Book picks similar to
Almanac for the Sleepless by Karin Gottshall


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I Am Not Your Final Girl


Claire C. Holland - 2018
    Holland, a timely collection of poetry that follows the final girl of slasher cinema - the girl who survives until the end - on a journey of retribution and reclamation. From the white picket fences of 1970s Haddonfield to the apocalyptic end of the world, Holland confronts the role of women in relation to subjects including feminism, violence, motherhood, sexuality, and assault in the world of Trump and the MeToo movement. Each poem centers on a fictional character from horror cinema, and explores the many ways in which women find empowerment through their own perceived monstrousness.

The White Book


Han Kang - 2016
    THE WHITE BOOK becomes a meditation on the color white, as well as a fictional journey inspired by an older sister who died in her mother's arms, a few hours old. The narrator grapples with the tragedy that has haunted her family, an event she colors in stark white--breast milk, swaddling bands, the baby's rice cake-colored skin--and, from here, visits all that glows in her memory: from a white dog to sugar cubes.As the writer reckons with the enormity of her sister's death, Han Kang's trademark frank and chilling prose is softened by retrospection, introspection, and a deep sense of resilience and love. THE WHITE BOOK--ultimately a letter from Kang to her sister--offers powerful philosophy and personal psychology on the tenacity and fragility of the human spirit, and our attempts to graft new life from the ashes of destruction.

McGill's Short Cases 1-3


Joseph Flynn - 2013
    Life and death cases. One case, solving the murder of Patricia Darden Grant’s first husband, might even have changed the course of American history. But not every investigation is epic in scope. There are short cases, too.This is the first collection of three such cases. In Found Money, political enemies of the president — McGill’s wife — try to concoct a scandal by making McGill look corrupt. If McGill is going to stop them, he’ll have to turn things around overnight. In Lost Dog, a little girl wants McGill to find her missing pooch. Only the kid is the daughter of a Russian diplomat, and the Chinese might be involved, too. If McGill isn’t careful, he might step in something nasty. In Pins & Needles, McGill is asked to help a first-round NFL draft choice who put himself on the wrong side of voodoo queen. To come out on top in this one, he’ll have to steal the woman’s juju.Sometimes, you’ll want a lot of McGill.Other times you’ll find good things come in short cases.

downloadhelveticaforfree.com


Steve Roggenbuck - 2011
    100 lines from the author's MSN messenger chat history, set in large bold helvetica.

Snow Soldiers


Carrie Crafton - 2012
    A husband she loved, two little boys that were the center of her life, and even a mother-in-law who adored her. So why was she being packed up and shipped off from her home in Ireland back to her own country? Was it really up to everybody else to tell her she needed to find herself again?But, when she's reunited with her best friend and the other women in her life she left behind, the key to the person she once was dangles in front of her enticingly. Will she be able to reach out and grab it?

The Morning They Came for Us: Dispatches from Syria


Janine Di Giovanni - 2016
    It would mark the beginning of a long relationship with the country, starting with her coverage of the peaceful uprising and continuing as the situation quickly turned into one of the most brutal, internecine conflicts in recent history. Drawn to the stories of the ordinary people caught up in the conflict, Syria came to consume her every moment, her every emotion.Speaking to those directly involved in the war, di Giovanni relays here the personal stories of rebel fighters thrown in jail at the least provocation; of children and families forced to watch loved ones taken and killed by regime forces with dubious justifications; and the stories of the elite, holding pool parties in Damascus hotels, trying to deny the human consequences of the nearby shelling.Delivered with passion, fearlessness and sensitivity, The Morning They Came For Us is an unflinching account of a nation on the brink of disintegration, charting an apocalyptic but at times tender story of life in a jihadist war – and an unforgettable testament to human resilience in the face of devastating, unimaginable horrors.

Morning Glory on the Vine: Early Songs and Drawings


Joni Mitchell - 2019
    For this stunningly beautiful book, Joni hand-wrote an exquisite selection of her own lyrics and poems and illustrated them with more than thirty of her original pictures. Handcrafted, signed, and numbered in Los Angeles, the existing copies of this labor of love have rarely been seen in the past half-century.      Now, during Joni’s seventy-fifth birthday year, Morning Glory on the Vine: Early Songs and Drawings will be widely available for the first time. In this faithfully reproduced edition, Joni’s best-loved lyrics and poems spill across the pages in her own elegant script. The lively, full-color drawings depict a superb array of landscapes, still lifes, portraits of friends, self-portraits, innovative abstractions, and more. All the artwork from the original book is included, along with several additional pictures that Joni drew of her friends from the same period. Finally, the refreshed volume features an original introduction written by Joni. Morning Glory on the Vine is a gorgeous and intimate keepsake and an invitation to explore anew the dazzling, visionary world of Joni Mitchell.

Guarding Hanna


Miha Mazzini - 2000
    But when Hanna Woyczik becomes the key witness in a pivotal court case, he is called on to perform the most difficult task imaginable: to move in with and guard the woman for an entire week.

How to Be Australian


Ashley Kalagian Blunt - 2020
    After all,Australia’s just Canada with more sunshine and strange animals, right?But they soon discover things aren’t so simple. Steve struggles to settle and Ashley fears he will come to regret both the move and the marriage – especially after she loses her wedding rings on Bondi Beach. Baffled, homesick and increasingly anxious (in a land renowned for ‘no worries’), she is preparing to return to Canada when Steve shockingly announces that he wants to stay in Australia. Forever.For the sake of her marriage and her happiness, Ashley must find an Australia she can belong to: she decides to travel the country, learn its history, decode its cultural quirks and connect with as many residents as she can meet. How to Be Australian is a remarkable memoir, at once familiar and faraway, that shines a fresh, funny and fascinating light onto the country we think we know.

Knockout


John Jodzio - 2016
    Some readers noticed his nimble blending of humor with painful truths reminded them of George Saunders. His creativity and fresh voice reminded others of Wells Tower's Everything Ravaged, Everything Burned. But with his new collection, Jodzio creates a class of his own.Knockout is the unified collection of stories that create flawless portraits of deeply flawed figures on the edge of the American Dream. A recovering drug addict gets tricked into stealing a tiger. A man buys a used sex chair from his neighbor. A woman suffering from agoraphobia raises her son completely indoors. An alcoholic runs a bed and breakfast with the son from his deceased wife's first marriage. These people will admit that their chances have passed them by. These people know they were born on the wrong side of the tracks, and their dreams will remain unreachable, but that doesn't stop them from dreaming. Yet readers won’t be fooled by the funny premises —Jodzio steers these stories into deeper places, creating a brilliant examination of those on the fringes of modern life.With its quirky humor, compelling characters, and unexpected sincerity, Knockout by John Jodzio is poised to become his breakout book, drawing a wide readership to this provocative and talented young writer.

I Dreamed You


Justine Avery - 2020
    I Dreamed You gives a voice to the feelings so difficult to express and so important to share.Award-winning and beloved children's author Justine Avery thoughtfully, reverently expresses the sentiments behind welcoming a child into our lives, whether we're a grandparent, adopting parent, step-parent, sibling, or anyone else blessed with a cherished young one.

See You In The Morning


Mairead Case - 2015
    Rosie is a mystic romantic whose dad earned so much money writing screenplays that she doesn’t need an after-school job. John, Rosie’s ex, works at the roller rink in a rabbit costume and takes care of his mom when she's tired after a day cutting hair. The narrator works at a bookstore and sometimes focuses so hard on their reading that they see polka dots take over the room. John is the narrator's best and oldest friend, so now the two of them must be in love, right? Because if they aren't, why stay in town? But if they aren't, who else will ever understand? What is love and how does it work? See You In the Morning happens at diners and house shows, in paragraph-shaped poems, and the narrator's angry, tender, colorful voice.

The Little House


Philippa Gregory - 1996
    She married the man she loved, bore him two children and made a home for him which was the envy of their friends.It was harder for Ruth. She married Elizabeth’s son and then found that, somehow, she could never quite measure up…Isolation, deceit and betrayal fill the gaps between the two individual women and between their different worlds. In this complex thriller, Philippa Gregory deploys all her insight into what women want and what women fear, as Ruth confronts the shifting borders of her own sanity. Laying bare the comfortable conventions of rural England, this spine-tingling novel pulses with suspense until the whiplash double-twist of the denouement.

Midnight Bet


Jodi Thomas - 2015
    Still, the biggest danger is losing their hearts—Rick to an old flame and Lizzy to an old friend she’d never noticed before…PREVIOUSLY PUBLISHED IN THE ANTHOLOGY ASK ME WHY?

Ghostbird


Carol Lovekin - 2016
    Someone needs to forgive.‘Charming, quirky, magical’ Joanne HarrisNothing hurts like not knowing who you are.Nobody will tell Cadi anything about her father and her sister. Her mother Violet believes she can only cope with the past by never talking about it. Lili, Cadi’s aunt, is stuck in the middle, bound by a promise she shouldn’t have made. But this summer, Cadi is determined to find out the truth.In a world of hauntings and magic, in a village where it rains throughout August, as Cadi starts on her search, the secrets and the ghosts begin to wake up. None of the Hopkins women will be able to escape them.‘Carol Lovekin’s prose is full of beautifully strange poetry.’Rebecca Mascull, author of The Visitors and Song of the Sea Maid.‘Drawing on nature, witchcraft, age-old fairytales and secrets, Lovekin weaves a powerful, spellbinding tale.’Judith Kinghorn, author of The Last Summer.