Book Recommendations from Readers like You

Today's blog post features book recommendations from readers like you: two new releases in well-established mystery series, a fantastic Pulitzer prize winning novel, a romance, the first novel in a new WW2 saga, a reimagining of the Shadow, and a timely nonfiction book by a Missoula based author. Read on for some great titles you may want to add to your Summer Reading list.

So Shall You Reap by Donna Leon (2023)
On a cold November evening, Guido Brunetti and Paola are up late when a call from his colleague Ispettore Vianello arrives, alerting the Commissario that a hand has been seen in one of Venice's canals. The body is soon found, and Brunetti is assigned to investigate the murder of an undocumented Sri Lankan immigrant. Because no official record of the man's presence in Venice exists, Brunetti is forced to use the city's far richer sources of information: gossip and the memories of people who knew the victim. Curiously, he had been living in a small house on the grounds of a palazzo owned by a university professor, in which Brunetti discovers books revealing the victim's interest in Buddhism, the revolutionary Tamil Tigers, and the last crop of Italian political terrorists, active in the 1980s. As the investigation expands, Brunetti, Vianello, Commissario Griffoni, and Signora Elettra each assemble pieces of a puzzle--random information about real estate and land use, books, university friendships--that appear to have little in common, until Brunetti stumbles over something that transports him back to his own student days, causing him to reflect on lost ideals and the errors of youth, on Italian politics and history, and on the accidents that sometimes lead to revelation.
Find it in the library catalog Here
Also available for digital checkout:
Montana Library2Go/Libby app eBook 
Hoopla eBook 
Read more about the author Here

Someone Else's Shoes by Jojo Moyes (2023)

Who are you when you are forced to walk in someone else's shoes? Nisha Cantor lives the globetrotting life of the seriously wealthy, until her husband announces a divorce and cuts her off. Nisha is determined to hang onto her glamorous life. But in the meantime, she must scramble to cope--she doesn't even have the shoes she was, until a moment ago, standing in. That's because Sam Kemp - in the bleakest point of her life - has accidentally taken Nisha's gym bag. But Sam hardly has time to worry about a lost gym bag--she's struggling to keep herself and her family afloat. When she tries on Nisha's six-inch high Christian Louboutin red crocodile shoes, the resulting jolt of confidence that makes her realize something must change--and that thing is herself. Full of Jojo Moyes' signature humor, brilliant storytelling, and warmth, Someone Else's Shoes is a story about how just one little thing can suddenly change everything.
Find it in the library catalog Here
Also available for digital checkout:
Montana Library2Go/Libby app eBook and audiobook
Read more about the author Here

 

 

Dead on Target by M.C. Beaton; R. W. Green (2023)

Beloved New York Times bestseller M. C. Beaton's cranky, crafty Agatha Raisin--the star of her own hit T.V. series--is back on the case again in Dead on Target. A visit to the local village fete for a spot of fun and relaxation turns into a nightmare for Agatha Raisin when she discovers the body of the local landowner in the woods―with an arrow in his chest and trousers round his ankles. Agatha's old adversary, Detective Chief Inspector Wilkes, declares the death a tragic accident, believing the victim has been hit by a stray arrow from an archery demonstration. Agatha is convinced of foul play, however, and is shocked when Wilkes eventually agrees...with her as his prime murder suspect. Determined to clear her name and find the real killer, Agatha launches her own investigation, quickly becoming involved with a family at war, an unscrupulous gangster―and a killer who is determined to make her the next victim...

Dead on Target's release date is in September 2023, place a hold on this book Here
Find more titles in the Agatha Raisin series, as well as DVD TV series in the catalog Here
Also available for digital checkout:
Montana Library2Go/Libby app eBooks and audiobooks
Hoopla audiobooks and TV series
Read more about the author and the Agatha Raisin series Here

 

 

Tenacious Beasts by Christopher J. Preston  (2023)         NONFICTION

An inspiring look at wildlife species that are defying the odds and teaching important lessons about how to share a planet. The news about wildlife is dire--more than 900 species have been wiped off the planet since industrialization. Against this bleak backdrop, however, there are also glimmers of hope and crucial lessons to be learned from animals that have defied global trends toward extinction. Bear in Italy, bison in North America, whales in the Atlantic. These populations are back from the brink, some of them in numbers unimaginable in a century. How has this happened? What shifts in thinking did it demand? In crisp, transporting prose, Christopher Preston reveals the mysteries and challenges at the heart of these resurgences. Drawing on compelling personal stories from the researchers, Indigenous people, and activists who know the creatures best, Preston weaves together a gripping narrative of how some species are taking back vital, ecological roles. Each section of the book--farms, prairies, rivers, forests, oceans--offers a philosophical shift in how humans ought to think about animals, passionately advocating for the changes in attitude necessary for wildlife recovery. Tenacious Beasts is quintessential nature writing for the Anthropocene, touching on different facets of ecological restoration from Indigenous knowledge to rewilding practices. More important, perhaps, the book offers a road map--and a measure of hope--for a future in which humans and animals can once again coexist.

Find it in the library catalog Here
Read more about the author Here