<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?><rss xmlns:dc="http://purl.org/dc/elements/1.1/" xmlns:content="http://purl.org/rss/1.0/modules/content/" xmlns:atom="http://www.w3.org/2005/Atom" version="2.0"><channel><title><![CDATA[title results for Staff Picks]]></title><description><![CDATA[title results for Staff Picks]]></description><link>https://gateway.bibliocommons.com/v2/libraries/westvanlibrary/rss/search?query=Staff%20Picks&amp;searchType=title&amp;origin=core-catalog-explore&amp;view=grouped</link><generator>RSS for Node</generator><lastBuildDate>Fri, 10 Apr 2026 13:05:57 GMT</lastBuildDate><item><title><![CDATA[Project Hail Mary]]></title><description><![CDATA[Ryland Grace is the sole survivor on a desperate, last-chance mission--and if he fails, humanity and the earth itself will perish. Except that right now, he doesn't know that. He can't even remember his own name, let alone the nature of his assignment or how to complete it. All he knows is that he's been asleep for a very, very long time. And he's just been awakened to find himself millions of miles from home, with nothing but two corpses for company. His crewmates dead, his memories fuzzily returning, Ryland realizes that an impossible task now confronts him. Hurtling through space on this tiny ship, it's up to him to puzzle out an impossible scientific mystery--and conquer an extinction-level threat to our species. And with the clock ticking down and the nearest human being light-years away, he's got to do it all alone. Or does he?]]></description><link>https://westvanlibrary.bibliocommons.com/v2/record/S74C2121023</link><guid isPermaLink="true">https://westvanlibrary.bibliocommons.com/v2/record/S74C2121023</guid><category><![CDATA[BK]]></category><category><![CDATA[eng]]></category><dc:creator><![CDATA[Weir, Andy]]></dc:creator><pubDate>Sun, 31 Jan 2021 00:00:00 GMT</pubDate><comments>https://westvanlibrary.bibliocommons.com/item/comment/2121023074</comments><format>BK</format><subtitle>A Novel</subtitle><language>eng</language><image_url>https://secure.syndetics.com/index.aspx?isbn=9780593135204/MC.GIF&amp;client=westp&amp;type=xw12&amp;oclc=</image_url></item><item><title><![CDATA[The Names]]></title><description><![CDATA[In the wake of an enormous, history-making storm, Cora sets off with her nine-year-old daughter, Maia, to register her son's birth. Her husband, Gordon, a local doctor, respected in the community but a terrifying and controlling presence at home, intends for her to name the child after him. But when the registrar asks which name she wants to pick, Cora hesitates... What follows are three alternate and alternating versions of both Cora's and her young son's life, shaped by her brave last-minute choice of name. Spanning thirty-five years, the novel draws us in from the first page, as we follow three unforgettable journeys of one young man, but also his mother, grandmother, and sister. In richly layered prose, The Names explores the painful ripple effects of domestic abuse, the messy ties of family, and the possibilities of autonomy and healing.]]></description><link>https://westvanlibrary.bibliocommons.com/v2/record/S74C2329055</link><guid isPermaLink="true">https://westvanlibrary.bibliocommons.com/v2/record/S74C2329055</guid><category><![CDATA[BK]]></category><category><![CDATA[eng]]></category><dc:creator><![CDATA[Knapp, Florence]]></dc:creator><pubDate>Fri, 31 Jan 2025 00:00:00 GMT</pubDate><comments>https://westvanlibrary.bibliocommons.com/item/comment/2329055074</comments><format>BK</format><subtitle>A Novel</subtitle><language>eng</language><image_url>https://secure.syndetics.com/index.aspx?isbn=9780735250147/MC.GIF&amp;client=westp&amp;type=xw12&amp;oclc=</image_url></item><item><title><![CDATA[Yotsuba&!]]></title><description><![CDATA[Revolves around the wacky adventures of a green-haired six-year-old girl named Yotsuba who has just moved to a new town with her father.]]></description><link>https://westvanlibrary.bibliocommons.com/v2/record/S74C1386105</link><guid isPermaLink="true">https://westvanlibrary.bibliocommons.com/v2/record/S74C1386105</guid><category><![CDATA[BK]]></category><category><![CDATA[eng]]></category><dc:creator><![CDATA[Azuma, Kiyohiko]]></dc:creator><pubDate>Invalid Date</pubDate><comments>https://westvanlibrary.bibliocommons.com/item/comment/1386105074</comments><format>BK</format><subtitle></subtitle><language>eng</language><image_url>https://secure.syndetics.com/index.aspx?isbn=9780316073875/MC.GIF&amp;client=westp&amp;type=xw12&amp;oclc=</image_url></item><item><title><![CDATA[Death Note]]></title><description><![CDATA[Light tests the boundaries of the Death Note's powers as L and the police close in. Luckily Light's father is the head of the Japanese National Police Agency and leaves vital information about the case lying around the house. With access to his father's files, Light can keep one step ahead of the authorities. But who is the strange man following him, and how can Light guard against enemies whose names he doesn't know?]]></description><link>https://westvanlibrary.bibliocommons.com/v2/record/S74C1421548</link><guid isPermaLink="true">https://westvanlibrary.bibliocommons.com/v2/record/S74C1421548</guid><category><![CDATA[BK]]></category><category><![CDATA[eng]]></category><dc:creator><![CDATA[Ōba, Tsugumi]]></dc:creator><pubDate>Mon, 31 Jan 2005 00:00:00 GMT</pubDate><comments>https://westvanlibrary.bibliocommons.com/item/comment/1421548074</comments><format>BK</format><subtitle></subtitle><language>eng</language><image_url>https://secure.syndetics.com/index.aspx?isbn=9781421501680/MC.GIF&amp;client=westp&amp;type=xw12&amp;oclc=</image_url></item><item><title><![CDATA[The Secret Life of A Cemetery]]></title><description><![CDATA["For Benoît Gallot, Père Lachaise is best explored without a guide: You're guaranteed to lose your way. You'll feel as though you've stepped out of time, out of Paris, and into another place entirely. In his debut memoir, Gallot, head curator of Père Lachaise and son of a grave stonemason, pulls back the curtains on his otherworldly workplace-a cemetery crammed with tourists in the high season and mourners year round, but also a natural paradise, where foxes roam, birds flit between trees, and wildflowers and moss encroach onto tombstones. In elegant, engrossing chapters, Gallot reveals the secret world of Père Lachaise-its Napoleonic origins, its unusual graves and monuments-alongside touching stories from his working life in the cemetery. Born into a family of undertakers, Gallot was named curator of Père-Lachaise in his early-thirties, inheriting the complex job of managing over 100 acres of green space, overseeing 70,000 graves, and arranging burials and cremations, all while contending with millions of tourists-plus film crews, birdwatchers, ghost hunters, and the occasional nude performance artist. Gallot, who also lives on the cemetery grounds with his wife and young children, demystifies his unusual and often misunderstood profession, which in reality requires much more contact with living people than dead ones. In doing so, he provides insight into the history of graveyards and our evolving relationship with death. Gallot also shares vivid descriptions of flora and fauna, which have reemerged in recent years thanks to a huge rewilding effort. Initially unsure about the idea, he embraced it as the cemetery alleys blossomed and birdsong proliferated. Then in April 2020, with the city in lockdown, Gallot took an early-morning stroll and crossed paths with a fox-in the middle of Paris! He snapped a picture and posted it, unwittingly setting off a media frenzy. Gallot's daily photographs of Père-Lachaise's flourishing animal and plant life have attracted followers from around the world, helping to change the public perception of cemeteries, which ultimately exist as places for the living."--]]></description><link>https://westvanlibrary.bibliocommons.com/v2/record/S74C2331224</link><guid isPermaLink="true">https://westvanlibrary.bibliocommons.com/v2/record/S74C2331224</guid><category><![CDATA[BK]]></category><category><![CDATA[eng]]></category><dc:creator><![CDATA[Gallot, Benoît]]></dc:creator><pubDate>Fri, 31 Jan 2025 00:00:00 GMT</pubDate><comments>https://westvanlibrary.bibliocommons.com/item/comment/2331224074</comments><format>BK</format><subtitle>The Wild Nature and Enchanting Lore of Père-Lachaise</subtitle><language>eng</language><image_url>https://secure.syndetics.com/index.aspx?isbn=9781778401589/MC.GIF&amp;client=westp&amp;type=xw12&amp;oclc=</image_url></item><item><title><![CDATA[Yellowface]]></title><description><![CDATA[Authors June Hayward and Athena Liu were supposed to be twin rising stars: same year at Yale, same debut year in publishing. But Athena's a cross-genre literary darling, and June didn't even get a paperback release. Nobody wants stories about basic white girls, June thinks. So when June witnesses Athena's death in a freak accident, she acts on impulse: she steals Athena's just-finished masterpiece, an experimental novel about the unsung contributions of Chinese laborers to the British and French war efforts during World War I. So what if June edits Athena's novel and sends it to her agent as her own work? So what if she lets her new publisher rebrand her as Juniper Song-- complete with an ambiguously ethnic author photo? Doesn't this piece of history deserve to be told, whoever the teller? That's what June claims, and the New York Times bestseller list seems to agree. But June cant get away from Athena's shadow, and emerging evidence threatens to bring June's (stolen) success down around her. As June races to protect her secret, she discovers exactly how far she will go to keep what she thinks she deserves. With its totally immersive first-person voice, Yellowface takes on questions of diversity, racism, and cultural appropriation not only in the publishing industry but the persistent erasure of Asian-American voices and history by Western white society.]]></description><link>https://westvanlibrary.bibliocommons.com/v2/record/S74C2248643</link><guid isPermaLink="true">https://westvanlibrary.bibliocommons.com/v2/record/S74C2248643</guid><category><![CDATA[BK]]></category><category><![CDATA[eng]]></category><dc:creator><![CDATA[Kuang, R. F.]]></dc:creator><pubDate>Tue, 31 Jan 2023 00:00:00 GMT</pubDate><comments>https://westvanlibrary.bibliocommons.com/item/comment/2248643074</comments><format>BK</format><subtitle>A Novel</subtitle><language>eng</language><image_url>https://secure.syndetics.com/index.aspx?isbn=9780063250833/MC.GIF&amp;client=westp&amp;type=xw12&amp;oclc=</image_url></item><item><title><![CDATA[Warrior Girl Unearthed]]></title><description><![CDATA[With the rising number of missing Indigenous women, her family's involvement in a murder investigation, and grave robbers profiting off her Anishinaabe tribe, Perry takes matters into her own hands to solve the mystery and reclaim her people's inheritance.]]></description><link>https://westvanlibrary.bibliocommons.com/v2/record/S74C2349461</link><guid isPermaLink="true">https://westvanlibrary.bibliocommons.com/v2/record/S74C2349461</guid><category><![CDATA[BK]]></category><category><![CDATA[eng]]></category><dc:creator><![CDATA[Boulley, Angeline]]></dc:creator><pubDate>Fri, 31 Jan 2025 00:00:00 GMT</pubDate><comments>https://westvanlibrary.bibliocommons.com/item/comment/2349461074</comments><format>BK</format><subtitle></subtitle><language>eng</language><image_url>https://secure.syndetics.com/index.aspx?isbn=9781250394668/MC.GIF&amp;client=westp&amp;type=xw12&amp;oclc=</image_url></item><item><title><![CDATA[Ducks]]></title><description><![CDATA[Katie heads out west to take advantage of Alberta's oil rush-part of the long tradition of East Coasters who seek gainful employment elsewhere when they can't find it in the homeland they love so much. Katie encounters the harsh reality of life in the oil sands, where trauma is an everyday occurrence yet is never discussed. Beaton's natural cartooning prowess is on full display as she draws colossal machinery and mammoth vehicles set against a sublime Albertan backdrop of wildlife, northern lights, and boreal forest. Her first full length graphic narrative, Ducks: Two Years in the Oil Sands is an untold story of Canada: a country that prides itself on its egalitarian ethos and natural beauty while simultaneously exploiting both the riches of its land and the humanity of its people.]]></description><link>https://westvanlibrary.bibliocommons.com/v2/record/S74C2221699</link><guid isPermaLink="true">https://westvanlibrary.bibliocommons.com/v2/record/S74C2221699</guid><category><![CDATA[BK]]></category><category><![CDATA[eng]]></category><dc:creator><![CDATA[Beaton, Kate]]></dc:creator><pubDate>Mon, 31 Jan 2022 00:00:00 GMT</pubDate><comments>https://westvanlibrary.bibliocommons.com/item/comment/2221699074</comments><format>BK</format><subtitle>Two Years in the Oil Sands</subtitle><language>eng</language><image_url>https://secure.syndetics.com/index.aspx?isbn=9781770462892/MC.GIF&amp;client=westp&amp;type=xw12&amp;oclc=</image_url></item><item><title><![CDATA[The Nightingale]]></title><description><![CDATA["Viann and Isabelle have always been close despite their differences. Younger, bolder sister Isabelle lives in Paris while Viann lives a quiet and content life in the French countryside with her husband Antoine and their daughter. When World War II strikes and Antoine is sent off to fight, Viann and Isabelle's father sends Isabelle to help her older sister cope. As the war progresses, it's not only the sisters' relationship that is tested, but also their strength and their individual senses of right and wrong. With life as they know it changing in unbelievably horrific ways, Viann and Isabelle will find themselves facing frightening situations and responding in ways they never thought possible as bravery and resistance take different forms in each of their actions."--]]></description><link>https://westvanlibrary.bibliocommons.com/v2/record/S74C1673510</link><guid isPermaLink="true">https://westvanlibrary.bibliocommons.com/v2/record/S74C1673510</guid><category><![CDATA[BK]]></category><category><![CDATA[eng]]></category><dc:creator><![CDATA[Hannah, Kristin]]></dc:creator><pubDate>Sat, 31 Jan 2015 00:00:00 GMT</pubDate><comments>https://westvanlibrary.bibliocommons.com/item/comment/1673510074</comments><format>BK</format><subtitle>A Novel</subtitle><language>eng</language><image_url>https://secure.syndetics.com/index.aspx?isbn=9780312577223/MC.GIF&amp;client=westp&amp;type=xw12&amp;oclc=</image_url></item><item><title><![CDATA[Orbital]]></title><description><![CDATA[A singular new novel from Betty Trask Prize-winner Samantha Harvey, Orbital is an eloquent meditation on space and life on our planet through the eyes of six astronauts circling the earth in twenty-four hours. A slender novel of epic power, Orbital deftly snapshots a day in the lives of six women and men hurtling through space-not toward the moon or the vast unknown, but around our planet. Selected for one of the last space station missions of its kind before the program is dismantled, these astronauts and cosmonauts-from America, Russia, Italy, Britain, and Japan-have left their lives behind to travel at warp speed as the earth reels below. We glimpse moments of their earthly lives through brief communications with family, their photos and talismans; we watch them whip up dehydrated meals, float in gravity-free sleep, and exercise in regimented routines to prevent atrophying muscles; we witness them form bonds that will stand between them and utter solitude. Most of all, we are with them as they behold and record their silent blue planet. Their experiences of sixteen sunrises and sunsets and the bright, blinking constellations of the galaxy are at once breathtakingly awesome and surprisingly intimate. So are the marks of civilization far below, encrusted on the planet on which we live. Profound, contemplative, and gorgeous, Orbital is a gift-a moving elegy to our humanity, environment, and planet.]]></description><link>https://westvanlibrary.bibliocommons.com/v2/record/S74C2272279</link><guid isPermaLink="true">https://westvanlibrary.bibliocommons.com/v2/record/S74C2272279</guid><category><![CDATA[BK]]></category><category><![CDATA[eng]]></category><dc:creator><![CDATA[Harvey, Samantha]]></dc:creator><pubDate>Tue, 31 Jan 2023 00:00:00 GMT</pubDate><comments>https://westvanlibrary.bibliocommons.com/item/comment/2272279074</comments><format>BK</format><subtitle>A Novel</subtitle><language>eng</language><image_url>https://secure.syndetics.com/index.aspx?isbn=9780802161543/MC.GIF&amp;client=westp&amp;type=xw12&amp;oclc=</image_url></item><item><title><![CDATA[The Alchemist]]></title><description><![CDATA[An Andalusian shepherd boy named Santiago travels from his homeland in Spain to the Egyptian desert in search of treasure buried in the Pyramids. Along the way he meets a Gypsy woman, a man who calls himself king, and an Alchemist, all of whom point Santiago in the direction of his quest. No one knows what the treasure is, or if Santiago will be able to surmount the obstacles along the way. But what starts out as a journey to find worldly goods turns into a meditation on the treasures found within.]]></description><link>https://westvanlibrary.bibliocommons.com/v2/record/S74C1204793</link><guid isPermaLink="true">https://westvanlibrary.bibliocommons.com/v2/record/S74C1204793</guid><category><![CDATA[BK]]></category><category><![CDATA[eng]]></category><dc:creator><![CDATA[Coelho, Paulo]]></dc:creator><pubDate>Fri, 31 Jan 2014 00:00:00 GMT</pubDate><comments>https://westvanlibrary.bibliocommons.com/item/comment/1204793074</comments><format>BK</format><subtitle></subtitle><language>eng</language><image_url>https://secure.syndetics.com/index.aspx?isbn=9780062315007/MC.GIF&amp;client=westp&amp;type=xw12&amp;oclc=</image_url></item><item><title><![CDATA[The Safekeep]]></title><description><![CDATA[It is 1961 and the rural Dutch province of Overijssel is quiet. Bomb craters have been filled, buildings reconstructed, and the war is truly over. Living alone in her late mother's country home, Isabel knows her life is as it should be--led by routine and discipline. But all is upended when her brother Louis brings his graceless new girlfriend Eva, leaving her at Isabel's doorstep as a guest, to stay for the season. Eva is Isabel's antithesis: she sleeps late, walks loudly through the house, and touches things she shouldn't. In response, Isabel develops a fury-fueled obsession, and when things start disappearing around the house--a spoon, a knife, a bowl--Isabel's suspicions begin to spiral. In the sweltering peak of summer, Isabel's paranoia gives way to infatuation--leading to a discovery that unravels all Isabel has ever known. The war might not be well and truly over after all, and neither Eva--nor the house in which they live--are what they seem.]]></description><link>https://westvanlibrary.bibliocommons.com/v2/record/S74C2289290</link><guid isPermaLink="true">https://westvanlibrary.bibliocommons.com/v2/record/S74C2289290</guid><category><![CDATA[BK]]></category><category><![CDATA[eng]]></category><dc:creator><![CDATA[Wouden, Yael van der]]></dc:creator><pubDate>Wed, 31 Jan 2024 00:00:00 GMT</pubDate><comments>https://westvanlibrary.bibliocommons.com/item/comment/2289290074</comments><format>BK</format><subtitle>A Novel</subtitle><language>eng</language><image_url>https://secure.syndetics.com/index.aspx?isbn=9781668034354/MC.GIF&amp;client=westp&amp;type=xw12&amp;oclc=</image_url></item><item><title><![CDATA[Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone]]></title><description><![CDATA[Rescued from the outrageous neglect of his aunt and uncle, a young  boy with a great destiny proves his worth while attending Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry.]]></description><link>https://westvanlibrary.bibliocommons.com/v2/record/S74C1201334</link><guid isPermaLink="true">https://westvanlibrary.bibliocommons.com/v2/record/S74C1201334</guid><category><![CDATA[BK]]></category><category><![CDATA[eng]]></category><dc:creator><![CDATA[Rowling, J. K.]]></dc:creator><pubDate>Mon, 31 Jan 2022 00:00:00 GMT</pubDate><comments>https://westvanlibrary.bibliocommons.com/item/comment/1201334074</comments><format>BK</format><subtitle></subtitle><language>eng</language><image_url>https://secure.syndetics.com/index.aspx?isbn=9781526646651/MC.GIF&amp;client=westp&amp;type=xw12&amp;oclc=</image_url></item><item><title><![CDATA[Fire Weather]]></title><description><![CDATA["A stunning, panoramic exploration of the symbiotic relationship between humans and combustion and why we are entering a new century of fire. In May 2016, the city of Fort McMurray in Alberta--the seat of the Canadian oil industry, from which the U.S. derives almost half its oil imports--burned to the ground. The unprecedented disaster forced 88,000 people from their homes and showed us what the fires of the future look like: increasingly destructive, already here. While the chemistry and physics of wildfires remain unchanged over the last century and a half, climate change has created conditions that give fire exponentially more opportunity to burn. And yet there is no other natural force or element over which we have such a compelling illusion of control. Fire yearns, above all, for freedom, and takes at any opportunity and at any cost. In our unchecked consumption of fossil fuels, it has enabled the same impulses in us. In masterly prose and cinematic style, John Vaillant weaves together an enthralling, multifaceted story of how Fort McMurray revealed a new normal of fires burning longer and with greater intensity than at any other time this planet has ever known. From the large-scale histories of North American resource extraction and climate science, to the intimate tales of lives scarred by the Fort McMurray disaster, Valliant's urgent work is a book for--and from--our new century of fire.""--]]></description><link>https://westvanlibrary.bibliocommons.com/v2/record/S74C2251204</link><guid isPermaLink="true">https://westvanlibrary.bibliocommons.com/v2/record/S74C2251204</guid><category><![CDATA[BK]]></category><category><![CDATA[eng]]></category><dc:creator><![CDATA[Vaillant, John]]></dc:creator><pubDate>Tue, 31 Jan 2023 00:00:00 GMT</pubDate><comments>https://westvanlibrary.bibliocommons.com/item/comment/2251204074</comments><format>BK</format><subtitle>The Making of A Beast</subtitle><language>eng</language><image_url>https://secure.syndetics.com/index.aspx?isbn=9780735273160/MC.GIF&amp;client=westp&amp;type=xw12&amp;oclc=</image_url></item><item><title><![CDATA[Demon Copperhead]]></title><description><![CDATA[Set in the mountains of southern Appalachia, this is the story of a boy born to a teenaged single mother in a single-wide trailer, with no assets beyond his dead father's good looks and copper-colored hair, a caustic wit, and a fierce talent for survival. In a plot that never pauses for breath, relayed in his own unsparing voice, he braves the modern perils of foster care, child labor, derelict schools, athletic success, addiction, disastrous loves, and crushing losses. Through all of it, he reckons with his own invisibility in a popular culture where even the superheroes have abandoned rural people in favor of cities. Many generations ago, Charles Dickens wrote David Copperfield from his experience as a survivor of institutional poverty and its damages to children in his society. Those problems have yet to be solved in ours. Dickens is not a prerequisite for readers of this novel, but he provided its inspiration. In transposing a Victorian epic novel to the contemporary American South, Barbara Kingsolver enlists Dickens' anger and compassion, and above all, his faith in the transformative powers of a good story. Demon Copperhead speaks for a new generation of lost boys, and all those born into beautiful, cursed places they can't imagine leaving behind.]]></description><link>https://westvanlibrary.bibliocommons.com/v2/record/S74C2225567</link><guid isPermaLink="true">https://westvanlibrary.bibliocommons.com/v2/record/S74C2225567</guid><category><![CDATA[BK]]></category><category><![CDATA[eng]]></category><dc:creator><![CDATA[Kingsolver, Barbara]]></dc:creator><pubDate>Mon, 31 Jan 2022 00:00:00 GMT</pubDate><comments>https://westvanlibrary.bibliocommons.com/item/comment/2225567074</comments><format>BK</format><subtitle>A Novel</subtitle><language>eng</language><image_url>https://secure.syndetics.com/index.aspx?isbn=9780063251984/MC.GIF&amp;client=westp&amp;type=xw12&amp;oclc=</image_url></item><item><title><![CDATA[Hamnet & Judith]]></title><description><![CDATA[England, 1580. A young Latin tutor--penniless, bullied by a violent father--falls in love with an eccentric young woman: a wild creature who walks her family's estate with a falcon on her shoulder and is known throughout the countryside for her unusual gifts as a healer. Agnes understands plants and potions better than she does people, but once she settles on the Henley Street in Stratford she becomes a fiercely protective mother and a steadfast, centrifugal force in the life of her young husband. His gifts as a writer are just beginning to awaken when their beloved twins, Hamnet and Judith, are afflicted with the bubonic plague, and, devastatingly, one of them succumbs to the illness.]]></description><link>https://westvanlibrary.bibliocommons.com/v2/record/S74C2029453</link><guid isPermaLink="true">https://westvanlibrary.bibliocommons.com/v2/record/S74C2029453</guid><category><![CDATA[BK]]></category><category><![CDATA[eng]]></category><dc:creator><![CDATA[O'Farrell, Maggie]]></dc:creator><pubDate>Fri, 31 Jan 2020 00:00:00 GMT</pubDate><comments>https://westvanlibrary.bibliocommons.com/item/comment/2029453074</comments><format>BK</format><subtitle></subtitle><language>eng</language><image_url>https://secure.syndetics.com/index.aspx?isbn=9780735280175/MC.GIF&amp;client=westp&amp;type=xw12&amp;oclc=</image_url></item><item><title><![CDATA[Circe]]></title><description><![CDATA[Circe is not powerful like her father Helios, nor viciously alluring like her mother Perse. Turning to the world of mortals for companionship, she discovers that she does possess power-- the power of witchcraft, which can transform rivals into monsters and menace the gods themselves. Zeus banishes her to a deserted island, where she hones her occult craft, tames wild beasts and crosses paths with many figures in mythology. When Circe unwittingly draws the wrath of both men and gods, she ultimately finding herself pitted against one of the most terrifying and vengeful of the Olympians.]]></description><link>https://westvanlibrary.bibliocommons.com/v2/record/S74C1896698</link><guid isPermaLink="true">https://westvanlibrary.bibliocommons.com/v2/record/S74C1896698</guid><category><![CDATA[BK]]></category><category><![CDATA[eng]]></category><dc:creator><![CDATA[Miller, Madeline]]></dc:creator><pubDate>Wed, 31 Jan 2018 00:00:00 GMT</pubDate><comments>https://westvanlibrary.bibliocommons.com/item/comment/1896698074</comments><format>BK</format><subtitle></subtitle><language>eng</language><image_url>https://secure.syndetics.com/index.aspx?isbn=9780316556347/MC.GIF&amp;client=westp&amp;type=xw12&amp;oclc=</image_url></item><item><title><![CDATA[A Little Life]]></title><description><![CDATA[When four classmates from a small Massachusetts college move to New York to make their way, they're broke, adrift, and buoyed only by their friendship and ambition. There is kind, handsome Willem, an aspiring actor; JB, a quick-witted, sometimes cruel Brooklyn-born painter seeking entry to the art world; Malcolm, a frustrated architect at a prominent firm; and withdrawn, brilliant, enigmatic Jude, who serves as their center of gravity. Over the decades, their relationships deepen and darken, tinged by addiction, success, and pride. Yet their greatest challenge, each comes to realize, is Jude himself, by midlife a terrifyingly talented litigator yet an increasingly broken man, his mind and body scarred by an unspeakable childhood, and haunted by what he fears is a degree of trauma that he’ll not only be unable to overcome—but that will define his life forever.  ]]></description><link>https://westvanlibrary.bibliocommons.com/v2/record/S74C1677068</link><guid isPermaLink="true">https://westvanlibrary.bibliocommons.com/v2/record/S74C1677068</guid><category><![CDATA[BK]]></category><category><![CDATA[eng]]></category><dc:creator><![CDATA[Yanagihara, Hanya]]></dc:creator><pubDate>Sat, 31 Jan 2015 00:00:00 GMT</pubDate><comments>https://westvanlibrary.bibliocommons.com/item/comment/1677068074</comments><format>BK</format><subtitle></subtitle><language>eng</language><image_url>https://secure.syndetics.com/index.aspx?isbn=9780385539258/MC.GIF&amp;client=westp&amp;type=xw12&amp;oclc=</image_url></item><item><title><![CDATA[Thinking, Fast and Slow]]></title><description><![CDATA[Two systems drive the way we think and make choices, Kahneman explains: System One is fast, intuitive, and emotional; System Two is slower, more deliberative, and more logical. Examining how both systems function within the mind, Kahneman exposes the extraordinary capabilities as well as the biases of fast thinking and the pervasive influence of intuitive impressions on our thoughts and our choices. Engaging the reader in a lively conversation about how we think, he shows where we can trust our intuitions and how we can tap into the benefits of slow thinking, contrasting the two-system view of the mind with the standard model of the rational economic agent.]]></description><link>https://westvanlibrary.bibliocommons.com/v2/record/S74C1564614</link><guid isPermaLink="true">https://westvanlibrary.bibliocommons.com/v2/record/S74C1564614</guid><category><![CDATA[BK]]></category><category><![CDATA[eng]]></category><dc:creator><![CDATA[Kahneman, Daniel]]></dc:creator><pubDate>Mon, 31 Jan 2011 00:00:00 GMT</pubDate><comments>https://westvanlibrary.bibliocommons.com/item/comment/1564614074</comments><format>BK</format><subtitle></subtitle><language>eng</language><image_url>https://secure.syndetics.com/index.aspx?isbn=9780385676533/MC.GIF&amp;client=westp&amp;type=xw12&amp;oclc=</image_url></item><item><title><![CDATA[Things Fall Apart]]></title><description><![CDATA["Okonkwo is born into poverty, with a wastrel for a father. Driven by ambition, he works tirelessly to gain the prosperity of many fields and wives and prestige in his village. But he is harsh as well as diligent. As he sees the traditions of his people eroded by white missionaries and government officials, he lashes out in anger."--Container.]]></description><link>https://westvanlibrary.bibliocommons.com/v2/record/S74C1188423</link><guid isPermaLink="true">https://westvanlibrary.bibliocommons.com/v2/record/S74C1188423</guid><category><![CDATA[BK]]></category><category><![CDATA[eng]]></category><dc:creator><![CDATA[Achebe, Chinua]]></dc:creator><pubDate>Fri, 31 Jan 1992 00:00:00 GMT</pubDate><comments>https://westvanlibrary.bibliocommons.com/item/comment/1188423074</comments><format>BK</format><subtitle></subtitle><language>eng</language><image_url>https://secure.syndetics.com/index.aspx?isbn=9780385474542/MC.GIF&amp;client=westp&amp;type=xw12&amp;oclc=</image_url></item><item><title><![CDATA[Anxious People]]></title><description><![CDATA[In a small town in Sweden it appears to be an ordinary day. But look more closely, and you'll see a mysterious masked figure approaching a bank. A bank robber on the run locks himself in with an over-enthusiastic estate agent, two bitter IKEA-addicts, a pregnant woman, a suicidal multi-millionaire and a rabbit. In the end the robber gives up and lets everyone go, but when the police storm the apartment it is empty.  In a series of dysfunctional testimonies after the event, the witnesses all tell their version of what really happened and it's clear we have a classic locked-room mystery on our hands -- How did the robber manage to escape? Why is everyone so angry? And -- What is wrong with people these days?]]></description><link>https://westvanlibrary.bibliocommons.com/v2/record/S74C2062241</link><guid isPermaLink="true">https://westvanlibrary.bibliocommons.com/v2/record/S74C2062241</guid><category><![CDATA[BK]]></category><category><![CDATA[eng]]></category><dc:creator><![CDATA[Backman, Fredrik]]></dc:creator><pubDate>Fri, 31 Jan 2020 00:00:00 GMT</pubDate><comments>https://westvanlibrary.bibliocommons.com/item/comment/2062241074</comments><format>BK</format><subtitle></subtitle><language>eng</language><image_url>https://secure.syndetics.com/index.aspx?isbn=9781982121600/MC.GIF&amp;client=westp&amp;type=xw12&amp;oclc=</image_url></item><item><title><![CDATA[A Thousand Splendid Suns]]></title><description><![CDATA[This is the story of an unusual and lifelong friendship between two Afghan women, spanning from the idyllic mid 1950s to post-September 11 Kabul. Bound by tragedy and fate, by political circumstance and custom, the two women live through the Soviet war, the harrowing days of the Afghan civil war and the rule of the Taliban. Yet even as their world unravels around them and innocence is shattered, they find that there, amidst the ruins, is the possibility for hope, meaning and unexpected grace.]]></description><link>https://westvanlibrary.bibliocommons.com/v2/record/S74C1371132</link><guid isPermaLink="true">https://westvanlibrary.bibliocommons.com/v2/record/S74C1371132</guid><category><![CDATA[BK]]></category><category><![CDATA[eng]]></category><dc:creator><![CDATA[Hosseini, Khaled]]></dc:creator><pubDate>Thu, 31 Jan 2008 00:00:00 GMT</pubDate><comments>https://westvanlibrary.bibliocommons.com/item/comment/1371132074</comments><format>BK</format><subtitle></subtitle><language>eng</language><image_url>https://secure.syndetics.com/index.aspx?isbn=9780670064915/MC.GIF&amp;client=westp&amp;type=xw12&amp;oclc=</image_url></item><item><title><![CDATA[Precipice]]></title><description><![CDATA[Summer 1914. A world on the brink of catastrophe. In London, twenty-six-year-old Venetia Stanley -- aristocratic, clever, bored, reckless -- is part of a fast group of upper-crust bohemians and socialites known as "The Coterie." She's also engaged in a clandestine love affair with the Prime Minister, H. H. Asquith, a man more than twice her age. He writes to her obsessively, sharing the most sensitive matters of state. As Asquith reluctantly leads the country into war with Germany, a young intelligence officer with Scotland Yard is assigned to investigate a leak of top-secret documents. Suddenly, what was a sexual intrigue becomes a matter of national security that could topple the British government -- and will alter the course of political history.]]></description><link>https://westvanlibrary.bibliocommons.com/v2/record/S74C2305177</link><guid isPermaLink="true">https://westvanlibrary.bibliocommons.com/v2/record/S74C2305177</guid><category><![CDATA[BK]]></category><category><![CDATA[eng]]></category><dc:creator><![CDATA[Harris, Robert]]></dc:creator><pubDate>Wed, 31 Jan 2024 00:00:00 GMT</pubDate><comments>https://westvanlibrary.bibliocommons.com/item/comment/2305177074</comments><format>BK</format><subtitle></subtitle><language>eng</language><image_url>https://secure.syndetics.com/index.aspx?isbn=9780735282148/MC.GIF&amp;client=westp&amp;type=xw12&amp;oclc=</image_url></item><item><title><![CDATA[Doppelganger]]></title><description><![CDATA[In Doppelganger, Klein braiding together elements of tragicomic memoir, chilling political reportage, and cobweb-clearing cultural analysis, as she dives deep into what she calls the Mirror World--our destabilized present rife with doubles and confusion, where far right movements playact solidarity with the working class, AI-generated content blurs the line between genuine and spurious, New Age wellness entrepreneurs turned anti-vaxxers further scramble our familiar political allegiances, and so many of us project our own carefully curated digital doubles out into the social media sphere. Klein begins this richly nuanced intellectual adventure story by grappling with her own doppelganger--a fellow author and public intellectual whose views are antithetical to Klein's own, but whose name and public persona are sufficiently similar that many people have confused the two over the years. From there, she turns her gaze both inward to our psychic landscapes--drawing on the work of Sigmund Freud, Jordan Peele, Alfred Hitchcock, and bell hooks, to name a few--and outward, to our intersecting economic, environmental, medical, and political crises. Ultimately seeking to escape the Mirror World and chart a path beyond confusion and despair, Klein delivers a revelatory treatment of the way many of us think and feel now.]]></description><link>https://westvanlibrary.bibliocommons.com/v2/record/S74C2261944</link><guid isPermaLink="true">https://westvanlibrary.bibliocommons.com/v2/record/S74C2261944</guid><category><![CDATA[BK]]></category><category><![CDATA[eng]]></category><dc:creator><![CDATA[Klein, Naomi]]></dc:creator><pubDate>Tue, 31 Jan 2023 00:00:00 GMT</pubDate><comments>https://westvanlibrary.bibliocommons.com/item/comment/2261944074</comments><format>BK</format><subtitle>A Trip Into the Mirror World</subtitle><language>eng</language><image_url>https://secure.syndetics.com/index.aspx?isbn=9781039006898/MC.GIF&amp;client=westp&amp;type=xw12&amp;oclc=</image_url></item><item><title><![CDATA[Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow]]></title><description><![CDATA["On a bitter-cold day, in the December of his junior year at Harvard, Sam Masur exits a subway car and sees, amid the hordes of people waiting on the platform, Sadie Green. He calls her name. For a moment, she pretends she hasn't heard him, but then, she turns, and a game begins: a legendary collaboration that will launch them to stardom. These friends, intimates since childhood, borrow money, beg favors, and, before even graduating college, they have created their first blockbuster, Ichigo. Overnight, the world is theirs. Not even twenty-five years old, Sam and Sadie are brilliant, successful, and rich, but these qualities won't protect them from their own creative ambitions or the betrayals of their hearts. Spanning thirty years, from Cambridge, Massachusetts, to Venice Beach, California, and lands in between and far beyond, Gabrielle Zevin's Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow is a dazzling and intricately imagined novel that examines the multifarious nature of identity, disability, failure, the redemptive possibilities in play, and above all, our need to connect: to be loved and to love. Yes, it is a love story, but it is not one you have read before."--]]></description><link>https://westvanlibrary.bibliocommons.com/v2/record/S74C2203910</link><guid isPermaLink="true">https://westvanlibrary.bibliocommons.com/v2/record/S74C2203910</guid><category><![CDATA[BK]]></category><category><![CDATA[eng]]></category><dc:creator><![CDATA[Zevin, Gabrielle]]></dc:creator><pubDate>Mon, 31 Jan 2022 00:00:00 GMT</pubDate><comments>https://westvanlibrary.bibliocommons.com/item/comment/2203910074</comments><format>BK</format><subtitle></subtitle><language>eng</language><image_url>https://secure.syndetics.com/index.aspx?isbn=9780735243347/MC.GIF&amp;client=westp&amp;type=xw12&amp;oclc=</image_url></item></channel></rss>