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Publication Date:  July 9, 2019 Format:  Paperback Genre:   Ghost Fiction/Coming of Age Publisher:  Penguin Books  Length:  224  pages Buy:  Kindle  |  Paperback Synopsis Growing up in 1980s Niagara Falls - a seedy but magical, slightly haunted place - Jake Baker spends most of his time with his uncle Calvin, a kind but eccentric enthusiast of occult artifacts and conspiracy theories. The summer Jake turns twelve, he befriends a pair of siblings new to town, and so Calvin decides to initiate them all into the "Saturday Night Ghost Club." But as the summer goes on, what begins as a seemingly light-hearted project may ultimately uncover more than any of its members had imagined. Review:  Th...

Publication Date:  July 24, 2012 Format:  Paperback Genre:   Science Fiction  Publisher:  Open Road Media Length:  356 pages Buy:    Kindle  |  Paperback Synopsis Lauren Olamina and her family live in one of the only safe neighborhoods remaining on the outskirts of Los Angeles. Behind the walls of their defended enclave, Lauren’s father, a preacher, and a handful of other citizens try to salvage what remains of a culture that has been destroyed by drugs, disease, war, and chronic water shortages. While her father tries to lead people on the righteous path, Lauren struggles with hyperempathy, a condition that makes her extraordinarily ...

  Publication Date:  March 23, 2021 Format:  Paperback Genre:   Coming of Age Publisher:  Ecco Length:  298  pages Buy:    Kindle  |  Paperback  Synopsis It’s the summer of 1994 in Claypot, Wisconsin, and the lives of ten-year-old Fischer “Fish” Branson and Dale “Bread” Breadwin are shaped by the two fathers they don’t talk about. One night, tired of seeing his best friend bruised and terrorized by his no-good dad, Fish takes action. A gunshot rings out and the two boys flee the scene, believing themselves murderers. They head for the woods, where they find their way onto a raft, but the natural terrors of Ironsforge gorge threaten to overwhelm them. Four adults track them into the forest, each one on a journey...

Publication Date:  July 25, 2017 Format:  Paperback Genre:   Coming of Age Publisher:  Kensington Length:  304  pages Buy:    Kindle  |  Paperback  Synopsis On a summer evening in 1931, Lilly Blackwood glimpses circus lights from the grimy window of her attic bedroom. Lilly isn’t allowed to explore the meadows around Blackwood Manor. She’s never even ventured beyond her narrow room. Momma insists it’s for Lilly’s own protection, that people would be afraid if they saw her. But on this unforgettable night, Lilly is taken outside for the first time—and sold to the circus sideshow. More than two decades later, nineteen-year-old Julia Blackwood has inherited her parents’ estate and horse farm. For Julia, home was an unhapp...

Publication Date:  August 13, 2019 Format:  Audio Genre:   Coming of Age Narrators:  Chloe Cannon Publisher:  Tantor Media Length:  4 hours 59 min Buy:  Kindle  |  Audio Synopsis A surreal exploration of one woman's life and death against a landscape of meat, office desks, and bad men. The Book of X  tells the tale of Cassie, a girl born with her stomach twisted in the shape of a knot. From childhood with her parents on the family meat farm, to a desk job in the city, to finally experiencing love, she grapples with her body, men, and society, all the while imagining a softer world than the one she is in. Twining the drama of the everyday — school-age crushes, paying bills, the sickness of parents — with the surreal — rivers of thighs, me...

  Publication Date:  August 15, 2021 Format:  Kindle Genre:   Coming of age Publisher:  Self Published Length:  174 pages Buy:    Kindle  |  Synopsis I grew up in a housing society in Mumbai (then Bombay) that overlooked a slum colony, beyond which lay a notorious area which I refer to as the ‘other’ side in this book. The ‘other’ side held a deep fascination for me with its colorful, busy alleys bustling with activity, people and mystery. There was one particular young man in that area that had become a figure of childhood folklore of sorts and we knew him only by his nickname. He had achieved a high level of recognition, given the issues he stood up for and the scraps he got embroiled in. I saw him just once and identified him i...

  Publication Date:  April 21, 2020 Format:  Audio Genre:   Crime Thriller Narrators:  David DeVries, Lisa Negron Publisher:  Macmillan Audio      Length:  12 hours 38 min Buy:  Kindle  |  Audio Synopsis Five years have passed since sixteen-year-old Angie Favorite’s mother disappeared without a trace. Since that day, Angie has managed to go through the motions of everyday life—until the summer morning when she’s abducted from a mall parking lot. Angie narrowly escapes, and her attacker is arrested, but he takes his life in jail before he can offer an explanation for his crime. When his mother contacts Angie, begging forgiveness on her son’s behalf, the girl agrees to meet with her in hopes of finding answers ...

  Publication Date:  April 6, 2021 Format:  Kindle Genre:   Asian American coming of age Publisher:  Riverhead Books Length:  336 pages Buy:    Kindle  |  Paperback  Synopsis Ba dies in the night; Ma is already gone. Newly orphaned children of immigrants, Lucy and Sam are suddenly alone in a land that refutes their existence. Fleeing the threats of their western mining town, they set off to bury their father in the only way that will set them free from their past. Along the way, they encounter giant buffalo bones, tiger paw prints, and the specters of a ravaged landscape as well as family secrets, sibling rivalry, and glimpses of a different kind of future.  Both epic and intimate, blending Chinese symbolism and reimagined his...

Publication Date:  October 9, 2018 Format:  Paperback Genre:   Non-fiction, death, dying Publisher:  WW Norton & Co      Length:  288 pages Buy:    Kindle  |  Paperback  Synopsis Felix Love has never been in love—and, yes, he’s painfully aware of the irony. He desperately wants to know what it’s like and why it seems so easy for everyone but him to find someone. What’s worse is that, even though he is proud of his identity, Felix also secretly fears that he’s one marginalization too many—Black, queer, and transgender—to ever get his own happily-ever-after. When an anonymous student begins sending him transphobic messages—after publicly posting Felix’s deadname alongside images of him before he transi...

Publication Date:  June 19, 2012 Format:  Paperback Genre:   Historical Fiction/Lgbtq Publisher:  The Dial Press                   Length:  367 pages Buy:  Paperback  |  Kindle  Synopsis 1987. The only person who has ever truly understood fourteen-year-old June Elbus is her uncle, the renowned painter Finn Weiss. Shy at school and distant from her older sister, June can be herself only in Finn’s company; he is her godfather, confidant, and best friend. So when he dies, far too young, of a mysterious illness her mother can barely speak about, June’s world is turned upside down.   But Finn’s death brings a surprise acquaintance into June’s life. At the funeral, June notices a ...

Release Date:  September 12, 2017 Publisher:  Random House Studios Format:  Audio Length:  15 hours 28 minutes Narrator:  Toni Morrison Genre:  Fiction Buy:   Audible  |  Kindle  Synopsis:  Milkman Dead was born shortly after a neighborhood eccentric hurled himself off a rooftop in a vain attempt at flight. For the rest of his life he, too, will be trying to fly. With this brilliantly imagined novel, Toni Morrison transfigures the coming-of-age story as audaciously as Saul Bellow or Gabriel García Márquez. As she follows Milkman from his rustbelt city to the place of his family’s origins, Morrison introduces an entire cast of strivers and seeresses, liars and assassins, the inhabitants of a fully realized black world. Review: I've tried to read this book once before and struggled with the dense prose. I decided to try the audio version of this book to see if it helped but I still struggled to focus and stay involved with ...