Our August Picks Are Here!

We Are All the Same in the Dark
Julia Heaberlin
Julia Heaberlin is a magician with words. Every page of We Are All the Same in the Dark is beautiful and surprising. A police procedural at heart, you will be captivated the whole way, asking “Whodunnit?” and dazzled by the sentences and paragraphs on each page. The imagery is profound, as are the secrets unearthed along the way. Per usual — any mystery worth its weight in gold needs to search for both the killer and something more: the human condition. We can’t stop thinking about this book.
 
Our Monthly Speculative Fiction Pick

The City We Became
N. K. Jemisin
 N.K Jemisin absolutely crushes her readers by mixing real-world themes of cultural conflict and the human condition with hauntingly reimagined worlds — The City We Became is no exception. Book one of this new series is a joyride of magic and myth set in contemporary NYC. A newly awakened force is on the attack, and five people — one that delightfully personifies each of the city’s five boroughs — are called on to come together to protect it. Touching on cultural identity, privilege and gentrification, this perfectly weird and witty fantasy adventure is not to be missed!
 
Our Monthly Fiction Pick

White Ivy
Susie Yang
This millennial The Talented Mr. Ripley is an unforgettable, highly original coming-of-age story that we couldn’t put down. Appearances are wildly deceiving and dangerous in this story of love and obsession, secrets and lies, family and freedom. Ivy wants nothing more than to fit in, and her crush on a popular boy only shows how much of a chasm sits between her and what she wants. But then her grandmother arrives in the US, and everything changes. How far would you go to get what — or who — you want? (And does Ivy really know what she wants?)
 
Our Monthly Non-Fiction Pick

Agent Sonya: The Spy Next Door
Ben Macintyre
Agent Sonya — bourgeois intellectual, committed Communist, fearless, charismatic and passionate — was the spy responsible for several of WWII’s most notorious espionage rings and the agent who most ensured that the Soviet Union became a nuclear power. Macintyre’s apparent affinity for mavericks, iconoclasts, rascals, rogues and spies, his unerring knack for finding a great angle, and the ability to write a captivating story, once again means a terrific thriller of a history lesson.
 
Our Monthly Young Adult Pick

Grown
Tiffany D. Jackson
Legendary R&B artist makes promises of taking young girls under his wing and boosting their careers, but, in actuality, manipulates them physically and emotionally. Sound familiar? Tiffany D. Jackson’s second book, Grown, is an all-too-familiar story about the blind eye turned to the wrongdoings of the idols in the Black community and the disregard for the word of Black women.
 
Our Monthly Young Reader Pick

Dragon Mountain
Katie Tsang & Kevin Tsang
Fans of the Rick Riordan Presents series of diverse fantasy novels — kids, parents and teachers — will love our newest Monthly Pick for young readers. Twelve-year-old Billy Chan thinks he’s being exiled when his parents tell him they’ve signed him up to attend language and culture camp in China. He certainly isn’t expecting to make friends at camp OR open a crack in an ancient mountain and meet dragons … but now it’s up to Billy and his new pals to save the dragons — and the world as we know it.