River Readers

First grade teacher and single mother Alexa Harris is no stranger to struggle, but for once, things are looking up. The school year is over and the lazy days of summer are here. Mini-vacations and relaxing twilight barbeques are on the horizon until Alexa’s free-spirited younger sister vanishes.

Ransom calls and death threats force Alexa and her young daughter to flee their quiet home in Maryland. With nowhere else to turn, Alexa seeks the help of Jackson Matthews, Ethan Cooke Security’s Risk Assessment Specialist and the man who broke her heart.

He was just trying to hitch a bus ride, but after an accident, Jack Reacher finds himself stranded in Bolton, S.D. The town's police department asks his help in keeping a witness alive, especially after two people have been found shot to death.

Commoner Pomella has been invited to the trials to be the next High Mystic's apprentice. People are outraged that a commoner has been selected over a highborn, and the local royalty tell Pomella that if she goes to the trials she will be "unclaimed" or made a pariah. Pomella decides to risk it anyways.
A surprising twist ends this fun novel.

The shocking thing about the girls was how nearly normal they seemed when their mother let them out for the one and only date of their lives. Twenty years on, their enigmatic personalities are embalmed in the memories of the boys who worshipped them and who now recall their shared adolescence: the brassiere draped over a crucifix belonging to the promiscuous Lux; the sisters' breathtaking appearance on the night of the dance; and the sultry, sleepy street across which they watched a family disintegrate and fragile lives disappear. goodreads.com

Here's Mickey Spillane and Mike Hammer in their roughest and readiest--a double-strength shot of sex, violence, and action that is vintage Spillane all the way. It's a tough-guy mystery to please even the most bloodthirsty of fans! goodreads.com

When the Norwegian ambassador to Thailand is found dead in a Bangkok brothel, Inspector Harry Hole is dispatched from Oslo to help hush up the case.

Midwest Medicinal Plants is a comprehensive guide for foraging and natural medicine that is accessible to everyone, from beginners seeking reliable advice to experienced practitioners on the hunt for new information. You’ll find plant profiles, color photographs, step-by-step instruction for essential herbal remedies, and seasonal foraging tips. This must-have resource to finding, harvesting, and using wild plants covers Ohio, Illinois, Michigan, Wisconsin, Minnesota, Iowa, Missouri, Kansas, Nebraska, and Ontario.

Navigating between the Indian traditions they've inherited and the baffling new world, the characters in Jhumpa Lahiri's elegant, touching stories seek love beyond the barriers of culture and generations. In "A Temporary Matter," published in The New Yorker, a young Indian-American couple faces the heartbreak of a stillborn birth while their Boston neighborhood copes with a nightly blackout. In the title story, an interpreter guides an American family through the India of their ancestors and hears an astonishing confession.

Newly engaged Avery Stafford leaves her job as a federal prosecutor in Washington, D.C., to go back home to South Carolina, where she is being groomed to succeed her ailing father, a U.S. senator. At a meet-and-greet at a nursing home, she encounters May, a woman who seems to have some link with Avery's Grandma Judy, now suffering from dementia. The reader learns early on that May was once Rill Foss, one of five siblings snatched from their shanty home on the Mississippi and taken to the Memphis branch of the Tennessee Children's Home Society.

When ninety-nine-year-old heiress Josephine Bettendorf Warrick summons Brooke Trappnell to Talisa Island, her 20,000 acre remote barrier island home, Brooke is puzzled. Everybody in the South has heard about the eccentric millionaire mistress of Talisa, but Brooke has never met her. Josephine’s cryptic note says she wants to discuss an important legal matter with Brooke, who is an attorney, but Brooke knows that Mrs. Warrick has long been a client of a prestigious Atlanta law firm.

The sport of tennis has been played in one form or another for more than 800 years. It can trace its roots to games played by monks in the 12th century. Through the years the game has evolved from one in which the ball was struck with the hands to the modern game in which rackets are used to propel the ball in excess of 150 miles per hour. From the sport of the elite to the sport played by elite athletes, tennis has grown immensely in the past 135 years and it remains one of the few sporting pastimes that is played extensively by people of all ages and all nationalities.

In the past . . .
On a blisteringly hot August afternoon in Crystal Palace, once home to the tragically destroyed Great Exhibition, a solitary thirteen-year-old boy meets his next door neighbor, a recently widowed young teacher hoping to make a new start in the tight-knit South London community. Drawn together by loneliness, the unlikely pair form a deep connection that ends in a shattering act of betrayal.

In the present . . .

From the catalog: "The saga continues ... Now Brianna has made a disturbing discovery that sends her to the stone circle and a terrifying leap into the unknown. In search of her mother and the father she has never met, she is risking her own future to try to change history and to save their lives. But as Brianna plunges into an uncharted wilderness, a heartbreaking encounter may strand her forever in the past or root her in the place she should be, where her heart and soul belong."

Felix is your typical middle school kid except for one little thing. He and his mom live in a van. It was supposed to be temporary, but as the months go by it becomes more of the norm. His mom Astrid has slumps and can't keep a job. Despite the fact that Felix has no fixed address or place to call home he is doing pretty well. He is enrolled in a French immersion school and has reconnected with his best friend. He even has a girl friend Winnie. The icing on the cake is the audition for his favorite game show.

This is a deeply personal story of one man's struggle with Tourette's as he is making his way through life. Josh Hanagarne is a librarian by calling, a family man with a loving wife and son, and a Mormon. He also happens to have Tourette's. His story is one of faith and love and exploration as he deals with normal life through the lens of Tourette's. I have never met anyone with Tourette's, but I found his struggles deeply moving. I thought it was interesting that he learned to manage his ticks through movement and exercise. I also really identified with his struggle with his faith.