From last week's Indie bestseller lists, available at IndieBound.org, here are the recommended titles, which are also Indie Next Great Reads:
Hardcovers
Fin & Lady: A Novel by Cathleen Schine (Sarah Crichton Books, $26, 9780374154905). "Fin is a charmer. The bright, 11-year-old boy's life changes when his mother dies and he is consigned to the care of his older half-sister, Lady. Fin leaves behind the bucolic Connecticut countryside of his mother's dairy farm and heads to Greenwich Village. Lady might be older, but it soon becomes clear that Fin is the protector of his spirited sister, a woman beset by unsuitable suitors and prone to impetuous actions. Set in the 1960s, the era of the Civil Rights Movement and the Vietnam War, this delightful story is a comic romp about the bonds between a brother and a sister." --Deon Stonehouse, Sunriver Books & Music, Sunriver, Ore.
Lexicon: A Novel by Max Barry (Penguin Press, $26.95, 9781594205385). "Barry's newest novel manages to be a gripping, page-turning thriller as well as a phenomenally intelligent dissertation on language's raw, neurological power. Barry manages to maintain a blistering pace in an ingenious, complex plot structure with seeming ease, while at the same time exploring conspiracy theories, intense paranoia, privacy concerns in the Internet era, and countless other frightening ideas for the reader to ponder long after the book is finished. Lexicon is simultaneously brainy and muscular, like a Heisman Trophy winner who just happens to work as a semiotics professor on the side." --Hank Stephenson, Flyleaf Books, Chapel Hill, N.C.
Paperback
Shine Shine Shine: A Novel by Lydia Netzer (St. Martin's Griffin, $14.99, 9781250020413). "Sunny Mann is bald, nine months pregnant, and the mother of an autistic four year old. Her mother is dying. On top of all this, her husband, Maxon, is on his way to the moon to colonize it with robots. Yet Sunny manages to pretend that her life is 'normal' until the aftermath of a minor car accident forces her to confront her perceptions and redefine who she is. Shine Shine Shine is a love story unlike any you've ever read, told in lyrical prose that will have you re-reading paragraphs simply to enjoy the author's voice and her way with words." --Carla Ketner, Chapters Books & Gifts, Seward, Neb.
For Ages 4 to 8
123 Versus ABC by Mike Boldt (HarperCollins, 9780062102997, $17.99). "It's an alphabet book! No, it's a book about numbers! So goes the battle between numbers and letters as an increasingly ridiculous host of animals enter the book. By the time 13 monkeys wearing 14 neckties and juggling 15 oranges appear, the numbers and letters have decided to collaborate. Show-stopping illustrations make this book a delight, even for proficient counters and readers!" --Erin Barker, Hooray for Books!, Alexandria, Va.
[Many thanks to IndieBound and the ABA!]
