By Brock Clarke

“… a delightfully dark story of Sam Pulsifer, the "accidental arsonist and murderer" narrator who leads readers through a multilayered, flame-filled adventure about literature, lies, love and life … (Publishers Weekly).”

By Junot Diaz
Recommended By Sonia Grgas, Reference Librarian

Living with an old–world mother and rebellious sister, an urban New Jersey misfit dreams of becoming the next J.R.R. Tolkien and believes that a long–standing family curse is thwarting his efforts to find love and happiness.

By John Kennedy Toole
Recommended By Sharon Long, Assistant Library Director

"A masterwork of comedy.... The novel astonishes with its inventiveness, it lives in the play of its voices. A Confederacy of Dunces is nothing less than a grand comic fugue (New York Times Book Review)."

By Laura Zigman
Recommended By Sue Ann R., Head of Children's Services

“Dating Big Bird is funny and convincing enough to penetrate the cynicism of readers who still associate parenthood with " minivans and portacribs and strollers and enormous shoulder-strapped survival bags stuffed with toys and dolls and stickers and hundreds of little Ziploc Baggies (USA Today).”

By Kristin Hannah
Recommended By Rosemarie Germaine, Senior Library Clerk

An exploration of the complicated terrain between best friends - one who chooses marriage and motherhood while the other opts for career and celebrity. 

By Cole Moreton
Recommended By Brenda Cherry, Reference Librarian

“British journalist Moreton's fiercely lyrical account of an abandoned island off Ireland's southwest tip, and of its residents' emigration to America, is memorable and evocative (Publishers Weekly).”

By Peter S. Beagle
Recommended By Jessikah Chautin, Community Engagement Specialist

“Three powerful women (each with her own secret past), a stable boy, a weaver's son, and an innkeeper set in motion a series of events that brings each of them face to face with the forces of magic and the workings of fate… A finely crafted piece as well as a rich, evocative fantasy… (Library Journal).”

By Joseph Finder
Recommended By John Shea, Library Page

“… Jason Steadman, a middle-management salesman for an international electronics firm, befriends mysteriously well-connected tow-truck driver Kurt Semko and suddenly finds himself on the fast track to the executive suite, thanks mainly to the misfortunes of others (Publishers Weekly).”

By Alan Brennert
Recommended By Evelyn Hershkowitz, Readers' Services Librarian, Pam Strudler, Programming & Arts Librarian

Tracks the poignant struggle of a Hawaiian woman who contracts leprosy as a child in Honolulu during the 1890s and is deported to the island of Moloka'i, where she grows to adulthood at the quarantined settlement of Kalaupapa.

By Zarah Ghahramani
Recommended By Jackie, Head of Readers' Services

“The second-year Iranian college student in 2001 knew "that making that speech meant trouble," but she "had no real expectation of being kidnapped in the heart of Tehran and hustled off" to the notorious Evin Prison… straightforward style, elegant in its simplicity… (Publishers Weekly).”

By Diana Abu-Jaber
Recommended By Ed Goldberg, Head of Reference

“Life is grim for Lena Dawson, a fingerprint examiner for the Syracuse police. Uncertain about her own origins, or her sanity, the delicately pretty technician has carved out a spare existence for herself since her philandering husband, Charlie, left, and has also lived down the brief flare of fame that followed her uncovering of crucial evidence in the murder of a child (Kirkus Reviews).”

By Richard Yates
Recommended By Kelly Ramos, Children's Librarian

“It’s hard to think that there’s too much wrong with April and Frank Wheeler over and above what has been tagged the disenchantment syndrome of the average young married couple in the suburbs… For April’s discontent is a real emotional destitution, and this, to Yates’ great credit, is only imperceptibly apparent (Kirkus Reviews).”

Became the movie: Revolutionary Road.

By Meg Cabot
Series Heather Wells Mysteries

“Heather Wells, former teen idol, turns detective in the cute debut of a new mystery series… Cabot delivers Heather's amateur sleuthing adventures in a rapid-fire narrative that may leave some readers begging for time-outs to control sudden laughing fits (Publishers Weekly).”

By Elizabeth Rosner
Recommended By Audrey Honigman, Library Clerk

“It’s not hard to like this lyrical, gently paced debut that confronts the terrible legacy carried by children of trauma and tragedy.  Paula Perel and her older brother Julian bear the anguish of their father’s Holocaust memories in vastly different ways … thoughtful, earnest novel … (Kirkus Reviews).”

By Harper Lee
Recommended By Pam Strudler, Programming & Arts Librarian, Adrienne Rein, Library Clerk, Jackie, Head of Readers' Services
With Jackie Ranaldo, Head of Readers' Services

Tuesday, June 28, 2011. 1 PM & 7:30 PM.

The explosion of racial hate in an Alabama town is viewed by a little girl whose father defends a black man accused of rape.

Became the movie: To Kill a Mockingbird.

By Julie Otsuka
Recommended By Amy B., Children's Librarian

A story told from five different points of view, chronicles the experiences of Japanese Americans caught up in the nightmare of the World War II internment camps.

By A.J. Jacobs
Recommended By Ralph Guiteau, Readers' Services Librarian

“With the Bible in hand, Jacobs sets off to spend a year attempting to follow the innumerous laws of Scripture in order to achieve the supposed claim of fundamentalists who say the Bible should be taken literally… (Publishers Weekly).”