Summer Reading 2023

The Fifth Season Novel by N. K. Jemisin

Read with Danielle McReynolds-Dell, Academic Dean

This is the way the world ends. . .for the last time.

It starts with the great red rift across the heart of the world's sole continent, spewing ash that blots out the sun. It starts with death, with a murdered son and a missing daughter. It starts with betrayal, and long dormant wounds rising up to fester.

This is the Stillness, a land long familiar with catastrophe, where the power of the earth is wielded as a weapon. And where there is no mercy.

Read the first book in the critically acclaimed, three-time Hugo award-winning trilogy by NYT bestselling author N. K. Jemisin.

I Keep My Exoskeletons to Myself: A Novel by Marisa Crane

Read with Kristjiana Gong, History and Service Learning

In a United States not so unlike our own, the Department of Balance has adopted a radical new form of law enforcement: rather than incarceration, wrongdoers are given a second (and sometimes, third, fourth, and fifth) shadow as a reminder of their crime. Within the Department, corruption and prejudice run rampant, giving rise to an underclass of so-called Shadesters who are disenfranchised, publicly shamed, and deprived of civil rights protections.

Kris is a Shadester and a new mother. Grieving the loss of her wife and thoroughly unprepared for the reality of raising a child alone, she teeters on the edge of collapse. As the kid grows, Kris finds her footing, raising a child whose irrepressible spark cannot be dampened by the harsh realities of the world. She can’t forget her wife, but she can make a new life for herself and the kid, supported by a community of fellow misfits who defy the Department to lift one another up in solidarity and hope.

Legends & Lattes: A Novel of High Fantasy and Low Stakes by Travis Baldree 

Read with Mischa Lassow, Math

After a lifetime of bounties and bloodshed, Viv is hanging up her sword for the last time.

The battle-weary orc aims to start fresh, opening the first ever coffee shop in the city of Thune. But old and new rivals stand in the way of success ― not to mention the fact that no one has the faintest idea what coffee actually is.

If Viv wants to put the blade behind her and make her plans a reality, she won't be able to go it alone.

But the true rewards of the uncharted path are the travelers you meet along the way. And whether drawn together by ancient magic, flaky pastry, or a freshly brewed cup, they may become partners, family, and something deeper than she ever could have dreamed.

Manga Genre Group

Read with Paris Cardenas, Library Leader

Choose the manga of your choice to discuss with fellow manga fans in the fall. Not sure where to start? See recommendations below or get in touch with Paris.

From Bookriot: Manga, manga, manga! There’s so much manga to read. The options available in English have never been more plentiful and diverse than now. But if you’re delving into manga for the first time, maybe you don’t want to start with an epic, unfinished saga. (No shade, One Piece. You have your place in manga history, and no one will dispute that, but with 100 volumes released in Japan and 98 of those available in English, we can’t pretend the length hasn’t become a barrier to entry for folks new to the format.) That said, maybe you’ve read a few standalone, single-volume manga and want to try something longer. What are the best completed manga series out there? Click here for recommendations.

A Psalm for the Wild-Built by Becky Chambers

Read with Jo de Pirul, Library 

It's been centuries since the robots of Panga gained self-awareness and laid down their tools; centuries since they wandered, en masse, into the wilderness, never to be seen again; centuries since they faded into myth and urban legend.

One day, the life of a tea monk is upended by the arrival of a robot, there to honor the old promise of checking in. The robot cannot go back until the question of "what do people need?" is answered.

But the answer to that question depends on who you ask, and how.

They're going to need to ask it a lot.

Becky Chambers's new series asks: in a world where people have what they want, does having more matter?

This Poison Heart by Kalynn Bayron

Read with Laura Hawkins (Math) and Ruthann Betkey (History)

Briseis has a gift: with a single touch she can grow plants from tiny seeds to rich blooms.

When Briseis’s aunt dies and wills her a dilapidated estate in rural New York, Bri and her parents hope that surrounded by plants and flowers, she will finally learn to control her gift. But their new home is sinister in ways they never expected―it comes with a mysterious set of instructions, a walled garden filled with the deadliest botanicals in the world, and generations of secrets. There is more to Bri’s sudden inheritance than she could have imagined, and she is determined to uncover it.

Vagabonds!: a novel by Eloghosa Osunde

Read with Courtney Rein, English

Eloghosa Osunde's brave, fiercely inventive novel traces a wild array of characters for whom life itself is a form of resistance: a driver for a debauched politician with the power to command life and death; a legendary fashion designer who gives birth to a grown daughter; a lesbian couple whose tender relationship sheds unexpected light on their experience with underground sex work; a wife and mother who attends a secret spiritual gathering that shifts her world. As their lives intertwine, vagabonds are seized and challenged by spirits who command the city's dark energy. Whether running from danger, meeting with secret lovers, finding their identities, or vanquishing their shadowselves, Osunde's characters confront and support one another, before converging for the once-in-a-lifetime gathering that gives the book its unexpectedly joyous conclusion.

Batman: The Long Halloween by Jeph Loeb (Author), Tim Sale (Illustrator)

Read with Lingerr Senghor, English and Journalism

Christmas. St. Patrick's Day. Easter. As the calendar's days stack up, so do the bodies littered in the streets of Gotham City. A murderer is loose, killing only on holidays. The only man that can stop this fiend? The Dark Knight. In a mystery taking place during Batman's early days of crime fighting, Batman: The Long Halloween is one of the greatest Dark Knight stories ever told.

Working with District Attorney Harvey Dent and Lieutenant James Gordon, Batman races against the calendar as he tries to discover who Holiday is before he claims his next victim each month. A mystery that has the reader continually guessing the identity of the killer, this story also ties into the events that transform Harvey Dent into Batman's deadly enemy, Two-Face.