Book picks similar to
Everything Is Totally Fine by Zac Smith


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Dopeworld: Adventures in the Global Drug Trade


Niko Vorobyov - 2019
    After I got out of jail, I was determined to find out more about how the issue of drugs not only landed me there, but has shaped the entire world: wars, scandals, coups, revolutions. I read every book, watched every documentary. I saved up to buy plane tickets. I went to Colombia, Mexico, Russia, Italy, Japan and the Afghan border—all in all, fifteen countries across five continents. Call me Narco Polo. Just as Anthony Bourdain's No Reservations did for the world of food, Dopeworld is an intoxicating journey into the world of drugs. From the cocaine farms in South America to the streets of Manila, Dopeworld traces the emergence of psychoactive substances and our intimate relationship with them. As a former drug dealer turned subversive scholar, with unparalleled access to drug lords, cartel leaders, street dealers and government officials, journalist Niko Vorobyov attempts to shine a light on the dark underbelly of the drug world. At once a bold piece of journalism and a hugely entertaining travelogue, Dopeworld is a brilliant and enlightening journey across the world, revealing how drug use is at the heart of our history, our lives, and our future.

Silent Approach


Bobby Cole - 2017
    When he accepts a position with the Mississippi Choctaw Nation as their cultural liaison, he is tasked with one job: to track down and reclaim the tribe’s stolen artifacts dug up from sacred ground and sold on the black market.John Allen’s investigation leads him to crooked publisher Winston Walker, who’s using these priceless antiquities to prop himself up after a wealth-wasting divorce. Racing against time, John Allen finds a cache of treasures stolen thirty years ago that may hold the key to an unsolved murder and mysterious disappearance. Along the way, he teams up with FBI agent Emma Haden, who is also investigating Walker and who stirs unexpected feelings in John Allen.But the desperate Walker won’t go quietly, and the closer John Allen gets to the truth and the proof that will put Walker away, the closer he may come to being buried himself.

The Circle


Stephen J. Galgon - 2019
    The power to control law enforcement, politicians at the highest levels, the judicial system as a whole. To have what you want when you want it, whatever it is. All you have to do is kill someone . . . before someone kills you. MEMBERS of THE CIRCLE don’t have to imagine such a life. They live it. The liberation of being both hunter and hunted. The salvation that comes with such freedom. A chance to feel truly alive. A chance to savor each precious moment. Because in THE CIRCLE any moment could be your last. DOUGLAS GOODWIN isn’t rich. He isn’t powerful. What could the sacred society of THE CIRCLE possibly want with him—just a regular guy with a regular job leading a regular life? What would drive them to coerce a young man who has always valued integrity over hedonism into their midst? And why would Doug agree to submersion in a world of secrecy and murder? It’s unthinkable. THE HARSH REALITY? Doug has been inducted into an institution where friends become enemies overnight, loyalty is a nothing more than a punchline, and conscience is a burden. Where he will be hunted and expected to hunt other members to their death. With no escape from THE CIRCLE’s ubiquitous influence and domination. HOW FAR WILL DOUG GO? How much will he sacrifice to preserve his way of life? Will he be swayed by the money, the women, the power? Or will THE CIRCLE consume him, as it has hundreds of others before him, and leave nothing but another nameless corpse in its wake?

The Sin Soldiers


Tracy Auerbach - 2019
    Yellow exhausts them. Blue drives them into a state of ravenous addiction. The thief Kai knows about the chemically controlled soldiers of the Eastern forces and their savage, deadly nature. When a robbery attempt at Club Seven goes wrong, Kai is captured by a handler and his bestial soldier-boy. She wakes up inside the military base with no idea what happened to her twin brother, Dex.Things go from bad to worse when Kai is started on a drug and training regimen, and forced to take injections of blue compound. The scientists in charge plan to make her into a working soldier who will mine the mysterious power crystals beneath the desert. Kai becomes a victim of the bully Finn, a handsome but nasty soldier whose years on red compound seem to have erased his humanity. Still, she begins to pity the Seven Soldiers, including the monstrous boy who tried to rip her to shreds at the club. They appear to be nothing more than genetically enhanced, drug-controlled teenagers.On the outside, Dex and his tech-savvy boyfriend try to crack the soldiers’ chemical code to find a weakness that will break the system. But Kai has already been drawn deep into her new world. Strong feelings for the soldiers she’s come to know have started to cloud her judgment. Can she escape and find Dex without becoming a monster herself?

Northern Light: Power, Land, and the Memory of Water


Kazim Ali - 2021
    We belong to them."The child of South Asian migrants, Kazim Ali was born in London, lived as a child in the cities and small towns of Manitoba, and made a life in the United States. As a man passing through disparate homes, he has never felt he belonged to a place. And yet, one day, the celebrated poet and essayist finds himself thinking of the boreal forests and lush waterways of Jenpeg, a community thrown up around the building of a hydroelectric dam on the Nelson River, where he once lived for several years as a child. Does the town still exist, he wonders? Is the dam still operational?When Ali goes searching, however, he finds not news of Jenpeg, but of the local Pimicikamak community. Facing environmental destruction and broken promises from the Canadian government, they have evicted Manitoba's electric utility from the dam on Cross Lake. In a place where water is an integral part of social and cultural life, the community demands accountability for the harm that the utility has caused.Troubled, Ali returns north, looking to understand his place in this story and eager to listen. Over the course of a week, he participates in community life, speaks with Elders and community members, and learns about the politics of the dam from Chief Cathy Merrick. He drinks tea with activists, eats corned beef hash with the Chief, and learns about the history of the dam, built on land that was never ceded, and Jenpeg, a town that now exists mostly in his memory. In building relationships with his former neighbors, Ali explores questions of land and power―and in remembering a lost connection to this place, finally finds a home he might belong to.

The Animal Rescue Agency #1: Case File: Little Claws


Eliot Schrefer - 2022
    Pepper. Meeting the blustery old rooster changed her heart, convincing her to turn from a life of crime and instead form the Animal Rescue Agency, which masterminds rescue operations across the globe.Esquire and her unlikely chicken business manager coordinate their far-flung agents to get them to the Arctic. In that frozen land they learn that what happened to the polar bear cub was no accident--and that saving him will pit them against the scariest predator in the world: a human.

The Counsellor


Gillian Jackson - 2012
    Struggling to make sense of her grief, it becomes evident that a complete change and a positive focus is the only thing which will help her to carry on with life. Training as a therapeutic counsellor provides this focus, bringing her into contact with people who desperately need her help. Julie and her children are living in fear of an abusive husband, Janet is crumbling under the weight of a secret she has kept for over forty years, and Karen has never recovered from her mother’s violent death. Maggie is drawn into her client’s problems as she seeks to empower them to move on with their lives. And then she is faced with her own ethical dilemma when she meets Peter...

Perfect Little Flaws


Jennifer Ann Shore - 2021
    Even my parents mention him in hushed, angry whispers, fearful he’s going to shatter my brother’s records and destroy the legacy left behind when he died.However, I avoid Vince Novak at all costs, hiding from him and the rest of the world behind my camera lens. But my best laid plans—and photos—are nearly ruined when my tangible disinterest in his existence intrigues him.The more time we spend together, the more his little flaws peek out beneath the layers of perfection and break down the walls I’ve built around my heart.

Shattered Princess


Amber Vant - 2022
    The elites run this town, but they aren’t ready for a girl like me.Especially the boys who made it known from the beginning I wasn’t wanted here that one summer I stayed with my father. I hadn’t belonged—I knew that—but now I was coming back. Forced into the one place I despised after my addict mother unexpectedly dies. Only months before my eighteenth birthday.The worst of them all is my half-brother’s best friend. The leader of the group. The oppressor, my enemy. Those hate-fueled cerulean eyes still haunt me in my dreams. He thinks he can break me, but what he doesn’t know is I’ve already been shattered.I hope they’re ready because I wasn’t the obedient, delicate person they remembered. It’s my turn to watch them simmer. Welcome to the world of the hellhounds.You’ll hate it here.SHATTERED PRINCESS is a full-length new adult high school enemies-to-lovers novel. It is the first book in the Hardin Hellhounds Series and does end in a cliffhanger.

Let's Never Talk About This Again: A Memoir


Sara Faith Alterman - 2020
    But Sara's world changed for the icky when she discovered that Ira had been shielding her from the truth: that he was a campy sex writer who'd sold millions of books in multiple languages, including the wildly popular Games You Can Play with Your Pussy. Which was, to the naïve Sara's horror, not a book about cats. For decades the books remained an unspoken family secret, until Ira developed early onset Alzheimer's disease . . . and announced he'd be reviving his writing career. With Sara's help. In this cringeworthy, hilarious, and moving memoir, Sara shares the profound experience of discovering new facets of her father; once as a child, and again as an adult. Let's Never Talk About This Again is a must-read confessional from a woman who spent years trying to find humor in the perverse and optimism in the darkness, and succeeded.

How to Kill Your Best Friend


Lexie ElliottLexie Elliott - 2021
    How can it be true that Lissa, the strongest swimmer they know, drowned? Granted, there is something strange about Kanu Cove, where Lissa was last seen, swimming off the coast of the fabulous island resort she owned with her husband.Lissa's closest friends gather at the resort to honor her life, but Georgie and Bron can't seem to stop looking over their shoulders. Danger lurks beneath the surface of the crystal-clear water, and even their luxurious private villas can't help them feel safe. As the weather turns ominous, trapping the funeral guests together on the island, nobody knows who they can trust. Lissa's death was only the beginning....

Calder Brand


Janet Dailey - 2021
    The Calder family patriarch is known throughout Montana as a formidable adversary—a force no one in his right mind would cross. But sometimes love can make a man do crazy things . . . Ambition drove Joe Dollarhide across the parched plains from Fort Sam Houston to Dodge City. One day, he was determined to have a spread every bit as vast and impressive as his employers’. But when a wild stampede separates him from the cattle drive, it is survival that keeps him going when most would have given up. Survival and a burning need to settle the score with Benteen Calder, the cattle boss he used to worship, the man who’d left him for dead… Hope buoyed Sarah Foxworth when she had just five dollars to her name, traveling the dusty rails where Joe first rescued her from a violent attack, then won her heart as a cowboy in need of redemption. With dreams of becoming a doctor herself one day, she uses all her wits to save her uncle’s medical practice and his reputation. But it’s her own reputation that suffers when she gives birth to an illegitimate baby. Years later, when Sarah walks into Joe’s world once more, he’s shaken to the core. Her dreams of becoming a doctor are dashed; her only hope is to find a better life for herself and her son—a child there’s no denying is his own. Now a prosperous rancher, Joe yearns to finally make a home with Sarah and their boy. Only Joe’s own road to riches has been strewn with obstacles, some looming even larger than the demons he still struggles against. But life has also shown Joe that nothing worth having ever comes easy. And that Sarah is a woman worth fighting for…

The Necklace


Matt WittenMatt Witten - 2021
    Even worse, her prime suspect has a young daughter who's at terrible risk. With no money and no time to spare, Susan sets out to uncover the truth before an innocent man gets executed and another little girl is killed.But the FBI refuses to reopen the case. They—and Susan's own mother—believe she's just having an emotional breakdown. Reaching deep, Susan finds an inner strength she never knew she had. With the help of two unlikely allies—a cynical, defiant teenage girl and the retired cop who made the original arrest—Susan battles the FBI to put the real killer behind bars. Will she win justice for the condemned man—and her daughter—at last?

Human++


Dima Zales - 2016
     With billions in the bank and my own venture capital firm, I’m living the American dream. My only problem? A car accident that leaves my mother with memory problems. Brainocytes, a new technology that can transform our brains, could be the answer to all of my problems—but I’m not the only one who sees its potential. Plunged into a criminal underworld darker than anything I could’ve imagined, my life-saving technology might be the death of me. My name is Mike Cohen, and this is how I became more than human.

Other Kinds


Dylan Nice - 2012
    They are stories about the woods, houses hidden in the gaps between mountains. Behind them, the skeletons of old and powerful machines rust into the slate and leaves. Water red with iron leeches from the empty mines and pools near a stone foundation. The boy there plays in the bones because he is a child and this will be his childhood. He watches while winter comes falling slowly down over the road. Sometimes he remembers a girl, her hair and the perfume she wore. These are stories about her and where she might have gone. He waits for sleep because in the next story he will leave. The boy watches an airplane blink red past his window. From here, you can't hear its violence.