Sunday, April 21, 2024

Boswell bestsellers for the week ending April 20, 2024

Boswell bestsellers for the week ending April 20, 2024

Hardcover Fiction:
1. The Unsettled, by Ayana Mathis (a few real signed copies, not tip-ins)
2. I Cheerfully Refuse, by Leif Enger (signed copies)
3. Table for Two, by Amor Towles
4. Pay Dirt V22, by Sara Paretsky (Event today! Register here)
5. The Familiar, by Leigh Bardugo
6. James, by Percival Everett
7. The Women, by Kristin Hannah
8. The Heaven and Earth Grocery Store, by James McBride
9. The Hunter, by Tana French
10. Close to Death V5, by Anthony Horowitz

The Delta Memorial Endowment Fund has another successful fundraiser luncheon for college scholarships. This year's speaker, Ayana Mathis, had critical acclaim with her novel The Unsettled, with six raves and a positive on BookMarks, not including Sam Sacks in The Wall Street Journal (don't worry - I wrote to them to ask them to add the link), who wrote "The Unsettled follows Ms. Mathis’s debut, The Twelve Tribes of Hattie, whose loosely assembled family vignettes also explored the ambivalent aftermath of the Great Migration north. But this is a far better book, more focused and cohesive, and also more alive. This may be because here the South is not merely a ghostly memory but, in the form of Dutchess’s riotous monologues, an expressive voice, cajoling and imploring its exiles and calling them back home."

The Unsettled arrives in paperback in June. You can preorder here.

Hardcover Nonfiction:
1. Knife, by Salman Rushdie
2. Financial Literacy for All, by John Hope Bryant
3. An Unfinished Love Story, by Doris Kearns Goodwin
4. The Anxious Generation, by Jonathan Haidt
5. Puerto Rico, by Jorell Meléndez-Badillo (May 8 Boswell event)
6. The Age of Magical Overthinking, by Amanda Montell
7. Charlie Hustle, by Keith O'Brien
8. The Creative Act, by Rick Rubin
9. There's Always Next Year, by Hanif Abdurraqib
10. Come Together, by Emily Nagoski

An Unfinished Love Story: A Personal History of the 1960s, by Doris Kearns Goodwin is a memoir/history about her life with her husband Dick Goodwin, notably his years in government with John F Kennedy and Lyndon Johnson. BookMarks notches two raves, four positives and a mixed - including Chris Vognar in The San Francisco Chronicle, who writes: " This is not a news-breaking book, and it’s not about dish; that’s not really the Kearns Goodwin brand. But it is eminently readable, appealing especially to anyone fascinated by the period covered, and a touching invitation to eavesdrop on a long marriage between two people who had an unusual level of access to presidential policy and personality."

Paperback Fiction:
1. Monsters We Have Made, by Lindsay Starck (signed copies)
2. The Twelve Tribes of Hattie, by Ayana Mathis
3. Saturday Night at the Lakeside Supper Club, by J Ryan Stradal
4. What the Chickadee Knows, by Margaret Noodin
5. The Secret History, by Donna Tartt
6. Weweni, by Margaret Noodin
7. Weyward, by Emilia Hart
8. The Midnight Library, by Matt Haig
9. Virgil Wander, by Leif Enger
10. Horse, by Geraldine Brooks

It's the release week for the paperback of J Ryan Stradal's Saturday Night at the Lakeside Supper Club. And what do you know? It was also Supper Club Week on Top Chef Wisconsin. If you are wanting a truly wonderful supper club novel, check on J Ryan's latest. Wisconsinites can tell you that the Harvey House is a more urbane version of the Supper Club experience, but that doesn't mean I don't want to eat there. I do! Here's the recap from Milwaukee Record.

Paperback Nonfiction:
1. Strangers No Longer, by Sergio M González (signed copies)
2. River Profiles, by Pete Hill
3. When Heaven and Earth Changed Places, by Le Ly Hayslip
4. They Called Me a Lioness, by Ahed Tamimi
5. Child of War, Woman of Peace, by Le Ly Hayslip
6. Between Two Worlds, by Suleika Jaouad
7. Reading the Room, by Paul Yamazaki
8. Mexicans in Wisconsin, by Sergio M González
9. Milwaukee in Stone and Clay, by Raymond Wiggers (May 10 virtual event)
10. Wisconsin for Kennedy, by BJ Hollars

Alas, our event with Paul Yamazaki for Reading the Room: A Bookseller's Tale next Friday was cancelled, but Yamazaki's book recommendations continue. We've put together a display of some of the books that have particular meaning for him. From the starred Booklist review: " Yamazaki has exquisite taste and a hunger for representative viewpoints. He wears his erudition casually as part of his drive to be the Coltrane of booksellers, to curate 'twelve well-selected, serendipitous linear inches and find a universe.'"

Books for Kids:
1. The Secret Code Inside You, by Rajani Larocca, illustrations by Steven Salerno
2. Endlessly Ever After, by Laurel Snyder, illustrations by Dan Santat
3. Charlie and Mouse V1, by Laurel Synder
4. Orphan Island, by Laurel Snyder
5. This Again, by Adam Borba
6. The Reappearance of Rachel Price, by Holly Jackson
7. The Giving Tree, by Shel Silverstein
8. Buffalo Fluffalo, by Bess Kalb, illustrations by Erin Kraan
9. The Great Lakes, by Barb Rosenstock, illustrations by Jamey Christoph
10. Dog Man V12: The Scarlet Shredder, by Dav Pilkey

Jenny Chou's enthusiasm for a great time travel novel is contagious. She notes that "This Again is LOL funny but also a great reflection on being a good friend and doing what makes you happy rather than trying to meet what you think are other people’s expectations. "Plus Booklist wrote: "Despite being a bit zany, this novel strikes a tone that is both nostalgic and fresh." Zany as a negative - I never heard of such a thing!

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