Shelf Life

Author: Jane Simon Ammeson

  • Indiana Landmarks Rescued and Restored

    Indiana Landmarks Rescued and Restored

    The Restored Fowler Theatre


    Once a glorious example of Streamline-Moderne architecture and one of only five theaters in the U.S. to premiere “Gone with the Wind,” in 2001 the future of the 81-year-old Fowler Theatre was bleak. No longer open, its owner planned to sell anything architecturally significant including the original marquee.  To prevent this, the non-profit Preservation Guild was formed to save the theater, purchasing the theater for $30,000 and obtained a $2000 grant and a $60,000 line of credit from Indiana Historic Landmarks Foundation.

    The Fowler Theatre before restoration.

    Today, the Fowler Theatre is a marvel, one of many buildings throughout the state that dedicated citizens and the Foundation have worked together in order to preserve Indiana’s heritage and also benefit communities. In the case of the Fowler Theatre, it was a way to keep low cost entertainment available and to help revitalize the downtown.

    Vurpillatt’s Opera House in Winamac Restored

    The theatre is one of 50 success stories highlighted in the recently released Indiana “Landmarks Rescued & Restored,” a lovely coffee table book with before and after photos showcasing what historic preservation can accomplish.

    Vurpillatt’s Opera House in Winamac

    “I want the book to be an acknowledgement of the wonderful people and partnerships that have made Landmarks as effective as it is,” says Indiana Landmarks’ President, Marsh Davis who wrote the forward to the book. “When we take the approach of working together, then we become part of the solution.”

    DeRhodes House West Washington Historic District South Bend Restored

    One of Landmarks most well-known projects was the restoration of two grand early 20th century resorts, French Lick Springs and West Baden Springs in Orange County. Returning them to their glory has made the entire area boom economically by bringing in an influx of tourism, creating local jobs and improving property values and instilling a sense of pride and vitality.

    DeRhodes House West Washington Historic District South Bend

    Landmarks, largest statewide preservation group in the country, saves, restores, and protects places of architectural and historical significance, including barns, historic neighborhoods such as Lockerbie Square in Indianapolis, churches and other sacred places, schools, bridges and even the Michigan City Lighthouse Catwalk.

    Old Republic in New Carlisle Restored

    Rescued and Restored also highlights other successes in Northern Indiana including partnership with the National Trust for Historic Preservation and the National Park Service in the restoration of the House of Tomorrow in the Indiana Dunes National Park, considered one of the most innovative and influential houses in modern architectural design.

    Old Republic Before Restoration

    The book, edited by Tina Connor, who worked at Landmarks for 42 years, retiring from her position as the non-profit’s executive vice president in 2018, 144 pages with more than 200 color photos. Hon. Randall T. Shepard, honorary chairman and long-time director of Indiana Landmarks, wrote the book’s foreward.

    Statewide, Marsh says that he feels privileged knowing that Landmarks worked with the Lyles Station Historic Preservation Corporation to save Lyles Station Community School. Now a museum and the last surviving building of what was a successful African-American farming community founded by former slaves in 1849.

    “These places are all about the people who made them,” says Davis, “and the people who worked at saving them.”

    For more information, visit indianalandmarks.org

    As published in The Times of Northwest Indiana

  • Love and Theft

    Love and Theft

             Starting fast—a motorcycle convoy roars through the lobby of the Wynn Las Vegas, staying only long enough to scoop up millions of dollars’ worth of stones from a classy jewelry store before riding away—Stan Parish’s latest novel “Love and Theft” (Doubleday 2020; $19.49 Amazon price) never slows down.

             Told from multiple points of view, we follow the police as they work to solve the crime as well as the thieves planning their next one last heist and not getting busted. We move with the action from Vegas to Jersey and then to the luxe vacation destination of Tulum, Mexico. Along the way there are weird stops such as one at the home of a doctor who injects willing subjects with a hallucinatory drug that helps them calm down while he and his wife, wearing wired masks, communicate their insights while taking notes.

             It’s all breathless but at the same time human. Neither cops nor bad guys are cartoon characters here. Parish makes them real while juggling the fast-paced plot.

             His interest in mystery-thrillers began when he was around 10 or 11 and pulled a copy of “Dog Soldiers” from his dad’s bookshelf. Parish was ordered to put it back, his father telling him it was full of sex, drugs and violence. Of course, the book only stayed on the shelf until his parents went to bed.

             Inspiration also comes from stories he hears from what he reads and hanging out.

             “In April 2007, two stolen Audi A8s smashed through the glass façade of the Wafi Mall in Dubai,” says Parish. “In a marble rotunda, the white car rammed the secure entrance of Graff Jewelers, while the black car spit out men in masks with automatic weapons.”

             It was the work of a successful gang called the Pink Panthers and became the basis for the opening sequence of “Love and Theft.” But the book is also fueled by what he calls being a diviner though instead of finding water he has “a sixth sense for strange subcultures, suspicious characters, and after-after parties.”

             A few years ago, in Marbella, Spain he was invited to a party at the home of several young bullfighters and during the evening “divined” that some of their income derived from storing drugs for a local cartel. That experience too became a plot point in the novel.

             The former editor-in-chief of The Future of Everything at The Wall Street Journal whose writings have appeared in the New York Times, Esquire and GQ, Parish earned a brown belt in Brazilian Jiu Jitsu and moved to Los Angeles from New York a few years ago. But now he’s living in Europe, waiting for the pandemic to end. He’s dedicated to his craft. Planning on finishing his thriller in Malaga, Spain, he accidentally left his computer, notes and outline behind at JFK International Airport in New York City and while calling lost and found everyday hoping it would turn up, tapped out sections his novel on his cell phone his while riding in cabs late at night. His life, in other words, seems to track his fast-paced novel.

  • Author Sonali Dev’s new novel is an Indian twist on Jane Austen’s ‘Pride and Prejudice’

    Author Sonali Dev’s new novel is an Indian twist on Jane Austen’s ‘Pride and Prejudice’

    In the 300-room Sagar Mahal, the Ocean Palace built by her great-times-four grandfather on the Arabian Sea, 13-year-old Trisha Raje is coached by her father not to be overwhelmed by the sorrow she sees at a school for the blind but instead find a solution, so she doesn’t feel badly.

    And so, she does. Before long, Trisha has created a global charity that performs eye surgeries on the needy and then becomes San Francisco’s premier neurosurgeon, a woman with immense skill but so lacking in social graces that many in her family are not talking to her, as she once inadvertently jeopardized her older brother’s fast-track political career.

    But that isn’t Trisha’s only difficulty in Sonali Dev’s newest book, “Pride, Prejudice and Other Flavors,” an Indian take on Jane Austen’s classic, “Pride and Prejudice.”

    Dev switches up the focus between Trisha and DJ Caine, a rising-star chef whose cancer-stricken sister is a patient of Trisha’s. Trisha is a descendent of Indian Royalty, while Caine, a Rwandan/Anglo-Indian, belongs to a much lower social class — the classic Austen-style mismatch.

    To paraphrase Austen, Dev writes, “It is a truth universally acknowledged that only in an overachieving Indian-American family can a genius daughter be considered a black sheep,” and the book reflects classic Austen, with its subtle ironic humor and the structured setting required in any well-to-do aristocratic English or Indian milieu.

    Trisha has broken the three ironclad rules of her family: Never trust an outsider, never do anything to jeopardize your brother’s political aspirations and never, ever, defy your family.

    Trisha must cope with falling in love with Caine, saving his sister and ensuring that she will not somehow disgrace her family again.

    Dev, who is married with two teenagers and lives in Naperville, says she’s been entranced with Jane Austen’s book since watching the Indian TV adaptation of “Pride and Prejudice,” called “Trishna,” in the 1980s when she was a middle-schooler.

    “I went straight to the library and checked out “Pride and Prejudice” and read it over and over,” she says.

    As for writing, Dev says she wrote before she could even read, making up stories and characters, noting she wrote and acted in her first play when she was 8. “Writing has always been with me,” she says.

    She grew up in Mumbai though the family traveled a lot as her father was in the military.

    “I was always the new kid on the block with a book,” she says.

    She continues to read and write at an amazing speed.

    “I am in fact waiting to get the edits back for my new book,” she says, noting that writing is an escape, a way of putting yourself in the shoes of someone not like you.

  • Virtual Book Event: Ask Me Anything with True Crime Authors

    Virtual Book Event: Ask Me Anything with True Crime Authors

    Log on to Reddit on Saturday August 22nd at 4:30 p.m. for “Ask Me Anything with True Crime Authors,” featuring four best selling authors who will be answering your questions live!

    Submit your question about writing, work, real-life crimes, cover-ups, covert operations, all-time favorite snacks, and anything in between and read through responses as the authors write them!

    Registrants will receive a direct link to the Ask Me Anything hosted on Reddit.com; in order to ask a question, please note you will need access to a free Reddit account.

    This text-only event will be hosted on a specific Reddit page. You can access this event by clicking the orange “GO TO ONLINE EVENT PAGE” button in your Eventbrite email confirmation or by following the direct link that will be shared via email about 10 minutes before scheduled start time.

    Visit BookYourSummerLive.com for more information!

    Maureen Callahan, author of American Predator, is an award-winning investigative journalist, author, columnist, and commentator. She has covered everything from pop culture to politics. Her writing has appeared in Vanity Fair, New York, Spin, and the New York Post, where she is currently critic-at-large. She lives in New York.

    Amaryllis Fox, author of Life Undercover, had a CIA career in the field and now covers current events and offered analysis for CNN, National Geographic, Al Jazeera, the BBC, and other global news outlets. She speaks at events and universities around the world on the topic of peacemaking. She is the co-host of History Channel’s series American Ripper and lives in Los Angeles, California, with her husband and daughter.

    Dr. Lee Mellor Ph.D. is a criminologist, lecturer, musician, and the author of seven books on crime including Behind the Horror. He received his doctorate from Montreal’s Concordia University after specializing in abnormal homicide and sex crimes. As the chair of the American Investigative Society of Cold Cases’ academic committee, he has consulted with police on cold cases in Pennsylvania, Missouri, Ohio, and London, Ontario. He resides in Ontario, Canada.

    Ariel Sabar, is an award-winning journalist whose work has appeared in The Atlantic, The New York Times, Harper’s Magazine, The Washington Post, and many other publications. He is the author of My Father’s Paradise: A Son’s Search for His Jewish Past in Kurdish Iraq, which won the National Book Critics Circle Award. He also authored Veritas: A Harvard Professor, A Con Man and the Gospel of Jesus’s Wife.

  • Lady Romeo: The Radical and Revolutionary Life of Charlotte Cushman, America’s First Celebrity

    Lady Romeo: The Radical and Revolutionary Life of Charlotte Cushman, America’s First Celebrity

    A force of nature in her time, stage actress Charlotte Cushman who played both male and
    female roles, was friends with Abraham Lincoln who admired her work. Indeed, she acted along side both Edwin and John Wilkes Booth and was said to have left a scar on the assassin’s neck that was later used to identify him as the president’s murderer.

    Tana Wojczuk by Beowulf Sheehan

    Cushman was 58-years-old when on November 7, 1874 she gave her last performance in front of
    thousands of fans in New York City. There should have been much to remember her by. She is Angel of Waters on top of Central Park’s Bethesda Fountain designed by her lover Emma Stebbins. This is no ordinary sculpture, Cushman soars above what is, at twenty-six feet high by ninety-six feet wide, one of New York’s largest fountains. But that was the kind of woman she was. She acted for more than 30 years traveling the world to appear on stage and it was publicly well-known that her lovers were female. Yet for some reason she slips from sight, almost lost to history until now, almost 160 years later, her vibrant life is captured in Tana Wojczuk’s new biography, Lady Romeo: The Radical and Revolutionary Life of Charlotte Cushman, America’s First Celebrity.

    Angel of Waters (Wikimedia Commons)

    Wojczuk, a senior nonfiction editor at Guernica who teaches writing at New York University, first
    became aware of Cushman when she was an aspiring actress, a passion she pursued starting at age
    thirteen, and continued through college.

    “Women often played men in the 18th and 19th centuries,” says Wojczuk who came across
    Cushman’s name while researching women who had played Hamlet. “Most cross-dressing onstage was for comic effect or to titillate men who liked to ogle a woman’s legs. But Charlotte was a convincing man onstage. When I found out that she had also been one of the most famous women in the world I wanted to know why, and, like in a detective novel, to account for her disappearance.”

    Charlotte Cushman. Wikimedia Commons

    Cushman aimed for realism so much so that, according to Wojczuk, she was a pioneer of
    method acting, visiting prostitutes in Five Points and exchanging clothes with them to prepare to
    play a prostitute.

    Reading fascinating books like this makes you wonder how many fascinating women—and
    men—have vanished into the mists of time. Why, I wonder? ojczuk has a surprising answer.

    “When she was at her height, American culture was remarkably diverse and experimental, still
    figuring out what it would become,” she says. “There were successful all-black theatres in New York, for example, before well-connected white theatre owners had them shut down. Charlotte’s masculinity was acceptable on-stage, when viewed as a performance, and it helped argue for all gender as performance. But by the time she died in 1876, the American centennial, the postwar culture had clamped down, strictly policing public morality. Even though Charlotte helped create American culture, her role became inconvenient. She was a dangerous influence to young women now clamoring to go to college, to work, to vote. Even on the day she died Victorian critics tried to write her out of history. For a long time, they were successful.”

  • The Request: We All Have a Friend We’d Rather Forget

    The Request: We All Have a Friend We’d Rather Forget

    “We all have a friend from our past who is a lot of fun when we’re young but when we get older
    and get settled that person is someone you want to leave behind,” says David Bell, explaining the idea behind his latest mystery-thriller The Request (Berkley 2020; $11.99—Amazon price). “And I wondered what would happen if that friend showed up and even more if that friend knew something about you that one else knows.”

    That’s what happens to Ryan Francis. Years ago, Ryan was involved in a car accident that left a
    young girl seriously injured. It was his fault his best friend Blake Norton tells Ryan after he wakes up in the hospital, the memory of the accident completely gone.

    Since that time, Ryan has rebuilt his life, marrying, starting a successful business and is now the
    father of a young child. He also carries the guilt of knowing he’s harmed someone and has stealthily left large sums of money in the girl’s mailbox to help with her ongoing medical expenses.

    But things are coming undone. The girl’s sister confronts Ryan, demanding a large amount of
    cash or else she’ll reveal the truth. But she’s not the only one wanting something from Ryan. Blake is
    back and he needs a big favor—break into his ex-girlfriend’s home and steal letters Blake wrote her that she’s threatening to show his current fiancé. And though Ryan refuses, Blake won’t take no for an answer. If Ryan won’t get those letters then Blake will reveal the truth of what happened all those years ago.

    It’ll be easy, Blake assures him. But, of course, it’s not. Letting himself into the house when
    Blake’s ex is supposed to be at yoga class, Ryan can’t find the letters—they’re not where Blake said
    they’d be. But much, much worse, the Blake’s ex never left the house to go to yoga. Ryan stumbles across her body—she’s been murdered. And at the same instant, his phone lights up, the woman lying dead at his feet has just asked him to become her Facebook friend.

    Blake disappears, stealing Ryan’s laptop, a strange man tries to break into their home while his
    wife and baby are there by themselves and the police zero in on Ryan—and his wife–as a possible
    suspects. It seems that others besides Ryan and Blake have their secrets as well.

    “Even the person closest to you has a secret they don’t want you to know,” says Bell. “I think
    we’ve all had the experience of thinking we know someone really well but people can still surprise us, no matter what.”

    DAVID BELL is a USA Today bestselling, award-winning author whose work has been translated into multiple foreign languages. He’s currently an associate professor of English at Western Kentucky University in Bowling Green, Kentucky, where he directs the MFA program. He received an MA in creative writing from Miami University in Oxford, Ohio, and a PhD in American literature and creative writing from the University of Cincinnati. His novels include Layover, Somebody’s Daughter, Bring Her Home, Since She Went Away, Somebody I Used to Know, The Forgotten Girl, Never Come Back, The Hiding Place, Cemetery Girl, and The Request.

    The Times of Northwest Indiana Entertainment.

  • Scott Turow: The Last Trial

    Scott Turow: The Last Trial

                  Sandy Stern is a fragile 85 after surviving several devastating bouts of cancer, dealing with several other ailments and the deaths of his two wives. But when his longtime friend Kiril Pafko asks Stern, a noted defense lawyer to represent him on charges of inside trading and murder. Stern though doubtful as to whether he has the physical strength and mental acuity to do so. But Stern owes Pafko, a brilliant medical doctor, a Nobel Prize-winning scientist and one of the creators of g-Livia, touted as an amazing breakthrough in cancer treatment.  Stern knows the latter firsthand as Pafko successfully treated him with g-Livia putting his aggressive cancer into remission.

                  But Stern was one of the lucky ones. g-Livia also can have deadly side effects, a fact that Pafko is said to have tried to hide by altering test data. He also sold off great amounts of stock in his company that is making the drug, hence the insider trading charge.

                  And so begins the opening of The Last Trial (Grand Central Publishing), Scott Turow’s latest courtroom thriller. Turow, who is retiring from his legal practice next month, has worked as a lawyer in Chicago for decades. He also is the bestselling author of Presumed Innocent, The Burden of Proof, Innocent and other novels, several of which have been made into movies and in all have sold more than 40 million copies.  Turow, who isn’t afraid to throw his characters into dark places where all appears lost, is also credited with inventing the modern legal thriller and it’s easy to see why when reading this absorbing story which delves into drug research, development, testing and FDA approval of pharmaceutical drugs.  Though none of these subjects sound fascinating, Turow, who did what he calls a “daunting amount of research,” writes about it in such a way that the process becomes a page turner.

                  “It also obviously has a weird relevance about rushing pharmaceuticals to market like we are today,” he says, referring to the vaccines said to be on the horizon to treat COVID-19. This being a Turow novel, there are twists and turns, ups and downs and surprises. Even when you think you’re keeping up with the plot twists, he usually manages to stay a step or more ahead. And yet in the end, it all makes sense.

                  “If you want to get philosophical about it, some of twists and turns stems from graduate school,” says Turow who received an Edith Mirrielees Fellowship to Stanford University’s Creative Writing Center where he attended for two years before entering Harvard Law School where he graduated cum laude. “I’ve always been aware of the artifice of the novel where there is, to some extent game playing with the reader—cat and mouse—which I enjoy doing. I also enjoy reading those stories too.”

                  Though Turow is retiring he’ll still do a lot of pro bono work, always a passion for him.  And he is currently working on another novel. This one is centered around Pinky, Sandy Stern’s granddaughter and paralegal, a bright but erratic young woman who is working at solving the hit and run accident that severely injured Stern several months earlier. Was it an attempt to kill him? Unfortunately, Pinky also has penchant for indulging in illegal drugs. A definite break-out personality, Turow says he’s committed himself to Pinky as his major character but he worries about recreating her inner voice. But it’s a problem he will solve.

                  “I looked at Pinky from the outside in this book,” he says. “I’ll find my way inside in the next.”

  • Social Change Virtual Town Hall

    Yara Shahidi, Andrew Yang, Karamo Brown, CEOs and Nonprofit Leaders Convene for Citizen Verizon Assembly Addressing Responsible Business and Creating Social Change

    In what should be a fascinating event, join world-renowned leaders for an urgent discussion on driving impact around inclusivity, education and the workforce of the future on Tuesday, July 28 at 5pm EST on Yahoo Finance and @Verizon on Twitter.

    For this event, Verizon is bringing together business leaders, activists, policy experts and thought leaders for the first-ever Citizen Verizon Assembly, which will focus on creating responsible and just business practices, cultivating an inclusive future in education, and upskilling our workforce to ensure everyone can prosper.

    The hour-long virtual event will include keynotes and discussions with leaders from around the globe, including former presidential candidate Andrew Yang, Grown-ish actress and activist Yara Shahidi, and Ben & Jerry’s CEO Matthew McCarthy, among others.

    This is the first in a series of Citizen Verizon Assemblies that will spotlight the importance of corporate responsibility in helping to drive social, economic and environmental advancement.

    “The Citizen Verizon Assembly was born out of the need for businesses to raise their voices along with the millions of Americans who are fighting for social causes and change. From big cities to small towns, now is the time for all of us to come together and use our power – our power as caring citizens, thought leaders, companies, educators, activists and celebrities – to follow through on our commitments to create real, lasting, meaningful change. At the end of the day, we’re all citizens of this world. I’m excited to see changemakers coming together to join us in moving the world forward,” said Rose Stuckey Kirk, Chief Corporate Social Responsibility Officer, Verizon.

    The inaugural Citizen Verizon Assembly will allow the public to hear from global leaders, activists, television personalities and leaders of iconic brands. Events include:

    A discussion moderated by Karamo Brown on building a future that’s inclusive, including:
    • Geoff Canada, educator and activist pioneering school reform;
    • Yara Shahidi, actress, producer and change agent;
    • and Meredith Walker, Co-Founder and Executive Director of Amy Poehler’s Smart Girls
    A CEO panel on businesses taking a responsibility for pressing social issues will include:
    • Hans Vestberg, CEO, Verizon;
    • Matthew McCarthy, CEO of Ben & Jerry’s;
    • David Heath, Co-Founder and CEO of Bombas;
    • Mindy Grossman, CEO of Weight Watchers;
    • Enrique Lores, CEO of HP;
    • and moderated by Ibram X Kendi, bestselling author and founding director of the Antiracist Research and Policy Center at American University
    • Andrew Yang, Founder, Humanity Forward, will deliver closing

  • Alexandra Petri: Nothing is Wrong and Here is Why

    Alexandra Petri: Nothing is Wrong and Here is Why

             Before she turned 30, Alexandria Petri was the winner of the O. Henry Pun Off World Championship (I bet you didn’t even know such a contest existed) where she made puns on the names of every U.S. president  in chronological order such as “if Andrew jacks an automobile” and the loser on Jeopardy! Now Petri, a columnist for the Washington Post has written her second book, Nothing Is Wrong and Here Is Why (W.W. Norton & Co. 2020; $17.99—Amazon price), collection of more than 50 new and adapted essays from her Post columns.

             If you think someone with a resume like this was a nerd in high school, you’d be right. The only child of a U.S. Congressman from Wisconsin, she wrote a Shakespeare and feline comic book at age eight. Now that is seriously nerdy.

             Petri now has taken her humor to a more modern stage. She loves to skewer politics and the somewhat frightening and nonsensical actions our politician’s take.

             Is it hard, I ask her, to transform the horrible news we hear into satire and is it a way for her to keep sane?

             “I think I tend to be a relatively cheery person and this almost maniacal devotion to hunting for a bright side in gloomy situations can manifest as a kind of satire,” she says in describing the way she writes such columns as “America, please don’t put bleach inside yourself like the president says” and “Know The Signs: How to tell if your grandparent has become an antifa agent” in response to President Trump’s musing that maybe the 75-year-old protestor pushed to the ground in Buffalo was actually an ANTIFA agent trying to block police communication.

             It’s a way, she says, of looking at the way your thinking would have to be deranged to see today’s particular monstrosity as great news.

             “ I think of writing as a way of trying to make eye contact with people and say, are you seeing this too?, and in that way it is sanity-affirming,” she says. “It helps me feel less alone and remember that other people agree that this is not the way we would like our world to be.”

             Sometimes even people who can win national pun contests run out of ideas. What does Petri do when this happens?

             “I will usually go for a walk or pick up a book or something that isn’t the news and see if fresh inputs will help my brain along, but sometimes that doesn’t do it and my editor is nice enough to think it’s better only to write when you have something to say,” she says. “I am also grateful that I don’t always have to write jokes; sometimes I will just write a more straightforward column. If I can’t think of anything funny to say, I know I don’t always have to. And the flip side of this is that there are some days when I want to write three columns and have to be restrained from doing so.”

             Asked if there is anything else she wants people to know about her book, Petri has a quick answer.

             “I hope they will buy it and enjoy its cover,” she says, adding, “everyone please wash your hands and wear a mask and stay safe.”

  • Barnes and Noble’s Best Books of 2020 (So Far)

    Barnes and Noble’s Best Books of 2020 (So Far)

    Booksellers Select the Top Ten Titles from the First Half of 2020

    Barnes & Noble Inc., the world’s largest retail bookseller, today announced that booksellers from across the U.S. selected ten titles as the Best Books of 2020 (So Far), including books that address our current moment, share lessons from the past, and bring memorable characters—both real and imagined—to life.

    “Our passionate bookselling team has undertaken the distinct challenge of narrowing down our favorite books from the first half of 2020 into a short list of ten diverse and thought-provoking titles. The result is a unique range that includes the informative and historical, to electrifying new novels and even a heartwarming children’s tale about a dog, a gorilla, and an elephant,” Jackie De Leo, Vice President, Bookstore, Barnes & Noble. “I am really impressed with our booksellers’ selections, and I am pleased to recommend these titles to our customers.”

    1) The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes, by Suzanne Collins
    “Readers return to the districts of Panem to see the Hunger Games in its infancy and witness a side to future-President Snow that you wouldn’t expect … A heart-stopping adrenaline rush that has you clamoring to reread the original series now that you’ve gotten a glimpse of this unexpected backstory!” -Bookseller Melissa Lavendier

    2) A Burning, by Megha Majumdar
    “A searing debut novel filled with characters who will live with you long after you turn the final page… the intensity of this story cannot be overstated. A Burning is the best book I’ve read so far this year!”  -Bookseller Sarah Coombs

    3) Countdown 1945: The Extraordinary Story of the Atomic Bomb and the 116 Days That Changed the World, by Chris Wallace
    “Step into the shoes of President Truman and experience the most difficult 116 days in American history.  Albert Einstein said working on the atomic bomb was ‘the one great mistake in my life.’  Don’t let missing this book be yours.” -Bookseller Steven Kneeland

    4) Deacon King Kong, by James McBride
    “This brilliant novel starts out with a literal bang when a church deacon shoots a local drug dealer in 1969 Brooklyn. It’s a story that will captivate you until the very end. Hands down, one of the best books I’ve read this year.”  -Bookseller Tara Smart

    5) Me and White Supremacy, by Layla F. Saad
    “A must read—and ENGAGE—book and an invaluable tool for fully examining the tentacles of white privilege and for confronting our own, individual complicity in a racist culture.  Said is a firm, gentle, frank, and demanding guide on a journey to explain and drive home the full meaning of what it is to be antiracist.” -Book Buyer Sallye Leventhal


    6) The One and Only Bob, by Katherine Applegate
    “Another heartfelt and empowering novel from Katherine Applegate, it will enchant and delight the inner child in every reader.  Follow Bob along on his mission to save his long-lost sister with his best friends.  See Ivan again in this as he helps his friend, Bob, and root them on until the very last page.” -Bookseller

    7) The Splendid and the Vile, by Erik Larson
    “A beautiful history of how Churchill gave strength to the British people through times of great struggle and brought a country together.” -Bookseller Savanna Kessler

    8) Stamped, by Jason Reynolds and Ibram X. Kendi
    “Stamped is a book that should be in the hands of every teenager. This book is a call to action and is written with the intention of dismantling the racist prejudices that continue to plague our nation. It is educational, important and so very relevant.” -Bookseller Victoria Bartolo

    9) Untamed, by Glennon Doyle
    “Untamed is another honest, moving and empowering book from Glennon Doyle. Her books feel like you’re having a conversation with just her, this one is no different.”            -Bookseller Sarah Smith

    10)  The Vanishing Half, by Brit Bennett
    “The Vanishing Half is an incredibly thought-provoking novel that touches on societal norms, gender constructs and racial inequality. Brit Bennett has given us a powerful, challenging and complex story that I absolutely recommend to anyone looking to understand racial prejudice and colorism.” -Bookseller Allison Osborn

    Customers can find these titles at their local Barnes & Noble and on BN.com.