Adult

When novelist Andy Drake returns to his hometown to care for his ailing father, a reconnection with his childhood friend Rachel escalates into a secret love affair. For Rachel, struggling to maintain the facade of a picture-perfect life, it’s an escape from an emotionally abusive marriage. Then Andy receives an anonymous note warning him to end the affair. Or else. Devoured this book in one sitting.

Joan is a thirtysomething ICU doctor at a busy New York City hospital. The daughter of Chinese parents who came to the United States to secure the American dream for their children, Joan is intensely devoted to her work, happily solitary, successful. But when Joan’s father suddenly dies and her mother returns to America to reconnect with her children, a series of events sends Joan spiraling out of her comfort zone just as her hospital, her city, and the world are forced to reckon with a health crisis more devastating than anyone could have imagined.

Get this: eating less and exercising more is not necessarily the way to create sustainable weight loss. In this very readable semi-autobiographical account, Fritz uncovers over 20 common evidence-based reasons that almost no one talks about – including the power of the words you speak aloud to yourself.

Every family has its own mythology. When Fly and Stela meet in 21st Century New York City, it seems like fate. He's a Black American musician from a mixed-religious background who knows all about heartbreak. She’s a Catholic science teacher from the Caribbean, looking for lasting love. But are they meant to be? The answer goes back decades – all the way to their parents’ earliest loves.

A novel version detailing the life of Rosalind Franklin – the woman whose contributions to discovering the DNA double helix were despicably upstaged by her male counterparts. Read this, and you’ll hunger to learn more about the real story.

The fun-loving NFL Insider on Fox NFL Sunday bravely shares his fight through depression and anxiety, his successful careers in NFL journalism and business, as well as his work with military vets struggling with PTSD. Glazer’s ability to laugh at himself and take on his mental struggles and share them in order to help others makes this an inspiring read.

Want to make this a great year? Well, this is just the book for you. Subtitled “Practical Thoughts for Better Decisions in Life,” this is a book you can read quickly on a brief flight that you will want to return to again and again to chart your growth in various parts of your life. Essential reading for anyone looking to improve.

Tale of the extraordinary women who raised James Baldwin, Martin Luther King and Malcolm X, whose lives spanned Jim Crow, the Great Migration, the civil rights movement, and the specific prejudices Black women faced during these and many more pivotal moments in American history.

Zauner’s unflinching, powerful memoir about growing up Korean American, losing her mother and forging her own identity. Have tissue handy.

I don’t normally list education books on this site, but Frank is a friend and a wonderful speaker. You’ll learn more about digital organization from him in ten minutes than anyone else can teach in a 30-day course. So timely for educators dealing with remote learning.

I have my wife and Janee Dahl to thank for this five-volume series of quirky, funny diatribes that make for quick, happy reading. Check them out: you can finish each volume in under two hours, and they get progressively better.

From 1954 to 1981, Brennan wrote for The New Yorker's “Talk of the Town” department under the pen name “The Long–Winded Lady.” Her wonderful observations of New York form a timeless, bittersweet tribute to what she called the “most reckless, most ambitious, most confused, most comical, the saddest and coldest and most human of cities.”

The holidays are filled with relaxing music, so I decided to grab a biography from one of the master vocalists, Tony Bennett. In this rich and beautiful memoir, the legendary Grammy and Emmy Award–winning singer takes us behind the scenes of his multi-platinum career and provides a “master class in life” that reveals his journey as an artist and all the amazing characters he has encountered along the way.  

Looking at the headlines – the worsening climate crisis, a global pandemic, loss of biodiversity, political upheaval – it can be hard to feel optimistic. And yet hope has never been more desperately needed. This book offers an intimate and thought-provoking dialogue on one of the most sought after and least understood elements of human nature: hope. Sorely needed – now, more than ever.

A beautiful and moving novel of compassion in the face of loss, of the small acts that turn friends into family, and of the possibilities to achieve happiness at any age.