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Book reviews by library staff and guest contributors

Forever Fall

Cover of Bella's Fall Coat
A review of Bella's Fall Coat by Lynn Plourde

It's fall! And Bella, like so many four and five year olds, CANNOT sit still. All she wants to do is be outside. She whirls and twirls and crinkles and crackles in the leaves, she stretches and reaches, picks and plucks fall apples, but her favorite fall coat is becoming too small. Thanks goodness for grandmas. This beautifully illustrated picture book will have your toddler whirling and twirling with it's vivid language, but also might help start a conversation about how sadly, not all things like favorite coats and seasons last for ever.

Sep 24, 2021

Dead bodies and wedding dresses

Cover of Dial A for Aunties
A review of Dial A for Aunties by Jesse Q. Sutanto

Meddelin Chan's tightly knit Chinese-Indonesian family runs a full-service wedding business that provides cakes (Big Aunt), hair and make-up (Second Aunt), flowers (Meddie's mom), entertainment (Fourth Aunt), and photography (Meddie). A spectacularly rich couple hire the Chan's for their biggest event yet, a grand wedding to be held at an exclusive resort on an island off the coast of California. Things go wrong almost immediately. Some of the "wrong" includes a dead body, groomsmen too drunk to get dressed for the wedding, a major theft and an impending storm.

Sep 21, 2021

A child of grace

Cover of The Ninth Hour
A review of The Ninth Hour by Alice McDermott

It may seem incongruous that The Ninth Hour, Alice McDermott’s exquisite family saga of faith, sacrifice and grace, should begin with a suicide. When Jim shoos his young wife Annie out of their Brooklyn tenement to do some shopping, locks the door behind her and turns on the gas, it looks as bleak as could be for the young widow. Early-twentieth century Brooklyn is a tough place for its many inhabitants, and particularly so for a young Irish widow with a baby on the way.

Sep 20, 2021

Edwardian era magic

Cover of A Marvellous Light
A review of A Marvellous Light by Freya Marske

There are some books that make me feel like I'm smiling from the first page to the last. I finish the book and immediately want to tell everyone about the delight I had in reading it (I think I've already mentioned it to multiple co-workers). Such was the case with A Marvellous Light, a debut queer fantasy novel full of "magic, contracts, and conspiracies".

Sep 16, 2021

A part of the movement, a part of the history, a part of the change

Cover of We are Still Here! Native
A review of We are Still Here! Native American Truths Everyone Should Know by Traci Sorell and illustrated by Frané Lessec

Twelve topics related to Native Americans' experiences are represented in this picture book designed as a student information fair. The story starts in a classroom with students signing up for ten-minute long presentations. Topics range from assimilation and allotment to relocation, the Indian New Deal and language revival. In the subsequent pages, each topic receives a full spread illustration depicting the topic during the time period in which it took place, always ending with the words, "We are still here!"

Sep 14, 2021

Noir with a touch of Minnesota nice

Cover of Gone to Dust
A review of Gone to Dust by Matt Goldman

PI Nils Shapiro has seen some dirty crime scenes, but none like this. In an otherwise immaculate house in Minneapolis’s snobbiest suburb, there are heaps of vacuum bag dust—and under one of those heaps is the corpse of Maggie Somerville, freshly divorced and Edina’s first murder victim in decades. The killer obviously knew what he/she was doing—the presence of so much dust makes forensic analysis impossible and an overnight snowstorm obliterated any exterior trails. This seemly impossible case is the set up for Matt Goldman’s debut Gone to Dust.

Sep 13, 2021

Different, with love

Cover of Mila Has Two Beds
A review of Mila Has Two Beds by Judith Koppens

Mila Has Two Beds shares a story familiar to many children – going between two houses and two parents. Mila says goodbye to “Sweet Daddy” and her dog, Pepper, and returns to the “Mommy-house” and “smiling Mommy”. The illustrations are drenched in color and show happy and cozy scenes and each parent’s house. Mila has a different bed, a different toothbrush, and a different bedtime routine at each house. Even the goodnight wishes are different: “Good night, my darling,” says her Mommy, and “Nighty-night, little princess,” says her Daddy.

Sep 10, 2021

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