By Luke Gorham
Published May 20, 2021 in The Burg
After that odd mid-April snowfall, it seems that spring has finally sprung. With a slew of 60-degree days shaping the past couple weeks, it feels safe to finally look forward to summer. After the past year (and a long winter), it seems like a good assumption that most of us are itching to get back outside, at any opportunity. One of the easiest ways to give yourself that excuse is in the company of a good book, and with that in mind, the Galesburg Public Library has plenty of recent release recommendations for your reading pleasure.
For those looking for a literal summer read, fan-favorite Jennifer Weiner is back with her latest novel, titled That Summer, about Daisy Shoemaker, a woman in the midst of family, workplace, and friendship crises whose life is further upset by a series of misdirected emails and a stranger with ulterior motives. People We Meet on Vacation, courtesy of Beach Read author Emily Henry, is a lighter affair that gives off serious When Harry Met Sally… vibes in its story of two friends who might be more.
For the more supernaturally-minded, Rivers Solomon’s fantasy-horror mashup, Sorrowland, finds the seven-months-pregnant Vern on the run — into the forest — from both the religious compound where she was raised and a mysterious something hot on her trail. Elsewhere, in science fiction territory, The Martian author Andy Weir is back with another space-set thriller, Hail Mary, about a sole survivor on a last-chance mission to the deep reaches of space in a bid to save humanity’s future. And if you like your science fiction a little more grounded in reality, make sure to check out renowned and multiple award-winning author Kazuo Ishiguro’s latest novel, Klara and the Sun, which tells the tale of an AI companion to a young girl dealing with a debilitating health crisis.
If nonfiction is more your thing, poet-essayist-cultural critic Hanif Abdurraqib’s latest effort, A Little Devil in America, might be up your alley; the book explores the idea of Black performance in America, both historically and in present contexts. White Magic, from Native American author Elissa Washuta, is a similarly penetrating work, one that considers issues of colonization, heartbreak, addiction, and witchcraft, as well as Stevie Nicks and Oregon Trail II. Meanwhile. Melissa Febos’s best-selling Girlhood just keeps selling copies, with its stories of the forces that shape girls and the adult women they become.
The Galesburg Public Library has all of the above books available for checkout, and if none of these catch your eye, we’re happy to help you find something that will! Contact us at 309-343-6118 or reference@galesburglibrary.org.
(Luke Gorham is the Reference Librarian at the Galesburg Public Library.)
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