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Ghosts Of Booksellers Past
While these booksellers themselves aren't necessarily ghosts, their recommendations still stand even after they've left our stores.
In a nutshell, this book replaces Odysseus with a graffiti artist/historian named Americo Monk, and replaces the Ancient Mediterranean with 1965 Los Angeles amidst the Watts riots, but let’s get into what really makes this book an incredible and unique read. By taking the formula used by Homer and Joyce and using it to tell the story of artists who are both figuratively and literally erased from the conversation of “real” art, Lombardo complicates not just the standard for who can be a hero or a monster, but who gets to decide such delineations. But beyond its lofty artistic assertions, the story sucks you in right away because of how damn fun it is – who said literary fiction couldn’t be driven by a great plot? If reading a book that blends history with fantasy and features encounters with The Honorable Elijah Muhammad, magical albino weed, Godzilla, and a one-eyed gangster who lives in the sewer, look no further my friend.
-- Mack
Fantasyland is an in-depth examination into the birth of “alternative facts” America, tracing the winding thread that connects Puritans and Jamestown settlers convinced they’d find mountains of gold to hippies rejecting medicine and evangelicals rejecting evolution. A truly crazy thing I learned about this book, which maybe you saw on the shelf, rolled your eyes at, and filed into the “another F’ing Trump book” part of your brain, is that he began writing it before Trump was even running. The absurdity of that whole campaign/ dystopic Newspeak Hell we inhabit today just led tons of credence to the points there were to be made about the only developed country where 7-out-of-10 people actually believe in Heaven, and 2-in-5 believe the Earth is 10,000 years old. As depressing, though fascinating, as that all may sound, the book is actually deeply comforting in a way with the authority with which it defends logic, science, and objectivity, giving the impression (to me at least) that hope is not entirely lost, and reason ultimately does win out over fantasy and delusion. Someone tell de Blasio! Funnily enough, the very week I finished the book Andersen was featured on Marc Maron’s WTF podcast for an interview that really opened the book up even wider – is God trying to tell me something, is Mercury in retrograde, or am I just a superstitious, self-obsessed American with delusions of grandeur?
-- Mack
When does a dream become a nightmare?
Few artists have the ability to create a world as luscious as Lorena Alvarez has done in the Nightlights series. Her use of form and color will completely envelop you in Sandy's imagination.
-- Jocelyn
Instagram yoga powerhouse, Jessamyn Stanley, has crafted one of the most relevant and relatable yoga guides out there. This is filled with helpful pictures and concise cues to make yoga more accessible to beginner and veteran yogis alike -- especially those practicing at home!
-- Jocelyn
I don't think this book could feel more personal if I had written it myself. I am half convinced Older pried this story from the hearts of Cuban-Americans to lay bare for the rest of the world to see. It is a love letter, a haunting, and utterly unforgettable.
-- Jocelyn
This collection of essays is a vulnerable and intimate look at mental illness and stigma -- especially as experienced by the author herself -- that manages to strike a tone often reminiscent of Audre Lorde's "Sister Outsider." It is deeply emotional and will force you to confront your own biases of the schizophrenias. Highly recommended for those interested in mental health and collections that read like memoirs.
-- Jocelyn
At its core, this is a love letter to Shakespeare and the theatre -- in the form of a thriller. As the circumstances of thespian Oliver's imprisonment unfold, you are brought along for the entirety of the exhilarating, dramatic, and haunting journey. I promise this story (and the deliciously insufferable characters therein) will live with you long after you finish.
-- Jocelyn
Nobody breathes life into characters like Silvia Moreno-Garcia. This time we find ourselves at the threshold: between tradition and change, life and death, mythology and reality. Let yourself be swept away by the unapologetically human, Casiopea, and her journey with the Maya god of death, Hun-Kame.
-- Jocelyn
If you've made your way through the Percy Jackson and Heroes of Olympus series and are searching for your new favorite mythology books, look no further! These are packed with princes, prophecy, and all the Bengali creatures you could want.
-- Jocelyn
Beautiful yet macabre, Mafi has created a world completely unlike anything you've read before. A great fantasy choice for those who loved the creepiness of "Coraline" and the whimsy of "Nevermoor."
-- Jocelyn
Somehow this manages to be both a cozy read and a spooky one. This is perfect for anyone looking for a Halloween book -- regardless of the season.
-- Jocelyn
Leo is brave, curious, and does NOT like being kept from her family's secret. This is sweet from start to finish. It even includes recipes so you can try some baking magic of your own!
-- Jocelyn
From the smell of the pastelitos baking to the sound of the viejitos gossiping and playing domino, I was completely transported to Port Coral. Within these pages I laughed and cried alongside Rosa. Sweet, fun, and relatable, this is the best YA contemporary of the year.
-- Jocelyn
Superheroes, first crushes, summer internships, and a supportive group of friends, this book has everything you could want. Lee plays a lot with the idea of heroes vs. villains and Jess will surely win your heart in the process.
-- Jocelyn
In this world of gods of salt and sun, where women fulfill certain roles as primeras and segundas, there is a growing rebellion and a need to question the status quo. This is where we find our main character, Dani, who is learning what love and loyalty mean to her. If you love courageous, sapphic women, this might just be your new favorite series.
-- Jocelyn
I had two copies of this book and now I have none because I’m forcing all my friends to read it. Some classic nonfiction from Sheila Heti, this book explores the question of having children and what that choice means in a way that feels like an exercise in expanding your mind. Sheila follows a practice of the i ching by tipping coins to answer very complicated questions. It is a delight.
-- Emily
I’m pretty sure this book is a living breathing creature. If you want to embark on Lispector, a criminally under-read genius, this is where to start.
-- Emily
Tarta Westover was raised entirely isolated in a Mormon-survivalist family, barely home schooled, shuffled around, and somehow made it all the way to Cambridge. In her first college years she had never heard of the Holocaust and she thought summer was called “canning season.” This is her story.
-- Emily
100 Years of Solitude meets Persian culture / pans / modern day fertility clinic. This book is an epic family tale, politics and myth through the eyes of the Sadrs. All told from the perspective of one daughter in the waiting room of a clinic, but stretching back hundreds of years. If someone as cool as Rivka Galchen is a fan, you will be too.
Favorite play, favorite translation, favorite author. Antigone is the most performed play from the western world for a reason, and Anne understands her better than anyone else. Forget Hegel. What is a nick?
