Category: Book

I Curse You with Joy by Tiffany Haddish

Tiffany Haddish is back with her highly anticipated new essay collection, I Curse You With Joy.

It’s been a minute. Readers last sat down with Tiffany in her bestselling debut The Last Black Unicorn. Since then, Haddish has catapulted to A-list fame as the breakout star of Girls Trip. She’s walked the Oscars red carpet, released a hit stand-up special with Netflix, and made history as the first Black female comedian to host Saturday Night Live and Shark Week.

But it hasn’t been all VIP parties and free diving with apex predators. In these humorous and heartfelt essays, Tiffany gets real about the highs and lows of life. Believe it or not, there was a time when Tiffany didn’t totally know who Tiffany was. Before she found her groove, she was on stage dressed like her snobby airline coworkers telling halfhearted dick jokes. She tanked.

It took a fake penis, some help from friends, and a little encouragement from Bob Saget, but eventually Tiffany figured out Tiffany. I Curse You With Joy celebrates all the lessons she learned along the way–the joy and the pain. Tiffany reckons with the legacy of her childhood trauma, the challenges of being a Black woman in the entertainment industry, and her bittersweet reunion with her estranged father after twenty years apart. Don’t worry, she’s got plenty of advice to share, too.

I Curse You With Joy is Tiffany Haddish unfiltered. (We know what you’re thinking…how much more unfiltered can she get?) These essays lay it all bare, bringing readers into Tiffany’s inner circle where joy, honesty, humor, and heart are the order of the day.

The Ministry of Time by Kalian Bradley

“If youre a fan of Outlander, spy novels, time travel books, or just really innovative and fun storytelling, The Ministry of Time is definitely for you.” —Town & Country, 45 Must-Read Books of Spring 2024

Part time travel romance, part spy thriller and 100% “multi-faceted joyride” (Harper’s Bazaar, UK): Welcome to The Ministry of Time, the exhilaratingly original debut novel by Kaliane Bradley.

In the near future, a civil servant is offered the salary of her dreams and is, shortly afterward, told what project she’ll be working on. A recently established government ministry is gathering “expats” from across history to establish whether time travel is feasible—for the body, but also for the fabric of space-time.

She is tasked with working as a “bridge”: living with, assisting, and monitoring the expat known as “1847” or Commander Graham Gore. As far as history is concerned, Commander Gore died on Sir John Franklin’s doomed 1845 expedition to the Arctic, so he’s a little disoriented to be living with an unmarried woman who regularly shows her calves, surrounded by outlandish concepts such as “washing machines,” “Spotify,” and “the collapse of the British Empire.” But with an appetite for discovery, a seven-a-day cigarette habit, and the support of a charming and chaotic cast of fellow expats, he soon adjusts.

Over the next year, what the bridge initially thought would be, at best, a horrifically uncomfortable roommate dynamic, evolves into something much deeper. By the time the true shape of the Ministry’s project comes to light, the bridge has fallen haphazardly, fervently in love, with consequences she never could have imagined. Forced to confront the choices that brought them together, the bridge must finally reckon with how—and whether she believes—what she does next can change the future.

An exquisitely original and feverishly fun fusion of genres and ideas, The Ministry of Time asks: What does it mean to defy history, when history is living in your house? Kaliane Bradley’s answer is a blazing, unforgettable testament to what we owe each other in a changing world.

+How To Read A Book by Monica Wood

“A deeply humane and touching novel; highly recommended for book clubs and fans of Shelby Van Pelt’s Remarkably Bright Creatures.” — Booklist

“A beautiful, big-hearted treasure of a novel.” —Lily King

From the award-winning author of The One-in-a-Million Boy comes a heartfelt, uplifting novel about a chance encounter at a bookstore, exploring redemption, unlikely friendships, and the life-changing power of sharing stories.

Our Reasons meet us in the morning and whisper to us at night. Mine is an innocent, unsuspecting, eternally sixty-one-year-old woman named Lorraine Daigle…

Violet Powell, a twenty-two-year-old from rural Abbott Falls, Maine, is being released from prison after serving twenty-two months for a drunk-driving crash that killed a local kindergarten teacher.

Harriet Larson, a retired English teacher who runs the prison book club, is facing the unsettling prospect of an empty nest.

Frank Daigle, a retired machinist, hasn’t yet come to grips with the complications of his marriage to the woman Violet killed.

When the three encounter each other one morning in a bookstore in Portland—Violet to buy the novel she was reading in the prison book club before her release, Harriet to choose the next title for the women who remain, and Frank to dispatch his duties as the store handyman—their lives begin to intersect in transformative ways.

How to Read a Book is an unsparingly honest and profoundly hopeful story about letting go of guilt, seizing second chances, and the power of books to change our lives. With the heart, wit, grace, and depth of understanding that has characterized her work, Monica Wood illuminates the decisions that define a life and the kindnesses that make life worth living. 

The Demon of Unrest by Erik Larson


The #1 New York Times bestselling author of The Splendid and the Vile brings to life the pivotal five months between the election of Abraham Lincoln and the start of the Civil War—a simmering crisis that finally tore a deeply divided nation in two.

A MOST ANTICIPATED BOOK OF THE YEAR: The New York Times, Time, Los Angeles Times, Men’s Health, New York Post, Lit Hub, Book Riot

On November 6, 1860, Abraham Lincoln became the fluky victor in a tight race for president. The country was bitterly at odds; Southern extremists were moving ever closer to destroying the Union, with one state after another seceding and Lincoln powerless to stop them. Slavery fueled the conflict, but somehow the passions of North and South came to focus on a lonely federal fortress in Charleston Harbor: Fort Sumter.

Master storyteller Erik Larson offers a gripping account of the chaotic months between Lincoln’s election and the Confederacy’s shelling of Sumter—a period marked by tragic errors and miscommunications, enflamed egos and craven ambitions, personal tragedies and betrayals. Lincoln himself wrote that the trials of these five months were “so great that, could I have anticipated them, I would not have believed it possible to survive them.”

At the heart of this suspense-filled narrative are Major Robert Anderson, Sumter’s commander and a former slave owner sympathetic to the South but loyal to the Union; Edmund Ruffin, a vain and bloodthirsty radical who stirs secessionist ardor at every opportunity; and Mary Boykin Chesnut, wife of a prominent planter, conflicted over both marriage and slavery and seeing parallels between them. In the middle of it all is the overwhelmed Lincoln, battling with his duplicitous secretary of state, William Seward, as he tries desperately to avert a war that he fears is inevitable—one that will eventually kill 750,000 Americans.

Drawing on diaries, secret communiques, slave ledgers, and plantation records, Larson gives us a political horror story that captures the forces that led America to the brink—a dark reminder that we often don’t see a cataclysm coming until it’s too late.

888 Love and the Divine Burden of Numbers by Abraham Chang

Goodreads Editor’s Pick • Publishers Weekly Author to Watch

“Packed with pop culture…. A beautifully tender and funny examination of love, of identity, of making your way in a world that is getting bigger and smaller at the same time.” —Kevin Wilson, bestselling author of Nothing to See Here

Love is a numbers game…

Young Wang has received plenty of wisdom from his beloved uncle: don’t take life too seriously, get out on the road when you can, and everyone gets just seven great loves in their life—so don’t blow it. This last one sticks with Young as he is an obsessive cataloger of his life: movies watched, favorite albums . . . all filtered through Chinese numerology and superstition. He finds meaning in almost everything, for which his two best friends endlessly tease him. But then, at the end of 1995, when Young is at New York University, he meets Erena. She’s brilliant, charismatic, quick-witted, and crassly funny. They fall in love and, for Young, it feels so real that he’s thrilled and terrified. As Young and Erena’s relationship blossoms, we get flashbacks to Young’s first five loves. That means Erena is “number six.” Was his uncle wrong—is she the one and only? Or are they fated for failure to make room for Young’s final, seventh love?

A love letter to Western pop culture, Eastern traditions, and being a first-generation New Yorker, Abraham Chang’s dazzling debut reminds us that luck only gets us so far when it comes to matters of the heart.

Bite by Bite by Aimee Nezhukumatathil

From the New York Times bestselling author of World of Wonders, a lyrical book of short essays about food, offering a banquet of tastes, smells, memories, associations, and marvelous curiosities from nature.

In Bite by Bite, poet and essayist Aimee Nezhukumatathil explores the way food and drink evoke our associations and remembrances—a subtext or layering, a flavor tinged with joy, shame, exuberance, grief, desire, or nostalgia.

Nezhukmatathil restores our astonishment and wonder about food through her encounters with a range of foods and food traditions. From shave ice to lumpia, mangoes to pecans, rambutan to vanilla, she investigates how food marks our experiences and identities and explores the boundaries between heritage and memory.

Bite by Bite offers a rich and textured kaleidoscope of vignettes and visions into the world of food and nature, drawn together by intimate and humorous personal reflections, with Fumi Nakamura’s gorgeous imagery and illustration.

Miss Morgan’s Book Brigade by Jane Skeslien Charles

The New York Times and internationally bestselling author of the “captivating, richly drawn” (Woman’s World) The Paris Library returns with a brilliant new novel based on the true story of Jessie Carson—the American librarian who changed the literary landscape of France.

1918: As the Great War rages, Jessie Carson takes a leave of absence from the New York Public Library to work for the American Committee for Devastated France. Founded by millionaire Anne Morgan, this group of international women help rebuild destroyed French communities just miles from the front. Upon arrival, Jessie strives to establish something that the French have never seen—children’s libraries. She turns ambulances into bookmobiles and trains the first French female librarians. Then she disappears.

1987: When NYPL librarian and aspiring writer Wendy Peterson stumbles across a passing reference to Jessie Carson in the archives, she becomes consumed with learning her fate. In her obsessive research, she discovers that she and the elusive librarian have more in common than their work at New York’s famed library, but she has no idea their paths will converge in surprising ways across time.

Based on the extraordinary little-known history of the women who received the Croix de Guerre medal for courage under fire, Miss Morgan’s Book Brigade is a tribute to the resilience of the human spirit, the power of literature, and ultimately the courage it takes to make a change.

May Staff Pick: Long Island

Long Island by Colm Tóibín (Scribner, May 7), picked by bookseller, Leslie

Long Island tells the story of Eilis Fiorello, nee Lacey. Colm Tóibín first wrote about Eilis in his terrific novel Brooklyn, published in 2009. Eilis is now living in Long Island with her family – husband Tony and teenage children Larry and Rosella. When a stranger comes to Eilis’s door to tell her that he will be depositing a baby that Tony has fathered with the stranger’s wife while working as a plumber in their house, Eilis decides to handle the matter in a very straightforward way. She tells her children about it. She then informs Tony that she’ll be going back to Ireland for her mother’s birthday because she doesn’t want to be home when the baby is delivered. Eilis tells Tony that this has nothing to do with her and he should handle the situation. 

While reading this book, I could feel the suffocation that Eilis must have felt in her marriage and in her house, with Tony’s brothers and Italian mother always in everybody’s business. Tony’s mother believes her sons can do no wrong.  I found her to be most annoying and irritating.

Eilis hasn’t been back to Ireland since she left as a young woman and made a life with Tony. Once there, she lives in her mother’s house and rekindles relationships from her past. There is so much that is not said in this book. For one, I could sense that Eilis asked herself – What do I want?  How do I want to live?  I kept asking myself – What will Eilis do? She yearns for love.

As Long Island progressed, I came to love Eilis more and more, and her happiness became so important to me. Then I wondered – what is it she is seeking?  Is it happiness, purpose or something else. Colm Tóibín’s intimate story is captivating.

~ Leslie

Small Mercies – Denis Lehane

“My daughter, a reader, said ‘Mother, you have to read this. It’s such a page turner. Maybe he’s best.’ So I read it and she was right. It’s a great read, didn’t want to put it down. More than a mystery!”
-Judy, Store co-founder

Small Mercies is thought provoking, engaging, enraging, and can’t-put-it-down entertainment.” — Stephen King

The acclaimed New York Times bestselling writer returns with a masterpiece to rival Mystic River—an all-consuming tale of revenge, family love, festering hate, and insidious power, set against one of the most tumultuous episodes in Boston’s history.

In the summer of 1974 a heatwave blankets Boston and Mary Pat Fennessy is trying to stay one step ahead of the bill collectors. Mary Pat has lived her entire life in the housing projects of “Southie,” the Irish American enclave that stubbornly adheres to old tradition and stands proudly apart.

One night Mary Pat’s teenage daughter Jules stays out late and doesn’t come home. That same evening, a young Black man is found dead, struck by a subway train under mysterious circumstances.

The two events seem unconnected. But Mary Pat, propelled by a desperate search for her missing daughter, begins turning over stones best left untouched—asking questions that bother Marty Butler, chieftain of the Irish mob, and the men who work for him, men who don’t take kindly to any threat to their business.

Set against the hot, tumultuous months when the city’s desegregation of its public schools exploded in violence, Small Mercies is a superb thriller, a brutal depiction of criminality and power, and an unflinching portrait of the dark heart of American racism. It is a mesmerizing and wrenching work that only Dennis Lehane could write.

Funny Story by Emily Henry

Named a Most Anticipated book of 2024 by TIME ∙ The New York Times ∙ Goodreads ∙ Entertainment Weekly ∙ Today.com ∙ Paste ∙ SheReads ∙ BookPage ∙ Woman’s World ∙ The Nerd Daily and more!

A shimmering, joyful new novel about a pair of opposites with the wrong thing in common, from #1 New York Times bestselling author Emily Henry.


Daphne always loved the way her fiancé Peter told their story. How they met (on a blustery day), fell in love (over an errant hat), and moved back to his lakeside hometown to begin their life together. He really was good at telling it…right up until the moment he realized he was actually in love with his childhood best friend Petra.
 
Which is how Daphne begins her new story: Stranded in beautiful Waning Bay, Michigan, without friends or family but with a dream job as a children’s librarian (that barely pays the bills), and proposing to be roommates with the only person who could possibly understand her predicament: Petra’s ex, Miles Nowak.
 
 Scruffy and chaotic—with a penchant for taking solace in the sounds of heart break love ballads —Miles is exactly the opposite of practical, buttoned up Daphne, whose coworkers know so little about her they have a running bet that she’s either FBI or in witness protection. The roommates mainly avoid one another, until one day, while drowning their sorrows, they form a tenuous friendship and a plan. If said plan also involves posting deliberately misleading photos of their summer adventures together, well, who could blame them?
 
But it’s all just for show, of course, because there’s no way Daphne would actually start her new chapter by falling in love with her ex-fiancé’s new fiancée’s ex…right?