Check out these reviews written by the staff of the Marathon County Public Library! (For reviews in all genres, visit our main Staff Reviews webpage.) Staff book reviews are also published at Goodreads.com; follow us for the latest updates.
One thing New York City is known for is the exorbitant cost of rent and real estate. So when twentysomething Jules loses her job and breaks up with her cheating boyfriend all in the same day, she is instantly in need of money and a place to stay. Jules answers an ad looking for someone to live rent-free at the Bartholomew – an elite, historic and...
Order and routine are the two main tenets that keep the Salem State Hospital running smoothly. Under the strict control of Nurse Ratched, members of the ward (comprised of “acutes” and “chronics”) have a set schedule, know their limitations, and stick to the rules. That is, until R.P. McMurphy arrives. McMurphy is an unruly, insubordinate inmate...
There is a little girl who wears a dress. The dress and the girl experience a lot together, like playing and exploring, until one day they travel to a new country together to find a better life. The dress and the girl get unexpectedly separated when getting off of the boat in their new county; the dress in a trunk and the girl moving on in her...
Alice, desperately fleeing an abusive relationship, finds herself and 10 year-old Oren getting off a bus in the midst of a snowstorm, relying on the help of strangers to protect them. Mattie, the social worker who collects them, ends up breaking protocol and bringing them to her house in the middle of the woods instead of the local shelter. She tells them...
Fixie Farr is the youngest of the Farr family, helps to keep their family shop a success, and lives by the family motto of "family first" to a fault. Fixie and her siblings are charged with the task of keeping the family shop in good working order when her mother takes a holiday in Spain. It should be easy, but in reality her...
James is a little boy whose memories are represented by balloons, as are Grandpa's memories. James loves talking to Grandpa and sharing balloons. But one day, Grandpa doesn't have as many balloons, and his favorite balloon, the silver balloon is floating above his head. James questions why the balloons are floating away. This is such...
Rosie and Penn are a happily married couple living just outside Madison with a house full of delightfully eccentric sons (four, to be exact). In hopes of having a daughter, the two decide to have one more child, which turns out to be…another boy, whom they name Claude. But around the time he starts kindergarten, Claude begins to question his gender...
Audience: adults | Genre: fiction, contemporary fiction
Imagine being a contestant of a survival type of reality television show. Now imagine a world that encounters a deadly virus that wipes out much of the Earth's population the same time you become a contestant of a survival reality show. That is the exact scenario that the author of The Last One has conjured up. The story starts out...
Once upon a time, a mother with three daughters decided it was time for them to marry. "Look out the back door and the first thing you see is your destiny." The first daughter sees a wealthy farmer. The second daughters sees a fine prince. The third daughter sees a large black bull. So begins the fairy tale, "The Black Bull of Norroway...
Audience: teens | Genre: fiction, graphic novel, fantasy
Team sports can be important to a small town. In the case of Beartown, a tiny, rural town in Sweden, that sport is hockey. Boys begin skating almost as soon as they can walk, and the townspeople look at the sport as a source of pride, validation and opportunity. Beartown follows around fifteen different characters, who all have ties to the town’s beloved...
Audience: adults | Genre: fiction, contemporary fiction
In this modern-day telling of Rebecca by Daphne du Maurier, a young woman moves into a lovely estate in the Hamptons with her new fiancé. Max Winter is a wealthy politician and widower: his wife Rebekah is recently deceased. After a whirlwind romance on a boat, Max welcomes his new fianceé to his lavish estate, Asherley, and introduces her to...
How would you react if your first-grader was trying to kill you? Would you try to appeal to her with unconditional love, or would you protect yourself and wish for her to disappear from your life? That’s the dilemma stay-at-home mom Suzette finds herself in in Baby Teeth. To put it mildly, Suzette has a rocky relationship with her seven year-old daughter...
"Elevation" was my very first Stephen King novel due to the fact that I had heard a lot of buzz surrounding this book. In this story we meet Scott Carey, who seems to be in a predicament. He keeps losing pounds on the scale; however, his body composition never changes. It seems that no matter how much he eats or wears, Scott simply cannot stop losing...
Arthur Less no longer wants to be in love. On the verge of turning 50, Less is a mildly successful author who has spent a large chunk of his adult life in relationships, only to get burned in the end. His book publisher also has passed on his most recent manuscript, putting him at a unique crossroads in his life. To avoid attending the wedding of Freddy...
Audience: adults | Genre: fiction, contemporary fiction
Annie Bianchi is a fifth-grader with dyslexia. This disability makes life difficult for her in many ways. She struggles to read and dress herself. She is teased when she smiles and laughs for no apparent reason. Annie has a habit of counting things and arranging numbers into organized groups. It is a coping mechanism for when she doesn’t know how to handle...
Not *just* another zombie-vampire-apocalypse genre novel (but yes, it is also that), "The Passage" tells an epic, century-long tale of the downfall of modern civilization due to a contagion that transforms humans into bloodthirsty, fanged, nigh-indestructible creatures of the night that the author graciously (though conspicuously) tries very hard not...
Audience: adults | Genre: fiction, science fiction, horror, supernatural, dystopian
Ever since Jade Leighton's mother died in a car crash, she's been working hard on shutting down and blocking people out, convinced that making connections with people would only cause her more pain. Feeling like an outside, Jade dresses as a goth, with plenty of black, and has made "friends" with other outsider goth students at her school....
Audience: teens | Genre: fiction, slice of life
Rona Blackburn's daughters, granddaughters and great granddaughters have lived on Anathema Island for many years. Rona's powerful witchcraft has been passed down to each daughter, yet each one only inherits one of Rona's mysterious powers. Nor Blackburn wants to live a quiet unremarkable life, so when she's gifted with the ability to hear the plants,...
Audience: teens | Genre: fiction, urban fantasy, witchcraft
Leliani has only one friend, Autumn, and the popular group of Haileys at school look like they would be fun friends, so she decides to plan a sleepover and invite them. However, with her confused grandmother helping with the party, the kids on the “Do Not Invite” list get invited instead of kids on the “Do Invite” list. So now she’s stuck with the...
Kris bought her first electric guitar with her savings, never imaging that she would eventually become the guitarist for a semi-famous heavy metal band. But on the eve of their big break, the lead singer, Terry, did something more horrible than selling out, and while he went on to achieve fame and glory, the rest of the band disappeared into...
Sadie is alone in the world. Her sister was murdered and her mother has abandoned them. With nothing to lose, Sadie sets out to find the person she believes is responsible for her sister's death. Told from two perspectives, Sadie's own and from the perspective of a podcast producer/narrator, this novel is an intricate puzzle. The...
Ellie and her grandfather have become better friends since last year when her grandfather turned himself young again through a science experiment and attended Ellie’s middle school. In this sequel to The Fourteenth Goldfish, crusty teenage scientist (with two PhDs) Melvin Sagarsky returns. Having her grandfather around has encouraged in Ellie a love for...
Seventh-grade student Alex worries about everything, including worrying about worrying, but mostly about everyone dying and all the germs on people and surfaces everywhere. He always wears gloves and washes his hands compulsively, so much so that his skin is cracked, raw, and painful. Because of his OCD he is picked on at school and bullied repeatedly,...
Erin, a filmmaker, and Mark, an investment banker, seem like the perfect couple with the perfect life. Newly married, they embark on a lavish honeymoon in Bora Bora. It's a perfect honeymoon until they find something ominous in the water while scuba diving. They have to decide whether to tell the truth about their discovery or keep it hidden. Their final...
Jane leads a relatively normal life, taking care of two children and teaching a creative writing class (while she not-so-patiently waits for the day she is an officially published author). Her husband, Leon, is already an accomplished novelist and the main breadwinner of the family. When he's brutally attacked in their own driveway while Jane is only steps...
