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TINKERS

One of our recommended books for 2019 is Tinkers by Paul Harding

Special edition of the Pulitzer Prize-winning debut novel–featuring a new foreword by Marilynne Robinson and book club extras inside.

In this deluxe tenth anniversary edition, Marilynne Robinson introduces the beautiful novel Tinkers, which begins with an old man who lies dying. As time collapses into memory, he travels deep into his past, where he is reunited with his father and relives the wonder and pain of his impoverished New England youth. At once heartbreaking and life affirming, Tinkers is an elegiac meditation on love, loss, and the fierce beauty of nature.

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THERE THERE

One of our recommended books for 2019 is There There by Tommy Orange

Tommy Orange’s shattering novel follows twelve characters from Native communities: all traveling to the Big Oakland Powwow, all connected to each other in ways they may not yet realize. Together, this chorus of voices tells of the plight of the urban Native American—grappling with a complex and painful history, with an inheritance of beauty and spirituality, with communion and sacrifice and heroism.

Hailed as an instant classic, There There is at once poignant and laugh-out-loud funny, utterly contemporary and always unforgettable.

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SWEDE HOLLOW

One of our recommended books for 2019 is Swede Hollow by Ola Larsmo

When the Klar family leaves Sweden for New York in 1897, they take with them a terrible secret and a longing for a new life. Their dream of starting over is nearly crushed at the outset, until an unexpected gift allows them to make one more desperate move, this time to the Midwest and a place called Swede Hollow.

Their new home is a cluster of shacks on the edge of St. Paul, Minnesota inhabited by other immigrants. The men hire on as day laborers or work at the nearby brewery, and the women clean houses or work in factories.

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THE STORYTELLER

One of our recommended books for 2019 is The Storyteller by Pierre Jarawan

Samir leaves the safety and comfort of his family’s adopted home in Germany for volatile Beirut in an attempt to find his missing father. His only clues are an old photo and the bedtime stories his father used to tell him. The Storyteller follows Samir’s search for Brahim, the father whose heart was always yearning for his homeland, Lebanon.

In this moving and gripping novel about family secrets, love, and friendship, Pierre Jarawan does for Lebanon what Khaled Hosseini’s The Kite Runner did for Afghanistan. He pulls away the curtain of grim facts and figures to reveal the intimate story of an exiled family torn apart by civil war and guilt.

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THE ROSIE RESULT

One of our recommended books for 2019 is The Rosie Result by Graeme Simsion

In The Rosie Project, the first book in the trilogy, Don Tillman gives a lecture on Asperger’s Syndrome. This sets up the premise that Don has autistic traits but doesn’t recognize them in himself. By the end of The Rosie Result, though, both Don and his son Hudson identify as autistic.

If the storylines in The Rosie Result center on Don’s challenges in trying to parent a son who shares many similarities with him, the novel’s main theme is labeling and identity. The book directly questions many people’s assumptions about autism.

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SAINT X

One of our recommended books for 2020 is Saint X by Alexis Schaitkin

Claire is only seven years old when her college-age sister, Alison, disappears on the last night of their family vacation at a resort on the Caribbean island of Saint X. Several days later, Alison’s body is found in a remote spot on a nearby cay, and two local men—employees at the resort—are arrested. Years later, Claire is living and working in New York City when a brief but fateful encounter brings her together with Clive Richardson, one of the men originally suspected of murdering her sister.

As Claire doggedly shadows Clive, hoping to gain his trust, waiting for the slip that will uncover the truth,

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