The holiday season is quickly approaching and hopefully things will wind down enough for you to relax and pick up a good book to read. There are so many great books out here that its hard to choose, so I’ve put together a list of great books for you to curl up with this month. If you’re a fan of fiction, non-fiction, or looking for a great book for a child in your life, don’t worry there is something on this list for you!
The Stranger in the Lifeboat: A Novel by Mitch Albom
What would happen if we called on God for help and God actually appeared? In Mitch Albom’s profound new novel of hope and faith, a group of shipwrecked passengers pull a strange man from the sea. He claims to be “the Lord.” And he says he can only save them if they all believe in him. Read more.
A Secret in the Keys (Coconut Key Book 1) by Hope Holloway
The last thing Beck Foster wants to do is attend a party for her estranged aunt in the Florida Keys. One month earlier, Beck’s seemingly ideal existence imploded when her husband of thirty-four years announced he was leaving her. Now, so she has to sell her house, get a job, and somehow put her broken heart and life back together. She can’t do all that if she runs off to visit a woman she barely remembers. Or can she? Read more.
Girl, Under Oath by John Ellsworth
Do you love your husband enough to murder his other wife? Doctor Jenny Ipswich’s perfect life crashes down the day her husband dies. It shatters when his dying request is to pay half of his two-million-dollar life-insurance policy to some woman named Elise. Shocked to learn the secret affair resulted in a second wife and a child in Paris, Jenny comes face-to-face with the other woman when Elise shows up demanding half of everything she’s worked hard for—over Jenny’s dead body. As the wives square off, Jenny stands trial for their husband’s suspicious death. Criminal attorney Michael Gresham is on the case, but disturbing texts, emails, and a horrifying discovery come to light when Elise suddenly vanishes. Read more.
Dark Stranger The Dream by by I. T. Lucas
Since the dawn of human civilization, two warring factions of the immortal descendants of gods have been secretly shaping its destiny. Leading the battle from his luxurious L.A. high-rise, Kian is surrounded by his clan, and yet he’s alone.
As the descendants of a single goddess, clan members are forbidden to each other, and since the only other immortals are their sworn enemies, Kian and his kin have long been resigned to a lonely existence and eventual extinction. That is until his sister, a neuroscience professor and a researcher of paranormal abilities, makes a game-changing discovery.
Syssi’s premonitions are tricky. They foretell catastrophes, but when she gets a job as a research assistant, they fail to predict the thrilling yet terrifying turn her life is about to take. Turns out that her new boss is the immortal daughter of a goddess, and her boss’s imposing brother is the mysterious stranger who’s been starring in her dreams.
The Wish by Nicholas Sparks
From the author of The Longest Ride and The Return comes a novel about the enduring legacy of first love, and the decisions that haunt us forever.
1996 was the year that changed everything for Maggie Dawes. Sent away at sixteen to live with an aunt she barely knew in Ocracoke, a remote village on North Carolina’s Outer Banks, she could think only of the friends and family she left behind . . . until she met Bryce Trickett, one of the few teenagers on the island. Handsome, genuine, and newly admitted to West Point, Bryce showed her how much there was to love about the wind-swept beach town—and introduced her to photography, a passion that would define the rest of her life.
By 2019, Maggie is a renowned travel photographer. She splits her time between running a successful gallery in New York and photographing remote locations around the world. But this year she is unexpectedly grounded over Christmas, struggling to come to terms with a sobering medical diagnosis. Increasingly dependent on a young assistant, she finds herself becoming close to him.
As they count down the last days of the season together, she begins to tell him the story of another Christmas, decades earlier—and the love that set her on a course she never could have imagined.
The Unfit Heiress: The Tragic Life and Scandalous Sterilization of Ann Cooper Hewitt by Audrey Clare Farley
At the turn of the twentieth century, American women began to reject Victorian propriety in favor of passion and livelihood outside the home. This alarmed authorities, who feared certain “over-sexed” women could destroy civilization if allowed to reproduce and pass on their defects. Set against this backdrop, The Unfit Heiress chronicles the fight for inheritance, both genetic and monetary, between Ann Cooper Hewitt and her mother Maryon.
In 1934, aided by a California eugenics law, the socialite Maryon Cooper Hewitt had her “promiscuous” daughter declared feebleminded and sterilized without her knowledge. She did this to deprive Ann of millions of dollars from her father’s estate, which contained a child-bearing stipulation. When a sensational court case ensued, the American public was captivated. So were eugenicists, who saw an opportunity to restrict reproductive rights in America for decades to come.
This riveting story unfolds through the brilliant research of Audrey Clare Farley, who captures the interior lives of these women on the pages and poses questions that remain relevant today: What does it mean to be “unfit” for motherhood? In the battle for reproductive rights, can we forgive the women who side against us? And can we forgive our mothers if they are the ones who inflict the deepest wounds?
The Boy Who Harnessed the Wind by William Kamkwamba and Bryan Mealer (Young Reader’s Edition)
When a terrible drought struck William Kamkwamba’s tiny village in Malawi, his family lost all of the season’s crops, leaving them with nothing to eat and nothing to sell. William began to explore science books in his village library, looking for a solution. There, he came up with the idea that would change his family’s life forever: he could build a windmill. Made out of scrap metal and old bicycle parts, William’s windmill brought electricity to his home and helped his family pump the water they needed to farm the land.
Retold for a younger audience, this exciting memoir shows how, even in a desperate situation, one boy’s brilliant idea can light up the world. Complete with photographs, illustrations, and an epilogue that will bring readers up to date on William’s story, this is the perfect edition to read and share with the whole family.
No Cure for Being Human: (And Other Truths I Need to Hear) by Kate Bowler
It’s hard to give up on the feeling that the life you really want is just out of reach. A beach body by summer. A trip to Disneyland around the corner. A promotion on the horizon. Everyone wants to believe that they are headed toward good, better, best. But what happens when the life you hoped for is put on hold indefinitely?
Kate Bowler believed that life was a series of unlimited choices, until she discovered, at age 35, that her body was wracked with cancer. In No Cure for Being Human, she searches for a way forward as she mines the wisdom (and absurdity) of today’s “best life now” advice industry, which insists on exhausting positivity and on trying to convince us that we can out-eat, out-learn, and out-perform our humanness. We are, she finds, as fragile as the day we were born.
With dry wit and unflinching honesty, Kate Bowler grapples with her diagnosis, her ambition, and her faith as she tries to come to terms with her limitations in a culture that says anything is possible. She finds that we need one another if we’re going to tell the truth: Life is beautiful and terrible, full of hope and despair and everything in between—and there’s no cure for being human.
Digital Book Nook 