en-US Sun, 20 Sep 2026 06:47:51 -0700 60 144 41 https://www.goodreads.com/images/layout/goodreads_logo_144.jpg 3153910
Through Denny, Enzo has gained tremendous insight into the human condition, and he sees that life, like racing, isn't simply about going fast. On the eve of his death, Enzo takes stock of his life, recalling all that he and his family have been through.

A heart-wrenching but deeply funny and ultimately uplifting story of family, love, loyalty, and hope, The Art of Racing in the Rain is a beautifully crafted and captivating look at the wonders and absurdities of human life ... as only a dog could tell it.]]> 336 Garth Stein 1554681723 Diana 0 currently-reading 4.23 2008
author: Garth Stein
name: Diana
average rating: 4.23
book published: 2008
rating: 0
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date added: 2026/09/20
shelves: currently-reading
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]]> 235793220 *A RADIO 2 WINTER BOOK CLUB PICK*

A sweeping story of three generations of women who cross continents and decades to find truth, forgiveness and compassion.

Incheon, 1985. A nameless baby is born in a minbak in South Korea and vanishes nine days later.

London, 2008. When tragedy strikes, Hana faces ruin. She is forced to move her family – her teenage daughter Ada and ailing mother Youngja – into a single room with her, converting the rest of their home into a minbak, in a painful echo of her past life.

In the confined space of their shared room, there is nowhere to hide. As the past collides with the present, all three women are forced to face not only their family’s dark history, but that of an entire country.]]> 352 Ela Lee 1529972388 Diana 4 4.25 2026
author: Ela Lee
name: Diana
average rating: 4.25
book published: 2026
rating: 4
read at: 2026/09/20
date added: 2026/09/20
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]]> 43890641 Hamnet is a luminous portrait of a marriage, at its heart the loss of a beloved child.

Warwickshire in the 1580s. Agnes is a woman as feared as she is sought after for her unusual gifts. She settles with her husband in Henley street, Stratford, and has three children: a daughter, Susanna, and then twins, Hamnet and Judith. The boy, Hamnet, dies in 1596, aged eleven. Four years or so later, the husband writes a play called Hamlet.

Award-winning author Maggie O'Farrell's new novel breathes full-blooded life into the story of a loss usually consigned to literary footnotes, and provides an unforgettable vindication of Agnes, a woman intriguingly absent from history.

A New York Times Notable Book (2020), Best Book of 2020: Guardian, Financial Times, Literary Hub, and NPR.]]> 372 Maggie O'Farrell 1472223799 Diana 0 to-read 4.18 2020
author: Maggie O'Farrell
name: Diana
average rating: 4.18
book published: 2020
rating: 0
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date added: 2026/09/18
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]]> 258893091 Nora has spent her life doing what is expected; she excels at school, builds a successful career and helps keep her family afloat. But as Singapore changes, she begins to notice the compromises that shape everyday life; the things people learn to accept, the boundaries they learn not to cross. As the gap between who she is and who she is allowed to be widens, Nora must decide where she stands.
~Winner of the Epigram Books Fiction Prize 2026~]]> 279 Ratna Damayanti Taha 9815348310 Diana 0 to-read 0.0
author: Ratna Damayanti Taha
name: Diana
average rating: 0.0
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date added: 2026/09/18
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]]> 258899456 From the bestselling author of Crying in H Mart, a moving, funny, unforgettable new memoir about Michelle Zauner’s year in South Korea, learning Korean in an impossibly challenging language school and forging extraordinary new relationships with her mother’s family: the emotional continuation of a mother-daughter story that has captivated the world.

Michelle Zauner’s delectable new memoir takes the reader on an immersive and deeply personal journey through the heart of South Korea, and charts Zauner’s dream of learning her mother’s native language in hopes of being able to read the diary she left behind, and to connect with her family in Seoul. From the beginning, her adventure is beset by difficulties, from the quirky apartment she rents with Peter, her husband and bandmate, to the punishing language school that leaves her in tears. Korean does not come easily to her, even as she fights stubbornly to master it, and the difficulty of living in a foreign city places unexpected new pressures on her marriage. But there are also profound new pleasures and triumphs during her year abroad: making Korean friends, exploring Seoul’s alternative underground, spending precious time with her mother’s sister, performing songs in a new language. Zauner’s voice is fierce and emotional, her prose more precise and assured than ever, and her honesty is mesmerizing, as she shares her failures and her victories with unwavering candor. Fans of Crying in H Mart will recognize her intelligence and heart on every page.]]> Michelle Zauner 1035052016 Diana 0 to-read 5.00
author: Michelle Zauner
name: Diana
average rating: 5.00
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rating: 0
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date added: 2026/09/17
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]]> 231108670 It was a great love story, one for the ages. The speed of our beginning and the speed of our ending felt like matching bookends. They both came out of nowhere. He wanted it, he wanted me. And then he didn’t.

In March 2020, Belle Burden was safe and secure with her family at their house on Martha’s Vineyard, navigating the early days of the pandemic together—building fires in the late afternoons, drinking whisky sours, making roast chicken. Then, with no warning or explanation, her husband of twenty years announced that he was leaving her. Overnight, her caring, steady partner became a man she hardly recognized. He exited his life with her like an actor shrugging off a costume.

In Strangers, Burden revisits her marriage, searching for clues that her husband was not who she always thought he was. As she examines her relationship through a new lens, she reckons with her own family history and the lessons she intuited about how a woman is expected to behave in the face of betrayal. Through all of it, she is transformed. The discreet, compliant woman she once was—someone nicknamed “Belle the Good”—gives way to someone braver, someone determined to use her voice.

With unflinching honesty and profound grace, Burden charts a path through heartbreak to show the power of a woman who refuses to give up on love. Strangers is a stunning, deeply moving, compulsively readable memoir heralding the arrival of a thrilling new literary talent.]]> 241 Belle Burden 0593733312 Diana 4 4.02 2026
author: Belle Burden
name: Diana
average rating: 4.02
book published: 2026
rating: 4
read at: 2026/09/12
date added: 2026/09/12
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]]> 218460347 A darkly comic and warm-hearted novel about an old man on a cross-country mission to reunite with his high school crush—bringing together his adult daughter, two orphaned kids, and a cat who can predict death—from the beloved author of Rabbit Cake and Unlikely Animals

At sixty-three years old, million-dollar lottery winner PJ Halliday would be the luckiest man in Pondville, Massachusetts, if it weren’t for the tragedies of his life: the sudden death of his eldest daughter and the way his marriage fell apart after that. Since then, PJ spends both his money and his time at the bar, and he probably doesn’t have much time left—he’s had three heart attacks already.

But when PJ reads an obituary of his old romantic rival, he realizes his high school sweetheart, Michelle Cobb, is finally single again. Filled with a new enthusiasm for life, PJ decides he’s going to drive across the country to the Tender Hearts Retirement Community in Arizona to win Michelle back.

Before PJ can hit the road, tragedy strikes Pondville, leaving PJ the sudden guardian of his estranged brother’s grandchildren. Anyone else would be deterred from the planned trip, but PJ figures the orphaned kids might benefit from getting out of town. PJ also figures he can ask Sophie, his adult daughter, adrift in her 20s, to come along to babysit. And there’s one more surprise addition to the roster: Pancakes, a former nursing home therapy cat with a knack of predicting death, who recently turned up outside PJ’s home.

This could be the second chance PJ has long hoped for—a second shot at love and parenting—but does he have the strength to do both those things again? It’s very possible his heart can’t take it.]]> 384 Annie Hartnett 0593873440 Diana 0 to-read 4.32 2025
author: Annie Hartnett
name: Diana
average rating: 4.32
book published: 2025
rating: 0
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date added: 2026/09/11
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]]> 246241224 From the #1 New York Times bestselling author of Hidden Valley Road comes the heart-wrenching journey of a family facing a tragic genetic destiny, set against the scientific search for hope for all of us who fear losing our selves to dementia

In the idyllic American town of Pleasant Hills, Pennsylvania, lived a family with nine siblings, the youngest a girl named Barb. As the older children headed off to college and started their lives, only Barb was home to see their beautiful, still-young mother fall under a gothic spell, changed into someone they don’t withdrawn, neglectful, uncaring.

Thus begins The Vanishing Family, journalist Robert Kolker’s stunning follow-up to Hidden Valley Road (“Deeply compassionate and chilling”, Washington Post). The family, we learn, has a gene mutation for dementia, but with a special cruel twist. As early as their forties, formerly loving parents and hard driving executives will lose their jobs, have affairs, take up drinking—shed all inhibitions and sense of responsibility, and become people their families hardly know. And there is a 50/50 chance that it will happen to their children, too.

Kolker follows the family over years as they realize that what happened to their mother is happening to first one, then two, three, four, and more begin to change. The Vanishing Family unfolds like a heartbreaking thriller, as the siblings struggle to cope with terrifying fates. Sue, the black sheep of the family, finds a calling in caring for the others. And Barb sets out to find a cure. She learns that their mutation for a rare form of FTD (frontotemporal dementia) might help scientists understand and cure all dementia, including the scourge of Alzheimer’s disease.

Moving, intimate, hopeful, redemptive— The Vanishing Family is a medical detective story about an unforgettable family that speaks to all of us who wonder how our own stories will end.]]> 368 Robert Kolker 0385551037 Diana 0 to-read 4.56 2026
author: Robert Kolker
name: Diana
average rating: 4.56
book published: 2026
rating: 0
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date added: 2026/09/10
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]]> 65215270
The year is 1921. Lesley Hamlyn and her husband, Robert, a lawyer and war veteran, are living at Cassowary House on the Straits Settlement of Penang. When “Willie” Somerset Maugham, a famed writer and old friend of Robert's, arrives for an extended visit with his secretary Gerald, the pair threatens a rift that could alter more lives than one.

Maugham, one of the great novelists of his day, is beleaguered: Having long hidden his homosexuality, his unhappy and expensive marriage of convenience becomes unbearable after he loses his savings-and the freedom to travel with Gerald. His career deflating, his health failing, Maugham arrives at Cassowary House in desperate need of a subject for his next book. Lesley, too, is enduring a marriage more duplicitous than it first appears. Maugham suspects an affair, and, learning of Lesley's past connection to the Chinese revolutionary, Dr. Sun Yat Sen, decides to probe deeper. But as their friendship grows and Lesley confides in him about life in the Straits, Maugham discovers a far more surprising tale than he imagined, one that involves not only war and scandal but the trial of an Englishwoman charged with murder. It is, to Maugham, a story worthy of fiction.

A mesmerizingly beautiful novel based on real events, The House of Doors traces the fault lines of race, gender, sexuality, and power under empire, and dives deep into the complicated nature of love and friendship in its shadow.]]> 306 Tan Twan Eng 1639731938 Diana 0 to-read 3.97 2023
author: Tan Twan Eng
name: Diana
average rating: 3.97
book published: 2023
rating: 0
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date added: 2026/09/10
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]]> 60462539 Set against a changing Singapore, a sweeping novel about one boy's unique gifts and the childhood love that will complicate the fate of his community and country

Ah Boon is born into a fishing village amid the heat and beauty of twentieth-century coastal Singapore in the waning years of British rule. He is a gentle boy who is not much interested in fishing, preferring to spend his days playing with the neighbor girl, Siok Mei. But when he discovers he has the unique ability to locate bountiful, movable islands that no one else can find, he feels a new sense of obligation and possibility--something to offer the community and impress the spirited girl he has come to love.

By the time they are teens, Ah Boon and Siok Mei are caught in the tragic sweep of history: the Japanese army invades, the resistance rises, grief intrudes, and the future of the fishing village is in jeopardy. As the nation hurtles toward rebirth, the two friends, newly empowered, must decide who they want to be, and what they are willing to give up.

An aching love story and powerful coming-of-age that reckons with the legacy of British colonialism, the World War II Japanese occupation, and the pursuit of modernity, The Great Reclamation confronts the wounds of progress, the sacrifices of love, and the difficulty of defining home when nature and nation collide, literally shifting the land beneath people's feet.]]> 464 Rachel Heng 059342011X Diana 5 4.01 2023
author: Rachel Heng
name: Diana
average rating: 4.01
book published: 2023
rating: 5
read at: 2026/09/07
date added: 2026/09/07
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]]> 242693052 The acclaimed, prize-winning #1 New York Times bestselling writer returns with a moving, luminous novel that reminds us of the sweetness and impermanence of life and the power of connection to defy time.

When Daphne Fuller and her husband Jonathan visit the Metropolitan Museum of Art, they notice an older, white-haired gentleman following them. The man turns out to be Eddie Triplett, her former stepfather, who had been married to her mother for a little more than year when Daphne was nine. Now fifty-three, Daphne hasn’t seen Eddie for many years, not since the fateful event that changed the direction of both their lives. Meeting again, time falls away; while their relationship was brief, it had a profound impact on them both, and now that they are reunited, they have no intention of ever being separated again.

Whistler is a story about two adults looking back over the choices they made, and the choices that were made for them. It’s a story about bravery, memory, the often small yet consequential moments that define our lives, and the endless stream of loss that in time comes for us all. Beautiful in its simplicity, it is ultimately about how love endures, and how the feeling of being known by one other person, even for a short period of time, can change everything.]]> 304 Ann Patchett 0063511630 Diana 3 4.29 2026
author: Ann Patchett
name: Diana
average rating: 4.29
book published: 2026
rating: 3
read at: 2026/08/30
date added: 2026/08/30
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]]> 247150129
My passion for this topic isn’t just professional; it’s personal. As a shy introvert, new relationships haven’t always come easily to me. Over the past two decades, I’ve honed my ability to connect with students as a teacher, leadership teams as an advisor, and strangers as a podcast host. I assumed our most popular episodes would be driven by the quality of the content and the calibre of the guest. Yet the most enthusiastic listener feedback singles out the chemistry between me and the guest. For years, I’ve puzzled over why I vibe with some people but I’m awkward with others.

As a social scientist, as always, I started with the data. After synthesizing the findings, I found stories that animate the key insights. I’ll show you why similarity doesn’t always accelerate solidarity and why frequent interaction is not essential to connection. I’ll reveal the small touchpoints that can have big consequences, what it really takes for teams to click in work and sports, and what constitutes the ingredients for lifelong friendships.

Successful relationships are essential to all of us, and I want to show readers how we can spark, strengthen, and sustain connections in every corner of our lives.]]> Adam Grant 0753561689 Diana 0 to-read 4.40
author: Adam Grant
name: Diana
average rating: 4.40
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rating: 0
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date added: 2026/08/30
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]]> 245670660 The Art of Gathering

We say we want community. Successful teams. High-performing colleagues and workplaces. Dynamic friend groups. Yet many of us don’t understand the crucial element we need to forge long-lasting communities in our lives: healthy conflict.

In The Art of Fighting, Priya Parker explains that we can’t form and grow effective relationships without a fight. She rejects the idea that conflict is abnormal or that good groups don’t fight. All groups change and evolve; indeed, it’s because people disagree that good groups flourish.

As she did in the now-classic The Art of Gathering, Parker draws on her far-reaching experience as a conflict facilitator, her own detailed research, and real-world examples to lay out the ways that people can identify disputes, determine how to address them, and what to do if they are insurmountable. Whether people disagree in the boardroom or the locker room, on a playground or in church, online or in person, conflict is a part of life, and understanding healthy conflict and how to harness its power is more important than ever. The Art of Fighting is a vital primer to help all of us understand how to do that.]]> 320 Priya Parker 0593420225 Diana 0 to-read 4.22 2026
author: Priya Parker
name: Diana
average rating: 4.22
book published: 2026
rating: 0
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date added: 2026/08/30
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]]> 34023590 Your first love isn’t the first person you give your heart to—it’s the first one who breaks it.

School is almost out for Audrey, but the panic attacks are just beginning. Because Audrey told a lie and now her classmate, Ana, is dead. Just as her world begins to spin out of control, Audrey meets the enigmatic Rad—the boy who could turn it all around. But will their ill-timed romance drive her closer to the edge?]]> 362 Lang Leav 1449487769 Diana 2 3.33 2017
author: Lang Leav
name: Diana
average rating: 3.33
book published: 2017
rating: 2
read at: 2026/08/23
date added: 2026/08/23
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]]> 238226942
Then, one morning, Natalie wakes up in a strange, horrible version of reality. Her home, her husband, her children—they’re all familiar, but something’s off. Is this a hoax? A reality show? A test from God? Natalie knows just two things for sure: this isn't her perfect life, and she must escape, by any means possible.

As darkly funny as it is shocking and gripping, Yesteryear is an electrifying examination of tradition, fame, faith and the grand performance of womanhood, from a thrilling new talent in fiction.]]> 400 Caro Claire Burke Diana 0 to-read 3.83 2026
author: Caro Claire Burke
name: Diana
average rating: 3.83
book published: 2026
rating: 0
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date added: 2026/08/21
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]]> 41880608 A beautifully observed and deeply funny novel of May Attaway, a university gardener who sets out on an odyssey to reconnect with four old friends over the course of a year.

At forty, May Attaway is more at home with plants than people. Over the years, she's turned inward, finding pleasure in language, her work as a gardener, and keeping her neighbors at arm's length while keenly observing them. But when she is unexpectedly granted some leave from her job, May is inspired to reconnect with four once close friends. She knows they will never have a proper reunion, so she goes, one-by-one, to each of them. A student of the classics, May considers her journey a female Odyssey. What might the world have had if, instead of waiting, Penelope had set out on an adventure of her own?

RULES FOR VISITING is a woman's exploration of friendship in the digital age. Deeply alert to the nobility and the ridiculousness of ordinary people, May savors the pleasures along the way--afternoon ice cream with a long-lost friend, surprise postcards from an unexpected crush, and a moving encounter with ancient beauty. Though she gets a taste of viral online fame, May chooses to bypass her friends' perfectly cultivated online lives to instead meet them in their messy analog ones.

Ultimately, May learns that a best friend is someone who knows your story--and she inspires us all to master the art of visiting.]]> 290 Jessica Francis Kane 0525559221 Diana 1 3.68 2019
author: Jessica Francis Kane
name: Diana
average rating: 3.68
book published: 2019
rating: 1
read at: 2026/08/18
date added: 2026/08/18
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]]> 246379922
“A stunning book about how to protect our children—and our humanity—in the age of AI." —Adam Grant

"Hope is not lost. It’s right here. If there is a young person in your life, Human Raised is for you." —Angela Duckworth

As AI enters nurseries, playrooms, and classrooms, parents are being sold a “smart” childhood at every turn. This book is a guide to protecting the most important label of all: human raised.

In her groundbreaking book Thirty Million Words, Dr. Suskind revealed the extraordinary power of parent talk and interaction in building children’s brains. Now, with the advent of artificial intelligence, the stakes of that nurturing interaction have become even clearer. New AI applications demonstrate what technology can replicate—but they also illuminate what it cannot: the capacity of human interaction to build not just children’s skills but their very capacity for human connection.

Human Raised reveals the possibilities and perils of using AI and related technologies for child-rearing. From monitors that decode cries, to smart cribs that soothe babies to sleep, to interactive chatbots designed to engage an inquisitive toddler, the parenting landscape is shifting fast—and Dr. Suskind helps parents navigate this uncharted territory with clarity and confidence.

Readers will learn four guiding principles for raising children alongside AI:
Human connection is irreplaceable
Own your imperfections
Protect the early years
Enhance—don’t replace—connection
The book also offers a concrete evaluation framework to help parents (and anyone shaping children’s environments) assess individual technologies, along with evidence-based guidance for fostering the skills children will need to thrive in an AI-driven future. Critical thinking, empathy, creativity, and resilience form what Suskind calls the Human Edge—capabilities no algorithm can replicate and no artificial teacher can cultivate.

Drawing from neuroscience, evolutionary biology, and the lived experience of countless families, Human Raised prepares parents to act as essential guardians to the gateway between AI and their children’s developing minds—keeping human connection, in all its beautiful imperfection, at the center of childhood.]]> 320 Dana Suskind Diana 5 4.31
author: Dana Suskind
name: Diana
average rating: 4.31
book published:
rating: 5
read at: 2026/08/10
date added: 2026/08/10
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]]> 222376793 A propulsive, never-before-told story of one family's shocking involvement as Nazi and Japanese spies during WWII and the pivotal role they played in the bombing of Pearl Harbor.

It began with a call from a screenwriter, asking about a story. Your family. World War II. Nazi spies. Christine Kuehn was shocked and confused. When she asked her seventy-year-old father, Eberhard, what this could possibly be about, he stalled, deflected, demurred, and then wept. He knew this day would come.

The Kuehns, a prominent Berlin family, saw the rise of the Nazis as a way out of the hard times that had befallen them. When the daughter of the family, Eberhard's sister, Ruth, met Nazi leader Joseph Goebbels at a party, the two hit it off, and they had an affair. But Ruth had a secret--she was half Jewish--and Goebbels found out. Rather than having Ruth killed, Goebbels instead sent the entire Kuehn family to Hawaii, to work as spies half a world away. There, Ruth and her parents established an intricate spy operation from their home, just a few miles down the road from Pearl Harbor, shielding Eberhard from the truth. They passed secrets to the Japanese, leading to the devastating attack on Pearl Harbor. After Eberhard's father was arrested and tried for his involvement in planning the assault, Eberhard learned the harsh truth about his family and faced a decision that would change the path of the Kuehn family forever.

Jumping back and forth between Christine discovering her family's secret and the untold past of the spies in Germany, Japan, and Hawaii, Family of Spies is fast-paced history at its finest and will rewrite the narrative of December 7, 1941.]]> 272 Christine Kuehn 1250344468 Diana 5 4.18 2025
author: Christine Kuehn
name: Diana
average rating: 4.18
book published: 2025
rating: 5
read at: 2026/08/02
date added: 2026/08/02
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]]> 221289749 Award-winning comedian Zarna Garg turns her astonishing life story into a hilarious memoir, spilling all the chai on her wild ride from escaping an arranged marriage and homelessness in India to carving her own path in America and launching a dazzling second act in midlife.

“A deeply honest and hilarious book about how you always win if you bet on yourself.”—Amy Poehler

Throughout Zarna’s whole childhood in India, everyone called her “so American” just for reading the newspaper, having deep thoughts, and talking back to anyone over the age of thirty. When Zarna’s dad tried to marry her off at age fourteen, Zarna fled—first to the streets of Mumbai and ultimately to the glittering paradise of Akron, Ohio, where she got to become American for real.

On Zarna’s very American quest to find herself and her calling, she threw herself wholeheartedly into roles like dog-bite lawyer, crazy perfectionist stay-at-home mom, Indian matchmaker, prizewinning screenwriter, and more. It wasn’t until a dare led her to a stand-up comedy open mic that Zarna finally found her spiritual getting paid cold hard cash for her big fat mouth.

And as Zarna discovered, after surviving the brutal streets of Mumbai, the cutthroat world of stand-up comedy is nothing.

This American Woman is an exuberant story of fighting for your right to determine your own destiny and triumphing beyond what you ever dreamed was possible. Zarna’s mantra becomes a call to It’s never too late. If Zarna can do it, you can, too.

Bonus content! At the end of the program, hear from Zarna's sons Brij and Veer about losing their Mom to comedy, but finding each other. Experience Shalabh's front row seat watching his wife take flight in mid-life. If you think you cried enough during the memoir, you're not done yet!]]> 320 Zarna Garg 0593975022 Diana 0 to-read 4.28 2025
author: Zarna Garg
name: Diana
average rating: 4.28
book published: 2025
rating: 0
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date added: 2026/08/01
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]]> 228820257
Eleven-year-old Meg, one of the unadoptable “big girls” at the Lafayette County Orphan Asylum, fights each day to keep her spirit unbowed. Birdie, unmarried and outspoken, has come to Oxford on a mission to ask her social-climbing sister to help the struggling family she’s left behind. And Charlie is a woman with a past, running low on luck but driven by fire, fury, and grit. When their fates converge, they come up with an audacious plan to take back control of their lives. Together, they form an unlikely sisterhood—but in a place and time where hypocrisy is rife, women’s freedom is fragile, and making an enemy can have dire consequences, will the price they pay for their outrageous risk-taking be too high?

The Calamity Club will make you laugh, cry, and cheer—an epic testament to resilience, friendship, and the fierce, funny women who know that calamity can be the spark of new beginnings. This is Kathryn Stockett at her most confident, heartfelt, and hilarious—the triumphant return of one of the most beloved storytellers of our time.]]> 656 Kathryn Stockett 1954118813 Diana 5 4.61 2026
author: Kathryn Stockett
name: Diana
average rating: 4.61
book published: 2026
rating: 5
read at: 2026/07/27
date added: 2026/07/27
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]]> 203166736 Create a lifetime of connection with your children.Therapist and wildly popular attachment research expert Eli Harwood (a.k.a. Attachment Nerd) illuminates attachment theory as foundational to the only parenting approach proven to have a lasting impact. How do you raise kids who are confident, capable, and caring? The first ingredient is a secure and close relationship—key to helping them self-regulate and thrive later in life. When children feel seen, heard, and supported, all other parenting tips and tricks start to work. Groundbreaking author Eli Harwood makes attachment theory (the science that explores the innate human need to bond with other humans) accessible and actionable in how it can help our children learn and grow into compassionate, warm adults. For anyone looking to build a better life for their kids, no matter what you went through growing up yourself, these simple, real-life strategies will help ·        Help you create a secure attachment relationship with your kids by choosing connection over control·        Prompt reflection on attachment patterns you developed in childhood and why you respond in certain ways during emotional moments with your children·        Help you resolve past attachment traumas so you can gain effective skills to offer calm, connected, and secure base·        Provide scripts and practical tools to build and reinforce a strong foundation of trust·        Encourage you to release the reins of influence as their independence grows Hopeful and inspiring, this essential evidence-based guide will show parents across different ages and stages everywhere that they are not alone in the questions and concerns they may have about their children's development. Though there have been countless studies on how attachment styles affect our romantic relationships, Raising Securely Attached Kids reframes the subject for cultivating a strong relationship between parent and child to bring transformative change to your relationships of all stripes.]]> 288 Eli Harwood MA LPC 1632175460 Diana 4 4.49
author: Eli Harwood MA LPC
name: Diana
average rating: 4.49
book published:
rating: 4
read at: 2026/07/05
date added: 2026/07/05
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]]> 58666481
Discover the alchemy behind original thinking, as TED Talk superstar and Ogilvy advertising legend Rory Sutherland reveals why abandoning logic and casting aside rationality is the best way to solve any problem.

In his first book he blends cutting-edge behavioural science, jaw-dropping stories and a touch of branding magic on his mission to turn us all into idea alchemists. He shows how economists, businesses and governments have got it all wrong: we are not rational creatures who make logical decisions based on evidence. Instead, the big problems we face every day, whether as an individual or in society, could very well be solved by thinking less logically. To be brilliant, you have to be irrational.]]> 384 Rory Sutherland Diana 3 4.01 2019
author: Rory Sutherland
name: Diana
average rating: 4.01
book published: 2019
rating: 3
read at:
date added: 2026/06/28
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]]> 63094957 A brilliantly funny novel about friends, lovers, Ireland in chaos, and a young woman desperately trying to manage all three

Rachel is a student working at a bookstore when she meets James, and it’s love at first sight. Effervescent and insistently heterosexual, James soon invites Rachel to be his roommate and the two begin a friendship that changes the course of both their lives forever. Together, they run riot through the streets of Cork city, trying to maintain a bohemian existence while the threat of the financial crash looms before them.

When Rachel falls in love with her married professor, Dr. Fred Byrne, James helps her devise a reading at their local bookstore, with the goal that she might seduce him afterwards. But Fred has other desires. So begins a series of secrets and compromises that intertwine the fates of James, Rachel, Fred, and Fred’s glamorous, well-connected, bourgeois wife. Aching with unrequited love, shot through with delicious, sparkling humor, The Rachel Incident is a triumph.]]> 304 Caroline O'Donoghue 0593535707 Diana 4 4.04 2023
author: Caroline O'Donoghue
name: Diana
average rating: 4.04
book published: 2023
rating: 4
read at: 2026/06/18
date added: 2026/06/18
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]]> 60097435 From the bestselling author of Thinking in Bets comes a toolkit for mastering the skill of quitting to achieve greater success

Business leaders, with millions of dollars down the drain, struggle to abandon a new app or product that just isn't working. Governments, caught in a hopeless conflict, believe that the next tactic will finally be the one that wins the war. And in our own lives, we persist in relationships or careers that no longer serve us. Why? According to Annie Duke, in the face of tough decisions, we're terrible quitters. And that is significantly holding us back.

In Quit, Duke teaches you how to get good at quitting. Drawing on stories from elite athletes like Mount Everest climbers, founders of leading companies like Stewart Butterfield, the CEO of Slack, and top entertainers like Dave Chappelle, Duke explains why quitting is integral to success, as well as strategies for determining when to hold em, and when to fold em, that will save you time, energy, and money. You'll learn:
How the paradox of quitting influences decision making: If you quit on time, you will feel you quit early
What forces work against good quitting behavior, such as escalation commitment, desire for certainty, and status quo biasHow to think in expected value in order to make better decisions, as well as other best practices, such as increasing flexibility in goal-setting, establishing "quitting contracts," anticipating optionality, and conducting premortems and backcasts
Whether you're facing a make-or-break business decision or life-altering personal choice, mastering the skill of quitting will help you make the best next move.]]> 336 Annie Duke 0593422996 Diana 4 4.12 2022
author: Annie Duke
name: Diana
average rating: 4.12
book published: 2022
rating: 4
read at:
date added: 2026/06/15
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]]> 222685805 A runaway bestseller in China, sold in 20+ countries, this delightfully honest and humorous account gives a face and voice to the future of work—as if Nomadland met Nickel and Dimed.

In 2023, I Deliver Parcels in Beijing became the literary sensation of the year in China. Hu Anyan’s story, about short-term jobs in various anonymous megacities, hit a nerve with a generation of young people who feel at odds with an ever-growing pressure to perform and succeed.

Hu started posting essays about his experiences online during COVID lockdowns. His recollection of night shifts in a huge logistics center in the south of China went his nights were so hot that he could drink three liters of water without taking a toilet break; his days were spent searching for affordable rooms with proper air-conditioning; and his few moments of leisure were consumed by calculations of the amount of alcohol needed to sleep but not feel drowsy a few hours later.

Hu Anyan tells us about brutal work, where there is no real future in sight. But Hu is armed with deadpan humor and a strong idea of self. He moves on when he feels stuck—from logistics in the south, to parcel delivery in Beijing, to other impossible jobs. Along the way, he turns to reading and writing for strength and companionship.

I Deliver Parcels in Beijing is an honest and startling first-person portrait of Hu Anyan's struggle against the dehumanizing nature of our contemporary global work system—and his discovery of the power of sharing a story.]]> 336 Hu Anyan 1662603045 Diana 3 3.44 2023
author: Hu Anyan
name: Diana
average rating: 3.44
book published: 2023
rating: 3
read at: 2026/06/08
date added: 2026/06/08
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]]> 237833933
Stop letting little things ruin your entire day. Stop self-sabotaging. Set healthy boundaries without feeling guilty. Recognize the difference between real guilt and manipulation. Break the cycle of overthinking before it spirals out of control. Stop taking everything so personally and free yourself from emotional reactivity. Identify toxic patterns in relationships and walk away without regret. Be more in control and feel better everyday. Shift your mindset from victimhood to self-empowerment. Learn the art of emotional detachment—how to be unbothered without becoming cold. Move forward unapologetically, without feeling the need to explain your growth. Whether you're exhausted from overthinking everything, tired of absorbing everyone else's energy, or simply ready to stop letting life's chaos dictate how you feel, this book offers the transformative tools to finally reclaim your power, protect your peace, and live on your own terms. Your journey to inner strength and freedom starts here.

As Daniel says, "In a world designed to keep you overwhelmed, learning to protect your peace isn't just important—it's essential.”]]> 171 Daniel Chidiac 176411082X Diana 0 to-read 4.03
author: Daniel Chidiac
name: Diana
average rating: 4.03
book published:
rating: 0
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date added: 2026/06/06
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]]> 221251872 320 Lisa Ridzén Diana 5 4.28 2024
author: Lisa Ridzén
name: Diana
average rating: 4.28
book published: 2024
rating: 5
read at: 2026/05/31
date added: 2026/05/31
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]]> 249895847
Sociologist and bestselling author Teo You Yenn turns her eyes to the contours and rhythms of life inside families, exploring how ‘kiasu’ parents are made and investigating the ways in which inequality marks life in contemporary Singapore. Drawing from in-depth interviews with parents from all walks of life, Unease examines how social structures, individual strategies and common practices come to produce Singaporean ‘cultures’ of doing family.

An incisive exposé of how the logics of hierarchy, competition and unequal worth infect ordinary people’s lives, Unease asks what these cost parents, children and the values we hold as a society. And what possibilities are there for living differently?]]> 264 Teo You Yenn 9811781400 Diana 4 4.35
author: Teo You Yenn
name: Diana
average rating: 4.35
book published:
rating: 4
read at: 2026/05/25
date added: 2026/05/25
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]]> 233292703 In this humorous memoir, New York Times bestselling author and podcast host of The Spiritual Life, Father James Martin tells the story of a busboy, dishwasher, caddy, usher, factory worker, bank teller, and corporate tool and, finally, a Jesuit priest.

"Funny, charming, inspiring and wise—this is a memorable memoir." — Stephen Colbert, Comedian and writer

Work in Progress is a snapshot of several years—first as a boy, then as a teenager, and finally as a young adult--of being thrown into a series of jobs for which Martin had zero training. He had never set foot in a restaurant kitchen before working as a busboy and dishwasher; never stepped onto a golf course before working as a caddy; and had never seen a factory floor before working as an assembly-line worker. He almost always felt uncomfortable, unsettled, and uneasy. But, like many of us, he needed the money.

This coming-of-age story is set in the 1960s and 1970s, a lighthearted tale for readers who enjoy personal narratives, and it’s unlike anything Father Martin has written before. As he puts it, "This is a spiritual memoir from a different angle … told 'slant' as Emily Dickinson might say."

Each chapter features photos of memories and milestones throughout Father Martin's young life. If you're an aficionado of snafus, you won't be disappointed. He's not the hero of these stories, more a hapless teenager who learns in each job, even the ones he loathes, something about the value of work, about what it means to be an adult, about people, and about life overall.

Work in Progress teaches us small but important life lessons such

work hard and be on time, don't be mean, apologize when you need to, and forgive frequently, ask if you don't know something, don't misuse power,pay attention to those who are struggling, listen and, above all, be kind.Martin shares, "My summer jobs, crazy and funny and varied as they were, had something to do with who I am. As we Jesuits would say, the lessons I learned helped to 'form" me."]]> 362 James Martin 0062694499 Diana 0 to-read 4.10
author: James Martin
name: Diana
average rating: 4.10
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rating: 0
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date added: 2026/05/22
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]]> 235699995
Same world. Different beliefs. Different outcomes.

The greatest predictor of your future is the beliefs you hold about the world. In this extraordinary book, world-renowned researcher and author Shawn Achor illuminates how beliefs change the math about what is possible and probable in our lives. And by changing the math, beliefs change our path.

Drawing on two decades of research, as well as his work with NASA, the NFL, and over a third of the Fortune 100 companies, Shawn has discovered that the predictive power of beliefs has increased significantly. Beliefs about ourselves, money, the world, politics, faith, and work do more than shape the lens through which we see the world. They shape what happens next. Scientifically speaking, beliefs don’t just reflect reality. Beliefs bend reality.

Unfortunately, our beliefs can be empowering or they can be destructive. During what Achor calls the Great Drift, we have seen the staggering rise of the Four Horsemen of the Modern World: burnout, anxiety, loneliness, and depression. We are underperforming our true potential. But there is hope. Stunning new research in this book reveals the seven most predictive “core beliefs” that alter our future health, success, wealth, and education. Scientifically, these core beliefs take the cap off our potential, enrich us, strengthen us, and heal us.

Shawn explores the six main ways of changing your and others’ beliefs using research-based strategies he has tested everywhere from Wall Street to impoverished schools in Africa, from Camp Pendleton to Camp David:

• The Disaster Elevator: change what part of the brain processes the world.
• The Memory DeLorean: change the memory.
• Stopping Negative Mantras: change the language.
• Creating a Neural Tribe: change the sources.
• Starting the Wave: change the contagious actions.
• Common Texts, Common Action: change the texts.

The Power of Beliefs shows how seven core beliefs predict your present, bend the probability of future success, and, in the modern world, are the key to creating a better life for you and for others.]]> 208 Shawn Achor Diana 4 4.31
author: Shawn Achor
name: Diana
average rating: 4.31
book published:
rating: 4
read at: 2026/05/16
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]]> 1219949
The recipient of extraordinary acclaim from critics and the bookselling community, Tan Twan Eng's debut novel casts a powerful spell. Set during the tumult of World War II, on the lush Malayan island of Penang, The Gift of Rain tells a riveting and poignant tale about a young man caught in the tangle of wartime loyalties and deceits.]]> 447 Tan Twan Eng Diana 4 4.25 2007
author: Tan Twan Eng
name: Diana
average rating: 4.25
book published: 2007
rating: 4
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date added: 2026/05/11
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]]> 38497855 "Brant Pitre is one of the most compelling theological writers on the scene today." - Bishop Robert Barron

Bestselling author of Jesus and the Jewish Roots of the Eucharist casts new light on the Virgin Mary, illuminating her role in the Old and New Testaments.

Are Catholic teachings on Mary really biblical? Or are they the 'traditions of men'? Should she be called the "Mother of God," or just the mother of Jesus? Did she actually remain a virgin her whole life or do the "brothers of Jesus" refer to her other children? By praying to Mary, are Catholics worshipping her? And what does Mary have to do with the quest to understand Jesus?

In Jesus and the Jewish Roots of Mary, Dr. Pitre takes readers step-by-step from the Garden of Eden to the Book of Revelation to reveal how deeply biblical Catholic beliefs about Mary really are. Dr. Pitre uses the Old Testament and Ancient Judaism to unlock how the Bible itself teaches that Mary is in fact the new Eve, the Mother of God, the Queen of Heaven and Earth, and the new Ark of the Covenant.]]> 240 Brant Pitre 0525572732 Diana 5 4.55 2018
author: Brant Pitre
name: Diana
average rating: 4.55
book published: 2018
rating: 5
read at: 2026/04/23
date added: 2026/04/23
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]]> 6004724
Keefe reveals the inner workings of Sister Ping’s complex empire and recounts the decade-long FBI investigation that eventually brought her down. He follows an often incompetent and sometimes corrupt INS as it pursues desperate immigrants risking everything to come to America, and along the way, he paints a stunning portrait of a generation of illegal immigrants and the intricate underground economy that sustains and exploits them. Grand in scope yet propulsive in narrative force, The Snakehead is both a kaleidoscopic crime story and a brilliant exploration of the ironies of immigration in America.]]> 432 Patrick Radden Keefe 0385521308 Diana 3 4.14 2009
author: Patrick Radden Keefe
name: Diana
average rating: 4.14
book published: 2009
rating: 3
read at: 2026/04/20
date added: 2026/04/20
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]]> 60321484 A Little Hope —a Read with Jenna Bonus Pick—comes another “heartwarming, character-driven” ( Booklist ) life-affirming novel about three individuals whose lives intersect in unforeseen ways.

Set in a close-knit suburb in the grip of winter, A Quiet Life follows three people grappling with loss and finding a tender wisdom in their grief.

Chuck Ayers used to look forward to nothing so much as his annual trip to Hilton Head with his wife, Cat—that yearly taste of relaxation they’d become accustomed to after a lifetime of working and raising two children. Now, just months after Cat’s death, Chuck finds that he can’t let go of her belongings—her favorite towel, the sketchbooks in her desk drawer—as he struggles to pack for a trip he can’t imagine taking without her.

Ella Burke delivers morning newspapers and works at a bridal shop to fill her days while she anxiously awaits news—any piece of information—about her missing daughter. Ella adjusts to life in a new apartment and answers every call on her phone, hoping her daughter will reach out.

After the sudden death of her father, Kirsten Bonato set aside her veterinary school aspirations, finding comfort in the steady routine of working at an animal shelter. But as time passes, old dreams and new romantic interests begin to surface—and Kirsten finds herself at another crossroads.

In this beautiful and profoundly moving novel, three parallel narratives converge in poignant and unexpected ways, as each character bravely presses onward, trying to recover something they have lost. Emotionally riveting and infused with hope, “the soothing tone and warm worldview of this grown-up bedtime story will be good for what ails you” ( Kirkus Reviews ).]]> 294 Ethan Joella 1982190973 Diana 4 4.01 2022
author: Ethan Joella
name: Diana
average rating: 4.01
book published: 2022
rating: 4
read at: 2026/04/09
date added: 2026/04/09
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]]> 29430725
For over thirty-five years, parents have turned to How to Talk So Kids Will Listen & Listen So Kids Will Talk for its respectful and effective solutions to the unending challenges of raising children. Now, in response to growing demand, Adele’s daughter, Joanna Faber, along with Julie King, tailor How to Talk’s powerful communication skills to children ages two to seven.

Faber and King, each a parenting expert in her own right, share their wisdom accumulated over years of conducting How To Talk workshops with parents and a broad variety of professionals. With a lively combination of storytelling, cartoons, and fly-on-the-wall discussions from their workshops, they provide concrete tools and tips that will transform your relationship with the young kids in your life.

What do you do with a little kid who…won’t brush her teeth…screams in his car seat…pinches the baby...refuses to eat vegetables…throws books in the library...runs rampant in the supermarket? Organized according to common challenges and conflicts, this book is an essential emergency first-aid manual of communication strategies, including a chapter that addresses the special needs of children with sensory processing and autism spectrum disorders.

This user-friendly guide will empower parents and caregivers of young children to forge rewarding, joyful relationships with terrible two-year-olds, truculent three-year-olds, ferocious four-year-olds, foolhardy five-year-olds, self-centered six-year-olds, and the occasional semi-civilized seven-year-old. And, it will help little kids grow into self-reliant big kids who are cooperative and connected to their parents, teachers, siblings, and peers.]]> 385 Joanna Faber 1501131656 Diana 4 4.37 2017
author: Joanna Faber
name: Diana
average rating: 4.37
book published: 2017
rating: 4
read at: 2026/04/04
date added: 2026/04/04
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]]> 62022 258 Walter Tevis 1400030609 Diana 3 4.14 1983
author: Walter Tevis
name: Diana
average rating: 4.14
book published: 1983
rating: 3
read at: 2026/03/25
date added: 2026/03/25
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]]> 200158232
While serving as the deputy Beijing bureau chief of the Financial Times , Chinese-British journalist Yuan Yang began to notice common threads in the lives of her Chinese peers—women born during China’s turn toward capitalism in the 1980s and 1990s, who, despite the country's enormous economic gains during their lifetimes, were coming up against deeply entrenched barriers as they sought to achieve financial stability.

The product of seven years of intimate, in-depth reporting, this transporting and indelible book traces the journey of four such women as they try to make better lives for themselves and their families in the new Chinese economy. June and Siyue are among the few in their villages to graduate high school. Each makes her way to Beijing, June as a young professional and Siyue an entrepreneur. Like Siyue, Leiya lives with her grandparents in their village while her parents send money home; yearning for a different life than those of the women she sees around her, Leiya soon joins her parents in Shenzhen as an underage factory worker. Born to an urban middle-class family, Sam is outraged when her eyes are opened the poor treatment of workers, and becomes a labor activist, increasingly under threat by the authorities.

As the women grapple with government policies that threaten their businesses, their children's access to education, their choice of where to make a home, and, in Sam’s case, their lives, a vivid, damning, and urgent picture emerges of the previously unseen human cost of China’s rising economic tide—and the courage and perseverance of those caught in the swell.]]> 304 Yuan Yang 0593493907 Diana 4 3.94 2024
author: Yuan Yang
name: Diana
average rating: 3.94
book published: 2024
rating: 4
read at: 2026/03/14
date added: 2026/03/14
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]]> 246183803 Min Jin Lee, the acclaimed author of Pachinko, returns with a breathtaking contemporary epic that follows one family as they reckon with personal dreams and familial duty.

John and Helen Koh and their three children – Bo, DH and Mido – are building new lives in Korea when they find their worlds upended, first by a terrible betrayal and then by the 1997 Asian financial crisis. Striving to regain their footing, the Kohs set out to do whatever it takes to provide for their children’s futures.

They leave Seoul for Sydney and eventually settle in California, where new opportunities open for the Koh children, as the parents, strangers in a strange land, adjust to a difficult existence in which their qualifications mean little. Their way forward is lit by the faith that education will lead the next generation to the success and security that have eluded their parents.

The Kohs, their friends, relatives and even their foes move in and out of each other’s lives as they navigate love, work, fortune and fulfilment across the years. But with each new sacrifice and fresh horizon, larger questions begin to open up before them: what are we willing to give up to secure the happiness of the ones we love? What is the purpose of education? And what is truly important for a good life?

American Hagwon is the most ambitious and extraordinary work yet by one of our greatest novelists, Min Jin Lee.]]> 656 Min Jin Lee 0008823928 Diana 0 to-read 4.67 2026
author: Min Jin Lee
name: Diana
average rating: 4.67
book published: 2026
rating: 0
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date added: 2026/03/10
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]]> 52476830 An alternative cover edition for this ISBN can be found here.

A tense, page-turning psychological drama about the making and breaking of a family–and a woman whose experience of motherhood is nothing at all what she hoped for–and everything she feared.

Blythe Connor is determined that she will be the warm, comforting mother to her new baby Violet that she herself never had.

But in the thick of motherhood’s exhausting early days, Blythe becomes convinced that something is wrong with her daughter–she doesn’t behave like most children do.

Or is it all in Blythe’s head? Her husband, Fox, says she’s imagining things. The more Fox dismisses her fears, the more Blythe begins to question her own sanity, and the more we begin to question what Blythe is telling us about her life as well.

Then their son Sam is born–and with him, Blythe has the blissful connection she’d always imagined with her child. Even Violet seems to love her little brother. But when life as they know it is changed in an instant, the devastating fall-out forces Blythe to face the truth.

The Push is a tour de force you will read in a sitting, an utterly immersive novel that will challenge everything you think you know about motherhood, about what we owe our children, and what it feels like when women are not believed.]]> 307 Ashley Audrain 1984881663 Diana 4 4.01 2021
author: Ashley Audrain
name: Diana
average rating: 4.01
book published: 2021
rating: 4
read at: 2026/03/10
date added: 2026/03/10
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]]> 222139739 Screen time and education influencer known as The Gamer Educator takes the judgment out of parenting alongside screens and gaming, carving a new, well-researched path to managing screen time that is actionable and beneficial for the entire family.
 
Parents are feeling mounting pressure to minimize screen time, but are struggling to do so in our technologically driven world. In contrast to the fear and pressure parents are facing, Ash Brandin's Power On offers a calm and reassuring message that keeps the wellbeing of the whole family in mind.

Power On powerfully reframes our current dialogue around technology, beginning with the morality placed on screen time and leisure, and the systemic factors contributing to screen time that are being placed at the feet of exhausted caregivers. Brandin replaces fear with empowerment, giving caregivers tools and strategies for safely incorporating tech into their children's lives guiding children to having a healthy relationship with screens, with easy to implement approaches such

The ABCs of the Screentime Management Elements – Access, Behavior, Content The Managing Online Safety S.T.A.R. – Settings, Time, Ads/App Store, Restriction N.I.C.E. Screentime Boundaries – Needs, Input, Consistent, Enforceable And several other sets of steps, tools, and strategies to understand, manage, and effectively utilize tech in parenting.  
With today's parenting advice being awash with unhelpful negative judgements on screens and little realistic actionable advice, Ash Brandin provides timely, well‑informed, realistic advice that will empower readers to find a balance with screen time that works for everyone in the family. ]]> 272 Ash Brandin 0306836998 Diana 4 4.16
author: Ash Brandin
name: Diana
average rating: 4.16
book published:
rating: 4
read at: 2026/03/04
date added: 2026/03/04
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]]> 123857637 A former FBI hostage negotiator offers a new, field-tested approach to negotiating – effective in any situation.

After a stint policing the rough streets of Kansas City, Missouri, Chris Voss joined the FBI, where his career as a kidnapping negotiator brought him face-to-face with bank robbers, gang leaders, and terrorists. Never Split the Difference takes you inside his world of high-stakes negotiations, revealing the nine key principles that helped Voss and his colleagues succeed when it mattered the most – when people’s lives were at stake.

Rooted in the real-life experiences of an intelligence professional at the top of his game, Never Split the Difference will give you the competitive edge in any discussion.]]> 274 Chris Voss 1847941494 Diana 2 4.28 2016
author: Chris Voss
name: Diana
average rating: 4.28
book published: 2016
rating: 2
read at: 2026/02/27
date added: 2026/02/27
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]]> 223362031 From one of our most acclaimed chroniclers of the forces eroding the fabric of our shared life, her most personal and powerful a reckoning with the changes that have rocked her own beloved small Ohio hometown

The town of Urbana, Ohio was not a utopia when Beth Macy grew up there in the 70’s and 80’s, certainly not for her family. Her dad was an alcoholic who only fitfully worked, and people called him the town drunk, which hurt, as did their poverty. But Urbana had a healthy enough economy, and there were middle class kids at school whose families became her role models. People in Urbana were proud of their schools, and the library, and the history of their town, an important stop on the Underground Railroad. Macy loved Urbana, and though she was able to make it to college on a Pell Grant and then follow a career in journalism that took her far away, she still clung gratefully to the hometown that helped raise her. On the surface it was still picture-postcard cute.

But as Macy’s mother’s health began its final descent in 2020, on more frequent visits home to Ohio, she couldn’t shake the feeling that her town had dramatically hardened in ways she couldn’t process. Beth grew up as the paper girl, delivering the local newspaper, which was like civic glue, mirroring the community back to itself. Now there was no local paper, no paper girl, and precious little civic glue. Yes, a lot of the work that once supported the middle class had gone away, along with all that went with it. But that was an old story that didn’t begin to cover the forces turning her town into a poorer and angrier place. High school graduation rates were plummeting as absenteeism soared in the public schools and in the workplace. A mental health crisis gripped the small city, along with a litany of other pathologies. Urbana’s pride in its institutions was parents were opting to home school, or transferring their kids elsewhere, in record numbers. Even more painfully, many of her own family members and old friends had gone down the rabbit hole of conspiracies like QAnon, and worse. What happened to Urbana?

This was not an assignment Beth Macy ever wanted to take, but she felt she had no choice. Two years ago, she began to return regularly, to deploy everything she’d learned to figure her hometown out. The result is an astonishment, a book that takes us into the heart of one specific place and through it brings into focus in a new way our most urgent set of national issues.

Paper Girl is a gift of courage, empathy and insight, a profoundly generous act. Beth Macy has turned to face the darkest corners in the shared life of her family and community, people she loves wholeheartedly, even the ones she struggles now to like. And in doing so, in facing the truth—in person, with respect—she has found sparks of human dignity that she has used to light a great signal fire, of warning but also of hope.]]> 368 Beth Macy 0593656733 Diana 2 3.97 2025
author: Beth Macy
name: Diana
average rating: 3.97
book published: 2025
rating: 2
read at: 2026/02/22
date added: 2026/02/22
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]]> 247527532 From the bestselling author of Strange Houses and Strange Pictures comes a mesmerizing novel of eleven strange buildings and one terrible secret.

A lonely hut in the woods.
A murder house.
A hidden chamber.
A mysterious shrine.
A home in flames.
A nightmarish prison. . . .

Each of the buildings in this book tells a chilling story. Each one is part of a puzzle. Look closely . . . and you'll see that everything is connected. All leading to a revelation so horrifying you won't want to believe it.

Millions have become addicted to solving Uketsu's dark mysteries. Strange Buildings is the strangest, and darkest, of them all.]]> 384 Uketsu 1805336290 Diana 0 to-read 3.92 2023
author: Uketsu
name: Diana
average rating: 3.92
book published: 2023
rating: 0
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date added: 2026/02/22
shelves: to-read
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]]> 216189382 A reporter and novelist who is also a soldier in the Ukrainian army reconsiders his pacifism and the choices one makes when war is waged against you.

"Chapeye represents a modern-day Ukrainian counterpart to classic American writers like Mark Twain or O. Henry, capturing the dignity and respect his characters might not get but nonetheless long for and deserve. . . . —Kate Tsurkan, Los Angeles Review of Books

In Ordinary People Don't Carry Machine Guns, Artem Chapeye reveals his war, intimate and senseless, withholding nothing about his motivations, his nightmares, his new relationship with the world. Here one man, a pacifist turned fighter, a story writer turned soldier considers the reasons for and reactions to war on a very personal level.

Chapeye investigates his role in the Ukrainian people’s defense against the Russian army and his responsibilities as a father, a writer, a soldier, and a man of conviction. An avowed pacifist until 2022, Chapeye joined the Ukrainian army in the first days of the invasion. He tries to understand the large-scale decision-making that has a defining impact on both individual citizens and many of his fellow soldiers never considered enlisting before finding themselves at war; others fled the country. He wonders what his young children at home are doing and what they’re feeling.

The book has three parts, offering historical analogies and literary references throughout.

“When Darkness Comes” relates the first days of the full-scale invasion in February 2022 when lives and the peace were shattered.“It’s Necessary to Cultivate Your Garden” details the experience of the everyday people of Ukraine, workers and peasants, who look forward to returning to simpler lives.The last section, “People Aren’t Divided into Brands,” critiques the elitism of those who consider themselves above those who “simply” fight.
Deeply thought-provoking, intelligent, and heartbreaking, this is an essential book for anyone who wants to understand the ways that war can change everything.]]> 128 Artem Chapeye 1644214598 Diana 4 4.50
author: Artem Chapeye
name: Diana
average rating: 4.50
book published:
rating: 4
read at: 2026/02/13
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]]> 228110489
She was in her senior year of college when star students Sam and Yash swept her into an intoxicating world of academic fervour, rapid-fire banter and raucous card games. Their lives became quickly intertwined - with friendship but also with unpredictable passions and the intimations of first love.

Decades later, she is a successful writer, living a comfortable life with her husband and children, when a surprise visit brings the past crashing into the present, forcing her to confront the decisions and deceptions of her youth.]]> 256 Lily King 0802165176 Diana 3 4.13 2025
author: Lily King
name: Diana
average rating: 4.13
book published: 2025
rating: 3
read at:
date added: 2026/02/11
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]]> 46042377 From the author of The House of the Spirits, this epic novel spanning decades and crossing continents follows two young people as they flee the aftermath of the Spanish Civil War in search of a place to call home.

In the late 1930s, civil war grips Spain. When General Franco and his Fascists succeed in overthrowing the government, hundreds of thousands are forced to flee in a treacherous journey over the mountains to the French border. Among them is Roser, a pregnant young widow, who finds her life intertwined with that of Victor Dalmau, an army doctor and the brother of her deceased love. In order to survive, the two must unite in a marriage neither of them desires.

Together with two thousand other refugees, they embark on the SS Winnipeg, a ship chartered by the poet Pablo Neruda, to Chile: “the long petal of sea and wine and snow.” As unlikely partners, they embrace exile as the rest of Europe erupts in world war. Starting over on a new continent, their trials are just beginning, and over the course of their lives, they will face trial after trial. But they will also find joy as they patiently await the day when they will be exiles no more. Through it all, their hope of returning to Spain keeps them going. Destined to witness the battle between freedom and repression as it plays out across the world, Roser and Victor will find that home might have been closer than they thought all along.

A masterful work of historical fiction about hope, exile, and belonging, A Long Petal of the Sea shows Isabel Allende at the height of her powers. ]]> 325 Isabel Allende Diana 3 4.03 2019
author: Isabel Allende
name: Diana
average rating: 4.03
book published: 2019
rating: 3
read at: 2026/02/11
date added: 2026/02/11
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]]> 226887497 An urgent and practical book that helps parents and their boys navigate important topics like sex, drugs, bullying, power, consent, and more in a way that helps them grow their emotional intelligence, while also building connection and a closeness that can last a lifetime.

Talk to your Boys is a practical guide to communicating with your tween and teen boy with the goal of raising young men who care about themselves and others. The book focuses on 16 essential and wide‑ranging conversations on mental health and masculinity, sex and consent, money and power, violence and guns, and more. Packed with helpful advice, conversation starters, tips and scripts, Talk to Your Boys is designed to help families get better at having these crucial, but sometimes awkward, discussions with the larger goal to raise emotionally intelligent men who aren't hemmed in by outdated ideas of masculinity.

Co‑authors Joanna Schroeder, a parenting journalist, and Christopher Pepper, an award‑winning educator, have a real understanding of how challenging it is to navigate the ever‑changing worlds of teenagers with compassion and wisdom—especially when one has multiple children at different stages of development. Their practical advice is woven together with interviews with the leading experts in psychology, gender issues, and child development along with the voices and perspectives from dozens of teen boys from different backgrounds.]]> 307 Joanna Schroeder 1523527331 Diana 0 to-read 3.97
author: Joanna Schroeder
name: Diana
average rating: 3.97
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rating: 0
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date added: 2026/02/07
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]]> 61812308 The acclaimed New York Times bestselling writer returns with a masterpiece to rival Mystic River —an all-consuming tale of revenge, family love, festering hate, and insidious power, set against one of the most tumultuous episodes in Boston’s history.

In the summer of 1974 a heatwave blankets Boston and Mary Pat Fennessy is trying to stay one step ahead of the bill collectors. Mary Pat has lived her entire life in the housing projects of “Southie,” the Irish American enclave that stubbornly adheres to old tradition and stands proudly apart.

One night Mary Pat’s teenage daughter Jules stays out late and doesn’t come home. That same evening, a young Black man is found dead, struck by a subway train under mysterious circumstances. The two events seem unconnected. But Mary Pat, propelled by a desperate search for her missing daughter, begins turning over stones best left untouched—asking questions that bother Marty Butler, chieftain of the Irish mob, and the men who work for him, men who don’t take kindly to any threat to their business.

Set against the hot, tumultuous months when the city’s desegregation of its public schools exploded in violence, Small Mercies is a superb thriller, a brutal depiction of criminality and power, and an unflinching portrait of the dark heart of American racism. It is a mesmerizing and wrenching work that only Dennis Lehane could write.]]> 303 Dennis Lehane 0062129481 Diana 3 4.21 2023
author: Dennis Lehane
name: Diana
average rating: 4.21
book published: 2023
rating: 3
read at: 2026/01/31
date added: 2026/02/07
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]]> 222658336 From the coauthor of Tiny Humans, Big Emotions, a guide to supporting children’s social and emotional growth through the elementary school years (ages 5–12), a critical but often-overlooked developmental stage.

TOO OLD FOR TANTRUMS

TOO YOUNG FOR TEENAGE DRAMA

Meltdowns. Name-calling. Hitting, kicking, and hair pulling. Except, these aren’t the toddler years. Why is your elementary schooler still having these outbursts?

Long thought of as years when parents can finally enjoy calmer kids and deal with less emotional volatility and tears, the elementary school years are anything but. During these pivotal years, our children navigate a new set of social and emotional challenges. From playground bullying to cliques and exclusion, ever-increasing academic challenges—and plenty of physical growth and hormonal changes thrown in the mix—the elementary school years are more complicated than most parents realize.

Big Kids, Bigger Feelings is the guide you need to help your child thrive during these developmentally complex and wonderful years. The social and emotional skills you provide your children with now will prepare them for a lifetime of self-advocacy and stronger emotional intelligence. Campbell’s revolutionary Collaborative Emotion Processing (CEP) method, used in preschool and elementary school environments, teaches you how to work with your children to help them understand how they are feeling and process their big emotions in healthy, constructive ways. Discover how

Teach kids to handle unkind behaviors and set boundariesHelp kids learn to regulate themselves when they feel angry, sad, and upsetManage technology use in a safe and healthy wayNavigate puberty, body changes, sex, drugs, and other important topicsDevelop a deeper connection with your childThe elementary school years are rife with change—from changing bodies to changing social structures—and there’s never a better time to help your kids handle these ever-increasing challenges so they can thrive today and tomorrow.  ]]> 288 Alyssa Blask Campbell 0063415607 Diana 0 to-read 4.19
author: Alyssa Blask Campbell
name: Diana
average rating: 4.19
book published:
rating: 0
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date added: 2026/02/06
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]]> 84097626
We’re in the midst of a parenting revolution that is radically changing the way we raise our kids. Gone are the days of minimizing emotions: Don't cry. You're fine. Don't make a scene. As our understanding of developing brains has increased, today’s parents are looking for a new way to help their children understand their feelings and learn to process them.

Emotional development experts Alyssa Blask Campbell, M.Ed. and Lauren Stauble M.S. are at the forefront of a movement to foster little ones’ emotional intelligence. Their revolutionary Collaborative Emotion Processing (CEP) method has been a game changer for parents and educators, and now they are sharing it with readers in this indispensable guide.

Tiny Humans, Big Emotions provides the tools to tackle every sort of stressful child-rearing situation, including:
• What to do when your child throws a tantrum (it's not what you think!)
• Helpful scripts to handle any challenging moment like school refusal and bedtime resistance
• How to react when your child hits, punches, or bites
• Easy tips that help regulate your child’s nervous system
• How to anticipate and end meltdowns before they even begin

Designed for all humans—tiny and big—this book shows caregivers of children how to handle their children’s outbursts while empowering them to recognize and manage difficult feelings like anger, sadness, and shame, along with anxiety. All caregivers will find valuable insights and guidance in this book, especially those caring for children from infancy to age eight. Tiny Humans, Big Emotions equips adults with tools for emotional intelligence so they can respond with intention. This innovative, research-based approach teaches children self-regulation and empathy, even as it strengthens the parent-child relationship, setting the groundwork for a lifetime of emotional resilience and wellbeing. 

This book is an essential, empathetic guide that will teach parents to notice their own habits and hold space for their tiny human's big emotions.]]> 304 Alyssa Blask Campbell 0063306263 Diana 0 to-read 4.05
author: Alyssa Blask Campbell
name: Diana
average rating: 4.05
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date added: 2026/02/06
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]]> 217245618
“Dazzling.” —The Washington Post

“A magnificent novel.” —Geraldine Brooks, Pulitzer Prize–winning author of Horse

“This one will stay with me for years to come.” —Miranda Cowley Heller, New York Times bestselling author of The Paper Palace

In the wake of a catastrophic storm, Cora sets off with her nine-year-old daughter, Maia, to register her son's birth. Her husband, Gordon, respected in the community but a controlling presence at home, intends for her to follow a long-standing family tradition and name the baby after him. But when faced with the decision, Cora hesitates...

Spanning thirty-five years, what follows are three alternate and alternating versions of their lives, shaped by Cora’s last-minute choice of name. In richly layered prose, The Names explores the painful ripple effects of domestic abuse, the messy ties of family, and the possibilities of autonomy and healing.

Through a prism of what-ifs, Florence Knapp invites us to consider the "one . . . precious life" we are given. Full of hope, this is the story of three names, three versions of a life, and the infinite possibilities that a single decision can spark. It is the story of one family and love’s endless capacity to endure, no matter what fate has in store.

The book’s brilliantly imaginative structure, propulsive storytelling, and emotional power are certain to make The Names a modern classic.]]> 328 Florence Knapp 0593833902 Diana 4 4.09 2025
author: Florence Knapp
name: Diana
average rating: 4.09
book published: 2025
rating: 4
read at: 2026/01/23
date added: 2026/01/23
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]]> 222531211 From the former prime minister of New Zealand, then the world’s youngest female head of government and just the second to give birth in office, comes a deeply personal memoir chronicling her extraordinary rise and offering inspiration to a new generation of leaders.

What if we could redefine leadership? What if kindness came first? Jacinda Ardern grew up the daughter of a police officer in small-town New Zealand, but as the 40th Prime Minister of her country, she commanded global respect for her empathetic leadership that put people first. This is the remarkable story of how a Mormon girl plagued by self-doubt made political history and changed our assumptions of what a global leader can be.

When Jacinda Ardern became Prime Minister at age thirty-seven, the world took notice. But it was her compassionate yet powerful response to the 2019 Christchurch mosque attacks, resulting in swift and sweeping gun control laws, that demonstrated her remarkable leadership. She guided her country through unprecedented challenges—a volcanic eruption, a major biosecurity breach, and a global pandemic—while advancing visionary new policies to address climate change, reduce child poverty, and secure historic international trade deals. She did all this while juggling first-time motherhood in the public eye.

Ardern exemplifies a new kind of leadership—proving that leaders can be caring, empathetic, and effective. She has become a global icon, and now she is ready to share her story, from the struggles to the surprises, including for the first time the full details of her decision to step down during her sixth year as Prime Minister.

Through her personal experiences and reflections, Jacinda is a model for anyone who has ever doubted themselves, or has aspired to lead with compassion, conviction, and courage. A Different Kind of Power is more than a political memoir; it’s an insight into how it feels to lead, ultimately asking: What if you, too, are capable of more than you ever imagined?]]> 352 Jacinda Ardern 0593728696 Diana 5 4.43 2025
author: Jacinda Ardern
name: Diana
average rating: 4.43
book published: 2025
rating: 5
read at: 2026/01/17
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]]> 76865 Built to Last, the defining management study of the nineties, showed how great companies triumph over time and how long-term sustained performance can be engineered into the DNA of an enterprise from the very beginning.

But what about the company that is not born with great DNA? How can good companies, mediocre companies, even bad companies achieve enduring greatness?

The Study:
For years, this question preyed on the mind of Jim Collins. Are there companies that defy gravity and convert long-term mediocrity or worse into long-term superiority? And if so, what are the universal distinguishing characteristics that cause a company to go from good to great?

The Standards:
Using tough benchmarks, Collins and his research team identified a set of elite companies that made the leap to great results and sustained those results for at least fifteen years. How great? After the leap, the good-to-great companies generated cumulative stock returns that beat the general stock market by an average of seven times in fifteen years, better than twice the results delivered by a composite index of the world's greatest companies, including Coca-Cola, Intel, General Electric, and Merck.

The Comparisons:
The research team contrasted the good-to-great companies with a carefully selected set of comparison companies that failed to make the leap from good to great. What was different? Why did one set of companies become truly great performers while the other set remained only good?

Over five years, the team analyzed the histories of all twenty-eight companies in the study. After sifting through mountains of data and thousands of pages of interviews, Collins and his crew discovered the key determinants of greatness -- why some companies make the leap and others don't.

The Findings:
The findings of the Good to Great study will surprise many readers and shed light on virtually every area of management strategy and practice. The findings include:

Level 5 Leaders: The research team was shocked to discover the type of leadership required to achieve greatness.
The Hedgehog Concept: (Simplicity within the Three Circles): To go from good to great requires transcending the curse of competence.
A Culture of Discipline: When you combine a culture of discipline with an ethic of entrepreneurship, you get the magical alchemy of great results. Technology Accelerators: Good-to-great companies think differently about the role of technology.
The Flywheel and the Doom Loop: Those who launch radical change programs and wrenching restructurings will almost certainly fail to make the leap.
“Some of the key concepts discerned in the study,” comments Jim Collins, "fly in the face of our modern business culture and will, quite frankly, upset some people.”

Perhaps, but who can afford to ignore these findings?]]> 300 Jim Collins 0066620996 Diana 3 4.12 2001
author: Jim Collins
name: Diana
average rating: 4.12
book published: 2001
rating: 3
read at: 2026/01/08
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]]> 214151487 In 1970s Dublin, all forms of contraception are strictly forbidden, but an intrepid group of women will risk everything to change that in this “heartbreaking, powerful, and ultimately uplifting” (Amanda Geard, author of The Midnight House) novel inspired by a little-known true story.

Dublin, 1969: Maura has just married Dr. Christy Davenport and they look forward to growing their family. But as her husband’s vicious temper emerges, Maura worries that her home might never be safe for a child. Meanwhile, her close friend Bernie, a mother of three, learns the devastating news that another pregnancy could prove fatal.

Dublin, 2023: A close call makes Saoirse realize that she may never want to be a mother. Little does she know that only a few decades ago, a group of women made this option possible for her. And she’s about to meet one of them…

The Women on Platform Two is an “inspiring novel about the liberating paths blazed by Irish women” (Kirkus Reviews) and how much farther we still have to go.]]> 336 Laura Anthony 1668047381 Diana 0 to-read 4.39 2025
author: Laura Anthony
name: Diana
average rating: 4.39
book published: 2025
rating: 0
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date added: 2026/01/07
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]]> 211004089
Isolation has taken its toll on the Salts, but as they nurse the woman, Rowan, back to strength, it begins to feel like she might just be what they need. Rowan, long accustomed to protecting herself, starts imagining a future where she could belong to someone again.

But Rowan isn’t telling the whole truth about why she set out for Shearwater. And when she discovers sabotaged radios and a freshly dug grave, she realizes Dominic is keeping his own secrets. As the storms on Shearwater gather force, they all must decide if they can trust each other enough to protect the precious seeds in their care before it’s too late―and if they can finally put the tragedies of the past behind them to create something new, together.

A novel of breathtaking twists, dizzying beauty, and ferocious love, Wild Dark Shore is about the impossible choices we make to protect the people we love, even as the world around us disappears.]]> 298 Charlotte McConaghy Diana 0 to-read 4.05 2025
author: Charlotte McConaghy
name: Diana
average rating: 4.05
book published: 2025
rating: 0
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date added: 2026/01/05
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]]> 223736214 As the defining conflict of the twenty-first century approaches, Breakneck offers a riveting, firsthand investigation of China’s seismic progress—and what it means for America.

Technology analyst Dan Wang—“an indispensable voice on China” (Evan Osnos) for close to a decade—has been living through the country’s astonishing, messy progress. In this time, building big has fueled China’s economic ascent. But social engineering has led to unbearable costs, including the traumas of zero-COVID and the cruel legacies of the one-child policy. In Breakneck, Wang traverses dazzling metropolises and factory complexes, blending political, economic, and philosophical analysis with reportage to reveal how the Communist Party’s darkening ambitions have shaken its people.

Wang unveils a new framework for understanding China, one that sheds new light on its competition with America. While China is an engineering state, relentlessly pursuing megaprojects, the US has stalled. America has transformed into a lawyerly society, reflexively blocking everything, good and bad. As Breakneck reveals, only by understanding the remarkable strengths and the appalling weaknesses of the engineering state can America reignite its sense of restless ambition.]]> 288 Dan Wang 1324106034 Diana 5 4.03 2025
author: Dan Wang
name: Diana
average rating: 4.03
book published: 2025
rating: 5
read at: 2026/01/04
date added: 2026/01/04
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]]> 26069922
Jillian’s months in Siena are marked by eccentric people, stunning scenery, a trove of exquisite art, and most of all, the enthralling and painful discovery of a mother she never knew and a world of secrets she can’t unlearn. The shadows of the past, the memories of an artist, will either crush or unfold her within the walled city.]]> 344 Virginia Evans 069243514X Diana 0 to-read 3.91 2015
author: Virginia Evans
name: Diana
average rating: 3.91
book published: 2015
rating: 0
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date added: 2025/12/28
shelves: to-read
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]]> 223001257 “Imagine, the letters one has sent out into the world, the letters received back in turn, are like the pieces of a magnificent puzzle. . . . Isn’t there something wonderful in that, to think that a story of one’s life is preserved in some way, that this very letter may one day mean something, even if it is a very small thing, to someone?”

Filled with knowledge that only comes from a life fully lived, The Correspondent is a gem of a novel about the power of finding solace in literature and connection with people we might never meet in person. It is about the hubris of youth and the wisdom of old age, and the mistakes and acts of kindness that occur during a lifetime.

Sybil Van Antwerp has throughout her life used letters to make sense of the world and her place in it. Most mornings, around half past ten, Sybil sits down to write letters—to her brother, to her best friend, to the president of the university who will not allow her to audit a class she desperately wants to take, to Joan Didion and Larry McMurtry to tell them what she thinks of their latest books, and to one person to whom she writes often yet never sends the letter.

Sybil expects her world to go on as it always has—a mother, grandmother, wife, divorcee, distinguished lawyer, she has lived a very full life. But when letters from someone in her past force her to examine one of the most painful periods of her life, she realizes that the letter she has been writing over the years needs to be read and that she cannot move forward until she finds it in her heart to offer forgiveness.

Sybil Van Antwerp’s life of letters might be “a very small thing,” but she also might be one of the most memorable characters you will ever read.]]> 285 Virginia Evans 0593798430 Diana 5 4.41 2025
author: Virginia Evans
name: Diana
average rating: 4.41
book published: 2025
rating: 5
read at: 2025/12/27
date added: 2025/12/27
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]]> 42921509 What if all Palestinians vanished from their homeland overnight?

Alaa, a young Palestinian, is haunted by his grandmother’s memories of being displaced from Jaffa and becoming a refugee in her homeland. Ariel, Alaa’s neighbour and friend, is a liberal Zionist, critical of the military occupation of the West Bank and Gaza yet faithful to the project of Israel. When he wakes up one morning to find that all Palestinians have suddenly vanished, Ariel begins searching for clues to the secret of the collective disappearance; that search, and his reaction to it, intimately reveal the fissures at the heart of the Palestinian question. Between the stories of Alaa and Ariel are the people of Jaffa and Tel Aviv against whose ordinary lives these fissures and questions play out.

Critically acclaimed in Arabic, spare yet evocative, intensely intelligent in its interplay of perspectives, The Book of Disappearance is an unforgettable glimpse into contemporary Palestine.]]> 242 Ibtisam Azem 0815611110 Diana 3 4.15 2014
author: Ibtisam Azem
name: Diana
average rating: 4.15
book published: 2014
rating: 3
read at: 2025/12/19
date added: 2025/12/19
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]]> 224004832
When most of us think of nuns, we picture hands clasped in prayer, solemn shuffles down cloistered halls, and that iconic habit silhouette. But what about the nuns who ate spiderwebs, erupted into jealous fights over makeup, or chain-produced manuscripts for extra cash? In reality, these women were no one-dimensional martyrs. 16th- and 17th-century nuns were resourceful, rebellious, and refreshingly relatable—and their lives hold surprising lessons for us today.

Convent Wisdom is your guide to navigating everything from patriarchal bureaucracy to an all-consuming friend crush with help from history’s most fascinating nuns. Struggling with money? Saint Teresa and her fellow Carmelites have recession-proof advice. Scrolling social media and drowning in FOMO? Mary of Jesus of Ágreda’s miraculous ability to engage in bilocation might help you cope. Confounded by a lesbian situationship? The yearnings of Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz contain unexpected insights.

Blending rigorous research with tongue-in-cheek takeaways and weaving pop culture and personal anecdotes throughout, Brown University scholars and best friends Ana Garriga and Carmen Urbita spill the juicy inside scoop on monastic life so you can better conquer today’s anxiety-ridden, hyper-connected world. Be it work woes, unholy diets, or crises of the soul, the nuns of Convent Wisdom are here to guide you—with a wink and a prayer.]]> 256 Ana Garriga 1668065517 Diana 3 3.24 2025
author: Ana Garriga
name: Diana
average rating: 3.24
book published: 2025
rating: 3
read at: 2025/12/13
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]]> 214151202 “The farmer is dead. He is dead, and all anyone wants to know is who killed him.”

Beth and her gentle, kind husband Frank are happily married, but their relationship relies on the past staying buried. But when Beth’s brother-in-law shoots a dog going after their sheep, Beth doesn’t realize that the gunshot will alter the course of their lives. For the dog belonged to none other than Gabriel Wolfe, the man Beth loved as a teenager—the man who broke her heart years ago. Gabriel has returned to the village with his young son Leo, a boy who reminds Beth very much of her own son, who died in a tragic accident.

As Beth is pulled back into Gabriel’s life, tensions around the village rise and dangerous secrets and jealousies from the past resurface, this time with deadly consequences. Beth is forced to make a choice between the woman she once was, and the woman she has become.

A sweeping love story with the pace and twists of a thriller, Broken Country is a novel of simmering passion, impossible choices, and explosive consequences that toggles between the past and present to explore the far-reaching legacy of first love.]]> 320 Clare Leslie Hall 166807818X Diana 4 4.23 2025
author: Clare Leslie Hall
name: Diana
average rating: 4.23
book published: 2025
rating: 4
read at: 2025/12/07
date added: 2025/12/07
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]]> 51824630 An alternative cover edition for this ASIN can be found here.

Dublin, 1918: three days in a maternity ward at the height of the Great Flu. A small world of work, risk, death and unlooked-for love, by the bestselling author of The Wonder and ROOM.

In an Ireland doubly ravaged by war and disease, Nurse Julia Power works at an understaffed hospital in the city center, where expectant mothers who have come down with the terrible new Flu are quarantined together. Into Julia’s regimented world step two outsiders—Doctor Kathleen Lynn, on the run from the police, and a young volunteer helper, Bridie Sweeney.

In the darkness and intensity of this tiny ward, over three days, these women change each other’s lives in unexpected ways. They lose patients to this baffling pandemic, but they also shepherd new life into a fearful world. With tireless tenderness and humanity, carers and mothers alike somehow do their impossible work.

In The Pull of the Stars, Emma Donoghue once again finds the light in the darkness in this new classic of hope and survival against all odds. ]]> 304 Emma Donoghue 1443461792 Diana 3 3.93 2020
author: Emma Donoghue
name: Diana
average rating: 3.93
book published: 2020
rating: 3
read at: 2025/11/29
date added: 2025/11/29
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]]> 15818107 This is an alternate cover edition of ISBN 9780061950728, found here.

The author of Bird in Hand and The Way Life Should Be delivers her most ambitious and powerful novel to date: a captivating story of two very different women who build an unexpected friendship: a 91-year-old woman with a hidden past as an orphan-train rider and the teenage girl whose own troubled adolescence leads her to seek answers to questions no one has ever thought to ask.

Nearly eighteen, Molly Ayer knows she has one last chance. Just months from "aging out" of the child welfare system, and close to being kicked out of her foster home, a community service position helping an elderly woman clean out her home is the only thing keeping her out of juvie and worse.

Vivian Daly has lived a quiet life on the coast of Maine. But in her attic, hidden in trunks, are vestiges of a turbulent past. As she helps Vivian sort through her possessions and memories, Molly discovers that she and Vivian aren't as different as they seem to be. A young Irish immigrant orphaned in New York City, Vivian was put on a train to the Midwest with hundreds of other children whose destinies would be determined by luck and chance.

The closer Molly grows to Vivian, the more she discovers parallels to her own life. A Penobscot Indian, she, too, is an outsider being raised by strangers, and she, too, has unanswered questions about the past. As her emotional barriers begin to crumble, Molly discovers that she has the power to help Vivian find answers to mysteries that have haunted her for her entire life - answers that will ultimately free them both.

Rich in detail and epic in scope, Orphan Train is a powerful novel of upheaval and resilience, of second chances, of unexpected friendship, and of the secrets we carry that keep us from finding out who we are.]]> 278 Christina Baker Kline Diana 4 4.18 2013
author: Christina Baker Kline
name: Diana
average rating: 4.18
book published: 2013
rating: 4
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date added: 2025/11/22
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]]> 222376638 Unlock the power of self-talk to build confidence, believe in yourself, and transform your life.

Have you ever felt not quite good enough? Or confident enough? Ever felt like you need to do more, be more, to fit in?

You’re not alone.

In this deeply comforting and empowering book How to Talk to Yourself, Ro teaches you that your thoughts are not always worth believing. Instead through observing your inner voice and practising self talk, you can unlock happiness.

Ro explores the way in which we talk to ourselves and the power of changing your internal voice through positive self talk. After sharing her recovery story online, Ro discovered that her vulnerability and advice resonated with a huge number of people battling self-esteem issues with nobody to listen, to understand, or to help them in proactively making changes.

Ro tells her story but also provides a guiding hand to offer transformative advice, guidance and exercises to inspire you to find self-acceptance, be kinder to yourself, and to approach discipline and success from a new, healthier angle. From stopping social media comparison to unfriending your inner-critic, finding forgiveness to maintaining healthy habits, this is a nurturing and interactive guide to taking control of your own self-belief.]]> 256 Ro Mitchell 1035060442 Diana 3 4.03
author: Ro Mitchell
name: Diana
average rating: 4.03
book published:
rating: 3
read at: 2025/11/22
date added: 2025/11/22
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]]> 223665360
When a new neighbor, Bitsy, moves in, Lulu suspects that something darker lurks behind the woman's constant smile. As her fixation on Bitsy deepens, Lulu is drawn into a web of unsettling truths that threaten to expose the cracks in her own life. The more she uncovers about Bitsy, the more she questions everything she thought she knew―and soon, others begin questioning her sanity. But is Lulu truly losing her mind? Or is she on the verge of discovering a reality too terrifying to accept?

In the vein of The Bell Jar and The Hours, The Mad Wife weaves domestic drama with psychological suspense, so poignant and immersive, you won't want to put it down.]]> 352 Meagan Church 1464236747 Diana 4 3.83 2025
author: Meagan Church
name: Diana
average rating: 3.83
book published: 2025
rating: 4
read at: 2025/11/09
date added: 2025/11/09
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]]> 212421066
Then it starts. Breaking news: there's a hostage situation developing in London. The police arrive, and tell her Luke is involved. But he isn't a hostage. Her husband—doting father, eternal optimist—is the gunman.

What she does next is crucial. Because only she knows what the note he left behind that morning says...

From the author of Reese’s Book Club Pick and New York Times bestseller Wrong Place Wrong Time comes an addictive thriller about a new mother’s world upended when her husband commits a terrifying crime. How well does she truly know the man she loves? And what danger does she face if her entire life has been built on a lie?]]> 336 Gillian McAllister 0063338424 Diana 4 3.67 2025
author: Gillian McAllister
name: Diana
average rating: 3.67
book published: 2025
rating: 4
read at: 2025/11/02
date added: 2025/11/02
shelves:
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]]> 223296278 In an alternate world where nobody won WWII, three brothers are the only boys left in an orphanage whose dark secret is the reason for their existence—and the key to their survival—from the acclaimed author of Pet.

After a very different outcome to WWII than the one history recorded, 1979 England is a country ruled by a government whose aims have sinister underpinnings and alliances. In the Hampshire countryside, 13-year-old triplets Vincent, Lawrence and William are the last remaining residents at the Captain Scott Home for Boys, where every day they must take medicine to protect themselves from a mysterious illness to which many of their friends have succumbed. The lucky ones who recover are allowed to move to Margate, a seaside resort of mythical proportions.

In nearby Exeter, 13-year-old Nancy lives a secluded life with her parents, who dote on her but never let her leave the house. As the triplets' lives begin to intersect with Nancy’s, bringing to light a horrifying truth about their origins and their likely fate, the children must unite to escape – and survive.]]> 400 Catherine Chidgey 1538774070 Diana 4 4.15 2025
author: Catherine Chidgey
name: Diana
average rating: 4.15
book published: 2025
rating: 4
read at: 2025/10/26
date added: 2025/10/26
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]]> 41881472 Alternate cover edition of ISBN 9780857197689.

Doing well with money isn’t necessarily about what you know. It’s about how you behave. And behavior is hard to teach, even to really smart people.

Money―investing, personal finance, and business decisions―is typically taught as a math-based field, where data and formulas tell us exactly what to do. But in the real world people don’t make financial decisions on a spreadsheet. They make them at the dinner table, or in a meeting room, where personal history, your own unique view of the world, ego, pride, marketing, and odd incentives are scrambled together.

In The Psychology of Money, award-winning author Morgan Housel shares 19 short stories exploring the different ways people think about money and teaches you how to make better sense of one of life’s most important topics.]]> 242 Morgan Housel Diana 3 4.25 2020
author: Morgan Housel
name: Diana
average rating: 4.25
book published: 2020
rating: 3
read at: 2025/10/19
date added: 2025/10/19
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]]> 158875813
Ireland is falling apart, caught in the grip of a government turning towards tyranny. As the life she knows and the ones she loves disappear before her eyes, Eilish must contend with the dystopian logic of her new, unraveling country. How far will she go to save her family? And what—or who—is she willing to leave behind?

The winner of the Booker Prize 2023 and a critically acclaimed national bestseller, Prophet Song presents a terrifying and shocking vision of a country sliding into authoritarianism and a deeply human portrait of a mother’s fight to hold her family together.]]> 259 Paul Lynch Diana 4 4.00 2023
author: Paul Lynch
name: Diana
average rating: 4.00
book published: 2023
rating: 4
read at: 2025/10/12
date added: 2025/10/12
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]]> 218523638 From the Wall Street Journal bestselling author of Night Angels comes the epic story of a brilliant young woman’s dangerous rise to fame in the perilous world of jewelry in 1920s Shanghai―and the power of love and friendship.

Harbin, China, 1925. Fifteen-year-old Anyu Zhang discovers a priceless Fabergé egg in the snow and returns it to the owner, Isaac Mandelburg, a fugitive and former master jeweler for Russia’s imperial palace. In gratitude, he leaves her his address in Shanghai and a promise of hospitality, forever altering her fate.

A dazzling world of jewelry shrouded in secrecy and greed awaits, when later Anyu arrives at Mandelburg’s jewelry shop as an orphan. Single-minded and relentless, Anyu will stop at nothing until she masters the craft of jewelry making. But she soon finds herself entangled in the treacherous underbelly of the city, where violent gangsters stalk the streets, vicious rivals seek to exploit her, and obsessive collectors conspire to destroy the people she loves.

From snow-crowned land to diamond-sparkling showrooms to a pristine island on the brink of war, The Master Jeweler chronicles an exciting journey of a bold prodigy artisan―including her losses and triumphs―in a glamorous yet perilous world of treasure.]]> 349 Weina Dai Randel 1662522541 Diana 4 4.19 2025
author: Weina Dai Randel
name: Diana
average rating: 4.19
book published: 2025
rating: 4
read at: 2025/10/05
date added: 2025/10/05
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]]> 1078
A poignant tale about the life and labors of a Chinese farmer during the sweeping reign of the country¹s last emperor.

Each enriched classic edition includes:

• A concise introduction that gives readers important background information
• A chronology of the author's life and work
• A timeline of significant events that provides the book's historical context
• An outline of key themes and plot points to help readers form their own interpretations
• Detailed explanatory notes
• Critical analysis, including contemporary and modern perspectives on the work
• Discussion questions to promote lively classroom and book group interaction
• A list of recommended related books and films to broaden the reader's experience

Enriched Classics offer readers affordable editions of great works of literature enhanced by helpful notes and insightful commentary. The scholarship provided in Enriched Classics enables readers to appreciate, understand, and enjoy the world's finest books to their full potential.

SERIES EDITED BY CYNTHIA BRANTLEY JOHNSON]]> 418 Pearl S. Buck 1416500189 Diana 2 4.00 1931
author: Pearl S. Buck
name: Diana
average rating: 4.00
book published: 1931
rating: 2
read at: 2025/09/29
date added: 2025/09/29
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]]> 217927688
Their understanding had been that China's brutal one-child policy was leading to hundreds of abandoned girls, desperate for the care of adopted parents. What they didn't know - and what award-winning journalist Barbara Demick uncovered in 2007, while working as a correspondent in Beijing - was that their daughter had been snatched from her beloved family and her identical twin. Under China's one-child policy hundreds of poor Chinese were giving up their children due to soaring fines and threats of violence. More sinister still, international demand for adoptees was sky-rocketing, and local officials were forcibly seizing children and trafficking them to orphanages, who were selling them abroad.

Daughters of the Bamboo Grove tells the gripping story of separated twins, their respective fates in China and the USA, and Barbara Demick's role in reuniting them against huge odds. Painting a rich portrait of China's history and culture, it asks questions about the roots, impact and consequences of China's one-child policy, the ethics of international adoption, and, ultimately, the assumptions and narratives we hold about the quality of lives lived in the East and the West.]]> 352 Barbara Demick 0593132742 Diana 4 4.20 2025
author: Barbara Demick
name: Diana
average rating: 4.20
book published: 2025
rating: 4
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date added: 2025/09/20
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]]> 55854046
From the acclaimed author of the story collection Escape Routes comes a timely, bittersweet and beautifully observed coming of age story about a friendship that defines two lives, and about the value of loyalty in a divided world.

It’s a lonely life for Stan, at a new school that feels more ordeal than fresh start, and at home where he and his mother struggle to break the silence after his father’s death. When he encounters fearless, clever Charlie on the local common, all of that begins to change. Charlie’s curiosity is infectious, and it is Charlie who teaches Stan, for the first time, to stand on his own two feet. But will their unit of two be strong enough to endure in a world that offers these boys such different prospects?

The pair part ways, until their paths cross once again, as adults at a London party. Now Stan is revelling in all that the city has to offer, while Charlie seems to have hit a brick wall. He needs Stan’s help, and above all his friendship, but is Stan really there for the man who once showed him the meaning of loyalty?]]> 432 Naomi Ishiguro 147227329X Diana 0 to-read 3.47 2021
author: Naomi Ishiguro
name: Diana
average rating: 3.47
book published: 2021
rating: 0
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date added: 2025/09/14
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]]> 222259253 (New York Times) The Gifted School.

When the Cassidy-Shaws’ autonomous minivan collides with an oncoming car, seventeen-year-old Charlie is in the driver’s seat, with his father, Noah, riding shotgun. In the back seat, tweens Alice and Izzy are on their phones, while their mother, Lorelei, a world leader in the field of artificial intelligence, is absorbed in her work. Yet each family member harbors a secret that implicates them in the accident.

During a weeklong recuperation on the Chesapeake Bay, the family confronts the excruciating moral dilemmas triggered by the crash. Noah tries to hold the family together as a seemingly routine police investigation jeopardizes Charlie’s future. Alice and Izzy turn strangely furtive. And Lorelei’s odd behavior tugs at Noah’s suspicions that there is a darker truth behind the incident—suspicions heightened by the sudden intrusion of Daniel Monet, a tech mogul whose mysterious history with Lorelei hints at betrayal. When Charlie falls for Monet’s teenaged daughter, the stakes are raised even higher in this propulsive family drama that is also a fascinating exploration of the moral responsibility and ethical consequences of AI.

Culpability explores a world newly shaped by chatbots, autonomous cars, drones, and other nonhuman forces in ways that are thrilling, challenging, and unimaginably provocative.]]> 350 Bruce Holsinger 1954118961 Diana 3 3.88 2025
author: Bruce Holsinger
name: Diana
average rating: 3.88
book published: 2025
rating: 3
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date added: 2025/09/14
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]]> 54916181 From the New York Times bestselling author of I'm Judging You, a hilarious and transformational book about how to tackle fear--that everlasting hater--and audaciously step into lives, careers, and legacies that go beyond even our wildest dreams.

Luvvie Ajayi Jones is known for her trademark wit, warmth, and perpetual truth-telling. But even she's been challenged by the enemy of progress known as fear. She was once afraid to call herself a writer, and nearly skipped out on doing a TED talk that changed her life because of imposter syndrome. As she shares in Professional Troublemaker, she's not alone.

We're all afraid. We're afraid of asking for what we want because we're afraid of hearing "no". We're afraid of being different, of being too much or not enough. We're afraid of leaving behind the known for the unknown. But in order to do the things that will truly, meaningfully change our lives, we have to become professional troublemakers: people who are committed to not letting fear talk them out of the things they need to do or say to live free.

With humor and honesty, and guided by the influence of her professional troublemaking Nigerian grandmother, Funmilayo Faloyin, Luvvie walks us through what we must get right within ourselves before we can do the things that scare us; how to use our voice for a greater good; and how to put movement to the voice we've been silencing--because truth-telling is a muscle.

The point is not to be fearless, but to know we are afraid and charge forward regardless. It is to recognize that the things we must do are more significant than our fears. This book is about how to live boldly in spite of all the reasons we have to cower. Let's go!]]> 304 Luvvie Ajayi Jones 1984881906 Diana 3 4.07 2021
author: Luvvie Ajayi Jones
name: Diana
average rating: 4.07
book published: 2021
rating: 3
read at: 2025/08/30
date added: 2025/08/30
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]]> 28484919 331 Ai Mi 7214059770 Diana 0 to-read 3.00 2007
author: Ai Mi
name: Diana
average rating: 3.00
book published: 2007
rating: 0
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date added: 2025/08/25
shelves: to-read
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]]> 6929931
What is it that leads an exceptional young mind want to disappear? Clegg makes stunningly clear the attraction of the drug that had him in its thrall, capturing in scene after scene the drama, tension, and paranoiac nightmare of a secret life--and the exhilarating bliss that came again and again until it was eclipsed almost entirely by doom. He also explores the shape of addiction, how its pattern--not its cause--can be traced to the past.

Portrait of an Addict as a Young Man is an utterly compelling narrative--lyrical, irresistible, harsh, honest, and beautifully written--from which you simply cannot look away.]]> 240 Bill Clegg 0316054674 Diana 4 3.77 2010
author: Bill Clegg
name: Diana
average rating: 3.77
book published: 2010
rating: 4
read at: 2025/08/23
date added: 2025/08/23
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]]> 217163697 The beautiful new novel that will make you laugh and cry, from the global bestselling author of Anxious People and A Man Called Ove. Fredrik Backman returns with an unforgettably funny, deeply moving tale of four teenagers whose friendship creates a bond so powerful that it changes a complete stranger’s life twenty-five years later…

You have to take life for granted, the artist thinks, the whole thing: sunrises and slow Sunday mornings and water balloons and another person’s breath against your neck. That’s the only courageous thing a person can do.

In the corner of one of the most famous paintings in the world three tiny figures sit at the end of a pier. Most people don’t even notice them. Most people think it’s just a depiction of the sea. But Louisa, an aspiring artist herself, knows otherwise.

Twenty-five years earlier, in a distant seaside town, a group of teenagers seek refuge from their bruising home lives by spending long summer days together. They tell jokes, they share secrets, and they commit small acts of rebellion. These lost souls find in each other a reason to get up each morning, a reason to dream, a reason to love.

Out of that summer emerges a transcendent work of art, a painting that will unexpectedly be placed into 18-year-old Louisa’s care. Determined to learn how it came to be and to decide what to do with it, Louisa embarks on a cross-country journey. But the closer she gets to the painting’s birthplace, the more nervous she becomes.

In this stunning testament to the transformative, timeless power of friendship and art, Louisa is proof that happy endings don’t always take the form we expect.]]> 436 Fredrik Backman 1982112824 Diana 4 4.28 2025
author: Fredrik Backman
name: Diana
average rating: 4.28
book published: 2025
rating: 4
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date added: 2025/08/17
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]]> 7244 The Poisonwood Bible is a story told by the wife and four daughters of Nathan Price, a fierce, evangelical Baptist who takes his family and mission to the Belgian Congo in 1959. They carry with them everything they believe they will need from home, but soon find that all of it -- from garden seeds to Scripture -- is calamitously transformed on African soil. What follows is a suspenseful epic of one family's tragic undoing and remarkable reconstruction over the course of three decades in postcolonial Africa.]]> 546 Barbara Kingsolver 0060786507 Diana 4 4.11 1998
author: Barbara Kingsolver
name: Diana
average rating: 4.11
book published: 1998
rating: 4
read at: 2025/08/10
date added: 2025/08/10
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]]> 213651231 The key concept from psychology that unlocks true and lasting behavioral change

The validation skills from dialectical behavior therapy (DBT) revolutionized psychology by balancing the emphasis on changing behavior with a corresponding emphasis on acceptance. Now a prominent psychologist brings these validation skills out of therapy and into everyday life to help anyone decrease conflict, strengthen relationships, and change behaviors—in themselves and in others.
    As both a means and an end, validation has profound it affirms a person’s experience and unlocks their potential for growth. Dr. Caroline Fleck explains how and why validation is a catalyst for transformation, while taking us step-by-step through eight skills we can use to communicate it. With practice, these skills become a way of life, helping us to focus on the possibilities that unfold when we see ourselves and others for who we really are.]]> 317 Caroline Fleck 0593541235 Diana 0 to-read 4.26 2025
author: Caroline Fleck
name: Diana
average rating: 4.26
book published: 2025
rating: 0
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date added: 2025/08/07
shelves: to-read
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]]> 57005178
Many think that they understand the secrets to the success of the biggest tech Facebook, Amazon, Apple, Netflix, and Google. It's the platform economy, or network effects, or some other magical power that makes their ultimate world domination inevitable. Investment banker and professor Jonathan Knee argues that the truth is much more complicated--but entrepreneurs and investors can understand what makes the giants work, and learn the keys to lasting success in the digital economy.

Knee explains what really makes the biggest tech companies a surprisingly disparate portfolio of structural advantages buttressed by shrewd acquisitions, strong management, lax regulation, and often, encouraging the myth that they are invincible to discourage competitors. By offering fresh insights into the true sources of strength and very real vulnerabilities of these companies, The Platform Delusion shows how investors, existing businesses, and startups might value them, compete with them, and imitate them.

The Platform Delusion demystifies the success of the biggest digital companies in sectors from retail to media to software to hardware, offering readers what those companies don't want everyone else to know. Knee's insights are invaluable for entrepreneurs and investors in digital businesses seeking to understand what drives resilience and profitability for the long term.]]> 384 Jonathan A. Knee 0593189434 Diana 3 3.93
author: Jonathan A. Knee
name: Diana
average rating: 3.93
book published:
rating: 3
read at: 2025/08/02
date added: 2025/08/02
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]]> 43562239
Leanna Smart’s life so far has been nothing but success. Age eight: Disney Mouseketeer; Age fifteen: first #1 single on the US pop chart; Age seventeen, *tenth* #1 single; and now, at Age nineteen…life is a queasy blur of private planes, weird hotel rooms, and strangers asking for selfies on the street.

When Leanna and Pab randomly meet at 4:00 a.m. in the middle of a snowstorm in Brooklyn, they both know they can’t be together forever. So, they keep things on the down-low and off Instagram for as long as they can. But it takes about three seconds before the world finds out…]]> 400 Mary H.K. Choi Diana 3 3.36 2019
author: Mary H.K. Choi
name: Diana
average rating: 3.36
book published: 2019
rating: 3
read at: 2025/08/02
date added: 2025/08/02
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]]> 218153875
Award-winning science journalist Melinda Wenner Moyer battled insomnia night after night, her thoughts spiraling around this exact problem. So she decided to do what she does best - learn from parenting experts and find the solution. Just as she did in her breakout book, How to Raise Kids Who Aren't Assholes, Moyer again interviewed researchers across multiple fields - from psychology to education, information literacy, business, and even addiction. What she even in a world full of assholes, we can still teach our kids how to take care of themselves, fight for what they believe in, manage uncertain times, and even bridge divides most adults aren't equipped to do.

In Hello, Cruel World!, Moyer provides those exact comprehensive, science-backed tools to help our children handle the world they will inherit. By using the three core attributes children need to succeed in our flawed world - coping mechanisms, connection techniques, and cultivation practices - our kids can learn to set boundaries, take responsibility for their actions, build healthy relationships in turbulent times, and much more. By being activists in our parenting, we can set our kids up to not just survive a shitty environment, but give them a fighting chance to make it a better world for future generations.]]> 320 Melinda Wenner Moyer 0593719360 Diana 5 4.05
author: Melinda Wenner Moyer
name: Diana
average rating: 4.05
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rating: 5
read at: 2025/07/20
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]]> 219520677 From the author of Oprah's Book Club pick and New York Times best seller Nightcrawling, here is an astonishing new novel about the joys and entanglements of a fierce group of teenage mothers in a small town on the Florida panhandle.

Adela Woods is sixteen years old and pregnant. Her parents banish her from her comfortable upbringing in Indiana to her grandmother’s home in the small town of Padua Beach, Florida. When she arrives, Adela meets Emory, who brings her newborn to high school, determined to graduate despite the odds; Simone, mother of four-year-old twins, weighs her options when she finds herself pregnant again; and the rest of the Girls, a group of outcast young moms who raise their growing brood in the back of Simone’s red truck.

The town thinks the Girls have lost their way, but really they are finding it: looking for love, making and breaking friendships, and navigating the miracle of motherhood and the paradox of girlhood.

Full of heart and life and hope, set against the shifting sands of these friends’ secrets and betrayals, The Girls Who Grew Big confirms Leila Mottley’s promise and offers an explosive new perspective on what it means to be a young woman.]]> 352 Leila Mottley 0593801121 Diana 4 3.97 2025
author: Leila Mottley
name: Diana
average rating: 3.97
book published: 2025
rating: 4
read at: 2025/07/13
date added: 2025/07/13
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]]> 204811915 New York Times bestseller and Oprah’s Book Club pick was named a Best Book of the Year by Time and NPR. In coastal Maine, local residents feel the reverberations of one shocking act.

With her remarkable insight into the human condition and silences that contain multitudes, Elizabeth Strout returns to the town of Crosby, Maine, and to her beloved cast of characters—Lucy Barton, Olive Kitteridge, Bob Burgess, and more—as they deal with a shocking crime in their midst, fall in love and yet choose to be apart, and grapple with the question, as Lucy Barton puts it, “What does anyone’s life mean?”

It’s autumn in Maine, and the town lawyer Bob Burgess has become enmeshed in an unfolding murder investigation, defending a lonely, isolated man accused of killing his mother. He has also fallen into a deep and abiding friendship with the acclaimed writer Lucy Barton, who lives down the road in a house by the sea with her ex-husband, William. Together, Lucy and Bob go on walks and talk about their lives, their fears and regrets, and what might have been. Lucy, meanwhile, is finally introduced to the iconic Olive Kitteridge, now living in a retirement community on the edge of town. They spend afternoons together in Olive’s apartment, telling each other stories. Stories about people they have known—“unrecorded lives,” Olive calls them—reanimating them, and, in the process, imbuing their lives with meaning.

Brimming with empathy and pathos, Tell Me Everything is Elizabeth Strout operating at the height of her powers, illuminating the ways in which our relationships keep us afloat. As Lucy says, “Love comes in so many different forms, but it is always love.”]]> 326 Elizabeth Strout 0593446097 Diana 0 to-read 3.89 2024
author: Elizabeth Strout
name: Diana
average rating: 3.89
book published: 2024
rating: 0
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date added: 2025/07/07
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]]> 36347888
Mike Hayes fought his way out of a brutal childhood and into a quiet, if lonely life, before he met Verity Metcalf. V taught him about love, and in return, Mike has dedicated his life to making her happy. He’s found the perfect home, the perfect job, he’s sculpted himself into the physical ideal V has always wanted. He knows they’ll be blissfully happy together.

It doesn’t matter that she hasn’t been returning his emails or phone calls.
It doesn’t matter that she says she’s marrying Angus.

It’s all just part of the secret game they used to play. If Mike watches V closely, he’ll see the signs. If he keeps track of her every move he’ll know just when to come to her rescue…

A spellbinding, darkly twisted novel about desire and obsession, and the complicated lines between truth and perception, Our Kind of Cruelty introduces Araminta Hall, a chilling new voice in psychological suspense.]]> 275 Araminta Hall 0374228191 Diana 4 3.37 2018
author: Araminta Hall
name: Diana
average rating: 3.37
book published: 2018
rating: 4
read at: 2025/06/26
date added: 2025/07/05
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]]> 3228917
His answer is that we pay too much attention to what successful people are like, and too little attention to where they are from: that is, their culture, their family, their generation, and the idiosyncratic experiences of their upbringing. Along the way he explains the secrets of software billionaires, what it takes to be a great soccer player, why Asians are good at math, and what made the Beatles the greatest rock band.]]> 309 Malcolm Gladwell 0316017922 Diana 3 4.19 2008
author: Malcolm Gladwell
name: Diana
average rating: 4.19
book published: 2008
rating: 3
read at: 2025/07/05
date added: 2025/07/05
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]]> 46258992
Vivian and the other women who work at Bell on East Liberty Street connect lines and lives. They aren’t supposed to listen in on conversations, but they do, and they all have opinions on what they hear―especially Vivian.

Then, one cold December night, Vivian listens in on a call between that snob Betty Miller and someone whose voice she can’t quite place and hears something shocking. Betty Miller’s mystery friend has news that, if true, will shatter Vivian’s tidy life in Wooster, humiliating her and making her the laughingstock of the town.

Vivian may be mortified, but she isn’t going to take this lying down. She’s going to get to the bottom of that rumor—get into it, get under it, poke around in the corners. Find every last bit. Vivian wants the truth, no matter how painful it may be.

But as Vivian is about to be reminded, in a small town like Wooster, one secret usually leads to another. . . .]]> 352 Gretchen Berg 0062917188 Diana 2 3.23 2020
author: Gretchen Berg
name: Diana
average rating: 3.23
book published: 2020
rating: 2
read at: 2025/06/22
date added: 2025/06/22
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]]> 62919742 With echoes of Educated and Born a Crime, How to Say Babylon is the stunning story of the author’s struggle to break free of her rigid Rastafarian upbringing, ruled by her father’s strict patriarchal views and repressive control of her childhood, to find her own voice as a woman and poet.

Throughout her childhood, Safiya Sinclair’s father, a volatile reggae musician and militant adherent to a strict sect of Rastafari, became obsessed with her purity, in particular, with the threat of what Rastas call Babylon, the immoral and corrupting influences of the Western world outside their home. He worried that womanhood would make Safiya and her sisters morally weak and impure, and believed a woman’s highest virtue was her obedience.

In an effort to keep Babylon outside the gate, he forbade almost everything. In place of pants, the women in her family were made to wear long skirts and dresses to cover their arms and legs, head wraps to cover their hair, no make-up, no jewelry, no opinions, no friends. Safiya’s mother, while loyal to her father, nonetheless gave Safiya and her siblings the gift of books, including poetry, to which Safiya latched on for dear life. And as Safiya watched her mother struggle voicelessly for years under housework and the rigidity of her father’s beliefs, she increasingly used her education as a sharp tool with which to find her voice and break free. Inevitably, with her rebellion comes clashes with her father, whose rage and paranoia explodes in increasing violence. As Safiya’s voice grows, lyrically and poetically, a collision course is set between them.

How to Say Babylon is Sinclair’s reckoning with the culture that initially nourished but ultimately sought to silence her; it is her reckoning with patriarchy and tradition, and the legacy of colonialism in Jamaica. Rich in lyricism and language only a poet could evoke, How to Say Babylon is both a universal story of a woman finding her own power and a unique glimpse into a rarefied world we may know how to name, Rastafari, but one we know little about.]]> 352 Safiya Sinclair 1982132337 Diana 4 4.41 2023
author: Safiya Sinclair
name: Diana
average rating: 4.41
book published: 2023
rating: 4
read at: 2025/06/15
date added: 2025/06/15
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]]> 181110045 A haunting and powerful story of female friendships and secrets in a Washington, D.C. boardinghouse during the McCarthy era.

Washington, D.C., 1950. Everyone keeps to themselves at Briarwood House, a down-at-the-heels all-female boardinghouse in the heart of the nation’s capital, where secrets hide behind white picket fences. But when the lovely, mysterious widow Grace March moves into the attic, she draws her oddball collection of neighbors into unlikely friendship: poised English beauty Fliss whose facade of perfect wife and mother covers gaping inner wounds; police officer’s daughter Nora, who is entangled with a shadowy gangster; frustrated baseball star Bea, whose career has ended along with the women’s baseball league of WWII; and poisonous, gung-ho Arlene, who has thrown herself into McCarthy’s Red Scare.

Grace’s weekly attic-room dinner parties and window-brewed sun tea become a healing balm on all their lives, but she hides a terrible secret of her own. When a shocking act of violence tears apart the house, the Briar Club women must decide once and for all: Who is the true enemy in their midst?

Capturing the paranoia of the McCarthy era and evoking the changing roles for women in postwar America, The Briar Club is an intimate and thrilling novel of secrets and loyalty put to the test.]]> 432 Kate Quinn 0063244748 Diana 5 4.23 2024
author: Kate Quinn
name: Diana
average rating: 4.23
book published: 2024
rating: 5
read at: 2025/06/08
date added: 2025/06/08
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]]> 177187
At 8:46 am on September 11, 2001, 14,000 people were inside the twin towers-reading e-mails, making trades, eating croissants at Windows on the World. Over the next 102 minutes, each would become part of a drama for the ages, one witnessed only by the people who lived it-until now.

Of the millions of words written about this wrenching day, most were told from the outside looking in. New York Times reporters Jim Dwyer and Kevin Flynn have taken the opposite-and far more revealing-approach. Reported from the perspectives of those inside the towers, 102 Minutes captures the little-known stories of ordinary people who took extraordinary steps to save themselves and others. Beyond this stirring panorama stands investigative reporting of the first rank. An astounding number of people actually survived the plane impacts but were unable to escape, and the authors raise hard questions about building safety and tragic flaws in New York's emergency preparedness.

Dwyer and Flynn rely on hundreds of interviews with rescuers, thousands of pages of oral histories, and countless phone, e-mail, and emergency radio transcripts. They cross a bridge of voices to go inside the infernos, seeing cataclysm and heroism, one person at a time, to tell the affecting, authoritative saga of the men and women-the nearly 12,000 who escaped and the 2,749 who perished-as they made 102 minutes count as never before.  102 Minutes is a 2005 National Book Award Finalist for Nonfiction.]]> 384 Jim Dwyer 0805080325 Diana 4 4.28 2005
author: Jim Dwyer
name: Diana
average rating: 4.28
book published: 2005
rating: 4
read at: 2025/06/01
date added: 2025/06/01
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]]> 217204419 The Office meets Six Feet Under meets About a Boy in this coming-of-middle-age tale about having a second chance to write your life’s story.

Bud Stanley is an obituary writer who is afraid to live. Yes, his wife recently left him for a “far more interesting” man. Yes, he goes on a particularly awful blind date with a woman who brings her ex. And yes, he has too many glasses of Scotch one night and proceeds to pen and publish his own obituary. The newspaper wants to fire him. But now the company’s system has him listed as dead. And the company can’t fire a dead person. The ensuing fallout forces him to realize that life may be actually worth living.

As Bud awaits his fate at work, his life hangs in the balance. Given another shot by his boss and encouraged by his best friend, Tim, a worldly and wise former art dealer, Bud starts to attend the wakes and funerals of strangers to learn how to live.

Thurber Prize-winner and New York Times bestselling author John Kenney tells a funny, touching story about life and death, about the search for meaning, about finding and never letting go of the preciousness of life.]]> 294 John Kenney Diana 4 4.00 2025
author: John Kenney
name: Diana
average rating: 4.00
book published: 2025
rating: 4
read at: 2025/05/25
date added: 2025/05/25
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]]> 63340978 A betrayal at the highest level risks the lives of two courageous female spies: MI6's best Soviet spy and the CIA's newest Moscow recruit. As the KGB closes in, a compromise must be struck if either woman hopes to survive.

Vienna, 1954

After losing everyone she loves in the final days of World War II, Ingrid Bauer agrees to a hasty marriage with a gentle Soviet embassy worker and follows him home to Moscow. But nothing deep within the Soviet Union's totalitarian regime is what it seems, including her new husband, whom Ingrid suspects works for the KGB. Upon her daughter's birth, Ingrid risks everything and reaches out in hope to the one country she understands and trusts--Britain, the country of her mother's birth--and starts passing along intelligence to MI6, navigating a world of secrets and lies, light and shadow.

Washington, DC, 1980

Part of the Foreign Studies Initiative, Anya Kadinova finishes her degree at Georgetown University and boards her flight home to Moscow, leaving behind the man she loves and a country she's grown to respect. Though raised by dedicated and loyal Soviet parents, Anya soon questions an increasingly oppressive and paranoid Soviet regime at the height of the Cold War. When the KGB murders her bestfriend, Anya picks sides and contacts the CIA. Working in a military research lab, Anya passes along Soviet military plans and schematics in an effort to end the 1980s arms race.

Alternating points of view keep readers on their toes as the past catches up to the present when an unprecedented act of treachery in 1985 threatens all undercover agents operating within the Soviet Union, and both Ingrid and Anya find themselves in a race for their lives against time and the KGB.

The exciting story of two brave female spies in Cold War Moscow]]> 384 Katherine Reay 1400243033 Diana 0 to-read 4.27 2023
author: Katherine Reay
name: Diana
average rating: 4.27
book published: 2023
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/05/22
shelves: to-read
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]]> 62949047 Pachinko and A Woman is No Man, a riveting and genre-bending debut of love and survival, set in the demilitarized zone separating North and South Korea. Life near the North Korean border is a zero-sum game, an ongoing battle in which you either win or you lose. This dangerous, shadowed netherworld is home to an unforgettable woman known only as the “trickster.” Inspired by the story of Lee’s great aunt, one of the oldest women to escape alone from North Korea, 8 Lives of a Century Old Trickster consists of eight dark and spellbinding chapters that follow this remarkable character and her family as they struggle to survive during the most turbulent times of modern Korean history. Mirinae Lee’s trickster is a shapeshifter—throughout the course of these interconnected chapters she is a slave, an escape artist, a murderer, a terrorist, a spy, a lover, and a mother—a woman who must often choose the unthinkable to survive war and conquest in Korea. Her story is a beguiling, complex tale of love and survival that will keep you riveted—and speculating—until the very end thanks to Lee’s brilliant talent for sleight of hand. A fascinating look at survival, trauma, and family, 8 Lives of a Century-Old Trickster is an incredible literary debut from a bright new talent.]]> 304 Mirinae Lee 0063240424 Diana 3 3.94 2023
author: Mirinae Lee
name: Diana
average rating: 3.94
book published: 2023
rating: 3
read at: 2025/05/19
date added: 2025/05/19
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]]> 39971465
But she kept a secret more shocking than her heritage or her marriage: she was a scientist. And she had an idea that might help the country fight the Nazis and revolutionize modern communication...if anyone would listen to her.

A novel based on the true story of the glamour icon and scientist whose groundbreaking invention revolutionized modern communication.]]> 312 Marie Benedict 1492666866 Diana 2 3.76 2019
author: Marie Benedict
name: Diana
average rating: 3.76
book published: 2019
rating: 2
read at: 2025/05/11
date added: 2025/05/11
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]]> 41692854 From the bestselling author of The Ragged Edge of Night comes a powerful and poetic novel of survival and sacrifice on the American frontier.

Wyoming, 1870. For as long as they have lived on the frontier, the Bemis and Webber families have relied on each other. With no other settlers for miles, it is a matter of survival. But when Ernest Bemis finds his wife, Cora, in a compromising situation with their neighbor, he doesn’t think of survival. In one impulsive moment, a man is dead, Ernest is off to prison, and the women left behind are divided by rage and remorse.

Losing her husband to Cora’s indiscretion is another hardship for stoic Nettie Mae. But as a brutal Wyoming winter bears down, Cora and Nettie Mae have no choice but to come together as one family—to share the duties of working the land and raising their children. There’s Nettie Mae’s son, Clyde—no longer a boy, but not yet a man—who must navigate the road to adulthood without a father to guide him, and Cora’s daughter, Beulah, who is as wild and untamable as her prairie home.

Bound by the uncommon threads in their lives and the challenges that lie ahead, Cora and Nettie Mae begin to forge an unexpected sisterhood. But when a love blossoms between Clyde and Beulah, bonds are once again tested, and these two resilient women must finally decide whether they can learn to trust each other—or else risk losing everything they hold dear.]]> 497 Olivia Hawker 1542091136 Diana 4 4.17 2019
author: Olivia Hawker
name: Diana
average rating: 4.17
book published: 2019
rating: 4
read at: 2025/05/04
date added: 2025/05/04
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]]> 18668059 “The impediment to action advances action. What stands in the way becomes the way.” — Marcus Aurelius

We are stuck, stymied, frustrated. But it needn’t be this way. There is a formula for success that’s been followed by the icons of history—from John D. Rockefeller to Amelia Earhart to Ulysses S. Grant to Steve Jobs—a formula that let them turn obstacles into opportunities. Faced with impossible situations, they found the astounding triumphs we all seek.

These men and women were not exceptionally brilliant, lucky, or gifted. Their success came from timeless philosophical principles laid down by a Roman emperor who struggled to articulate a method for excellence in any and all situations.

This book reveals that formula for the first time—and shows us how we can turn our own adversity into advantage.]]> 201 Ryan Holiday 1591846358 Diana 2 4.12 2014
author: Ryan Holiday
name: Diana
average rating: 4.12
book published: 2014
rating: 2
read at: 2025/04/25
date added: 2025/04/25
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]]> 22034
Almost fifty years ago, a classic was born. A searing portrayal of the Mafia underworld, The Godfather introduced readers to the first family of American crime fiction, the Corleones, and their powerful legacy of tradition, blood, and honor. The seduction of power, the pitfalls of greed, and the allegiance to family—these are the themes that have resonated with millions of readers around the world and made The Godfather the definitive novel of the violent subculture that, steeped in intrigue and controversy, remains indelibly etched in our collective consciousness.]]> 428 Mario Puzo Diana 5 4.39 1969
author: Mario Puzo
name: Diana
average rating: 4.39
book published: 1969
rating: 5
read at: 2025/04/20
date added: 2025/04/20
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]]> 56269143 Shelter, an unflinching portrayal of a woman trying to come to terms with the ghosts of her past and the tortured realities of a deeply divided America

Elinor Hanson, a forty-something former model, is struggling to reinvent herself as a freelance writer when she receives an unexpected assignment. Her mentor from grad school offers her a chance to write for a prestigious magazine about the Bakken oil boom in North Dakota. Elinor grew up near the Bakken, raised by an overbearing father and a distant Korean mother who met and married when he was stationed overseas. After decades away from home, Elinor returns to a landscape she hardly recognizes, overrun by tens of thousands of newcomers. Surrounded by roughnecks seeking their fortunes in oil and long-time residents worried about their changing community, Elinor experiences a profound sense of alienation and grief. She rages at the unrelenting male gaze, the locals who still see her as a foreigner, and the memories of her family’s estrangement after her mother decided to escape her unhappy marriage, leaving Elinor and her sister behind. The longer she pursues this potentially career-altering assignment, the more her past intertwines with the story she’s trying to tell, revealing disturbing new realities that will forever change her and the way she looks at the world.

With spare and graceful prose, O Beautiful presents an immersive portrait of a community rife with tensions and competing interests, and one woman’s attempts to reconcile her anger with her love of a beautiful, but troubled land.]]> 320 Jung Yun 125027432X Diana 1 3.62 2021
author: Jung Yun
name: Diana
average rating: 3.62
book published: 2021
rating: 1
read at: 2025/04/13
date added: 2025/04/13
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]]> 59349398
Things are looking up for Mr. and Mrs. Cho. Their dream of franchising their Korean plate lunch restaurants across Hawaiʻi seems within reach after a visit from Guy Fieri boosts the profile of Cho's Delicatessen. Their daughter, Grace, is busy finishing her senior year of college and working for her parents, while her older brother, Jacob, just moved to Seoul to teach English. But when a viral video shows Jacob trying—and failing—to cross the Korean demilitarized zone, nothing can protect the family from suspicion and the restaurant from waning sales.

No one knows that Jacob has been possessed by the ghost of his lost grandfather, who feverishly wishes to cross the divide and find the family he left behind in the north. As Jacob is detained by the South Korean government, Mr. and Mrs. Cho fear their son won't ever be able to return home, and Grace gets more and more stoned as she negotiates her family's undoing. Struggling with what they don't know about themselves and one another, the Chos must confront the separations that have endured in their family for decades.

Set in the months leading up to the 2018 false missile alert in Hawaiʻi, Joseph Han's profoundly funny and strikingly beautiful debut novel is an offering that aches with histories inherited and reunions missed, asking how we heal in the face of what we forget and who we remember.]]> 320 Joseph Han 1640094865 Diana 2 3.20 2022
author: Joseph Han
name: Diana
average rating: 3.20
book published: 2022
rating: 2
read at: 2025/04/06
date added: 2025/04/06
shelves:
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