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LAST HOUSE BEFORE THE MOUNTAIN

One of our recommended novels is Last House Before the Mountain by Monika Helfer

For readers of Ian McEwan, Elena Ferrante, and Julie Orringer, the spellbinding, internationally bestselling, multigenerational family saga set in a fractured rural village in WWI Austria.

Maria and Josef live with their children in a valley in westernmost Austria. When the First World War breaks out and Josef is drafted into the army, Maria is left to provide for her family alone. Every day is a struggle against starvation, the harsh alpine climate and the hostile nearby villagers who see Maria as little more than a beautiful temptress out for the men left behind. But when a red-haired stranger arrives in the village,

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LESSONS IN CHEMISTRY

One of our recommended books is Lessons in Chemistry by Bonnie Garmus

Chemist Elizabeth Zott is not your average woman. In fact, Elizabeth Zott would be the first to point out that there is no such thing as an average woman. But it’s the early 1960s and her all-male team at Hastings Research Institute takes a very unscientific view of equality. Except for one: Calvin Evans; the lonely, brilliant, Nobel–prize nominated grudge-holder who falls in love with—of all things—her mind. True chemistry results.

But like science, life is unpredictable. Which is why a few years later Elizabeth Zott finds herself not only a single mother, but the reluctant star of America’s most beloved cooking show Supper at Six.

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WHERE COYOTES HOWL

One of our recommended books is Where Coyotes Howl by Sandra Dallas

Beautifully rendered, Where Coyotes Howl is a vivid and deeply affecting ode to the early twentieth century West, from master storyteller Sandra Dallas.

Except for the way they loved each other, they were just ordinary, everyday folks. Just ordinary.

1916. The two-street town of Wallace is not exactly what Ellen Webster had in mind when she accepted a teaching position in Wyoming, but within a year’s time she’s fallen in love—both with the High Plains and with a handsome cowboy named Charlie Bacon. Life is not easy in the flat, brown corner of the state where winter blizzards are unforgiving and the summer heat relentless.

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THE LONELY HEARTS BOOK CLUB

One of our recommended books is The Lonely Hearts Book Club by Lucy Gilmore

A young librarian and an old curmudgeon forge the unlikeliest of friendships in this charming uplit novel about one misfit book club and the lives it changed along the way.

Sloane Parker lives a small, contained life as a librarian in her small, contained town. She never thinks of herself as lonely…but still she looks forward to that time every day when old curmudgeon Arthur McLachlan comes to browse the shelves and cheerfully insult her. Their sparring is such a highlight of Sloane’s day that when Arthur doesn’t show up one morning, she’s instantly concerned. And then another day passes,

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LIAR, DREAMER, THIEF

One of our recommended books is Liar, Dreamer, Thief by Maria Dong

A young woman’s carefully constructed fantasy world implodes in this brilliantly conceived novel that blurs distinctions between right and wrong, comedy and tragedy, imagination and reality: “Surreal . . . filled with technicolor lies and terrible truths” (Alix E. Harrow, New York Times bestselling and Hugo‑award winning author).

Katrina Kim may be broke, the black sheep of her family, and slightly unhinged, but she isn’t a stalker. Her obsession with her co-worker, Kurt, is just one of many coping mechanisms—like her constant shape and number rituals, or the way scenes from her favorite children’s book bleed into her vision whenever she feels anxious or stressed.

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AN AMERICAN BEAUTY

One of our recommended books is An American Beauty by Shana Abé

Amidst the opulent glamor and vicious social circles of Gilded Age New York, this stunning biographical historical novel by the New York Times bestselling author of The Second Mrs. Astor conjures the true rags-to-riches story of Arabella Huntington — a woman whose great beauty was surpassed only by her exceptional business acumen, grit, and artistic eye, and who defied the constraints of her era to become the wealthiest self-made woman in America.

1867, Richmond, Virginia: Though she wears the same low-cut purple gown that is the uniform of all the girls who work at Worsham’s gambling parlor,

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