Sweety is a little odd--even for a naked mole rat. A zany, charming book about finding people who share your interests, from interpretive dance to mushroom identification. Sweety will steal your heart!
Kate
Short, sweet, and bitingly funny, this collection--originally recorded as audio essays for NPR--will have you raring get outside and enjoy the spring weather! This is some of the best work I've read about the red rock deserts of Utah (my home country!), besieged by oil & mineral leases and left with diminished protections under the current Department of Interior. It might inspire a trip to Bears Ears or Canyonlands as well. ;)
Kate
April is National Poetry Month! Celebrate it with Fatimah Asghar's IF THEY COME FOR US. I started marking my favorite poems and eventually gave up when I realized every page was dog-eared. This collection entwines poems about the India/Pakistan Partition and Asghar's family history with personal explorations of queerness, the loss of her parents, and growing up as a Pakistani Muslim girl in post-9/11 America. There's truly something in here for everyone.
Kate
You may not have heard of Renaissance painter Artemisia Gentileschi, the first woman to be accepted into the Florence fine arts academy. But Joy McCullough brings her story to vivid life, from her days as a talented (but largely brushed aside) young artist\ to her assault by her mentor and her fight to get him convicted in court--a story that unfortunately still feels familiar today. This gorgeous, devastating, and ultimately uplifting novel-in-verse is the perfect pick for National Poetry Month.
Kate
Clare Legrand calls this "a book about girls," but it's really a book about the kind of girls you don't always see in novels: hurting, hopeful, hungry, and above all, powerful. It's a dark, strange, spooky read--perfect for a chilly March night--that reminded me of a Hiyao Miyazaki or Guillermo del Toro movie, but has a magic all its own. Check it out.
Kate
You might recognize him as the subject of the new Oscar-winning Best Documentary, FREE SOLO, a film about his death-defying ropeless journey up 3,000 feet of vertical cliff face in Yosemite. But Alex Honnold is also an engaging writer, and this peek into his thought processes is fascinating (and accessible to people who have never touched a climbing wall in their lives). A dizzying read that will fuel your sense of adventure.
Kate
Pick this up for a collection reads like Grimm fairy tales by way of contemporary Argentina: mysterious, bizarre, and darkly funny. Samanta Schweblin's prose is spare and startling. It's the perfect book for a month of cold winter's nights!
Kate
This is the 18th-century women-in-science pirate girl gang you've always dreamed of, tearing down ideas of patriarchy and colonialism as they swashbuckle their way across Europe and the Atlantic. Felicity is fierce, funny, and whip-smart. I didn't think I could love a book as much as Gentleman's Guide, but this one is just as good--and it's a companion novel, so you can pick this one up even if you haven't read the first one yet!
Kate
Like the music he writes about, Hanif Abdurraqib's essay collection is by turns novel and nostalgic, euphoric and poignant, contemplative and raw. A moving examination of the way pop culture ties into the current state of our nation--and how it affects us on a personal level.
Kate
Hey, it's easy to feel discouraged right now. The world feels big, individual actions seem small, and one might even say that things are objectively BAD. Luckily Lin-Manuel Miranda & Jonny Sun are here to give you a dose of inspiration. Best read daily--or whenever you're feeling down--these pages will pick you up in the morning & comfort you at night. A great gift for the winter season or way to kick off the new year.
Kate
