New Fiction – November 2008

       

FIC                       Adiga, Aravind. 

ADIGA                 The white tiger : a novel.  2008       

                                    When he relocates to New Delhi to take a new job, Balram Halwai is disillusioned

                                    by the city's materialism and technology-spawned violence, a circumstance that

                                    forces him to question his loyalties, ambitions, and past.

             

 FIC                      Anderson, Laurie Halse. 

ANDERSON         Chains : seeds of America.  2008.

                                    After being sold to a cruel couple in New York City, a slave named Isabel spies

                                    for the rebels during the Revolutionary War.     

           

FIC                       Barry, Sebastian, 1955- 

BARRY                The secret scripture : a novel.  2008.

                                    Recording the events of her life from a mental hospital as her hundredth birthday

                                    approaches, Roseanne McNulty considers returning to society when she learns

                                    that the hospital is about to close.

    

FIC                       Bruchac, Joseph, 1942- 

BRUCHAC           Code Talker : a novel about the Navajo Marines of World War Two.

                             2005.       

                                    After being taught in a boarding school run by whites that Navajo is a useless

                                    language, Ned Begay and other Navajo men are recruited by the Marines to

                                    become Code Talkers, sending messages during World War II in their native tongue.

             

FIC                       Chen, Da, 1962- 

CHEN                   Sword : a novel.  2008.       

                                    When Miu Miu turns fifteen, she learns the truth about her father's violent death

                                    and discovers that she must avenge his murder before she can marry the man to

                                    whom she is betrothed.

  

FIC                       Clements, Andrew, 1949- 

CLEMENTS         Things that are.  2008.        

                                    Alicia, who is still adjusting to being blind, must outwit an invisible man who is

                                    putting her family and her boyfriend, who was once invisible himself, in danger.

 

FIC                       Coelho, Paulo. 

COELHO              Brida : a novel.  2008.       

                                    Follows the journey of Brida, a beautiful young Irish girl, on a quest for

                                    knowledge and understanding as she encounters a wise man who teaches her how

                                    to overcome her fears and a woman who introduces her to the hidden music of the

                                    world.

    

FIC                       Cohn, Rachel.

COHN                  You know where to find me.  2008.       

                                    In the wake of her cousin's suicide, overweight and introverted Miles experiences

                                    significant changes in her relationships with her mother and father, her best friend

                                    and his family, and her cousin's father.

        

FIC                       Collins, Suzanne.

COLLINS             The Hunger Games.  2008.

                                     In a future North America, where the rulers of Panem maintain control through a

                                    televised survival competition pitting young people against one another, sixteen-

                                    year-old Katniss's skills are put to the test when she voluntarily takes her younger

                                    sister's place.                                       

             

FIC                       Cooney, Caroline B. 

COONEY             Enter three witches : a story of Macbeth.  2007.

                                    When her father betrays the Scottish king and is hung as a traitor, Lady Mary's

                                    future is bleak after she loses her only true protector and ends up locked away in

                                    the tower by the powerful and deadly Lord and Lady Macbeth.

              

FIC                       Craig, Colleen, 1956- 

CRAIG                 Afrika.  2007.                 

                                    Thirteen-year-old Kim learns the truth about her father and her mother's homeland

                                    after visiting South Africa, where she meets relatives and other children her age

                                    and witnesses the Truth and Reconciliation Hearings.

 

FIC                       Dessen, Sarah.                         

DESSEN               Someone like you.  1998.

                                    Halley's junior year of high school includes the death of her best friend Scarlett's

                                    boyfriend, the discovery that Scarlett is pregnant, and Halley's own first serious

                                    relationship.

    

FIC                       Deuker, Carl. 

DEUKER              Gym candy.  2007.         

                                    Football is the only thing that has ever really mattered to Mick Johnson, who

                                    works hard for a spot on the varsity team his freshman year, then tries to hold

                                    onto his edge by using steroids, despite the consequences to his health and social

                                    life.

                   

FIC                       Garigliano, Jeff. 

GARIGLIANO     Dogface : a novel.  2008.

                             Obsessed with all things military, fourteen-year-old Loren finds himself  

                                    incarcerated at Camp Ascend!, a facility to whip mixed-up teenagers back into

                                    shape, after an attempt to vandalize a local golf course.   

           

FIC                       Goldman, Steven, 1964- 

GOLDMAN          Two parties, one tux, and a very short film about the Grapes of wrath.

                             2008.

                                    Mitch, a shy and awkward high school junior, negotiates the difficult social

                                    situations he encounters, both with girls and with his best friend David, after

                                    David reveals to him that he is gay.

 

FIC                       Hoffman, Alice.

HOFFMAN           The third angel : a novel.  2008. 

                                    Follows the lives of three women in love with the wrong men--Madeleine Heller,

                                    attracted to her sister's fiancé; Frieda Lewis, the muse to an ill-fated rock star; and

                                    Bryn Evans, engaged to be married but secretly obsessed with her ex-husband.

    

FIC                       Hornby, Nick.

HORNBY             Slam.  2007.

                                    At the age of fifteen, Sam Jones's girlfriend gets pregnant and Sam's life of

                                    skateboarding and daydreaming about Tony Hawk changes drastically.

           

FIC                       James, Brian, 1976- 

JAMES                 Zombie blondes.  2008.

                                    Each time fifteen-year-old Hannah and her out-of-work father move she has some

                                    fears about making friends, but a classmate warns her that in Maplecrest,

                                    Vermont, the cheerleaders really are monsters.

        

FIC                       Jinks, Catherine. 

JINKS                   Genius squad.  2008.

                                    After the Axis Institute is blown up, fifteen-year-old Cadell Piggot is unhappily

                                    stuck in foster care with constant police surveillance to protect him from the evil

                                    Prosper English, until he gets an offer to join a mysterious group called Genius

                                    Squad.  

              

FIC                       Lanagan, Margo, 1960- 

LANAGAN           Tender morsels.  2008.

                             A young woman who has endured unspeakable cruelties is magically granted a

                                    safe haven apart from the real world and allowed to raise her two daughters there,

                                    until the barrier between the two worlds begins to break down.

         

FIC                       McKinley, Robin.

MCKINLEY          Chalice.  2008. 

                                    Beekeeper Mirasol's life changes completely when she is named the new Chalice,

                                    the most important advisor to the new Master, a former priest of fire.

           

FIC                       McNish, Cliff. 

MCNISH              Angel.  2008.

                                    An unlikely friendship develops between fourteen-year-olds Stephanie, an angel-

                                    obsessed social outcast, and Freya, a popular student whose visions of angels sent

                                    her to a mental institution and who is now seeing a dark angel at every turn.       

            

FIC                       Mitchell, Margaret, 1900-1949.

MITCHELL          Gone with the wind.  1936.

                                    The story of the tempestuous romance between Rhett Butler and Scarlet O'Hara

                                    is set amid the drama of the Civil War.     

            

FIC                       Parker, Robert B., 1932-

PARKER              The boxer and the spy.  2008.

                                    Fifteen-year-old Terry, an aspiring boxer, uncovers the mystery behind the

                                    unexpected death of a classmate.

        

FIC                       Petterson, Per, 1952- 

PETTERSON       Out stealing horses.  2007.

                                    After a meeting with his only neighbor, sixty-seven-year-old Trond is forced to

                                    reflect upon a long-ago incident that marks the beginning of a series of losses for

                                    Trond and his childhood friend, Jon.

              

FIC                       Phillips, Suzanne

PHILLIPS             Burn.  2008.

                                    Bullied constantly during his freshman year in high school, Cameron's anger and

                                    isolation grows, leading to deadly consequences.

   

FIC                       Reeve, Philip.

REEVE                 Here lies Arthur.  2008.                            

                                    When her village is attacked and burned, Gwyna seeks protection from the bard

                                    Myrddin, who uses Gwyna in his plan to transform young Arthur into the heroic

                                    King Arthur.

  

FIC                       Rorby, Ginny. 

RORBY                Hurt go happy.  2006.        

                                    Struggling to make her way through the world in spite of her mother's refusal to

                                    let her learn sign language, hearing-impaired teen Joey Willis secretly learns to

                                    sign while helping a primate scientist and his baby chimpanzee, Sukari.

 

FIC                       Roth, Philip.

ROTH                  Indignation.  2008.

                             In 1951, Marcus Messner, a studious young man from Newark, New Jersey,

                                    escapes his butcher father's fears about the potential dangers facing his beloved

                                    son, by attending college at Ohio's pastoral, conservative Winesburg College.

                     

FIC                       Supplee, Suzanne. 

SUPPLEE             Artichoke's heart.  2008.

                                    As overweight Rosemary takes charge of her life and slowly loses weight, she

                                    also copes with her mother's cancer, having a boyfriend for the first time, and

                                    discovering that other people's lives are not as perfect as they appear.

    

FIC                       Van Draanen, Wendelin.

VANDRAANEN   Confessions of a serial kisser.  2008.           

                                    After reading her mother's secret collection of romance novels during her parent's

                                    difficult separation, seventeen-year-old Evangeline Logan begins a quest for the

                                    perfect kiss.

     

FIC                       Volponi, Paul.

VOLPONI            Hurricane song.  2008. 

                                    Twelve-year-old Miles Shaw goes to live with his father, a jazz musician, in New

                                    Orleans, and together they survive the horrors of Hurricane Katrina in the

                                    Superdome, learning about each other and growing closer through their painful

                                    experiences.

 

FIC                       Woodson, Jacqueline.

WOODSON         If you come softly.  1998.        

                                     After meeting at their private school in New York, fifteen-year-old Jeremiah,

                                    who is black and whose parents are separated, and Ellie, who is white and whose

                                    mother has twice abandoned her, fall in love and then try to cope with people's

                                    reactions.  

         

FIC                       Wroblewski, David.

WROBLEWSKI  The story of Edgar Sawtelle : a novel.  2008.

                                    A tale reminiscent of "Hamlet" that also celebrates the alliance between humans

                                    and dogs follows speech-disabled Wisconsin youth Edgar, who bonds with three

                                    yearling canines and struggles to prove that his sinister uncle is responsible for his

                                    father's death.     

            

FIC                       Zarr, Sara.

ZARR                   Sweethearts : a novel.  2008.

                                    After losing her soul mate, Cameron, eight years previously, Jennifer transformed

                                    herself from the unpopular fat girl into the beautiful and popular Jenna, but

                                    Cameron's unexpected return dredges up memories that cause turmoil.