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Yellowface: A Reese's Book Club Pick
INSTANT NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER - A REESE'S BOOK CLUB PICK
"Hard to put down, harder to forget." -- Stephen King, #1 New York Times bestselling author
White lies. Dark humor. Deadly consequences... Bestselling sensation Juniper Song is not who she says she is, she didn't write the book she claims she wrote, and she is most certainly not Asian American--in this chilling and hilariously cutting novel from R.F. Kuang, the #1 New York Times bestselling author of Babel.
Authors June Hayward and Athena Liu were supposed to be twin rising stars. But Athena's a literary darling. June Hayward is literally nobody. Who wants stories about basic white girls, June thinks.
So when June witnesses Athena's death in a freak accident, she acts on impulse: she steals Athena's just-finished masterpiece, an experimental novel about the unsung contributions of Chinese laborers during World War I.
So what if June edits Athena's novel and sends it to her agent as her own work? So what if she lets her new publisher rebrand her as Juniper Song--complete with an ambiguously ethnic author photo? Doesn't this piece of history deserve to be told, whoever the teller? That's what June claims, and the New York Times bestseller list seems to agree.
But June can't get away from Athena's shadow, and emerging evidence threatens to bring June's (stolen) success down around her. As June races to protect her secret, she discovers exactly how far she will go to keep what she thinks she deserves.
With its totally immersive first-person voice, Yellowface grapples with questions of diversity, racism, and cultural appropriation, as well as the terrifying alienation of social media. R.F. Kuang's novel is timely, razor-sharp, and eminently readable.
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On Our Best Behavior: The Seven Deadly Sins and the Price Women Pay to Be Good
NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER - A groundbreaking exploration of the ancient rules women unwittingly follow in order to be considered "good," revealing how the Seven Deadly Sins still control and distort our lives and illuminating a path toward a more balanced, spiritually complete way to live Why do women equate self-denial with being good? We congratulate ourselves when we resist the donut in the office breakroom. We celebrate our restraint when we hold back from sending an email in anger. We feel virtuous when we wake up at dawn to get a jump on the day. We put others' needs ahead of our own and believe this makes us exemplary. In On Our Best Behavior, journalist Elise Loehnen explains that these impulses--often lauded as unselfish, distinctly feminine instincts--are actually ingrained in us by a culture that reaps the benefits, via an extraordinarily effective collection of mores known as the Seven Deadly Sins. Since being codified by the Christian church in the fourth century, the Seven Deadly Sins--pride, greed, lust, envy, gluttony, wrath, and sloth--have exerted insidious power. Even today, in our largely secular, patriarchal society, they continue to circumscribe women's behavior. For example, seeing sloth as sinful leads women to deny themselves rest; a fear of gluttony drives them to ignore their appetites; and an aversion to greed prevents them from negotiating for themselves and contributes to the 55 percent gender wealth gap. In On Our Best Behavior, Loehnen reveals how we've been programmed to obey the rules represented by these sins and how doing so qualifies us as "good." This probing analysis of contemporary culture and thoroughly researched history explains how women have internalized the patriarchy, and how they unwittingly reinforce it. By sharing her own story and the spiritual wisdom of other traditions, Loehnen shows how we can break free and discover the integrity and wholeness we seek.Sold out -
The Life Impossible
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 Grace Winters is a widow and retired math teacher whose life seems to be getting smaller and smaller. She keeps out of the way of people and passes time watching the birds in her garden and doing crossword puzzles. But when a long-lost friend dies in strange circumstances and leaves her a house on the Spanish island of Ibiza, Grace's solitary existence drastically changes. The Life Impossible is a story of wild adventure, deep transformation and gloriously heart-warming characters. It shows how a new outlook can burst into life at any moment and change everything. -
Pole Dancing To Gospel Hymns
Four-time Denver Grand Champion, Pushcart Prize nominee, and winner of the 2008 Women of the World Poetry Slam, Andrea Gibson's dynamic and energetic first book, Pole Dancing to Gospel Hymns, challenges us to not only read, but to react.
Hauntingly vivid, the poems march through a soldier's lingering psychological wounds, tackle the curious questions of school children on the meaning of "hate", and tangle with a lover's witty and vibrant description of longing.
Gibson's poems deconstruct the current political climate through stunning imagery and careful crafting. With the same velocity, the poignant and vacillating love poems are equally capable of sweeping the air out of the room. Pole Dancing to Gospel Hymns has a bold and unforgettable internal voice and is rich with the kind of questioning that inspires action.
Praise
"Andrea Gibson does not just show up to pluck your heart strings, [they stick] around to tune them. If being floored is new to you, ya might wanna grab a cushion. Beware the highway in [their] grace and the crowbar in [their] verse."
-Buddy Wakefield, author of Stunt Water
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The Will to Change: Men, Masculinity, and Love
From the New York Times bestselling author of All About Love, a brave and astonishing work that challenges patriarchal culture and encourages men to reclaim the best part of themselves. Everyone needs to love and be loved--even men. But to know love, men must be able to look at the ways that patriarchal culture keeps them from knowing themselves, from being in touch with their feelings, from loving. In The Will to Change, bell hooks gets to the heart of the matter and shows men how to express the emotions that are a fundamental part of who they are--whatever their age, marital status, ethnicity, or sexual orientation. But toxic masculinity punishes those fundamental emotions, and it's so deeply ingrained in our society that it's hard for men to not comply--but hooks wants to help change that. With trademark candor and fierce intelligence, hooks addresses the most common concerns of men, such as fear of intimacy and loss of their patriarchal place in society, in new and challenging ways. She believes men can find the way to spiritual unity by getting back in touch with the emotionally open part of themselves--and lay claim to the rich and rewarding inner lives that have historically been the exclusive province of women.Sold out -
Our Brave Foremothers: Celebrating 100 Black, Brown, Asian, and Indigenous Women Who Changed the Course of History
Inspired by her own foremothers' legacies and the friendships formed throughout her life, Rozella Kennedy centers and celebrates the stories of 100 Black, Brown, Asian, and Indigenous women--both famous and little-known--who changed the course of US history. In the beautiful pages of Our Brave Foremothers, discover an intergenerational, intercultural bouquet of Black, Brown, Asian, and Indigenous women lifted into the significance that they deserve. - From Etel Adnan to Mary Jones, Thelma Garcia Buchholdt to Pura Belpré to Zitkála-Sá, here are 100 women of color who left a lasting mark on United States history. Including both famous and little-known names, the thoughtful profiles and detailed portraits of these women herald their achievements and passions. - Following each entry is a prompt that asks you to connect your life to theirs, an inspiring way to understand their influence and the power of their stories. To consider on a deeper level the devotedness of Clara Brown, the fearlessness of Jovita Idár, the guts of Grace Lee Boggs, or the selflessness of Martha Louise Morrow Foxx. And to be as brave as we each can be--and then beyond that. -
Dykette
Named one of the Best LGBTQ+ Books of 2023 (So Far) by Vogue - Named a Best Book of 2023 (So Far) by Cosmopolitan - Named a Best Book of Spring 2023 by Esquire - Named a Most Anticipated LGBTQ+ Book of 2023 by BuzzFeed, Electric Lit, and Them
Sasha and Jesse are professionally creative, erotically adventurous, and passionately dysfunctional twentysomethings making a life together in Brooklyn. When a pair of older, richer lesbians--prominent news host Jules Todd and her psychotherapist partner, Miranda--invites Sasha and Jesse to their country home for the holidays, they're quick to accept. Even if the trip includes a third couple--Jesse's best friend, Lou, and their cool-girl flame, Darcy--whose It-queer clout Sasha ridicules yet desperately wants. As the late December afternoons blur together in a haze of debaucherous homecooked feasts and sweaty sauna confessions, so too do the guests' secret and shifting motivations. When Jesse and Darcy collaborate an ill-fated livestream performance, a complex web of infatuation and jealousy emerges, sending Sasha down a spiral of destructive rage that threatens each couple's future. Unfolding over ten heady days, Dykette is an unforgettable love story at the crossroads of queer nonconformity and seductive normativity. With propulsive plotting and sexy, wickedly entertaining prose, Jenny Fran Davis captures the vagaries of desire and the many devastating places in which we seek recognition.
An addictive, absurd, and darkly hilarious debut novel about a young woman who embarks on a ten-day getaway with her partner and two other queer couples -
Detransition, Baby
NATIONAL BESTSELLER - The lives of three women--transgender and cisgender--collide after an unexpected pregnancy forces them to confront their deepest desires in "one of the most celebrated novels of the year" (Time) "Reading this novel is like holding a live wire in your hand."--Vulture Named one of the Best Books of the Year by more than twenty publications, including The New York Times Book Review, Entertainment Weekly, NPR, Time, Vogue, Esquire, Vulture, and Autostraddle PEN/Hemingway Award Winner - Finalist for the Lambda Literary Award, the National Book Critics Circle Award, and the Gotham Book Prize - Longlisted for The Women's Prize - Roxane Gay's Audacious Book Club Pick - New York Times Editors' Choice Reese almost had it all: a loving relationship with Amy, an apartment in New York City, a job she didn't hate. She had scraped together what previous generations of trans women could only dream of: a life of mundane, bourgeois comforts. The only thing missing was a child. But then her girlfriend, Amy, detransitioned and became Ames, and everything fell apart. Now Reese is caught in a self-destructive pattern: avoiding her loneliness by sleeping with married men. Ames isn't happy either. He thought detransitioning to live as a man would make life easier, but that decision cost him his relationship with Reese--and losing her meant losing his only family. Even though their romance is over, he longs to find a way back to her. When Ames's boss and lover, Katrina, reveals that she's pregnant with his baby--and that she's not sure whether she wants to keep it--Ames wonders if this is the chance he's been waiting for. Could the three of them form some kind of unconventional family--and raise the baby together? This provocative debut is about what happens at the emotional, messy, vulnerable corners of womanhood that platitudes and good intentions can't reach. Torrey Peters brilliantly and fearlessly navigates the most dangerous taboos around gender, sex, and relationships, gifting us a thrillingly original, witty, and deeply moving novel. -
Invisible Women: Data Bias in a World Designed for Men
Caroline Criado Perez's Invisible Women: Data Bias in a World Designed for Men is a landmark, prize-winning, international bestselling examination of how a gender gap in data perpetuates bias and disadvantages women. #1 International Bestseller Winner of the 2019 Financial Times and McKinsey Business Book of the Year Award Winner of the 2019 Royal Society Science Book Prize Data is fundamental to the modern world. From economic development to health care to education and public policy, we rely on numbers to allocate resources and make crucial decisions. But because so much data fails to take into account gender, because it treats men as the default and women as atypical, bias and discrimination are baked into our systems. And women pay tremendous costs for this insidious bias: in time, in money, and often with their lives. Celebrated feminist advocate Caroline Criado Perez investigates this shocking root cause of gender inequality in Invisible Women. Examining the home, the workplace, the public square, the doctor's office, and more, Criado Perez unearths a dangerous pattern in data and its consequences on women's lives. Product designers use a "one-size-fits-all" approach to everything from pianos to cell phones to voice recognition software, when in fact this approach is designed to fit men. Cities prioritize men's needs when designing public transportation, roads, and even snow removal, neglecting to consider women's safety or unique responsibilities and travel patterns. And in medical research, women have largely been excluded from studies and textbooks, leaving them chronically misunderstood, mistreated, and misdiagnosed. Built on hundreds of studies in the United States, in the United Kingdom, and around the world, and written with energy, wit, and sparkling intelligence, this is a groundbreaking, highly readable exposé that will change the way you look at the world. -
Come as You Are: Revised and Updated: The Surprising New Science That Will Transform Your Sex Life
A revised and updated edition of Emily Nagoski's game-changing New York Times bestseller Come As You Are, featuring new information and research on mindfulness, desire, and pleasure that will radically transform your sex life. For much of the 20th and 21st centuries, women's sexuality was an uncharted territory in science, studied far less frequently--and far less seriously--than its male counterpart. That is, until Emily Nagoski's Come As You Are, which used groundbreaking science and research to prove that the most important factor in creating and sustaining a sex life filled with confidence and joy is not what the parts are or how they're organized but how you feel about them. In the years since the book's initial publication, countless women have learned through Nagoski's accessible and informative guide that things like stress, mood, trust, and body image are not peripheral factors in a woman's sexual wellbeing; they are central to it--and that even if you don't always feel like it, you are already sexually whole by just being yourself. This revised and updated edition continues that mission with new information and advanced research, demystifying and decoding the science of sex so that everyone can create a better sex life and discover more pleasure than you ever thought possible. -
One of Our Kind
Get Out meets The Stepford Wives in #1 New York Times best-selling author Nicola Yoon's first adult novel - A terrifying and thought-provoking look at what it means to be truly free in America as a woman uncovers a secret about her new home in a utopian community - "Brilliant, provocative, seminal...Your book club will be discussing this one for DAYS."--Jodi Picoult, #1 New York Times best-selling author Jasmyn and King Williams move their family to the planned Black utopia of Liberty, California hoping to find a community of like-minded people, a place where their growing family can thrive. King settles in at once, embracing the Liberty ethos, including the luxe wellness center at the top of the hill, which proves to be the heart of the community. But Jasmyn struggles to find her place. She expected to find liberals and social justice activists striving for racial equality, but Liberty residents seem more focused on booking spa treatments and ignoring the world's troubles. Jasmyn's only friends in the community are equally perplexed and frustrated by most residents' outlook. Then Jasmyn discovers a terrible secret about Liberty and its founders. Frustration turns to dread as their loved ones start embracing the Liberty way of life. Will the truth destroy her world in ways she never could have imagined? Thrilling with insightful social commentary, One of Our Kind explores the ways in which freedom is complicated by the presumptions we make about ourselves and each other. -
Take Me with You
For readers of Rupi Kaur (Milk and Honey) and Cheryl Strayed, a book small enough to carry with you, with messages big enough to stay with you, from one of the most quotable and influential poets of our time. Andrea Gibson explores themes of love, gender, politics, sexuality, family, and forgiveness with stunning imagery and a fierce willingness to delve into the exploration of what it means to heal and to be different in this strange age. Take Me With You, illustrated throughout with evocative line drawings by Sarah J. Coleman, is small enough to fit in your bag, with messages that are big enough to wake even the sleepiest heart. Divided into three sections (love, the world, and becoming) of one liners, couplets, greatest hits phrases, and longer form poems, it has something for everyone, and will be placed in stockings, lockers, and the hands of anyone who could use its wisdom. -
Big Swiss
NATIONAL BESTSELLER AND CULT FAVORITE Named a Best Book of the Year by the New Yorker, Time, NPR, Vogue, Elle, Cosmopolitan, Huffington Post, NBC News, Lit Hub, theSkimm, Condé Nast Traveler, Town & Country, and more! "One of the funniest books of the last few years" (Los Angeles Times) about a sex therapist's transcriptionist and her affair with one of the patients. Greta lives with her friend Sabine in an ancient Dutch farmhouse in Hudson, New York. The house is unrenovated, uninsulated, and full of bees. Greta spends her days transcribing therapy sessions for a sex coach who calls himself Om. She becomes infatuated with his newest client, a repressed married woman she affectionately refers to as Big Swiss. One day, Greta recognizes Big Swiss's voice in town and they quickly become enmeshed. While Big Swiss is unaware Greta has eavesdropped on her most intimate exchanges, Greta has never been more herself with anyone. Her attraction to Big Swiss overrides her guilt, and she'll do anything to sustain the relationship... "A fantastic, weird-as-hell, super funny novel" (Bustle), Big Swiss is both a love story and a deft examination of infidelity, mental health, sexual stereotypes, and more--from an amazingly talented, singular voice in contemporary fiction. -
The Faculty Lounge
By the acclaimed author of Moxie, a funny, bighearted adult debut that is at once an ode to educators, a timely glimpse at today's pressing school issues, and a tender character study, following a sprawling cast of teachers, administrators, and staff at a Texas high school With its ensemble of warm and unforgettable characters, The Faculty Lounge shows readers a different side of school life. It all starts when an elderly substitute teacher at Baldwin High School is found dead in the faculty lounge. After a bit of a stir, life quickly returns to normal--it's not like it's the worst (or even most interesting) thing that has happened within the building's walls. But when, a week later, the spontaneous scattering of his ashes on the school grounds catches the attention of some busybody parents, it sets in motion a year that can only be described as wild, bizarre, tragic, mundane, beautiful, and humorous all at once. In the midst of the ensuing hysteria and threats of disciplinary action, the novel peeks into the lives of the implicated adults who, it turns out, actually have first names and continue to exist when the school day is done. We meet: a former punk band front man, now a middle-aged principal who must battle it out with the schoolboard to keep his job; a no-nonsense school nurse willing to break the rules, despite the close watch on their campus, when a student arrives at her office with a dilemma; and a disgruntled English instructor who finds himself embroiled in even more controversy when he misfires a snarky email. Oh, and there's also a teacher make-out session in a supply closet during a lockdown. As these people continue to manage the messiness of this school year, there is the looming threat of what will become of their beloved Baldwin High. Ultimately, at the heart of this unconventional workplace novel is a story of the power of human connection and of the joy of finding purpose in what it is we do every day. -
Women and Other Monsters: Building a New Mythology
A fresh cultural analysis of female monsters from Greek mythology, and an invitation for all women to reclaim these stories as inspiration for a more wild, more "monstrous" version of feminism The folklore that has shaped our dominant culture teems with frightening female creatures. In our language, in our stories (many written by men), we underline the idea that women who step out of bounds--who are angry or greedy or ambitious, who are overtly sexual or not sexy enough--aren't just outside the norm. They're unnatural. Monstrous. But maybe, the traits we've been told make us dangerous and undesirable are actually our greatest strengths. Through fresh analysis of 11 female monsters, including Medusa, the Harpies, the Furies, and the Sphinx, Jess Zimmerman takes us on an illuminating feminist journey through mythology. She guides women (and others) to reexamine their relationships with traits like hunger, anger, ugliness, and ambition, teaching readers to embrace a new image of the female hero: one that looks a lot like a monster, with the agency and power to match. Often, women try to avoid the feeling of monstrousness, of being grotesquely alien, by tamping down those qualities that we're told fall outside the bounds of natural femininity. But monsters also get to do what other female characters--damsels, love interests, and even most heroines--do not. Monsters get to be complete, unrestrained, and larger than life. Today, women are becoming increasingly aware of the ways rules and socially constructed expectations have diminished us. After seeing where compliance gets us--harassed, shut out, and ruled by predators--women have never been more ready to become repellent, fearsome, and ravenous. -
The Undetectables
Be gay, solve crime, take naps--A witty and quirky fantasy murder mystery in a folkloric world of witches, faeires, vampires, trolls and ghosts, for fans of Magic for Liars by Sarah Gailey and T. J. Klune's Under the Whispering Door. A magical serial killer is stalking the Occult town of Wrackton. Hypnotic whistling causes victims to chew their own tongues off, leading to the killer being dubbed the Whistler (original, right?). Enter the Undetectables, a detective agency run by three witches and a ghost in a cat costume (don't ask). They are hired to investigate the murders, but with their only case so far left unsolved, will they be up to the task? Mallory, the forensic science expert, is struggling with pain and fatigue from her recently diagnosed fibromyalgia. Cornelia is suddenly stirring all sorts of feelings in Mallory. Diana is hitting up all her ex-girlfriends for information. And not forgetting ghostly Theodore: deceased, dramatic, and also the agency's first - unsolved - murder case. With bodies stacking up and the case leading them to mysteries at the very heart of magical society, can the Undetectables find the Whistler before they become the killer's next victims?