Every month there are new titles purchased for the Too Good to Miss collections at our libraries. If you're not familiar with TGTM (as we call it here in library-world), it's a special collection of popular books that are truly too good to miss. Some are new and popular titles, others are older titles that might not have had as much media attention as a bestseller or celebrity book club selection but are still great reads that deserve another look. New books are added to the collection monthly, and are available at all Madison Public Library locations on a walk-in, first-come-first-served basis.
For this month of January we have six new titles that were added.**
Nonfiction
They Just Need to Get a Job: 15 Myths on Homelessness by Mary Brosnahan
The former CEO of the Coalition for the Homeless breaks through the highly destructive misinformation surrounding our homeless neighbors.
What My Bones Know: A Memoir of Healing from Complex Trauma by Stephanie Foo
By age thirty, Stephanie Foo was successful on paper: She had her dream job as a radio producer at This American Life and had won an Emmy. But behind her office door she was having panic attacks and sobbing at her desk. After years of questioning what was wrong with her, she was diagnosed with Complex PTSD. Both of Stephanie's parents had abandoned her as a teenager after years of physical and verbal abuse and neglect. She thought she'd overcome her trauma, but her diagnosis illuminated the ways in which her past continued to threaten her present.
I Heard Her Call My Name: A Memoir of Transition by Lucy Sante
For a long time, Lucy Sante felt unsure of her place. Born in Belgium, the only child of conservative working-class Catholic parents who transplanted their little family to the United States, she felt at home only when she moved to New York City in the early 1970s and found her people among a band of fellow bohemians. But she still felt like her life a performance. She was presenting a façade, even to herself .Sante's memoir braids together two threads of personal narrative: the arc of her life, and her recent step-by-step transition to a place of inner and outer alignment.
Fiction
Muddled Cherries by Sally Collins
Twenty-year-old Emily, looking for work and a place to stay, finds herself in Door County, Wisconsin, where she is hired on the spot at The Schooner restaurant. There she has a summer she never expected, filled with new experiences and relationships that help her grow and, ultimately, allow her to face the shadows of her past.
Maria: A Novel of Maria von Trapp by Michelle Moran
In the 1950s, Oscar Hammerstein is asked to write the lyrics to a musical based on the life of a woman named Maria von Trapp. Oscar knows Maria's story has big Broadway potential. But much of her life will have to be reinvented for the stage. When Maria sees the script, she is so incensed that she sets off to confront Hammerstein, who foists her off on Fran, his secretary. The pair strike up an unlikely friendship as Maria tells Fran about her life, contradicting much of what will eventually appear in The Sound of Music and delivering a far grittier tale.
I Who Have Never Known Men by Jacqueline Harpman
Deep underground, thirty-nine women live imprisoned in a cage. Watched over by guards, the women have no memory of how they got there, no notion of time, and only vague recollection of their lives before. As the burn of electric light merges day into night and numberless years pass, a young girl - the fortieth prisoner - sits alone and outcast in the corner. Soon she will show herself to be the key to the others' escape and survival in the strange world that awaits them above ground.
If you're ever just looking for something "good" (a very subjective term) to read, I highly recommend browsing the TGTM books. There's a little something for everyone in this collection and it's my go-to when I'm not sure what I'm wanting to read.
**Linked titles are to the regular copies, which may have hold lists. The TGTM browse collection books are separate from those.