Well-Written Literary Fiction

Try these books if you're looking for:
  • good writing style
  • good content
  • emotion
  • searching for truth and meaning
  • character depth
  • thought-provoking
  • clean reads
The Awakening of Miss Prim 
Natalia Sanmartin Fenollera
F SANMARTI FENOLLER (currently a New Book)
"Prudencia Prim is a young woman of intelligence and achievement, with a deep knowledge of literature and several letters after her name. But when she accepts the post of private librarian in the village of San Ireneo de Arnois, she is unprepared for what she encounters there. Her employer, a book-loving intellectual, is dashing yet contrarian, always ready with a critique of her cherished Jane Austen and Louisa May Alcott. The neighbors, too, are capable of charm and eccentricity in equal measure, determined as they are to preserve their singular little community from the modern world outside."-- Provided by publisher. This sounds like it is going to be a cheesy romance, but, trust me, it isn’t. It turns out to be a very interesting look at the benefits of living a simplified life.

La’s Orchestra Saves the World 
Alexander McCall Smith
F MCCALL SMITH
It is 1939. Lavender--La to her friends--decides to flee London, not only to avoid German bombs but also to escape the memories of her shattered marriage. Settling in a small town, she boosts morale by organizing an amateur orchestra from the village and the local RAF base--and falls in love with one of her prized recruits. McCall Smith has a very soothing writing voice (I find his books particularly fun to listen to) and is best at character creation. His plots are not usually action-packed, but his characters are exceptionally vivid and his writing is beautifully philosophical, with a good dose of dry wit.

The Patrick Melrose Novels: Never Mind, Bad News, Some Hope, and Mother’s Milk 
Edward St. Aubyn
F ST AUBYN
Follows the life of Patrick Melrose, a member of an upper class English family, through his traumatic childhood with an abusive father, drug addiction, fatherhood, and the possible loss of his family home. St. Aubyn’s books provide a grim look into the life of a decadent aristocracy and explore how emotional health can be achieved even from a difficult childhood. Mother’s Milk, the first in the series, was nominated for the prestigious Booker Prize.

The Blind Man’s Garden 
Nadeem Aslam
F ASLAM (currently a New Book)
Jeo and Mikal are foster brothers from a small town in Pakistan. Though they were inseparable as children, their adult lives have diverged: Jeo is a dedicated medical student, married a year; Mikal has been a vagabond since he was fifteen, in love with a woman he can't have. But when Jeo decides to sneak across the border into Afghanistan--not to fight with the Taliban against the Americans, rather to help care for wounded civilians--Mikal determines to go with him, to protect him. This is an emotionally difficult book to read, but the writing is exquisite. There are violent things that happen, but the writing itself does not ever lean toward the graphically violent. This is not an easy book, but it is an important one, and one that will make you think about the ambiguity that is the situation in Afghanistan.

The Enchanted April 
Elizabeth von Arnim
F VON ARNIM
The four women at the center of The Enchanted April are alike only in their dissatisfaction with their everyday lives. They find each other--and the castle of their dreams--through a classified ad in a London newspaper one rainy February afternoon. The ladies expect a pleasant holiday, but they don't anticipate that the month they spend in Portofino will reintroduce them to their true natures and reacquaint them with joy. I enjoyed watching these four very different women come to learn about themselves and each other through von Arnim’s beautiful prose. (Also, it really made me want to spend a month in Italy.)

Angle of Repose 
Wallace Stegner
F STEGNER
Stegner's Pulitzer Prize-winning novel is the story of four generations in the life of an American family. A wheelchair-bound retired historian embarks on a monumental quest: to come to know his grandparents, now long dead. The unfolding drama of the story of the American West sets the tone for Stegner's masterpiece. Four generations in the life of an American family are chronicled as retired historian Lyman Ward, confined to a wheelchair, decides to write his grandparent's history. The Pulitzer Prize-winning classic has been selected by the board of the Modern Library as one of the best hundred novels of the 20th century. I read this several years ago and the prose still haunts me. A gorgeous book all around.

Dark Fiction

Try these books if you're looking for:
  • dark fiction
  • some dystopian
  • reads like Gone Girl
The Good Girl 
Mary Kubica
MYSTERY KUBICA
In this tale of a kidnapping gone wrong, Mia, the black-sheep daughter of prominent Chicago judge James Dennett, impulsively decides to go home with Colin, a young man she meets in a bar. The one-night stand quickly turns into a nightmare when Colin forces her into his car in the middle of the night, and Mia learns he’s been sent to abduct her for ransom. But just before the drop-off point, Colin, for reasons unknown, decides not to hand her over to the man who has hired him and instead takes her to a remote cabin in Minnesota. Back at home, Mia’s mother, Eve, cannot understand why James doesn’t seem to take the news of his daughter’s disappearance as seriously as she does. Gabe, the detective assigned to the case, wonders the same thing. The narrative unfolds in four different perspectives—from Mia, Eve, Gabe, and Colin, in alternating chapters—which are also structured as “before” and “after.”

The Silent Wife 
A.S.A Harrison
MYSTERY HARRISON
Jodi has led a quietly ordered and opulent life with her partner, Todd, for the past 20 years. She considers herself to be a flexible and understanding better half, who reacts to Todd's indiscretions by cooking him his favorite meal to remind him of their stable home life. A psychiatrist, she perceives an insurmountable difference between herself and her clients, whom she thinks would benefit from accepting the low points of their lives along with the high ones. But the events that Todd is about to set in motion will test Jodi's limits to a harrowing degree and cause a secret that she buried long ago to resurface. Told in the alternating voices of Jodi and Todd, Harrison's novel is the story of what happens when the life we've worked so hard to achieve is exposed as an illusion.

Dear Daughter 
Elizabeth Little
F LITTLE
Former celebrity Janie Jenkins gets out of jail on a technicality after serving 10 years for killing her high-society mother. She doesn’t remember doing it, but she didn’t like her mother very much; still, once out of jail, she’s determined to determine what really happened. Janie is smart, but she has a smart mouth, too, which tends to put people off. Her attorney, Noah, is on her side, but she has a hard time telling him—or anyone else—the truth. Meanwhile, tabloid reporter Trace is after her, convinced she’s guilty and willing to put his money where his mouth is, offering a large reward for her whereabouts. Janie digs into her mother’s past, which leads her to Ardelle, South Dakota, a small town filled with small-town secrets and a cast of quirky, sketchy characters, including a suspicious police chief; but Janie keeps them all guessing. It seems that the more she finds out, the more she needs to know as the mystery continues to deepen.

Panic 
Lauren Oliver
YA F OLIVER
Heather and Dodge live in Carp, N.Y., a down-on-its-heels town where graduating seniors can participate in a secret annual game called Panic. Everyone contributes to the pot, with winner take all when the game begins. Players have died in the past, and Dodge’s older sister was paralyzed two years earlier; this year’s prize is $67,000. This is a purported return to realistic fiction for Oliver following her popular Delirium books, and it’s realistic in the way that Before I Fall was: in her setting and characters, if not the situations they face. The stakes of Panic are extraordinarily high; an early challenge has competitors crossing between two water towers on a narrow plank, and things only escalate.

Glow 
Amy Kathleen Ryan
YA F RYAN Sky Chas #1
With Earth no longer viable, two pioneer spaceships have been on the road for years—and have more than 40 to go before arriving at their goal. The two spaceships are complete habitats, raising crops and families to prepare for colonizing New Earth. On board, the families have grown, and the first generation is nearing marriageable age. Unbeknownst to those on the Empyrean, all the women on board the other spaceship, the New Horizon, are sterile. So the New Horizon stages an attack and kidnaps all the girls, from 16-year-old Waverly to the youngest toddler, to harvest their eggs. Ryan’s depiction of religion—the charismatic but evil Anne Mather, of the New Horizon, is clearly Christian—explores the differences that can exist between the content and implementation of faith. This one is also told in alternating narrators.

Fantasy with Depth

Try these books if you're looking for:
  • adult fantasy
  • plot driven
  • character driven
  • books with life and depth
Assassin's Apprentice 
Robin Hobb
SCI-FI HOBB Farseer #1
As Fitz, an outcast and the bastard son of Prince Chivalry, grows to manhood, a legacy of magical skill and other mysterious talents propels him into the role of protector of the kingdom, if his initial perilous mission does not destroy him first.

Dragonflight 
Anne McCaffrey
SCI-FI MCCAFFRE Dragonri #1
At a time when the number of Dragonriders has fallen too low for safety and only one Weyr trains the creatures and their riders, the Red Star approaches Pern, threatening it with disaster.

Exciting Young Adult Reads

Try these books if you're looking for:
  • young adult fiction
  • exciting books
  • adventure 
Killer of Enemies 
Joseph Bruchac
YA F BRUCHAC
In a world that has barely survived an apocalypse that leaves it with pre-twentieth century technology, Lozen is a monster hunter for four tyrants who are holding her family hostage.

Old City Hall 
Robert Rotenberg
F ROTENBER
It should have been an open and shut case. Canada's leading radio talk show host came to the door of his luxury condominium, his hands bloody, and said to the newspaper deliveryman, "I killed her." Yet, the discovery that the victim was a self-destructive alcoholic, the presence of strange fingerprints at the crime scene, and the refusal of the accused to say anything--even to his attorney--lead to a hotly contested murder trial.

Non-fiction with Heart...and Some Other Stuff

Try these books if you're looking for:
  • non-fiction 
  • memoirs 
  • books dealing with relationships 
  • action 
  • humor 
As You Wish: Inconceivable Tales From the Making of the Princess Bride 
Cary Elwes
791.4372 ELW 2014
Even if you don’t have a crush on Cary Elwes, you’ll enjoy this vivid behind-the-scenes account of the making of The Princess Bride. His stories, especially those involving Andre the Giant, will leave you in stitches. Robin Wright, Mandy Patinkin, Billy Crystal, and others also recount their experiences. An amusing account of a group of performers who came together to make a heartfelt film that is loved by many. -- Emily Weiss for LibraryReads.

What If?: Serious Scientific Answers to Absurd Hypothetical Questions 
Randall Munroe
500 MUN 2014
"Millions of people visit xkcd.com each week to read Randall Munroe's iconic webcomic. His stick-figure drawings about science, technology, language, and love have a large and passionate following. Fans of xkcd ask Munroe a lot of strange questions. What if you tried to hit a baseball pitched at 90 percent the speed of light? How fast can you hit a speed bump while driving and live? If there was a robot apocalypse, how long would humanity last? In pursuit of answers, Munroe runs computer simulations, pores over stacks of declassified military research memos, solves differential equations, and consults with nuclear reactor operators. His responses are masterpieces of clarity and hilarity, complemented by signature xkcd comics. They often predict the complete annihilation of humankind, or at least a really big explosion. The book features new and never-before-answered questions, along with updated and expanded versions of the most popular answers from the xkcd website. What If? will be required reading for xkcd fans and anyone who loves to ponder the hypothetical. "--Provided by publisher.

Food: A Love Story 
Jim Gaffigan
818.602 GAF 2014
Stand-up Comedian and author Jim Gaffigan rhapsodizing over the most treasured dishes of the American diet.

In the Kingdom of Ice: The Grand and Terrible Polar Voyage of the U.S.S. Jeannette 
Hampton Sides
910.452 SID 2014
On his first Polar voyage in 1873, nothing in the frigid north appealed to Lieutenant George De Long, but he soon became obsessed. A few years later, leading an 1879 Arctic expedition and tasked with finding a mythical open-sea passage, De Long and his crew faced deadly trouble when their ship became trapped in the ice. Using letters, diaries, expedition records, newspaper reports, and other documents, bestselling author Hampton Sides provides a dramatic account of what happened to De Long and his crew in this gripping nautical tale. -- Description by Dawn Towery.

The Family Romanov: Murder, Rebellion, and the Fall of Imperial Russia 
Candace Fleming
947.083 FLE 2014
Traces the story of the Russian Revolution, the lives of the Romanov family, and the story of their tragic deaths, in an account that draws on primary source materials and includes period photography.