Kim Keith's Picks

January 2013: With a voice like the comedian, David Sedaris, Gilman delivers a glorious memoir of 'growing up' in New York in the 70s with hippie parents and a longing for becoming a princess, or an angel, or a ballerina, or a primadona or anything else where she is allowed to wear a tutu. She divides the book into three sections, which are representative of the stages of her life up to her late 20s. Starting at her early childhood in Part 1, "Grape Juice and Humiliation," moving into adolescence in Part 2: "Not Just Horny, But Obnoxious, Too." and Part 3: "Reality Says Hello," moves us through her awkward transition into adulthood and the responsibility it brings. In her telling memoir Gilman puts forth a kind of feminism that encourages women to both acknowledge their own mistakes, and learn to let them go.

The newest novel by Robert Goolrick, author of the New York Times #1 Best Seller, A Reliable Wife is “Heading Out to Wonderful”. It is a humane tale, filled with generous people who want to do the right thing, and maintains accuracy in depicting a sense of place in a by-gone era. It explores themes of sin and forgiveness, secrets and lies, memory and forgetfulness. An unsettling yet realistic novel that is ripe with discussion points.

The quote surrounding this book is "If Willa Cather and Gabriel Garcia Marquez had collaborated on a book, The Snow Child would be it. Eowyn Ivey is a bookseller at an independent store in Alaska, and her debut novel has rocked the indie bookselling world. Set in the 1920s in rural Alaska, it follows a couple who wish for a child, but never get one. One day, they build a little girl out of snow. The next morning, their snow girl has vanished but a new character, Faina appears on the scene. From here, the book becomes a fable or a fairy tale, guaranteed to grab readers who enjoyed Marquez's One Hundred Years of Solitude or Ali Shaw's The Girl with Glass Feet.