Cover ArtThe Fallen Fruit by Shawntelle Madison

Call Number: PS3613.A28452 F35 2024
ISBN: 9780063290594
Publication Date: 2024-09-03
Combining history and fantasy, a sweeping multi-generational epic in the vein of Kindred and The Time Traveler's Wife about a woman who travels through time to end a family curse that has plagued her ancestors for generations. On a rainy day in May 1964, history professor Cecily Bridge-Davis begins to search for the sixty-five acres of land she inherited from her father's family. The quest leads her to uncover a dark secret: In every generation, one offspring from each Bridge family unit vanishes--and is mysteriously whisked back in time. Rules have been established that must be followed to prevent dire consequences: Never interfere with past events. Always carry your free Negro papers. Search for the survival family packs in the orchard and surrounding forest. The ribbon on the pack designates the decade the pack was made to orient you in time. Do not speak to strangers unless absolutely necessary. With only a family Bible and a map marked with the locations of mysterious containers to aid her, Cecily heads to the library, hoping to discover the truth of how this curse began, and how it might be ended. As she moves through time, she encounters a circle of ancestors, including Sabrina Humbles, a free Black woman who must find the courage to seize an opportunity--or lose her heart; Luke Bridge, who traverses battlefields, slavery, and time itself to reunite with his family; Rebecca Bridge, a mother tested by an ominous threat; and Amelia Bridge, a young woman burdened with survivor's guilt who will face the challenge of a lifetime--and change Cecily's life forever. It is a race through time and against the clock to find the answers that will free her family forever. Shawntelle Madison's historical fiction debut is an enthralling, page-turning family saga about the inevitability of fate, the invincibility of love, and the indelible bonds of family.
 

Cover ArtThe Hitchcock Hotel by Stephanie Wrobel

Call Number: PS3623.R628 H58 2024
ISBN: 9780593547113
Publication Date: 2024-09-24
A Hitchcock fanatic with an agenda invites old friends for a weekend stay at his secluded themed hotel in this fiendishly clever, suspenseful new novel from the international bestselling author of Darling Rose Gold. Alfred Smettle is not your average Hitchcock fan. He is the founder, owner, and manager of The Hitchcock Hotel, a sprawling Victorian house in the White Mountains dedicated to the Master of Suspense. There, Alfred offers his guests round-the-clock film screenings, movie props and memorabilia in every room, plus an aviary with fifty crows. To celebrate the hotel's first anniversary, he invites his former best friends from his college Film Club for a reunion. He hasn't spoken to any of them in sixteen years, not after what happened. But who better than them to appreciate Alfred's creation? And to help him finish it. After all, no Hitchcock set is complete without a body.
 
 

Cover ArtHow to Leave the House by Nathan Newman

Call Number: PS3614.E632 H69 2024
ISBN: 9780593654903
Publication Date: 2024-08-13
"Profound--and profoundly sidesplitting." --Bobby Finger, The New York Times It's Natwest's last day before he leaves for university, and there's only one thing on his mind: the deeply embarrassing package he ordered to his house--which still hasn't arrived. He won't leave town without it. Any alternative is too distressing to consider. . . This is the story of twenty-four hours in the life of Natwest, and his small-town odyssey in pursuit of the missing package. And yet it's also the story of a middle-aged dentist who dreams of being a respected artist--but the only thing he can seem to paint is the human mouth. And it's the story of a tortured imam involved in a quasi-romantic entanglement with the local vicar; and an octogenerian mourning the death of her secretive husband; and a troubled teenager whose nudes have leaked on the internet. It's the story of Natwest's obnoxious ex-boyfriend, and his class-traitor mother and her childhood boyfriend, and the life-changing secrets he knows about Natwest's past. Alternating between Natwest's idiosyncratic inner world and the perspectives of the other characters--and dazzling in its energy, imagination and originality--this is an outrageously funny and tenderly moving story about being connected to everyone and everything at all times; about love, friendship, and the lies we tell ourselves; about unhappy endings, happy endings--and whether anything really is as simple as one or the other.
 

Cover ArtThe Life Impossible by Matt Haig

Call Number: PR6108.A39 L54 2024
ISBN: 9780593489277
Publication Date: 2024-09-03
The New York Times Bestseller "An odyssey of action and awe." --The New York Times "A wry and tender love-letter to the best of being human." --Benedict Cumberbatch The remarkable next novel from Matt Haig, the author of #1 New York Times bestseller The Midnight Library, with more than nine million copies sold worldwide "What looks like magic is simply a part of life we don't understand yet..." When retired math teacher Grace Winters is left a run-down house on a Mediterranean island by a long-lost friend, curiosity gets the better of her. She arrives in Ibiza with a one-way ticket, no guidebook and no plan. Among the rugged hills and golden beaches of the island, Grace searches for answers about her friend's life, and how it ended. What she uncovers is stranger than she could have dreamed. But to dive into this impossible truth, Grace must first come to terms with her past. Filled with wonder and wild adventure, this is a story of hope and the life-changing power of a new beginning.
 

Cover ArtSnake Oil by Kelsey Rae Dimberg

Call Number: PS3604.I46465 S63 2024
ISBN: 9780062867957
Publication Date: 2024-09-17
A razor-sharp literary thriller about three women vying for power at a wellness startup, where the cost of ambition might be deadly One woman's elixir is another woman's poison Rhoda West is Silicon Valley's favorite female CEO: the luminously charismatic founder of the fast-growing startup Radical, a wellness company whose core mission is the betterment of women's lives. Rhoda's Instagram page offers intimate glimpses of her personal life alongside promotions for the cult-status products developed in the Well, Radical's secretive lab. Dani Lang is a "quester," as Rhoda calls her most avid followers. Dani found Radical at a low point in her life, and took an entry level job just to get in the door. When she volunteers to test a controversial new supplement, Dani wins an opportunity to rise in the company, even to work with Rhoda herself. Cecelia Cole is a "quasher." She grinds away at the Customer Worship queue, resenting the entitled customers, the woo-woo Radical jargon, and Rhoda's smiling hypocrisy. Cecelia, who suffers from a miserable chronic illness, knows that the remedies Rhoda sells can't cure real sickness. Just as Rhoda announces another fundraising round that could turn Radical into a billion-dollar unicorn, an anonymous Twitter account begins spilling snarky gossip from inside the startup. Is Rhoda really the nurturing leader she presents to the world, or a fraud? Or is this just another case of a woman in business being punished for her strength and audacity? Tensions rise and loyalties clash, then tragedy strikes during a company party. In the aftermath of what looks more and more like a crime, even the most faithful questers begin to wonder to what lengths Rhoda will go to protect her company. Part page-turning suspense, part darkly comic skewering of startup culture, Snake Oil is a gripping exploration of ambition and authenticity, shining a revealing light on the wellness world.
 

Cover ArtWe Came to Welcome You by Vincent Tirado

Call Number: PS3620.I68 W4 2024
ISBN: 9780063383180
Publication Date: 2024-09-03
The Other Black Girl meets Midsommar in this spine-chilling, propulsive psychological adult debut from highly acclaimed author Vincent Tirado, in which a married couple moves into a gated "community" that slowly creeps into a pervasive dread akin to the social horror of Jordan Peele and Lovecraft County--We Came to Welcome You cleverly uses the uncanny to illuminate the cultish, shocking nature of systemic racism. Where beauty lies, secrets are held...ugly ones. Sol Reyes has had a rough year. After a series of workplace incidents at her university lab culminates in a plagiarism accusation, Sol is put on probation. Dutiful visits to her homophobic father aren't helping her mental health, and she finds her nightly glass of wine becoming more of an all-day--and all-bottle--event. Her wife, Alice Song, is far more optimistic. After all, the two finally managed to buy a house in the beautiful, gated community of Maneless Grove. However, the neighbors are a little too friendly in Sol's opinion. She has no interest in the pushy Homeowners Association, their bizarrely detailed contract, or their never-ending microaggressions. But Alice simply attributes their pursuit to the community motto: "Invest in a neighborly spirit"...which only serves to irritate Sol more.   Suddenly, a number of strange occurrences--doors and stairs disappearing, roots growing inside the house--cause Sol to wonder if her social paranoia isn't built on something more sinister. Yet Sol's fears are dismissed as Alice embraces their new home and becomes increasingly worried instead about Sol's drinking and manic behavior. When Sol finds a journal in the property from a resident that went missing a few years ago, she realizes why they were able to buy the house so easily... Through Sol's razor-sharp tongue and macabre sense of humor, Tirado explores the very real pressures to assimilate with one's surroundings to "survive," while also asking the question: Is it survival when you're no longer your true self Because in Maneless Grove, either you become a good neighbor--or you die.
 

Cover ArtWilliam by Mason Coile

Call Number: PR9199.3.P96 W56 2024
ISBN: 9780593719602
Publication Date: 2024-09-10
Psychological horror meets cyber noir in this delicious one-sitting read--a haunted house story in which the haunting is by AI. Henry is a brilliant engineer who, after untold hours spent in his home lab, has achieved the breakthrough of his career--he's created an artificially intelligent consciousness. He calls the half-formed robot William. No one knows about William. Henry's agoraphobia keeps him inside the house, and his fixation on his project keeps him up in the attic, away from everyone, including his pregnant wife, Lily. When Lily's coworkers show up, wanting to finally meet Henry and see the new house--the smartest of smart homes--Henry decides to introduce them to William, and things go from strange to much worse. Soon Henry and Lily discover the security upgrades intended to keep danger out of the house are even better at locking it in.