RaveShelf Awareness... heartrending ... Ultimately inspiring and hopeful, The Book of Rosy offers an intimately detailed and personal account of two mothers\' determination and strength. Rosy\'s poignant writing of the struggles facing Guatemalans and her firsthand experience of being in a \'literal and psychological prison\' are bookended by the powerful advocacy efforts of another mother, Julie Schwietert Collazo ... a powerful, emotional perspective that demonstrates how one family\'s immigrant experience can transcend inflicted pain and trauma in order to become an example of abundant generosity and love.
Ellen Feldman
RaveShelf Awareness... an unforgettable story of resistance, trust, faith and love. Starting with the novel\'s opening pages, Guggenheim fellow Ellen Feldman immediately grabs readers\' hearts and never lets go ... The best works of historical fiction have a way of illuminating the present, allowing readers to better understand themselves through well-defined characters reflected in the prism of time. In Paris Never Leaves You, Ellen Feldman does this beautifully in a multi-layered, tender story that explores the emotionally charged, often parallel terrains of truth, deception, love and heartbreak.
Esther Safran Foer
PositiveShelf Awareness... poignant ... Through Safran Foer\'s photographs, scant recollections, connections with experts from the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum and her travels to Kolki and Trochenbrod, I Want You to Know We\'re Still Here explores how to remember loved ones when all that is known is a name--and sometimes not even that ... In this heartfelt and compelling post-Holocaust memoir, a woman dedicates herself to learning the truth of the stories that framed her family\'s lifelong silences and traumas.
Jennifer Rosner
RaveShelf Awareness... profoundly moving ... a beautiful and deeply resonant depiction of the enduring, eternal connection between parent and child. Through unforgettable characters and a gripping, multi-layered plot, Rosner shows how both silence and music can become symbols of hope and survival ... Rosner has a keen ability to elicit heart-wrenching emotion through her simple yet luminescent writing. With vivid, descriptive prose that provides insight into both Shira\'s and her mother\'s desperation, the author gives readers a sense of physically being in the barn with the two. Despite the World War II setting, Róza\'s terror, guilt and shame--palpable on the page--become universally recognizable to anyone who has ever felt responsible for a child ... Rosner honors that truth through this exquisite tale, one that demonstrates how words and song have a timeless power to keep loved ones connected and their voices alive through generations.
Andrew David MacDonald
RaveShelf AwarenessIn When We Were Vikings, MacDonald\'s captivating, beautifully written and witty novel, he introduces to the literary world an unforgettable protagonist ... With a fast-paced and engaging plot, MacDonald makes it easy for his readers to care deeply—and immediately—about Zelda. As the humorous and bittersweet storyline of When We Were Vikings progresses, readers will feel compassion for Zelda, while enthusiastically cheering her on to victory against the perceived dangers in her life ... The coming-of-age themes in When We Were Vikings are universally relatable ... With his stunning, heartfelt debut, Andrew David MacDonald...[is] on a trajectory for a most legendary writing career.
Adam Minter
RaveShelf AwarenessArmed with a passionate curiosity coupled with an investigative journalism background as a Bloomberg reporter, Minter interviews and observes dozens of buyers, sorters, cutters and shippers while tracking the journey of the approximately four million tons of used clothes exported around the world each year. Secondhand details an intricate and diverse network of operations spanning the United States, Canada, West Africa, India, Asia and many other points along the way. Minter provides an eye-opening look at the ways used clothes are sold and repurposed as furniture stuffing and rags, a high-demand product for the hospitality, automotive and healthcare fields, among others ... In an accessible and engaging style, Secondhand unravels the complexities of a vast yet mostly hidden and often secretive enterprise of used clothes and good...The result is an unparalleled look at the lifespan of everyday things and the unexpected ways our society\'s abundance of discarded items are, refreshingly, being repurposed for a second life.
Maryse Meijer
RaveShelf Awarenesseading Maryse Meijer\'s short fiction is transformative. Stunning and evocative, Rag\'s 14 stories dazzle with brilliance while taking the reader\'s heart and wringing it dry--but not before delivering a solid literary punch ... Meijer is wildly innovative with her fiction and doesn\'t limit herself to exploring connection from solely a human point of view ... Deliciously manipulative and psychologically haunting, Rag signifies Maryse Meijer as a master of the short form who consistently shocks and connects by delivering the unexpected.
Allie Rowbottom
RaveShelf AwarenessWith candid and unflinching descriptions connecting the history of Jell-O, feminism and her mother\'s unpublished writings, Rowbottom makes a case that the curse [of the Jell-O family] wasn\'t physical, emotional or confined exclusively to their family. (Pearle Wait, the original holder of the Jell-O patent, went bankrupt shortly after the sale.) Instead, the curse was a repressive societal attitude \'reflected by the messages about women and their worth that her family sold with each box of Jell-O\' ... Jell-O Girls is a fascinating family history combined with an examination of an iconic brand, one with double-sided messages of domesticity and nurturing that have influenced generations of women. By sharing her family\'s most personal tragedies, Rowbottom shows the interconnectivity among women and the continued need for amplification of their voices.
Hannah Pittard
PositiveSelf- AwarenessOn June 3, 1962, a chartered plane crashed shortly after takeoff from Orly Field near Paris. Among the dead were 121 of Atlanta\'s most influential civic leaders, philanthropists and arts patrons, all returning home after a three-week museum tour. Thirty-three children and young adults lost both parents in the disaster, which Mayor Ivan Allen declared to be his city\'s \'greatest tragedy and loss.\' ... The novel grounds the reader firmly in the chaos and confusion that engulf Atlanta in the month following the crash, as its residents begin to grasp the scope of the tragedy and attempt to cope with their shock and grief. The devastating impact of their collective loss becomes palpable ... The abundance of unforgettable characters gives Visible Empire the feel of a novel in linked stories form, as Pittard skillfully pivots her narrative around three distinct yet interconnected perspectives.
C. Morgan Babst
PositiveShelf Awareness\"With a gripping yet deliberate narrative infused with vivid descriptions, Babst takes her time with this story, allowing it to build slowly and methodically with an appropriate weight, enhancing the confusion wrought by the storm. In contrast, Cora\'s point of view significantly intensifies the pace, lending an urgency to the novel and making her narrative feel almost cyclonic. A native of New Orleans who evacuated one day before Hurricane Katrina, Babst has an intimate understanding and knowledge of the region\'s people and rich culture, its topography and the complex forces of race and class. The result is in a timely debut novel about the power of nature and its omnipresent potential for destruction in every aspect of our lives.\
