by Hallie Cantor
Hallie Cantor's first novel, Like This, but Funnier, is a hilarious and brutally honest send-up of comedy writing for television, a serious consideration of the woes of modern womanhood, and a compassionate telling of one woman's fumbling journey.
After a relatively successful and socially engaged stint in New York writing for a sketch comedy show, Caroline Neumann moved to Los Angeles to write for a sitcom, which was then canceled. She's been working from home for the past four years--if you can call it "working"
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by Jane Park
Second-generation Korean Canadian Jane Park's gorgeous debut novel, Inheritance, achingly encapsulates an immigrant family coming to terms with their closest, yet least empathic, relationships: with each other. Anne Kim and her older brother, Charles, were born in Canada, and their parents tell Anne that they moved from Korea for her and Charles's sake. Eventually the family settles in rural Crow Plains, Alberta, where they own and operate a grocery store.
Thirty years later, in 2014, the father has died of
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by Cammie McGovern
Scrabble players rejoice when their tiles and the arrangement of the board align for maximum scoring potential. So, too, will they rejoice at The Last Letters of Sally and Walter by Cammie McGovern (Say What You Will; Hard Landings), a triple-word score of a novel set in an independent senior living community.
Walter is the well-meaning but awkward organizer of Golden Grove's Scrabble club, which newcomer Sally decides to try one night after dinner. "She wasn't sure what she expected, but surely not this:
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by Rex Ogle, illus. by Dave Valeza
An eighth grader in Texas navigates sexual identity, crushes, and the ever-elusive goal of belonging in this soapy and sweet graphic novel by Printz and Stonewall Honor-winning author Rex Ogle (Road Home), illustrated by frequent collaborator Dave Valeza (Four Eyes; Pizza Face).
As soon as Rex arrives at middle school, he notices that all his friends have "coupled up," leaving him feeling ignored and like a "seventh wheel." Rex awkwardly sets out to find himself a girlfriend, scared of being left out and earning
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by Minoru Tonai, Jolene Gutiérrez, illus. by Chris Sasaki
Unbreakable: A Japanese American Family in an American Incarceration Camp is a spectacular picture book memoir about the childhood experience of Japanese American activist Minoru Tonai, who died in 2023, co-written by Jolene Gutiérrez (The Ofrenda That We Built), illustrated by animator Chris Sasaki (Home Is a Window).
In 1941, Min is a California boy who enjoys collecting rocks. His life begins to change when FBI agents visit his home, suspecting his greengrocer father of being a spy because of his
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by Martin W. Sandler, Craig Sandler
National Book Award-winning author Martin Sandler (1919: The Year That Changed America) collaborates with his son, journalist Craig Sandler, to chronicle the impact of America's pastime on the United States during the lead-up to World War II in the wholly captivating Baseball's Shining Season.
Major League baseball was a different sport in 1941: the players' salaries were significantly lower; "not a single club was located farther west than St. Louis"; there were just 16 teams; and "every game was played in
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by Patrick Ness
Two-time Carnegie Medal-winner Patrick Ness returns to the world of Chaos Walking with the gripping and emotional Piper at the Gates of Dusk. This first installment in a planned YA sci-fi trilogy follows the intrepid sons of the original books' protagonists as the teens try to defeat child-thieving gods.
The Land, the indigenous people of the New World, use a wordless form of communication, dubbed "Noise" by the humans who live in "the city" on their planet. "When the first settlers landed... every man had
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