Staff Picks
Check out these reviews written by the staff of the Marathon County Public Library, featuring books and DVDs for adults, children and teens! Staff book reviews are also published at Goodreads.com; follow us for the latest updates.
"How To Walk Away"
Margaret Jacobsen is a normal young woman with a master's degree, a serious boyfriend, and all of a great life to look forward to. That is, until one day she and her new fiance are in a horrible accident that leaves Margaret paralyzed. In an instant her life takes a dramatic turn as her career hopes and life expectations fizzle, and all that remains is...
Audience: Adults | Genre: Contemporary Fiction
"BOSH!: The Cookbook: Simple Recipes. Amazing Food. All Plants."
This brand new cookbook is filled with recipes from the chefs behind the online video channel Bosh, popular in the U.K. This cookbook is packed with enticing recipes, including quick recipes, big meals, bowls, sides, desserts, breakfasts, cocktails, and meals meant to impress. I couldn't stop finding recipes I'm really excited to try, and because they're...
"The Truth As Told by Mason Buttle"
Mason Buttle appears to have almost all the cards stacked against him. He’s taller and bigger than all the other kids in his seventh grade class. He sweats profusely, so much so that he brings another shirt to school with him every day to change into later in the day. He has trouble with words, writing them and reading them. He lives in a ramshackle...
"What to Do When I'm Gone: A Mother's Wisdom to Her Daughter"
No one is ever really ready to lose a loved one, and this book tries to help with that in it's own unique way. As the title states, the author's mother provides preemptive advice on how to function in the event of her death. The advice walks her daughter through day-by-day instructions on what to do, days, even years, after her passing. As...
Audience: Adults | Genre: Nonfiction
"Prim Improper"
Meet Primrose “Prim” Leary, the quirky and charming 13-year-old star of Deirdre Sullivan’s Prim Improper. Prim is coping with the sudden loss of her mother, and you might expect a story like this to be dark and brooding, but Prim tells her tale (in diary form) with a precocious and wittily observant voice that delves into sensitive – and even...
"The Wild Robot Escapes"
Author Peter Brown left us with hints of impending doom for our robot friend, Roz and her family, near the end of the previous book, The Wild Robot. At the very least we were fairly certain that changes were ahead for the characters we, (okay I), had grown to love, and of course these play out in this sequel. Roz has been brought to the mainland and is...
"Bob"
Bob’s been waiting for Livy for five, very long boring years at her grandmother’s house, exactly as she told him to do. When Livy finally returns to her grandmother’s house in Australia to stay for a while, she strangely remembers nothing about ever being at her grandmother’s house before, yet it feels like she has forgotten something very important. Then...
"Hope in the Holler"
Wavie’s mom had a plan for her after her impending death from cancer, but ending up in in Conly Hollow, her family’s Appalachian home, was never intended to be a part of it. But when her alleged aunt shows up after her mom’s death and takes her there to live, she has no choice. What Waivie gets is a filthy home with garbage strewn everywhere, in a dirt-poor...
"Chloe Flavor: Saucy, Crispy, Spicy, Vegan"
The newest cookbook from Chloe Coscarelli features a new batch of delicious vegan recipes. Included are recipes for breakfast, brunch, snacks, soups, salads, sandwiches, pasta, main meals, drinks, and dessert. Full of tantalizing photographs and snippets about Chloe's journey to veganism, this is another favorite of mine from one of my all-time favorite...
"Hello Lighthouse"
This beautifully illustrated children's picture book traces the daily life of a lighthouse keeper and his wife in a lighthouse on a very tiny island in the middle of the sea. We see the keeper doing his daily chores such as polishing the lamp’s lens, filling the oil and trimming the wick to keep the lighthouse lamp lit. We experience the birth of their...
"Creative Quest"
Ahmir "Questlove" Thompson is a busy guy: drummer for the rap group The Roots, which is also the house band for The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon; DJ; restaurateur; and author of two previous books, Mo' Meta Blues and somethingtofoodabout.
His newest book, as the title suggests, is all about creativity: what defines it, how to tap into your...
Audience: Adults | Genre: Nonfiction
"The Broken Girls"
Part ghost story, part murder mystery, this atmospheric novel captivated me from the first page. Centered around a now abandoned school for troubled girls, Idlewild Hall holds secrets of the past within its walls and grounds. The reader learns the stories of the abandoned girls who were forced to attend, the ghost who forces its victims to relive their...
"One Day We'll All Be Dead and None of This Will Matter: Essays"
Scaachi Koul is the daughter of Indian immigrants. She was born and raised in Canada surrounded by western culture. She is also thoughtful and hilarious. All this comes together in “One Day We’ll All Be Dead And None Of This Will Matter,” a delightful collection of essays. Many of Koul’s stories clue us in on what it is like to bear the scrutiny of being a...
Audience: Adults | Genre: Nonfiction, Memoir, Essays, Humor
"The Witch Boy"
Aster wants to learn how to be a witch, but the men in his family are supposed to be shapeshifters and warriors. Aster doesn't care about those things; he just wants to learn witchcraft with the girls. He spies on them, jotting down notes and teaching himself spells. His mother warns him that what happened to his great uncle could happen to him, that his...
Audience: Children, Tweens | Genre: Fiction, Tween Graphic Novel, Identity
"The Changeling: A novel"
One night, Apollo Kagwa's wife, Emma, chains him to a chair, kills their infant son and disappears. Was it postpartum depression or something much worse? He sets out to discover whether his wife is still alive and what exactly happened to his son. Apollo has some baggage of his own that he has to grapple with along the way,...
Audience: Adults | Genre: Fantasy, Magical Realism, Fiction
"Dear Girl"
Written like a letter from a mother to a daughter, this children's book is one of my new favorites. I would recommend anyone to read this to the young girls in their lives; daughters, granddaughters, nieces, and friends. This is the perfect story to give girls permission to be themselves, love themselves, and express themselves. The story is fun and...
"Emma in the Night"
Eighteen-year-old Cass stands on her mother’s doorstep, steeling herself. Her mother and the police must believe her—Emma’s life depends on it. It’s been three years since she and her older sister Emma, then age 17, disappeared. Her story—that she and Emma, who gave birth a few months after they disappeared, were held captive by a reclusive couple who had...
"Mary's Monster: Love, Madness, and How Mary Shelley Created Frankenstein"
Dark and beautiful watercolor illustrations bring Mary Shelley's biography to life in this captivating graphic novel. Told in verse, this was a quick read and peek into Mary Shelley's odd, dark, and intense life. Mary was barely sixteen when she left home to follow the man she loved, the married Percy Shelley. It was a daring move for a 19th century British...
"I Am a Cat"
What happens when Simon, a normal house cat, tells a group of big cats from around the world that he is just like them? They are stunned, and then laugh hysterically! Lion, Cheetah, Puma, Jaguar, and Tiger each go on to tell Simon how they differ and how Simon is not "cat" enough. The lion has a mane and roars, Simon doesn't have a mane, nor can he...
Audience: Children | Genre: Picture Book, Fiction
"The Last Black Unicorn"
Stand-up comedian and actress Tiffany Haddish makes a living out of entertaining others and making people laugh. That might not seem like anything extraordinary, until you learn about all of the strife and setbacks Haddish faced in her life, especially before reaching adulthood.
While growing up, Haddish had an absentee father, a mother who verbally and...
Audience: Adults | Genre: Nonfiction, Biography And Memoir, Memoir, Celebrities, Humor
"Dear Pope Francis"
This book is a delightful and refreshingly candid look at Pope Francis and the children from around the world who had the once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to write a letter and ask the leader of the Catholic Church any questions they wished. The questions they ask are honest, surprising, and ones that people of all ages would be interested in hearing his...
Audience: Children | Genre: Nonfiction
"Sunburn"
Polly Costello is a striking, self-possessed woman with a complicated past who left her husband and young daughter behind at the beach, claiming to need a break from the sun, but she’s really looking for a fresh start. She stops in a bar in a small Delaware town for a drink and meets Adam, an intelligent, handsome man also just passing through, and sparks...
"The Glass Town Game"
What happens when four children follow a man made entirely out of book and magazine pages onto a train headed for Glass Town? An adventure, of course! Only these aren’t just any children, they are the Brontës—Branwell, Charlotte, Emily, and Anne—and the world they find themselves in is all their own creation.
Glass Town and Gondal are at war, just like...
"Educated"
Tara Westover has an impressive academic pedigree that includes Harvard and Cambridge, but she did not set foot into a classroom until she enrolled at Brigham Young University at the age of seventeen. This compelling memoir immerses the reader into the isolated world in which she was raised in rural Idaho as the youngest of six children. Her father, a...
Audience: Adults | Genre: Nonfiction
"Lady Bird"
Lady Bird's life is at a crossroads, of sorts. It’s her senior year at her Catholic high school and she yearns to spice up her life and make the year a memorable one. More than anything, though, Lady Bird (played by Saoirse Ronan) wants to make sure she gets out of Sacramento after high school and moves a place where she feels she can...
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