How did it get to be June already? We are halfway through the year. The summer solstice is only weeks away. Crops are planted. First crop hay has been cut and baled. Spring lambs, calves, and foals have been born and are frolicking and gamboling. And the Summer Reading Program is already a couple of weeks old (so why haven't you signed up yet?_ We haven't explored the national days and dates for upcoming months and days for a while so I thought I'd indulge my curiosity, while, I hope piquing yours. As everyone from Wisconsin knows, June is Dairy Month, but did you Know that it is also National Zoo and Aquarium Month, African-American Appreciation Month, LGBTQIA Pride Month, Adopt a Cat Month, National Fresh Fruit and Vegetable Month as well as the seemingly contradictory National Candy Month. and many other "months" that I don't have room to mention. Today, June 3rd has few National Days to recommend it: National Egg Day, National Repeat Day ( I said, "It's National Repeat Day" so do something twice.) and National Chocolate Macaroons Day (which, I'm sure many of us wouldn't mind doing twice!). In case your reading this too late on the 3rd to celebrate any of the aforementioned days, June 4th has Cheese Day, Cognac Day, Doughnut Day, and Hug Your Cat Day (if you dare). As you're enjoying all these opportunities to celebrate, why not check out one of the recently arrived books below?
Enjoy!
New Non-Fiction
The Nature of Oaks: The Rich Ecology of Our Most Essential Native Trees by Douglas Tallamy. The best-selling author of Nature's Best Hope reveals the ecological importance of the oak tree, discussing its month-by-month role in the planet's seasonal cycles and home safety provisions for essential insects and animals.
My Remarkable Journey by Katherine Johnson and others. In this extraordinary memoir, the woman at the heart of the smash New York Times best-seller and Oscar-winning film Hidden Figures shares her personal journey from child prodigy in the Allegheny Mountains of West Virginia to NASA human computer.
The Windsor Diaries: My Childhood with Princesses Elizabeth and Margaret by Alathea Fitzalan Howard. The never-before-published diaries of Alathea Fitzalan Howard—who spent her teenaged years living out World War II in Windsor Great Park with her close friends Princess Margaret and Princess Elizabeth, the future queen of the United Kingdom—provide an extraordinary and intimate look at the British Royal Family.
Beyond: How Humankind Thinks About Heaven by Catherine Wolff. Offers a thought-provoking cultural history of heaven.
Metabolical: The Lure and the Lies of Processed Food, Nutrition, and Modern Medicine by Robert Lustig. The “New York Times” best-selling author of Fat Chance and pediatric neuroendocrinologist explains the eight pathologies that underlie all chronic disease, proposing an urgent manifesto and strategy to cure both us and the planet.
The Bookseller of Florence: The Story of the Manuscripts That Illuminated the Renaissance by Ross King. The best-selling author of Michelangelo and the Pope’s Ceiling captures the excitement and spirit of the Renaissance in a chronicle of the life and work of “the king of the worlds booksellers” and the technological disruption that forever changed the ways knowledge spread.
New Fiction
The Saboteurs, No. 12 (Isaac Bell) by Clive Cussler and Jack Du Brul. Thwarting the attempted assassination of a U.S. Senator, detective Isaac Bell traces the attack to a plot involving the nearly constructed Panama Canal and a local insurgency that would prevent its completion. By the authors of The Titanic Secret.
Deadly Editions, No. 6 (Scottish Bookshop Mysteries) by Paige Shelton. Mysteriously invited to participate in an eccentric socialite's exclusive treasure hunt, bookseller Delaney Nichols investigates her hostess's dangerous past when a man connected to the competition is found murdered.
The Unkindness of Ravens by M.E. Hilliard. Librarian Greer Hogan matches wits with a deviously clever killer in a chilling series debut.
The House of Always, No. 4 (A Chorus of Dragons) by Jenn Lyons. As the enemies of Kihrin move forward with their plans to free the King of Demons, the Eight Immortals must decide if they can save the world while saving Kihrin, too, or watch him become the very evil they have all been sworn to destroy.
The Blackmailer’s Guide to Love by Marian Thurm. A 25-year-old assistant to a famous New York editor (known to be a notorious philanderer) at a prestigious mainstream magazine, begins to sell her short stories to the “New Yorker”, complicating her relationship with her boss and exerting pressure on her marriage.
The Girls in the Stilt House by Kelly Mustian. Murder breaks through the racial divide that separates two teenage girls, forging an unlikely friendship. A first novel
Madam by Phoebe Wynne. While working at Caldonbrae, a prestigious boarding school high above the rocky Scottish cliffs, 26-year-old Rose Christie discovers the true extent of the school’s nefarious purpose when she tries to find out what really happened to her predecessor.
The Last Thing He Told Me by Laura Dave. After her husband disappears, Hannah Hall quickly realizes he isn’t who he said he was and that his 16-year-old daughter, who wants nothing to do with her, may hold the key to figuring out his true identity.