Adult Fiction

What to Read After, or While Waiting for, The Fault in Our Stars

/ Sharon Tyler / 1 Comment

Are you among the masses that read and loved The Fault in Our Stars by John Green? If not, know that the book is emotionally charged. While considered a young adult novel because of the ages of the two main characters, the book has been read and raved about from teens and adults alike. It is not an easy read, but one that is worth the emotional investment that it seems to require. The book is about sixteen year old Hazel, a stage IV thyroid cancer patient, who has accepted her terminal diagnosis. Then a chance meeting with a boy at cancer support group forces her to reexamine her perspective on love, loss, and life.

Going Bovine by Libba Bray
Cameron Smith, a disaffected sixteen year-old who, after being diagnosed with Creutzfeld Jakob’s (aka mad cow) disease, sets off on a road trip with a death-obsessed video gaming dwarf he meets in the hospital in an attempt to find a cure.

You Have Seven Messages by Stewart Lewis
Teenaged Luna, who lives on Manhattan’s Upper West Side with her movie director father, tries to piece together the death of her mother with the seven unheard messages left on her forgotten cell phone.

Me & Earl & 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.

How to Save a Life by Sara Zarr
Told from their own viewpoints, seventeen-year-old Jill, in grief over the loss of her father, and Mandy, nearly nineteen, are thrown together when Jill’s mother agrees to adopt Mandy’s unborn child but nothing turns out as they had anticipated.

A Love Story Starring My Dead Best Friend by Emily Horner
As she tries to sort out her feelings of love, seventeen-year-old Cass, a spunky math genius with an introverted streak, finds a way to memorialize her dead best friend.

Before I Die by Jenny Downham
A terminally ill teenaged girl makes and carries out a list of things to do before she dies.

Hate List by Jennifer Brown
Sixteen-year-old Valerie, whose boyfriend Nick committed a school shooting at the end of their junior year, struggles to cope with integrating herself back into high school life, unsure herself whether she was a hero or a villain.

Still looking for more? Then you might also be interested in: Saving June by Hannah Harrington, Wintergirls by Laurie Halse Anderson, Ask the Passengers by A S King, Every Day by David Levithan, Dash and Lily’s Book of Dares by Rachel Cohn, David Levithan,  The Lover’s Dictionary by David Levithan, Please Ignore Vera Dietz by A S King,  Just One Day by Gayle Forman, Where She Went by Gayle Forman, The Moon and More by Sarah Dessen, Hold Me Closer, Necromancer Lish McBride,  Wonder by R J Palacio, The Cardturner by Louis Sachar, and Speechless by Hannah Harrington.

Top Audiobook Picks Around the World

/ Susan O. / Leave a comment

Do they even HAVE audiobooks in other countries?  They most certainly do!  Here are the number-one audiobook requests from iTunes around the world, so grab your earphones and go global with these best sellers. Can’t find it? Request it!  We’d be happy to get it for you!

UK – Bridget Jones: Mad About the Boy – Helen Fielding   Bridget Jones has hit middle age, facing the challenges of single parenthood and re-entering the dating world with all its technological traps in this funny and enjoyable sequel.

France – Inferno   Brown takes on Dante Alighieri and his Divine Comedy as Robert Langdon races through Italy to solve the clues and save the world from a terrorist plot to infect the world in his latest mystery thriller.

Canada – Winners – Danielle Steele    Steele weaves together a tale of loneliness and companionship as a surgeon and her patient’s father are faced with grief and tragedy, and learn to live again.

Ireland – The Garden Party and Other Stories – Maeve Binchy.     A collection of short stories by best-selling author Maeve Binchy. Stories included are: The Garden Party read by Niamh Cusack; The Special Sale read by Dervla Kirwan; The Sensible Celebration read by Doreen Hepburn and Dollys Mother read by Stella McCusker.

Portugal – The Blood Crows – Simon Scarrow    Two thousand years ago, Prefect Cato fights with native tribes to maintain Roman control over Londinium and England. Back in Rome, Emperor Claudius struggles to maintain his empire with or without England.

Sweden – The Alchemist – Paulo Coelho     Santiago, a simple Andalusian shepherd boy, dreams of  finding the greatest worldly treasure ever discovered. From Spain he travels to the markets of Tangiers, across the Egyptian desert,  to a fateful encounter with the mysterious alchemist.

Netherlands – The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time – Mark Haddon    A moderately autistic boy witnesses a crime, and struggles to make understanding of what he saw.

Greece – Jonathan Livingston Seagull – Richard Bach    The 197o best-seller about the spiritual journey of a seagull, who thinks soaring is a loftier goal in life than eating. A short book of few words, it packs a powerful punch as the seagull learns to realize that sometimes personal goals may not be popular with those around you, but the journey of self-discovery is sometimes the loftiest goal of all.

Germany – The 100 Year Old Man Who Climbed Out the Window and Disappeared by Jonas Jonasson.    In order to avoid his 100th birthday party, Allan Karlsson climbs out the window of his room at the nursing home, heads to the bus stop, steals a suitcase from a fellow passenger and winds up on a strange and sometimes dangerous adventure, which is nothing new to a man with a lot of history under his belt.

Denmark – The Preacher by Camilla Lackberg     A child stumbles upon the body of a murdered woman.  Soon two more bodies are discovered, and another girl disappears.  Can the constable find the murderer and find the missing girl before it’s too late?

10 Books We’re Looking Forward to in February

/ cheshirelib / Leave a comment

Every month, librarians from around the country pick the top ten new books they’d most like to share with readers. The results are published on LibraryReads.org. One of the goals of LibraryReads is to highlight the important role public libraries play in building buzz for new books and new authors. Click through to read more about what new and upcoming books librarians consider buzzworthy this month. The top ten titles are:

  1. Red Rising by Pierce Brown.
  2. The Good Luck of Right Now by Matthew Quick.
  3. This Dark Road to Mercy by Wiley Cash.
  4. The Martian by Andy Weir.
  5. After I’m Gone by Laura Lippman.
  6. Ripper by Isabel Allende.
  7. The Ghost of the Mary Celeste by Valerie Martin.
  8. The Wife, the Maid, and the Mistress by Ariel Lawhon.
  9. The Winter People by Jennifer McMahon.
  10. E.E. Cummings by Susan Cheever.

Sports Romance Books

/ Linda / Leave a comment

sports heartSports romance books are becoming increasingly more and more popular.   These athletes are generally at the top of their game, rich, and famous.  They are confident, stubborn,  dedicated, focused, passionate, and have a soft side  – which makes them strong, interesting characters.  All of them eventually realize that the love of a woman is what they need to make their life complete.  These stories are not overloaded with sports scenes or terminology.  There is just enough to give you a realistic insight into the sport and the challenges these athletes and the women in their lives face.

(On a side note:  Model Jed Hill seems the most popular choice for the many “naked chest” covers of sport romance books.  See his “stats” here and his facebook page here.  Enjoy!)

With the  cold days and nights ahead, turn up the heat with a Sport Romance!  Here’s a sampling of some titles available at the Cheshire Library.  Some are series where the first title is listed to get you started, although you don’t need to read them in order.

Tracy Solheim’s  Out of Bounds footballseries.  Book one – Game On.  Book two – Foolish Games. The funny, sexy and heartwarming exploits of the Blaze football stars and the women in their lives.

Susan Elizabeth Phillips has a sports series centering around football called Chicago Stars.  The first title is It Had to be You. A sexy, outrageous New York woman inherits a football team.

Let’s Misbehave by Lisa Plumley is a football story centering around Quarterback Cash Connelly and his need to find a nanny.

Another football themed title is Sweet Spot (book two of the Bakery Sisters trilogy)by Susan Mallery.  A touching, heartwarming story of a youth football coach and a bakery owner going through hard times.

Rachel Gibson has a hockey series, Chinooks Hockey Team.  The first title is Simply Irresistible.  Realisticstory about a hockey jock tamed by an irresistible woman.

Deirdre Martin also has a hockey series, Blades with the first title being Body Check.  Fun, sexy, withwonderful characters and story line.

Just In Time (Alaskan Night series) by Addison Fox about an injured hockey star returning to Alaska to heal and try to make things right with the girl back home.

Molly O’Keefe – two of her best poignant and deeply sensual books are hockey stories – Crazy Thing Called Love and Can’t Buy Me Love.

Jill Shalvis offers two baseball theme books – Double Play and Slow Heat. Jill’s books are humorous,sexy and fast reads.

Stealing Home is part of Sherryl Woods’ series Sweet Magnolias.  It’s about a single mom and her son’s baseball coach.

Staying with baseball, Pitch Perfect (A Cricket Creek Novel) by LuAnn McLane.  A hard-swinging baseball team and three hometown heroes try to revitalize the community.

Let Me Be The One by Bella Andre.  Part of The Sullivans – focusing on baseball pitcher Ryan Sullivan.

Pamela Britton has an exciting NASCAR series.  The first title is Slow Burn.  An action packed, sexy read.

Also in the race car theme – Erin McCarthy’s series, Fast Track.  Try Slow Ride and Jacked Up. Fast paced, steamy with a touch of humor.

Some miscellaneous sports:

Fast & Loose by Elizabeth Bevarly and The Horsemaster’s Daughter by Susan Wiggs. – Equestrian

Table for Five by Susan Wiggs – Golf

On Thin Ice by Susan Andersen. – Ice Skating

Extreme Bachelor and Wedding Survivor by Julia London – Extreme Sports

Crash Into Me by Jill Sorenson – Professional Surfing

Freefall by Jill Sorenson – Rock Climbing/Kayaking

Match Me If You Can by Susan Elizabeth Phillips – Sports Agent

Causing Havoc by Lori Foster. Her series, SBC, is based on the Ultimate Championship fighting world of bad boys and the women they love.

Today Show Book Club Picks Its Third Book – Under The Wide And Starry Sky by Nancy Horan

/ Linda / Leave a comment

On January 23rd, the Today Show announced its third book title for their book club, Under The Wide And Starry Skyby Nancy Horan, best selling author who wrote Loving Frank.

Get ready for a little romance in this historical fiction book centered around the famed Treasure Island author’s life with his wife and muse Fanny Van de Grift.  The old adage, behind every great man, there’s a great woman is the basis for this story of a complex and unconventional love affair between Van de Grift and Robert Louis Stevenson.

The “Today” selections, chosen every four to five weeks, will have stickers on their covers indicating their inclusion in the club. The books, chosen by a team of producers and the show’s co-hosts, will include both fiction and nonfiction, newly released titles and classics. Discussion groups and excerpts will be featured online.