Ah, the kitchen. The heart of the home, the place with the snacks, and the location where you have probably spent much more time this year compared to last year. Maybe you devoted hours of sheltering at home time to baking, perhaps you took this as an opportunity to try that elaborate new recipe you never felt you had the time for, or maybe you just have gotten tired of takeout and decided to try and recreate a fancy restaurant experience at home.
If any of these sound like you, or your nearest and dearest, take a look at my picks for the ten best cookbooks to come out in 2020! I love to gift my favorite cookbooks during the holiday season. If you are lucky they will share some of their successful and hopefully delicious results with you after they try out some recipes! *wink wink*
Each of these titles would make a wonderful gift for a family member, friend, or a lovely book to add to your own cookery library. Don’t forget to order from Bookshop.org so you can support your local, independent booksellers this holiday season!
Happy holidays and I hope you stay happy, healthy, and safe this season!
In this week’s special picks there are new exciting romance, mystery, suspense, and many more genres for you to choose from! Enjoy!
D: A Tale of Two Worlds by Michel Faber – Baffled by the sudden disappearance of the letter D, a young woman is summoned to the home of a former history teacher before arriving in an enslaved, wintry land where free thinking is under threat.
The Last Days of John Lennon by James Patterson – Published to commemorate the 40th anniversary of Lennon’s assassination and based on insider interviews, a chronicle of the iconic music artist’s final days includes coverage of his last album and the life of Mark David Chapman.
Laylaby Colleen Hoover – From #1 New York Times bestselling author Colleen Hoover comes a novel that explores life after tragedy and the enduring spirit of love in this engaging contemporary romance with a supernatural twist. It is part psychological thriller and part paranormal romance.
Cold Wind by Paige Shelton – A sequel to Thin Ice finds Beth investigating the discovery of a trapper’s secluded home in the woods near Benedict, Alaska, where a murder victim is linked to the owner of the local mercantile.
The How Not to Diet Cookbook by Michael Greger, M.D., FACLM – The author of the New York Times bestseller How Not to Die, comes a four-color, fully illustrated cookbook that shares the science of long-term weight-loss success. This book is primed to be a revolutionary new addition to the cookbook industry: incredibly effective and designed for everyone looking to make changes to their dietary habits to improve their quality of life, weight loss notwithstanding.
Unsinkable: Five Men and the Indomitable Run of the U.S.S. Plunkett by James Sullivan – Documents the true story of a U.S. Navy destroyer that inspired the writings of John Ford and Herman Wouk, drawing on the journals and other writings of five shipmates who witnessed the Anzio attacks and D-Day invasion.
Red Hands by Christopher Golden – Ben Walker, an expert in weird phenomena is asked by the Global Science Research Coalition to locate a woman who has been the victim of a devastating bioweapon that causes every person she touches to drop dead.
The Daydream Cabin by Carolyn Brown – A headstrong woman discovers it’s never too late for change in New York Times bestselling author Carolyn Brown’s spirited novel about lost hope and second chances. Working as a summer counselor at an amenities-limited camp for at-risk teens, a public-school teacher employs a tough-love approach to intervene on behalf of three troubled girls while bonding with a hardened boot-camp drill instructor.
Snowdrift by Helene Tursten – Swedish Detective Inspector Embla Nyström puts her life on the line when a new lead breaks in the unsolved disappearance of her best friend, a cold case that is further complicated by the murder of a notorious gang member.
The Mermaid from Jeju by Sumi Hahn – A talented young deep-sea diver from occupied 1948 Korea’s neighboring Jeju Island visits Mt. Halla for her family’s annual trading trip before her romance with a mountain youth is upended by family tragedy and political turbulence.
Take It Back by Kia Abdullah – Leaving her high-profile law position for a job at a crisis center, Zara Kaleel becomes involved in the case of a deformed teenage girl who accuses four boys in her class of rape, tearing the community apart.
The System by Ryan Gattis – On December 6, 1993, a drug dealer called Scrappy is shot and left for dead on the lawn outside her mother’s house in South Central Los Angeles, a heroin addict fingers two drug dealers as the killers, but only one of them is guilty.
If I could be your personal shopper for books I would pick…
The Lying Life of Adultsby Elena Ferrante, a fantastic coming-of-age novel by a best-selling author
Hamnet by Maggie O’Farrell, a deeply moving and brilliantly imagined historical novel
The Guest List by Lucy Foley, a fast-paced thriller with a wonderful cast of characters
The House in the Cerulean Seaby T.J. Klune, a magical story, masterfully told.
Hidden Valley Roadby Robert Kolker, non-fiction written with clarity and compassion
Hopefully these picks will appeal to a variety of readers in your life, so get busy and shop at Bookshop.org, an online book store that supports local book shops, fill your cart and make the reader in your life happy. Happy Holidays!
Discover RRPL’s Shared Shelf. Each week a staff member will share a glimpse into their reading shelf in hopes that you will discover that next great read.
True confession: while I love to read, buy books, talk about books, borrow and lend books, I find it challenging to purchase books for adults, and so I usually choose to purchase (or make) something else for them. I do, however, absolutely love to give books to the kids in my life, and lucky me, I know some wonderful little ones who will be getting some great selections this year.
Here are some titles I recommend that you consider for the half-pints in your life:
The Shortest Day by Susan Cooper
Where’s Prince? by Kev Gahan
Orange Pear Apple Bear by Emily Gravett
Tomorrow I’ll Be Brave by Jessica Hische
Find Frida Hardcover by Catherine Ingram
The Snowy Day by Ezra Jack Keats
All Kinds of Kindness by Judy Carey Nevin
Draw Here by Herve Tullet
Inspired? You can order these, and books about practically anything else you can imagine, at Bookshop.org. While you’re there, maybe pick yourself up something to get into the holiday spirit.
Who better than the experts in the RRPL Children’s Department to guest host our blog sharing holiday gift ideas! Below you’ll find new book titles, Christmas titles, and a few non-book items as well. Enjoy!
I love giving books and will take advantage of any occasion to find something I think will fit my giftee, and that includes pondering if there’s something you might want to gift yourself of course! I sorted the titles into broad ideas of who they might appeal to but left the heavy lifting of plot description to the reviews on bookshop.org (Bookshop is an online bookstore with a mishttps://bookshop.org/books/weather-9780345806901/9780385351102sion to financially support local, independent bookstores.) I hope this list helps you finish off your holiday shopping on a high note!
And if you’re looking for a way to do something extra, I just discovered the United States Postal Service has a program called “Operation Santa.” This won’t be news to everyone as it’s been going on for years but if you, like me, hadn’t heard of it before I’ll drop a link here.
I wish everyone a safe, healthy holiday season, with a book (or two) to help you keep feeling strong!
-Stacey
Being something of a gigantic nerd myself, I know that it can be difficult to buy holiday presents for that science fiction aficionado in your life. They have all the action figures – excuse me, figurines – they could ever need, and there’s no more space for posters on their walls. Let me, a self-professed nerd, guide you on a journey to the perfect present for your loved one.
All of these items are available through the library if you’d like to try before you buy, but please make sure to support your local independent bookstore; you can buy online and support indie bookstores with Bookshop.org.
I cannot stop raving about this series – in my opinion, these books are the best sci fi I’ve read in years. If the phrase “lesbian necromancers in space” sounds like something your nerd would like, pick up these books! Not a reader? Try gifting them the audiobook versions, which are also excellent.
Has your nerd ever thought about the collateral damage that their favorite superhero creates by smashing two skyscrapers together? Choose Hench for a different take on superheroes.
If your nerd loves Star Trek, they’ll love Redshirts, which follows the little guys rather than the starship captains in a ‘legally distinct’ universe from Star Trek.
The biggest film release of the year by one of the most acclaimed directors out there, Christopher Nolan. Your nerd is almost guaranteed to want this movie.
Another exciting release in 2020, this new Star Trek series brings back the most beloved of starship captains, Jean Luc Picard, played by Patrick Stewart.
This one is more of a horror entry, but still has science fiction elements. A crew of deep-sea researchers must get to safety after their underwater drilling station is hit by an earthquake.
Treat your nerd to this flick starring scenery-chewer Nicholas Cage as a farmer whose property is hit by a meteorite, based on an H. P. Lovecraft story.
If your nerd is a Star Wars fan, they’ll want to complete their collection with the final installment in the new trilogy that started with The Force Awakens.
Good luck in your hunt for the perfect present, and keep an eye on this blog for many more gift guides from other staff members in the coming week!
This year, Christmas feels a little strange and isolated. But it also feel a little cozy. The first snowfall was absolutely beautiful and really got me into the Christmas spirit. As I try to avoid malls and busy stores, I have of course turned to online shopping like many of us. But somehow that just seems impersonal this year. After weeks of quarantining, ordering carry out, groceries from Instacart, and pretty much everything else in the world from Amazon, I’m ready to get back to basics for this year’s holiday. My daughter and I tried our hand at making candles (we definitely need to read up on this a little bit, as I watch one of ours smoke itself out), we have plans for many more cookie varieties than ever, and are drawn towards handmade gifts from Etsy and local stores.
In keeping with this, I am buying books as gifts for the first time in years! My teen/young adult kids don’t read as vociferously as they used to, and most of my family reads on a Kindle. But this year, it just feels right to go back to basics, hold a real book in my hands while I sip coffee by my Christmas tree and lights. My kids have watched pretty much everything Netflix, Hulu and Amazon have to offer, so I think I’m going to try and entice them to take an electronic break, relax on the couch with me to read a good book by the tree.
Here are a few titles coming out in December. Some of them haven’t been published yet, but what is more fun then preordering a book and knowing you will be one of the first to read it? Remember that our local retailers need you this year more than ever. So head to bookshop.org to get some of these new titles that promise to be keepers! They also offer gift cards if you just can’t choose ;-).
Simply thrilling
There’s no such thing as a perfect family. And it’s usually not wise to point that out.
Thriller, romance and fantasy, all rolled into one.
A debut thriller that asks one simple question, shouldn’t a dead husband stay dead?
On the lighter side
Quinn and Minnie share their day of birth, but their lives couldn’t be more different.
A dare and a crash course in flirting turn a frumpy college professor’s life upside down.
An anxiety-ridden introvert finds herself in the spotlight and decides to fake it til she makes it.
Different times and places
Stunning debut explores Afghanistan on the eve of a violent revolution.
A story of survival, loss and love, and the sisters who changed fashion forever.
A poor girl with dreams grows up in the shadow of Biltmore House, the palatial Vanderbilt mansion.
The Woman before Wallis: A Novel of Windsors, Vanderbilts, and Royal Scandals by Bryn Turnbull
This debut novel is based on the life of Thelma Morgan Viscountess Furness who was a mistress of Edward, Prince of Wales (later King Edward VIII) before Wallis Simpson. In fact, Thelma introduced the pair. Thelma’s twin sister, Gloria Morgan Vanderbilt, became entangled in a notorious court battle for custody of her daughter, Little Gloria, after her husband died. Little Gloria was the heir to an impressive Vanderbilt fortune, and Gloria was allowed only to spend interest from the fortune to take care of Little Gloria. The Vanderbilts wanted Little Gloria in the United States and her mother wanted them to live in Europe. Thelma was a character witness for her sister at the trial. Everyone wanted to keep Edward away from any publicity which could detract from the royal family and Edward’s future role as king of England. Eventually Edward and Thelma drifted apart.
For enthusiasts of anything royal and fans of the Netflix series “The Crown”. Thelma was a real-life socialite who became part of British upper-crust society with her marriage and later association with Edward.
Read it or Weep 