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End-of-the-Year Contest 2020

Congratulations to the winners of our 2020 End-of-the-Year Contest! One Grand Prize winner received all 42 of Carol Fitzgerald's Bookreporter.com Bets On picks from 2020, while 14 others won a selection of three of these titles. You can see all the winners below, along with 2020's Bets On books.

Jeanine Cummins, author of American Dirt

Lydia Quixano Perez runs a bookstore in the Mexican city of Acapulco until one violent day changes everything. Forced to flee, Lydia and her eight-year-old son, Luca, find themselves miles and worlds away from their comfortable middle-class existence. Instantly transformed into migrants, Lydia and Luca ride la bestia --- trains that make their way north toward the United States, which is the only place they might feel safe. As they join the countless people trying to reach el norte, Lydia soon sees that everyone is running from something. But what exactly are they running to?

American Dirt by Jeanine Cummins

January 2020

I read an early advance copy of AMERICAN DIRT by Jeanine Cummins back in June, after hearing buzz about it at Book Expo. In it, Lydia Quixano Perez is a bookseller living in Acapulco, Mexico, with her husband, who is a journalist, and her eight-year-old son, Luca, who is quite precocious and prescient. Drug cartels are overtaking the city that she knows and loves, and her husband is writing about them, anonymously, so as to keep his family from feeling repercussions. A customer at Lydia’s store shares her book taste, and they chat and banter. She is unaware that he is Javier, the jefe of a cartel that has been rising quickly.

Bookreporter.com Reviewers Pick Their Favorite Books of 2020

Recently we asked our reviewers to provide us with a list of some of their favorite books from 2020. Included is a mix of fiction and nonfiction titles, all published for the first time this year. Take a moment to read these varied lists of titles and see if you agree with any of their selections! Please note that due to personal and professional commitments, some reviewers were not able to participate in this feature.

Week of January 31, 2022

Paperback releases for the week of February 1st include Jeanine Cummins' AMERICAN DIRT, a rare exploration into the inner hearts of people willing to sacrifice everything for a glimmer of hope; Lisa Scottoline's first work of historical fiction, ETERNAL, the tale of a love triangle that unfolds in the heart of Rome...in the creeping shadow of fascism; THE VANISHING HALF, Brit Bennett's stunning novel about twin sisters, inseparable as children, who ultimately choose to live in two very different worlds --- one Black and one white; Elizabeth McCracken's short story collection, THE SOUVENIR MUSEUM, in which the mysterious bonds of family are tested, transformed, fractured and fortified; and WHEN HARRY MET MINNIE, "CBS Sunday Morning News" correspondent and Emmy Award winner Martha Teichner's memoir of love and loss, being in the right place at the right time, and the mysterious ways that a beloved pet can bring people together.

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