Adult

For Karen Kipple, it isn't enough that she works full-time in the non-profit sector for an organization that helps children from disadvantaged homes. She's also determined to live her personal life in accordance with her ideals. This means sending her daughter, Ruby, to an integrated public school in their Brooklyn neighborhood. But when a troubled student from a nearby housing project begins bullying children in Ruby's class, the distant social and economic issues Karen has always claimed to care about so passionately begin to feel uncomfortably close to home.

When Russian tanks roll into the public squares of Budapest to crush the Hungarian Revolution, brothers Robert and Attila Beck flee with their family to the Paris townhouse of their great-aunt Hermina. The year is 1956, and as their country changes forever, these two boys transform as well, confronting danger and wonders previously unknown. As they travel through minefields both real and imagined, Robert and Attila grapple with sibling rivalry, family secrets and incalculable loss. Along the way they encounter mysterious fellow travelers, bewildering sights of a nation in transition and surprising hilarity, all in pursuit of the one place they thought they'd lost forever: home.

On her first day at a new school, Lily befriends Eva and her sisters Beatrice and Heloise, daughters of the infamous avant-garde painter Evan Trentham. An only child from an unremarkable, working-class family, Lily has never experienced a household like the Trenthams' --- a community of like-minded artists Evan and his wife have created, all living and working together to escape the stifling conservatism of 1930s Australia. And Lily has never met anyone like Eva, whose unabashed confidence and worldly knowledge immediately draw her in. But as seductive as the artists' utopian vision appears, behind it lies both darkness and dysfunction. And the further the girls are pulled in, the greater the consequences become.

Whether it’s repairing a home or taking care of clients’ other needs, Twin Cities handyman Sam Haney is in demand from his mostly female clientele.Haley Cooper has had enough heartache for a lifetime. Her high school sweetheart up and moved to Indonesia --- alone --- just two weeks before their wedding. Her mother thinks it’s time for Haley to move on and contracts Sam to work on Haley’s wreck of a house --- and anything else, if he’s got the notion. Fixing a house is one thing, but for this handyman, building a relationship will need a whole different set of skills.

Days before the outbreak of World War II, a terrorist bomb explodes on a busy street, killing and maiming innocent civilians. A man is hanged on the evidence given by a young witness. As time goes on, the witness doubts her recollection of events, but her testimony has already had far-reaching consequences. In the wake of the 7/7 London bombings, Sara returns to her childhood home to find that her sister, Polly, missing for more than ten years, has finally come back too. Polly’s return sets in motion events that will stretch the women’s fragile bond to its breaking point.

In their remote mountain village, Li-yan and her family align their lives around the seasons and the farming of tea. For the Akha people, life goes on as it has for generations --- until a stranger appears at the village gate. Slowly, Li-yan begins to reject the customs that shaped her early life. When she has a baby out of wedlock, she rejects the tradition that would compel her to give the child over to be killed, and instead leaves her near an orphanage. Despite being raised by loving adoptive parents, Li-yan’s daughter, Haley, wonders about her origins. Across the ocean Li-yan longs for her lost daughter. Over the course of years, each searches for meaning in the study of Pu’er, the tea that has shaped their family’s destiny for centuries.

To Christina Olson, the entire world was her family’s remote farm in the small coastal town of Cushing, Maine. Born in the home her family had lived in for generations, and increasingly incapacitated by illness, Christina seemed destined for a small life. Instead, for more than 20 years, she was host and inspiration for the artist Andrew Wyeth, and became the subject of one of the best known American paintings of the 20th century.

THE FIFTH BEATLE recounts the untold true story of Brian Epstein --- the visionary manager who created Beatlemania and guided the Beatles from basement gigs to unprecedented international stardom. It's also an uplifting, inspirational human story about the struggle to overcome seemingly insurmountable odds. This critically acclaimed and multiple award winning graphic novel has been added to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame Library and Archives!

Alexandra Horowitz, an eminent research scientist in the field of dog cognition, explores what the nose knows by taking an imaginative leap into what it is like to be a dog. Inspired by her own family dogs, Finnegan and Upton, Horowitz sets off on a quest to make sense of scents. In addition to speaking to experts across the country, Horowitz visits the California Narcotic Canine Association Training Institute and the Stapleton Group’s “Vapor wake” explosives dog training team; meets vets and researchers working with dogs to detect cancerous cells and anticipate epileptic seizure or diabetic shock; and travels with Finnegan to the west coast where he learns how to find truffles.

Lost for more than 75 years, THE KNIFE SLIPPED was meant to be the second book in the Cool & Lam series, but was shelved when Erle Stanley Gardner’s publisher objected to (among other things) Bertha Cool’s tendency to “talk tough, swear, smoke cigarettes, and try to gyp people.” But this tale of adultery and corruption, of double-crosses and triple identities --- however shocking for 1939 --- shines today as a glorious present from the past, a return to the heyday of private eyes and shady dames, of powerful criminals, crooked cops, blazing dialogue and delicious plot twists.