Arts & Entertainment

Top 5 Books You Do Not Want to Miss at the Library This Week

Get swept away to London, Paris or 19th-century Turkey in these great novels.

Senior reference librarian, Rosemary Jerome, chooses five of her favorite fiction books that are on the shelves at  right now.

Michael David Lukas, Oracle of Stamboul  (2011)

Debut novel depicts life in 19th-century Turkey. When Eleonora Cohen is eight, her father goes to Stamboul (Istanbul) to sell rugs, and she hides in the ship’s hold to be with him. While in that city she broadens her education and learns seven languages. When her father dies in an accident, she is left with his friend Moncef Bey. The sultan of the Ottoman Empire, the Caliph of Islam hears about this amazing child and he begins relying on her for political advice. It is discovered that she is the oracle that the prophecy foretold and she vanishes without a trace.


Shirley Marks, The Suitor List   (2010)

In this historical romance, Lady Augusta, the oldest daughter of the Duke of Faraday becomes the toast of the London season. Her father and aunt want her to find the ideal match from a long list of suitors, so they host an event at their country home. Augusta’s true love ends up being the last person she would have considered.  This is Mark’s fifth historical romance.

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Edith Pearlman, Binocular Vision: New & Selected Stories  (2011)

These stories take us around the world, from current day to the last century, the reader becomes immersed in her characters and settings. The complex, unforgettable stories range from an elderly couple who decides to shoplift; a young girl’s tryst with the tsar to a love affair between adolescent cousins.

Elena Mauli Shapiro, 13, rue Therese  (2011)

This first novel from Paris-born Shapiro centers on a box of WWI-era artifacts (depicted in color throughout the book) found by Trevor Stratton, an American academic in Paris. Stratton pieces together the life of their owner Madame Louise Brunet. What Stratton isn’t aware of is that the box was left for him by Josianne, a secretary at the university, who is using the box as a test of his romantic worthiness. Puzzle lovers will enjoy the book’s online counterpart where they can view 3-D versions of the book’s images.

Find out what's happening in Half Hollow Hillswith free, real-time updates from Patch.

Kelly Simmons, Bird House   (2011)

Ann Biddle is struggling against early dementia and trying to resolve old hurts and tragedies in her life.  She recounts her life where her husband died young of a heart attack;  her daughter died at age four and she was responsible; her demented and cancer ridden mother died in a nursing home; her father abandoned them and absconded with the family fortune;  as  a young  mother she was diagnosed with breast cancer and had a mastectomy and her daughter in law tries to keep her granddaughter  away from her. Author’s second novel after Standing Still.


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