This week’s new release lineup is stacked. We have a pair of new titles from some heavyweights tackling climate change, a government tell-all, and some extraordinary life stories. Keep reading for more.
Red at the Bone by Jacqueline Woodson
From marketing and events manager, Cristina L.: “I found myself tearing up at this book more times than I’d previously anticipated. Red at the Bone is a disarming story that explores an unplanned pregnancy, family dynamics, social classes, race, and how we wrestle with the unimaginable. At just the age of 17, Iris finds herself in an uncharted situation: a teenage pregnancy. Aubrey, Iris’ boyfriend, only wants what’s best for them, yet he is also battling with his own challenges at home; a dying mother and an uncertain living situation. Sabe and Po’Boy devoted their whole lives and dreams to assure that Iris could have the best future they could provide. Despite the unrest that will follow, their lives will come together for baby Melody. A beautiful book that left me wanting more, just as each character is left desiring more from the life they will have to part from.”
This is a book we are dying to get in your hands. Any reader looking for the kind of novel that contains”beautiful prose” (Consuelo), “the purest kind of empathy” (Raven) throughout and “sentences you will want to revisit time and time again” (Eugenia), will find it all in Red at the Bone.
If you love this book and Woodson’s others, you won’t want to miss the very special book talk and reading we’ll be hosting at the Central Presbyterian Church in downtown Austin with Jacqueline Woodson and Maya Smart on October 1st at 7PM!
We Are the Weather by Jonathan Safran Foer
In We Are the Weather, Jonathan Safran Foer tackles the most pressing issue of our time: climate change. We have, Foer reveals, turned our planet into a farm for growing meat, and the consequences are catastrophic. With the future of our home at stake, the time has come to consider how our descendants will judge our actions at this crucial moment.
We Are the Weather is as much a scientific exposé on our dangerous consumption habits as much as it is an impassioned plea for collective action to save the only planet we call home.
Bookseller Chrstine calls Foer’s latest “vulnerable and subversive…[a] book that will make readers uncomfortable as he urges folks to make their own decisions. And that is all the more reason to read it.” And Uriel says, “This book is urgent…absolutely necessary for anyone who thinks they can’t make a difference.” We urge you to join us this Friday, September 20 at 7PM when Jonathan Safran Foer returns to BookPeople to discuss We Are the Weather and our climate crisis alongside Megan Kimble of The Texas Observer.
To Love and Let Go by Rachel Brathen
While on her way to teach a yoga retreat in March 2014, Rachel Brathen collapses at an airport, brought to her knees by excruciating stomach pains. She is rushed to the hospital on the tiny island of Bonaire, and hours later forced to undergo surgery…
And while Rachel was struck down with seemingly mysterious pain, her best friend, Andrea, sustained fatal injuries as a result of a car accident.
Over the three years following Andrea’s death, at what might appear from the outside to be the happiest time, Rachel faces a series of trials that have the potential to define her life. As she recounts this transformative period, Rachel shares her hard-won wisdom about life and death, love and fear, what it means to be a mother and a daughter, and how to become someone who walks through the fire of adversity with the never-ending practice of loving hard and letting go.
Learn about Rachel’s journey when she comes to BookPeople this Wednesday, September 18th at 7PM for an insightful conversation with Lacey Pruett.
On Fire: The (Burning) Case for the Green New Deal by Naomi Klein
Journalist and activist Naomi Klein is back with a collection ripe for our times.
On Fire: The (Burning) Case for a Green New Deal gathers for the first time more than a decade of her impassioned writing, and pairs it with new material on the staggeringly high stakes of our immediate political and economic choices. These long-form essays show Klein at her most prophetic and philosophical, investigating the climate crisis not only as a profound political challenge but as a spiritual and imaginative one, as well.
Reporting on everything from the decimation of the Great Barrier Reef to post-hurricane Puerto Rico, Klein makes the case that we will rise to the existential challenge of climate change only if we are willing to transform the systems that produced this crisis.
This urgent, new book seems to come at a time when we need it most. And for this reason we are so grateful (and thrilled) to be hosting Naomi Klein in-store on October 3 at 7PM for a discussion alongside The Texas Observer‘s Andrea Valdez. Please join us and get informed.
Crossfire Hurricane by Josh Campbell
Crossfire Hurricane is former special assistant to James Comey’s riveting fly on the wall narrative of his time in the FBI during the early days of the Trump administration and Russian collusion investigation.
Using both firsthand experience and reporting, he reveals fresh details about this tumultuous period; explains how the FBI goes about its work and its historic independence from partisan forces; and describes the increasing dismay inside the bureau as the president and his allies escalate their attacks on the agency.
Smart, clear and passionate, Campbell’s Crossfire Hurricane is a captivating and sobering look at how we got know. Don’t miss Josh Campbell when he comes to BookPeople on October 2 at 7PM – he’ll read and (hopefully) answer all the burning questions we have about the inner workings of one of our country’s most important agencies.
Whole Food Cooking Every Day by Amy Chaplin
From James Beard Award-winning author Amy Chaplin comes an all new whole food cooking bible. Whole Food Cooking Every Day illustrates strategies, key recipes, and techniques for eating well day in and day out without getting bored.
Chaplin knows that eating whole foods can transform a diet, and mastering the art of cooking these foods can be easy with the proper techniques and strategies. In 20 chapters she shares ingenious recipes incorporating the foods that are key to a healthy diet: seeds and nuts, fruits and vegetables, whole grains, and other plant-based foods.
Don’t miss Amy Chaplin when she comes to BookPeople on September 23 at 7PM to teach us all how to seek out local and organic ingredients, stock our pantries with nutrient-rich whole food ingredients, prep ahead of time, and, most importantly, cook at home.
Sontag: Her Life and Work by Benjamin Moser
In the more than 800 pages that comprise Sontag, Benjamin Moser compounds hundreds of interviews and previously restricted archives to paint the definitive portrait of Susan Sontag, one of the American Century’s most towering intellectuals.
Mythologized and misunderstood, lauded and loathed, a girl from the suburbs who became a proud symbol of cosmopolitanism, Sontag left a legacy of writing on art and politics, feminism and homosexuality, celebrity and style, medicine and drugs, radicalism and Fascism and Freudianism and Communism and Americanism, that forms an indispensable key to modern culture.
This document explores the agonizing insecurity behind the formidable public face: the broken relationships, the struggles with her sexuality, that animated—and undermined—her writing. And it shows her attempts to respond to the cruelties and absurdities of a country that had lost its way, and her conviction that fidelity to high culture was an activism of its own. This book is an insurmountable achievement and we hope you join us on October 9th at 7PM when biographer Benjamin Moser comes to BookPeople to talk with us about the life and legacy of Susan Sontag.
Land of Wolves by Craig Johnson
Craig Johnson continues his beloved Longmire series in this latest installment, Land of Wolves. Still recovering from his harrowing experiences in Mexico, Sheriff Walt Longmire is thrust back into action after discovering the body of an itinerant shepard found hanged on a trail, the appearance of a mysterious young boy in town, and a bloodthirsty wolf on the prowl in the Bighorn Mountains.
With both a wolf and a killer on the loose, Longmire follows a twisting trail of evidence, leading to dark and shocking conclusions.
In his review of Land of Wolves, Crime Fiction Coordinator Scott M. says, “Land Of Wolves allows Craig Johnson to do what he does best. He is able to to take his time, take in Walt’s friendships and the lay of the land. The result is the reader taking in the life of a survivor and see the benefits and price of being one.”
Cosmology of Monsters by Shaun Hamill
Noah Turner sees monsters.
His father saw them—and built a shrine to them with The Wandering Dark, an immersive horror experience that the whole family operates.
His practical mother has caught glimpses of terrors but refuses to believe—too focused on keeping the family from falling apart.
And his eldest sister, the dramatic and vulnerable Sydney, won’t admit to seeing anything but the beckoning glow of the spotlight…until it swallows her up.
Shaun Hamill’s Cosmology of Monsters is an absolutely mesmerizing tale of a dysfunctional family surrounded by ghosts as well as an homage to Lovecraftian lore. If you want a book that’s “a love letter to family and the horror genre” (Joe) and totally “f-ed up” (Jessica L.), then you might want to pick up this book today!
A Hero Born by Jin Yong
The first volume of the Legends of the Condor Heroes, the epic Chinese classic and bestselling phenomenon is finally out today! Translated to English for the first time, A Hero Born by Jin Yong is a fantastical generational saga and kung-fu epic that comes highly recommeded by part-time bookseller Will B. who says, “Really refreshing…once I started I could not stop. With action that comes off the page and dances around your head in the myriad forms of martial arts on display, JinYong writes such that every emotion and blow is felt as strongly as the last, with no wasted pages. Reading A Hero Born felt the same as when I first read The Hobbit, or Eye of the World–I must say this was probably my favorite read of the year!”
The BabySitters Coven by Kate Williams
Adventures in Babysitting meets Buffy the Vampire Slayer in this funny, action-packed novel about a coven of witchy babysitters who realize their calling to protect the innocent and save the world from an onslaught of evil. Author Kate Williams, whose work you may have seen in NYLON and Bustle, will be at the Texas Teen Book Festival on October 12th to tell us more about her debut novel.
Juliet Takes a Breath by Gabby Rivera
Another author you’ll get to meet at the Texas Teen Book Festival! Rivera’s debut focuses on the story of Juliet, a self-proclaimed closeted Puerto Rican baby dyke from the Bronx, who actually comes out to her conservative family the night before she takes off to Portland for the summer to intern with her favorite feminist writer. This comes highly recommended by Kids events director Eugenia, who says, “A fun and inspiring read for all current and future brujas, warriors, and beautiful brown feminist babes. I absolutely loved Juliet Milagros Palante and it was her loud, succinct voice that pulled me into this story of exploration and power.”
The Last Kids on Earth and the Midnight Blade by Max Brallier
Come see what Jack and his buddies are up to in the latest installment of Last Kids on Earth, one of our favorite series AND soon to be a Netflix adaptation! A little bit about the book: When Jack discovers his Louisville Slicer has new, otherworldly powers, he’s thrown into epic training to find out what kind of destruction the blade can wield. But between fighting off zombies, fleeing from strange, glowy Vine-Thingies erupting from the ground, and squeezing in a video game session or two, there’s barely time left to figure out what’s wrong with their buddy, Dirk, who’s been acting weird any time he’s around the undead. When an unexpected villain appears, can Jack and his friends save themselves–and the rest of the world–from cosmic domination?
We’re so excited because Max Brallier is coming back to BookPeople October 1st! Mark your calendars and join us!
These titles and so many more are available for purchase now online and in-store at BookPeople.
And be sure to check back next week with a roundup of new titles you need to add to your ever-growing TBR pile.
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