this book because the sisters were so frustrating. Each of them is unhappy in a life of their own making and while the book is about them finding their way back to each other and to happiness I just sort of lost patience with them. However, the first person plural narration was a stoke of genius on Brown's part and truly gets to the root of what siblings are.

My favorite book on the list so far must be Where'd You Go, Bernadette by Maria Semple. I did not really expect too much from this book; I don't typically go in for comic novels. But Semple has written this truly funny work of satire that just blew me away. I remember the hype machine working really hard for this book when it was initially released and I am so sorry I ignored it for so long. Not only is this book wildly entertaining, but Maria Semple has an understanding of depression and failed promise that very few people do. I highly recommend this book!

Terry McMillan's Waiting to Exhale is said to be a book that defined a generation, so I was excited to read it and get a glimpse into a life that is different from my own. This book is unflinchingly honest; for all of the internet ink that goes into dissecting Lena Dunham's HBO series Girls here is McMillan's Waiting to Exhale, written 22 years ago and just as uncompromising and often unlikeable as this so-called trailblazing show. The biggest thing I took away from this novel was the reality McMillan described - these are four fully formed women. They are weak, they are strong, they are endlessly frustrating, they are lovable, but mostly they are real. The fact that I wanted to punch both Robin and Bernadine in the face is a testament to just how invested I was in their lives.

I have somehow made it to my advanced age having never read a mystery by Agatha Christie. So, thank you World Book Night for filling yet another glaring omission in my reading life. After the Funeral is the 29th Hercule Poirot mystery and it's a great whodunnit - each time I felt like I had decided which of the characters was the murderer Christie and her master detective spun my ideas on their head and had me pointing the finger at another possible perp. In the end, I was surprised and excited to hear Poirot explain just how he solved the case. The classist ideology and xenophobia were a bit hard to swallow at times, but such is as it is in classic novels.

World Book Night: The First Batch

I’ve read through the first five of my thirty-three unread World Book Night titles. It’s an exciting year so far and I can’t wait to move further down the list. I haven’t read anything Earth shattering yet but there are some solid books to look forward to.

Ransom Riggs’ Miss Peregrine’s Home for Peculiar Children is exactly my kind of scary (as in not scary at all but with a high creep factor). Using a series of very strange and very cool vintage photographs Riggs tells the story of Jacob’s discovery of Miss Peregrine’s orphanage. Jacob’s great grandparents died in Poland as the Third Reich entered Eastern Europe, but before that happened they sent their son (Jacob’s grandfather) to a special home on an island off the coast of Wales. There Miss Peregrine took care of children orphaned by the war and hunted by monsters. As Jacob looks deeper into his grandfather’s past he discovers that Miss Peregrine’s was not a home for ordinary orphans and the monsters his grandfather fought were more than just Nazis. It all gets a little overthetop, but it is a lot of fun. Riggs built the novel around actual found photographs; this creates a few narrative difficulties, but makes for a unique reading experience.

 

Hotel on the Corner of Bitter and Sweet by Jamie Ford is more sentimental than my usual fare, but I so enjoyed this novel. I got caught up in everything that I wanted for the characters and it was often difficult to stop reading. Ford stays away from soapboxing and moralizing in this tale of love in the time of Japanese internment and tells a somewhat deceptively simple story of first loves, family obligations, betrayal, and loyalty. A really enjoyable read and the book I will be handing out on April 23^rd!

I am a long time fan of A Prairie Home Companion. I was so excited to read Pontoon because while I love Garrison Keillor’s radio show I had never read any of his Lake Wobegone novels. This book just didn’t do anything for me. I would venture to say it is the weirdest book I have ever read. A lot of descriptions of weird sex, sad people, and outlandish events. Sure some of it is funny but most of it is just absurd.

Presumed Innocent by Scott Turow is probably the book on the list that I will like the least, but I have gotten used to the one dark mystery novel on the list each year. I chose to do this one in audiobook and that was definitely one of my better decisions. It is narrated by Edward Herrman who is quite possibly one of the best audiobook narrators ever (Richard Gilmore forever!). So, Presumed Innocent is a piney romance novel with a murder at its core. I have dubbed it a Sex-Mystery; is this a genre? Interesting fact: conversations with other readers have shown me that this novel is the 1987 version of Gone Girl – a megabestselling dark mystery with an explosive twist. Everyone read it and everyone talked about it. Not for me but good going WBN book pickers; I think this one will be popular on the 23^rd.

It feels strange to say but I had no real emotional response to Cheryl Strayed’s Wild, and I typically like this type of memoir for all the feels it provides. I enjoyed reading about her progress, following her as she hiked the Pacific Crest Trail in order to kick heroin and become the person she needed to be. I admired her strength as a person and talents as a writer, but on the whole Wild did not move me. I’m going to chalk that up to too much hype and expectation. I will definitely be reading more of Strayed’s work though.

Omar: Why I Want to Give Same Difference

This is my first time participating in World Book Night. As an avid proponent of comic books and graphic novels, Derek Kirk Kim’s Same Difference was an obvious choice for me. Graphic novels are largely still fighting to be considered as a valid story-telling medium. I truly believe in the importance of graphic novels, and how they can help people learn to love to read.

When I was a child, I didn’t care much for reading.  It wasn’t until a friend introduced me to the X-Men comic books that I realized reading could be fun. At that point, I started reading every X-Men comic I could get my hands on (which, at the time, wasn’t many). My mother worked right next to a library, so I ventured in one day and found some X-Men novels. By the end of the first book, I was hooked. Not just on X-Men, but on reading. It was like watching an entire movie, but in your head!

As I grew up, I read comics less and less. But my love of reading never changed. I spent most of my middle school and high school years reading. It wasn’t until after high school that I returned to comic books and rediscovered my love for the medium. There were some amazing characters fighting against all odds to save the people they cared about. But there were also non-superhero books. There were books like Sandman, a magical journey through the realms of dreams. And Y the Last Man, a book about the last male in a female-dominated world.  There were so many wonderful, awe-inspiring stories being told in the comic book/graphic novel medium.

Graphic novels are still fighting to earn the respect they deserve. Many people view graphic novels as less than traditional novels. Many refuse to accept them as a valid medium, claiming they’re just for kids (a false generalization). I’ve even heard people say that children who read comic books and graphic novels never learn how to use their imagination, and therefore never enjoy reading books. To all the naysayers, I say: try reading a few, truly outstanding graphic novels before you judge them. I came to love reading via comic books, and I doubt anyone who knows me would claim my imagination doesn’t work.

I would like to give out copies of Derek Kirk Kim’s Same Difference to show people that comic books and graphic novels are not just superheroes. Graphic novels are as varied as traditional novels; there’s something for everyone. All it takes is one great graphic novel and one person passionate about the medium to change the world’s minds. Same Difference could be that novel for many people. And I would like to be that person. Graphic novels deserve respect.

Victoria: Why I Want to Give The Perks of Being a Wallflower

I want to give out The Perks of Being a Wallflower for World Book Night 2014 because it meant something to me, and I would like the opportunity to give light or non-readers a book that will hopefully mean something to them as well.  Books are usually valued as entertainment, but I think they are often undervalued for the impact they can have on their readers’ lives.  So many people don’t read because they simply don’t enjoy it, and I am of the opinion that those people just haven’t found the right book yet.  I think everyone needs to have at least one book change their life, and I believe that The Perks of Being a Wallflower has the potential to be that book for quite a few people.  I plan to give my books out at LSU to people who either don’t have a love for reading or who have lost it in the slog of classes and homework assignments.  A book like Perks is short, intriguing, and simple, and I think it has an excellent chance of being that spark to get even the busiest students back to reading.  


I want to help encourage people to not only read in general, but to open themselves up to letting books change and influence them in ways they might not even realize are possible.  Reading a book and feeling it affect you is a powerful thing that I think everyone should experience, and I want to help bring this experience to others.  Perks is a powerful book, as anyone who has read it will likely attest.  It holds themes, ideas, and experiences that just about anyone can relate to and understand, which makes it an excellent book to give out to people who don’t really read much or at all.  It is also recognizable, since the movie was released about a year ago.  People might be more inclined to give the book a chance if they have heard of it or enjoyed the film.  The main goal is to get people to read the book we give them, since even one book is better than none.  The larger goal is to get people reading more books in general, through the one book we give them for WBN.  We want to help them realize that reading can be an enjoyable and even moving experience if they’d only give it a chance, and I think The Perks of Being a Wallflower is a book that has a chance of meeting both of those goals.


Victoria previously wrote about Perks here.

Michelle: Why I want to give Hotel on the Corner of Bitter and Sweet

I spent quite a while trying to decide what book I wanted to distribute on World Book Night next year. Of the three I had read none really worked with the place I wanted to hand out books (I’ll be at Women Outreaching Women, a women's shelter here in Denham). I wasn’t particularly feeling the book I was reading last week so I started flipping through a few of the World Book Night picks…a few pages in I knew I wanted to give out copies of Hotel on the Corner of Bitter and Sweet by Jamie Ford. Just that reference to the nature of life in the title was enough for me to know that this was the book for the women I will be talking to on April 23^rd.

Jamie Ford has created a deceptively simple story of first loves, family obligations, betrayal, and loyalty. You never feel bombarded with the sadness or sentimentality of the novel. It is a perfect balance of feeling, truth, and history. Hotel on the Corner of Bitter and Sweet is the story of Henry Lee at two distinct times in his life; when he first fell in love just prior to the Japanese internment of the 1940s and forty years later upon the death of his wife. Henry’s story is about what we want and need out of life and each other. It is about the power of relationships.

Then there is the history. Ford did a wonderful job telling the story of the camps, and he does so without soapboxing. This is an important part of American history that is for the most part glossed over. Ford shines a light on it revealing the fear of the time for exactly what it is.

I am so excited to have the opportunity to distribute copies of this book on World Book Night. It is a well told story with characters that the reader can grab on to. I can see it converting quite a few readers and definitely fulfilling the goal of World Book Night.

World Book Night - Those I've Read

I was so excited to get next year’s World Book Night picks! This will be my third year as a WBN giver and my third year to read through all of the picks from January to April 23^rd. This year there are thirty-five picks, five more than in previous years. I better get started! I am excited to be filling more gaps in my reading life (Agatha Christie! Joseph Heller!) as well as being introduced to books that were not previously on my radar. Reading these picks has absolutely helped me out as a bookseller. I used to believe that I was a broad reader and to some extent I have been, but I rarely approach genre fiction out of a lack of knowledge. World Book Night is giving me a mini crash course in genre fiction (especially mystery and romance) and I am loving it.

There are only three books on this list that I have read previously this time around.

I read Katherine Paterson’s Bridge to Terabithia in the fifth grade. And I absolutely loathed it! I think twenty years is enough time between us and I will definitely be rereading this one to discover my feelings about it as an adult.

I was in high school the first time I read The Perks of Being a Wallflower by Stephen Chbosky. And the second time, third time, fourth time. I’m no longer sure how many times I read this brilliant epistolary tale of a young man lost in the world and finding himself through words and friends. I reread Chbosky’s book for the first time as an adult when the film version was released in 2012. It still resonated with me even as it struck me in different places in my head and my heart than it did when I was a teen. I wrote about my reread here.

It was college when I read Anthony Bourdain’s Kitchen Confidential. Specifically, it was the summer of 2008 while I was on a three month long road trip to Alaska with my grandparents. Kitchen Confidential was my companion as we travelled up through the Badlands. I regaled my driving companions with (slightly cleaned up) stories of Bourdain’s wild adventures. I shared with my grandfather his rants against vegetarians (I was one at the time) and celebrity chefs (Food Network is a favorite of my grandmother’s). It was a perfect travel book. An interesting World Book Night pick; it will definitely keep new readers interested.

And that’s it! I’ve got thirty-two great looking books ahead of me and I cannot wait to read and write about them.

World Book Night 2014 Titles Announced

The titles for World Book Night on April 23, 2014 have been announced!  Sign up here to be a WBN Giver on April 23, 2014, and check out the full list below:

The Tipping Point by Malcolm Gladwell

This celebrated bestseller, now in paperback, is a book that is changing the way Americans think about selling products and disseminating ideas. The new Afterword by the author describes how readers can constructively apply the tipping point principle in their own lives and work.

 After the Funeral by Agatha Christie

After the reading of a will at a Victorian mansion, the sister of the deceased patriarch suspects he met with foul play. But before long, Cora is banished from the family tree--with eight blows of a hatchet. And detective Hercule Poirot suspects she won't be the last to go.

Presumed Innocent by Scott Turow

Prosecutor Rusty Sabich is transformed from accuser to accused when he is handed an explosive case--that of the brutal murder of a woman who happens to be his former lover.

The Dog Stars by Peter Heller

A riveting, powerful novel about a pilot living in a world filled with loss--and what he is willing to risk to rediscover love. Hig survived the flu that killed everyone he knows. His wife is gone, his friends are dead. But when a random transmission somehow beams through his radio, the voice ignites a hope deep inside him that a better life--something like his old life--exists.

Same Difference by Derek Kirk Kim

A series of short stories in graphic novel format follows a group of friends in their twenties as they navigate young adulthood and relationships.

Kitchen Confidential by Anthony Bourdain

New York chef Tony Bourdain gives away secrets of the trade in his wickedly funny, inspiring memoir and expose. From his first oyster in the Gironde to his lowly position as a dishwasher in a honky-tonk, Bourdain's tales of the kitchen are as passionate as they are unpredictable. "Kitchen Confidential" reveals what Bourdain calls "25 years of sex, drugs, bad behavior and haute cuisine".

Sunrise Over Fallujah by Walter Dean Myers

A two-time Newbery Honor-winning author looks at a contemporary war with the same power and searing insight he had brought to the Vietnam War of his classic, Fallen Angels.

100 Best-Loved Poems by Philip Smith (Ed.)

"The Passionate Shepherd to His Love," "Shall I compare thee to a summer's day?" "Death, be not proud," "The Raven," "The Road Not Taken," plus works by Blake, Wordsworth, Byron, Shelley, Keats, many others.

Catch-22 by Joseph Heller

Fifty years after its original publication, Catch-22 remains a cornerstone of American literature and one of the funniest—and most celebrated—books of all time. In recent years it has been named to “best novels” lists by Time, Newsweek, the Modern Library, and the London Observer.

Hoot by Carl Hiaasen

New to Florida, Roy spots the running boy--running away from the school bus, carrying no books and wearing no shoes. Sensing a mystery, Roy sets himself on the boy's trail, which leads him to potty-trained alligators, a fake-fart champion, and a renegade eco-avenger.

Pontoon by Garrison Keillor

A fresh and funny Lake Wobegon novel about a woman with a secret life. After Evelyn dies in her sleep, it is revealed she has been in love for years with a Las Vegas man. Pontoon is a heartfelt and comic work by one of America's greatest storytellers.

Wait Till Next Year by Doris Kearns Goodwin

Set in the suburbs of New York in the 1950s, this memoir recreates the postwar era, when owning a single-family home meant the realization of a dream, everyone knew everyone else on the block, and children gathered in the streets to play. Here, Doris Goodwin recalls growing up loving her father and the glorious game of baseball.

Miss Darcy Falls in Love by Sharon Lathan

Noble young ladies were expected to play an instrument, but societal restrictions would have chafed for Georgiana Darcy, an accomplished musician. Her tour of Europe draws the reader into the musical life of the day and a riveting love story of a young woman learning to direct her destiny--and understand her own heart.

Young Men and Fire by Norman Maclean

In 1949, a crew of U.S. Forest Service Smokejumpers parachuted into a Montana forest fire. In less than an hour, all but three were dead or mortally burned. Haunted by these deaths for 40 years, Maclean reconstructs the pieces print.

The Ruins of Gorlan by John Flanagan

Full of adventure, storytelling, magic, and deep characterization, this debut fantasy introduces the magic-practicing Rangers, protectors of the kingdom, and Will, a 15-year-old villager who has been chosen as a Ranger's apprentice.

Bridge to Terabithia by Katherine Paterson

Jess and Leslie Burke become inseparable. It doesn't matter to Jess that Leslie dresses funny, or that her family has a lot of money -- but no TV. Leslie has imagination. Together, she and Jess create Terabithia, a magical kingdom in the woods where the two of them reign as king and queen, and their imaginations set the only limits. Then one morning a terrible tragedy occurs. Only when Jess is able to come to grips with this tragedy does he finally understand the strength and courage Leslie has given him.

Bobcat and Other Stories by Rebecca Lee

Using a range of landscapes and countries in each short story, Lee creates characters so wonderfully flawed that it's impossible not to feel for them when their fragile beliefs of romantic love, domestic bliss, or academic seclusion fail to provide them with the sort of force field they'd hoped for.

The Botany of Desire by Michael Pollan

Every schoolchild learns about the mutually beneficial dance of honeybees and flowers: the bee collects nectar and pollen to make honey and, in the process, spreads the flowers' genes. In The Botany of Desire,  Pollan ingeniously demonstrates how people and domesticated plants have formed a similarly reciprocal relationship.

The Perks of Being a Wallflower by Stephen Chbosky

Caught between trying to live his life and trying to run from it, Charlie is navigating through the strange worlds of love, drugs, "The Rocky Horror Picture Show", and dealing with the loss of a good friend and his favorite aunt.

The Lighthouse Road by Peter Geye

Against the wilds of sea and wood, a young immigrant woman settles into life outside Duluth in the 1890s, still shocked at finding herself alone in a new country, abandoned and adrift; in the early 1920s, her orphan son, now grown, falls in love with the one woman he shouldn't and uses his best skills to build them their own small ark to escape. But their pasts travel with them, threatening to capsize even their fragile hope. In this triumphant new novel, Peter Geye has crafted another deeply moving tale of a misbegotten family shaped by the rough landscape in which they live--often at the mercy of wildlife and weather--and by the rough edges of their own breaking hearts.

Code Name Verity by Elizabeth Wein

A British spy plane crashes in Nazi-occupied France. Its pilot and passenger are best friends. One of the girls has a chance at survival. The other has lost the game before it's barely begun. When "Verity" is arrested by the Gestapo, she's sure she doesn't stand a chance. As a secret agent captured in enemy territory, she's living a spy's worst nightmare.

Enchanted by Alethea Kontis

A charming tumble of fairy tales blended into one delicious novel, spiced with humor and sprinkled with true love.

Wild by Cheryl Strayed

At twenty-two, Cheryl Strayed thought she had lost everything. In the wake of her mother's death, her family scattered and her own marriage was soon destroyed. Four years later, with nothing more to lose, she made the most impulsive decision of her life. With no experience or training, driven only by blind will, she would hike more than a thousand miles of the Pacific Crest Trail from the Mojave Desert through California and Oregon to Washington State--and she would do it alone. Told with suspense and style, sparkling with warmth and humor, Wild powerfully captures the terrors and pleasures of one young woman forging ahead against all odds on a journey that maddened, strengthened, and ultimately healed her.

Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children by Ransom Riggs

A mysterious island. An abandoned orphanage. A strange collection of very curious photographs. It all waits to be discovered in Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children, an unforgettable novel that mixes fiction and photography in a thrilling reading experience.

When I Was Puerto Rican by Esmeralda Santiago

Magic, sexual tension, high comedy, and intense drama move through an enchanted yet harsh autobiography, in the story of a young girl who leaves rural Puerto Rico for New York's tenements and a chance for success. *Available in both English and Spanish for World Book Night givers

Waiting to Exhale by Terry McMillan

A hilarious and heartbreaking look at four vibrant black women in their thirties, who aren't holding their breath waiting for Mr. Right--but they haven't stopped hoping.

Where'd You Go, Bernadette by Maria Semple

Bernadette Fox is notorious. To her husband, she's a fearlessly opinionated partner; to fellow mothers in Seattle, she's a disgrace; and to 15-year-old Bee, she is a friend and mom. Then Bernadette disappears. Bee compiles e-mail messages, official documents, and secret correspondence--creating a compulsively readable and touching novel. *Also available in Large Print for World Book Night Givers

Hotel on the Corner of Bitter and Sweet by Jamie Ford

The Japanese internment of WWII comes alive in this timeless story, set in 1940s Seattle, of the power of the human heart to rise above hatred and bigotry. This is a book to share with others. -- Marilyn Scheer, East West Bookshop, Seattle, WA *Also available in Large Print for World Book Night Givers

The Weird Sisters by Eleanor Brown

A major new talent tackles the complicated terrain of sisters, the power of books, and the places we decide to call home.

The Zookeeper's Wife by Diane Ackerman

A true story--as powerful as "Schindler's List"--in which the keepers of the Warsaw Zoo saved hundreds of people from Nazi hands.

This Boy's Life by Tobias Wolff

This unforgettable, bestselling memoir by a gifted writer introduces the young Toby Wolff, by turns tough and vulnerable, crafty and bumbling, and ultimately winning.

Tales of the City by Armistead Maupin

For more than three decades Armistead Maupin's Tales of the City has blazed its own trail through popular culture—from a groundbreaking newspaper serial to a classic novel, to a television event that entranced millions around the world. The first of six novels about the denizens of the mythic apartment house at 28 Barbary Lane, Tales is both a sparkling comedy of manners and an indelible portrait of an era that changed forever the way we live.

Me and Earl and the Dying Girl by Jesse Andrews

Seventeen-year-old Greg has managed to become part of every social group at his Pittsburgh high school without having any friends, but his life changes when his mother forces him to befriend Rachel, a girl he once knew in Hebrew school who has leukemia.

Zora and Me by Victoria Bond and T.R. Simon

A fictionalized account of Zora Neale Hurston's childhood with her best friend Carrie, in Eatonville, Florida, as they learn about life, death, and the differences between truth, lies, and pretending. Includes an annotated bibliography of the works of Zora Neale Hurston, a short biography of the author, and information about Eatonville, Florida.

 The Raven's Warrior by Vincent Pratchett

Wounded in battle (900 A. D.), a near dead Celtic warrior is taken by Viken raiders and sold into a Baghdad slave market. He is dragged further East, through the desert, into the Middle Kingdom where he is bought by a Taoist Priest and his beautiful daughter. Hazy images of silk, herbs, needles, potions and steel, can only lead to one thing, he has been purchased by a wizard and his witch. Arkthar fears for his soul.