2024 Acquisitions

IOGRAPHY
The Art of Power: My Story as America’s First Woman Speaker of the House by Nancy Pelosi. Said by friend and foe alike to be the most powerful Speaker ever, Nancy tells what it takes to make history.
 
Chasing Beauty: The Life of Isabella Stewart Gardner by Natalie Dykstra. Richly detailed biographical portrait of a flamboyant woman with an obsession with purchasing beautiful objects—art, fashions, jewelry. She made her own path, ending with the creation of the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum to hold her collections. A unique accomplishment for a woman of her period (or any period?)
 
Fi: A Memoir of My Son by Alexandra Fuller. After the death of her 21-year-old son, Fuller must find a way to move on. With her usual humor and excellence, she calls on wisdom from Native American cultures and of her childhood in Zimbabwe to ease her pain.
 
Knife: Meditations by Salman Rushdie. This Booker Prize-winning author is no stranger to assassination threats. This book relives the events of the day in 2022 at the Chautauqua Institution when a would-be assassin made an attempt on his life.
 
Lucky Loser: How Donald Trump Squandered His Father’s Fortune and Created the Illusion of Success by Russ Buettner and Susanne Craig. After researching over twenty years worth of documentary evidence and insider interviews, Pulitzer Prize-winning authors write the “definitive true accounting of Trump and his money.”
 
The Message by Ta-Nehisi Coates. This is the author’s first book of new non-fiction in about a decade. Author is best known for Between the World and Me (2015), which won the National Book Award for Non-Fiction.
 
A Moveable Feast (The Restored Edition) by Ernest Hemingway. This classic memoir of Paris in the 1930s is one of Hemingway’s most beloved works. Portraits of F. Scott Fitzgerald, Gertrude Stein, his first wife Hadley, and other well-known figures are found here. This restored edition contains a foreword by Patrick Hemingway; Sean Hemingway wrote the introduction and also served as editor.
 
Night Flyer: Harriet Tubman and the Faith Dreams of a Free People by Tiya Miles. Written by a Harvard history professor, this is a stunning biography of Harriet Tubman. With deep research and exquisite prose, Miles recreates the powerful spirituality that undergirds her social and cultural mission.
 
Solito: A Memoir by Javier Zamora. In this “gripping memoir” of bravery, hope, and finding family, a young poet tells the story of his migration from El Salvador to the United States at the age of nine. Winner of the 2022 Los Angeles Times Book Prize.
 
Something Lost by Hilary Clinton. Reviews suggest that reading this book would be like sitting down for an “impassioned, entertaining conversation” with Hilary Clinton.
 
BIOGRAPHY COLLECTIONS
The Small and the Mighty: Twelve Unsung Americans Who Changed the Course of History, from the Founding to the Civil Rights Movement by Sharon McMahon. From America’s favorite government teacher, a heartfelt, inspiring portrait of twelve ordinary Americans whose courage formed the character of our country.
 
ESSAYS AND COLUMNS 
We’re Alone by Edwidge Danticat. The author immigrated to the U.S. in 1969 when she was twelve years old. This collection of essays, published by Graywolf, explores environmental catastrophe, traumas of colonialism, motherhood and resilience. Danticat will kick off this year’s Talking Volumes series in St. Paul.
 
FICTION
Absolution by Alice McDermott. After 60 years, Tricia shares her memories of 1963 Saigon where she was part of a group of expat American wives “bent on helping the poor and ailing Vietnamese.” McDermott unveils the complicated inner lives of these women, drawing parallels between their “charitable” activities and the growing American military involvement. Ann Patchett calls the novel a “moral masterpiece.”

Atonement by Ian McEwan. A symphonic novel of love and war, childhood and class, guilt and forgiveness that provides all the satisfaction of a brilliant narrative and the provocation we’ve come to expect from this prize-winning author. One of the New York Times 100 Best Books of the 21st Century.
 
The Bee Sting: A Novel by Paul Murray. Short-listed for the 2023 Booker Prize, this is a tragicomic novel by an Irish writer. The narrative follows the Barnes family. Each chapter is from a different family member’s perspective. “Instant classic,” says a reader.
 
The Berry Pickers: A Novel by Amanda Peters. This poignant story follows a Mi’kmaq family’s journey through hardship and hope after their four-year-old girl goes missing in the blueberry fields of Maine.

Brotherless Night by V.V. Ganeshananthan. Set Sri Lanka’s in the 1980s civil war, it’s the story of a young woman whose dreams of becoming a doctor are interrupted by mounting violence. When Sashi joins a secret project documenting human rights violations, she embarks on a dangerous path that will change her forever. This work by a Minnesota author received the 2024 Women’s Prize for Fiction.

Burma Sahib by Paul Theroux. Eric Blair, an inexperienced and insecure graduate of Eton, is thrown into the crucible of colonial Burma as a trainee policeman. A coming-of-age story like no other, Burma Sahib traces Blair’s rejection of imperial rule and his discovery of a “second self” as the writer who will become George Orwell. Rave reviews.
 
Creation Lake by Rachel Kushner. A female agent fools everybody (that is, she lies to everyone) until she comes up against the cave-dwelling mentor of the commune in rural France that she is assigned to infiltrate. Shortlisted for the 2024 Booker Prize.
 
Doorman Wanted by Glen Miller. When Franklin Henry inherits his father’s apartment building he notices a sign advertising a job for a doorman. He applies and is hired. Hiding his identity offers him a fascinating view of the people entering the building. Lorna Landvik called it a “gem of a novel.”
 
Erasure: A Novel by Percival Everett. A sharp satire on race and identity, this novel follows a disillusioned African American writer who crafts a provocative book to escape literary stereotypes and confront racial expectations in America. It was the basis for the film American Fiction.

Go as a River: A Novel by Shelley Read. Inspired by true events surrounding the destruction of the town of Iola, Colorado, in the 1960s, this is a story of deeply held love in the face of hardship and loss, but also of finding courage, resilience, friendship, and, finally, home—where least expected.
 
Great Circle: A Novel by Maggie Shipstead. This is an unforgettable story of a daredevil female aviator determined to chart her own course in life, at any cost. This novel was shortlisted for the Booker Prize.

The Hazelbourne Ladies Motorcycle and Flying Club by Helen Simonson. The “ladies” of the title miss the freedom, purpose, and excitement they enjoyed during World War I and refuse to return to the “respectable” existence now expected of them. By the popular author of Major Pettigrew’s Last Stand and The Summer Before the War.

How to Age Disgracefully: A Novel by Clare Pooley. You will laugh out loud at the bevy of unlikely but lovable senior citizens who populate a London neighborhood. They are determined to save their community center via whatever wily stunts suit them.
 
Intermezzo: A Novel by Sally Rooney. Peter and Ivan, brothers whose lives rarely intersect, are moved and changed as they despair over their father’s death. In their grief, each looks for love.
 
Lies and Weddings: A Novel by Kevin Kwan. By the author of Crazy Rich Asians, another romp among the rich and would-be rich, when Rufus Leung Gresham’s mother hatches a marriage plot that goes awry. The usual gaiety and complications ensue.
 
I Cheerfully Refuse by Leif Enger. Enger writes beautifully about a future time when a fictional character embarks on a sailing journey on Lake Superior. He encounters Odysseus- and Gulliver-like strangeness and still keeps the best aspects of his nature. 
 
The Mighty Red by Louise Erdrich. Pulitzer Prize-winning author returns to Argus, North Dakota—the fictional setting of many of her books—in a novel that intertwines the ecological and the human to funny, moving, breathtaking effect amid the 2008 recession.
 
The Ministry of Time: A Novel by Kaliane Bradley. Recognized on bestseller lists of speculative fiction, time travel fiction and literary fiction, this is a debut novel by a British-Cambodian writer based in London. Readers call it a smart, whimsical, sensitive, and thrilling summer read.
 
Playground by Richard Powers. Pulitzer Prize-winning author writes another ecological epic, set on a French Polynesian island.
 
Power & Light by Will Weaver. Weaver’s timeless Red Earth, White Earth was published in 1986. In this 2023 book, an emigrant family from Norway arrives in North Dakota with dreams of owning land and moving up in the world.
 
The Silence of the Girls: A Novel by Pat Barker. A retelling of Homer’s Iliad through the voice of Briseis, a captured Trojan queen. Briseis struggles to reclaim her story and dignity in a world where women are silent casualties of war.

Tell Me Everything by Elizabeth Strout. The author returns to the fictional Maine town to catch up with Olive Kitteridge and two other favorite characters. Strout won a Pulitzer Prize for Olive Kittredge, which is available in the Coffman Library.
 
This Strange Eventful History by Claire Messud. This epic novel traces three generations of the Cassan family, who, uprooted from their Algerian home, wander half the globe from Lebanon to Australia. Though officially French, they are looked down upon in France as “Africans.” Loosely based on Messud’s family story, her book dramatizes both the weight of history and the resilience of love.
 
Wandering Stars: A Novel by Tommy Orange. A powerful follow-up to There There, this novel traces the descendants of a Cherokee survivor of the 1864 Sand Creek Massacre, interweaving stories of identity, culture, and courage across generations. Longlisted for the 2024 Booker Prize.

The Women: A Novel by Kristin Hannah. Can women be heroes? This popular novel is set in 1960s Vietnam, where young nurse Frankie McGrath experiences the worst of the war and finds love, but once at home she is reviled by war protesters and by her family.
 
LARGE PRINT
Medgar & Myrlie: Medgar Evers and the Love Story That Awakened America by Joy-Ann Reid. The author has a BA from Harvard with a documentary film concentration. In this book, Reid uses Medgar and Myrlie’s relationship as a lens through which to view the voting rights work in the South. DONATED BY DOROTHY WALTZ

MILITARY HISTORY
When the Sea Came Alive: An Oral History of D-Day by Garrett M. Graff. Pulitzer Prize finalist draws from more than 700 eyewitness accounts for this gripping and propulsive history of the D-Day invasion.
 
MYSTERY/SPY
Close to Death: A Novel by Anthony Horowitz. Detective Hawthorne takes on an “unsolvable case” in this last of the series. An unsuitable family moves into a pristine gated community, and one of its members is murdered. Every last one of the residents is a suspect.
 
Dark Wives by Ann Cleeves. This 11th book in the Vera Stanhope series. It follows The Rising Tide, which the Coffman Library owns.
 
Death at the Sign of the Rook: A Jackson Brodie Book by Kate Atkinson. Brodie gets involved in a murder mystery party while searching for an art thief. Oh, and there might be a snowstorm in these “deliciously witty” (Booklist) adventure.
 
Drive Your Plow over the Bones of the Dead: A Novel by Olga Tokarczuk (Antonia Lloyd-Jones, transl.). Living in a remote Polish village, Janina studies astrology and translates William Blake. Then a neighbor turns up dead. A brilliant literary murder mystery. Author won the Nobel Prize in Literature in 2018 and the Booker Award in the same year for her book Flights.
 
Farewell, Amethystine by Walter Mosley. Set in 1970s Southern California, 16th in the Easy Rawlins series, this is about Rawlins’ old traumas and about finding Amethystine’s husband. The novel blends classic noir with history; yet another page-turner by this writer.
 
How to Solve Your Own Murder: A Novel by Kristen Perrin. When a small-town resident’s predicted murder proves true, her niece has one week to solve the crime and inherit her aunt’s fortune. She finds plenty of the locals also hope to gain from the estate.
 
The Midnight Feast: A Novel by Lucy Foley. Mysteries abound in this grisly thriller. English villagers resent the opening of an exclusive resort that infringes upon their town.  When murder is discovered, could the culprits be the legendary Night Birds of the ancient forest?
 
Refiner’s Fire: A Commissario Guido Brunetti Mystery by Donna Leon. This is #33 in a series popular with Coffman readers. Haven’t read this series? LaFenice is the first book; find it in the Mystery/Spy section of the Coffman Library.
 
The Waiting: A Ballard and Bosch Novel by Michael Connelly. Sixth in the series, the latest book features a new Bosch—Harry’s daughter. Connelly has written over 30 novels and sold over 85 million books. DONATED BY RICHARD ZEYEN
 
We Solve Murders by Richard Osman. The popular British author introduces another unlikely detective team composed of a retired cop and his daughter. Haven’t read the books in the series? The Coffman Library owns them all, beginning with ​The Thursday Murder Club.
 
Where They Last Saw Her: A Novel by Marcie Rendon. Ojibwe women have disappeared from a Minnesota reservation; suspects include oil pipeline workers. Women missing, women sleuths—this popular author tells it like it is.
 
NATIVE AMERICAN ISSUES
Native Nations: A Millenium in North America by Kathleen Duval. A thousand years ago, Native civilizations established large cities with pyramids, castles, and major road systems—not in South America, but along the Mississippi. Through more than 500 years of genocide, resilient Indigenous nations continue to exercise power in ways that “American” history has ignored until recently.
 
NATURE/ENVIRONMENT
The Light Eaters: How the Unseen World of Plant Intelligence Offers a New Understanding of Life on Earth by Zoë Schlanger. This study of plant science for nonscientific readers offers remarkable examples of inspired scientists and their recent discoveries that are changing the way we understand the natural world.
DONATED BY BRIAN NERNEY
 
The Climate Action Handbook: A Visual Guide to 100 Climate Solutions for Everyone by Heidi Roop. This book offers ways you can make a difference, alone or with your community, to help lower your carbon footprint and prepare for climate change. The author is director of the University of Minnesota’s Climate Adaptation Partnership.
 
The Great River: The Making and Unmaking of the Mississippi by Boyce Upholt.  Over millennia, the Mississippi watershed has been home to Indigenous people who regarded it with reverence. Colonists brought vast changes to the river and the lives of those on its banks. Attempts to “conquer” the river—­­dams, dikes and levees—brought both close to unsustainability. This landmark work reveals the costs of fighting nature as well as recent attempts to work with it.
 
PERSONAL GROWTH 
Before All Is Said and Done: Practical Advice on Living and Dying Well by Pat Miles. A well-known WCCO radio host, Miles offers advice on how to prepare for
end-of-life concerns, cognitive decline, the loss of one’s partner, and the caregiver’s ability to navigate the experience with considerations for oneself.
 
How to Know a Person: The Art of Seeing Others Deeply and Being Deeply Seen by David Brooks. The newspaper columnist offers insights into building meaningful connections by understanding others profoundly and being genuinely understood, thereby enriching personal and professional relationships.

POETRY
The Ecopoetry Anthology edited by Ann Fisher-Wirth and Laura-Gray Street. This wonderful anthology contains poems both extolling the natural world and lamenting its demise. From Walt Whitman to present-day poet Joy Harjo, it contains both conventional and more experimental poems; poet laureates to little-knowns.
 
The Art of Losing: Poems of Grief and Healing edited by Kevin Young. Containing work by various poets such as Mary Oliver, Dylan Thomas, and Elizabeth Bishop, this reflective anthology presents different aspects of grief (“Remembrance” and “Recovery”) and types of loss (“Siblings” and “Spouses and Lovers”).
 
PSYCHOLOGY
The Anxious Generation: How the Great Rewiring of Childhood Is Causing an Epidemic of Mental Illness by Jonathan Haidt. An examination of the impact of modern childhood on mental health. Haidt explores how technological and cultural shifts, such as the decline of a play-based childhood and the rise of a phone-based childhood, contribute to rising anxiety and mental illness among youth.

Supercommunicators: How to Unlock the Secret Language of Connection by Charles Duhigg. The author blends deep research and his trademark storytelling skills to show how we can all learn to identify and leverage the hidden layers that lurk beneath every conversation.
 
SCIENCE/TECHNOLOGY/MATHEMATICS
Challenger: A True Story of Heroism and Disaster on the Edge of Space by Adam Higginbotham. Based on archival research and original reporting, this book follows key individuals who worked on the Challenger project and the seven crew members who died. Several reviewers say that it reads like a thriller.
 
Nexus: A Brief History of Information Networks from the Stone Age to AI by Yuval Noah Harari. In his interview with Farred Zakaria, the author said, “Freedom of speech is a human right, not a bot right.” Harari asks us to consider the complex relationship between information and truth, bureaucracy and mythology, wisdom and power.
 
Secret Lives of Numbers: A Hidden History of Math’s Unsung Trailblazers by Kate Kitagawa. The author, one of the world’s leading experts on the history of mathematics, looks at breakthrough work in math, going beyond the usual white men of Western Europe.
 
U.S. HISTORY
America’s Deadliest Election by Dana Bash and David Fisher. Their focus on the 1872 election and its consequences is a cautionary tale for 2024’s election party politics. “In snappy and accessible prose, the authors distill themes, including how elected leaders ‘let loose a monster’ when the ‘approved violence as an acceptable means to resolve political disputes.’”
 
The Demon of Unrest: A Saga of Hubris, Heartbreak, and Heroism at the Dawn of the Civil War by Erik Larson. Covering the period after Lincoln’s election and before the start of the Civil War, this riveting saga explores the tumultuous lives and events entangled in the era’s political and personal conflicts, blending history with dramatic storytelling.

WORLD POLITICS/GOVERNMENT
Age of Revolutions: Progress and Backlash from 1600 to the Present by Fareed Zakaria. Has polarization of the electorate always fomented revolutions? Can there be a middle ground? Zakaria looks to past revolutions and the ideas that fostered them.
 
Autocracy, Inc.: The Dictators Who Want to Run the World by Anne Applebaum. The author writes that autocrats are rewriting the rules of world trade and governance. She argues that if democracies are to survive we must reframe our worldview and learn how to fight back.
 
Black Pill: How I Witnessed the Darkest Corners of the Internet Come to Life, Poison Society and Capture American Politics by Elle Reeve. Reeve would like to see the disinformation that continues to propel members of the Far Right into action be forced into the public eye and seen for what it is.
 
On Freedom by Timothy Snyder. His publicist writes that Snyder’s first book inspired people around the world to fight for freedom. In this book, the author helps us see exactly what we are fighting for. On Tyranny is also in the Coffman Library’s collection.
 
War by Bob Woodward. The Woodward of Watergate fame and two-time Pulitzer Prize winner tells the story of three “wars”—Ukraine, the Middle East, and the struggle for the American Presidency.  DONATED BY RICHARD ZEYEN
 
CONTRIBUTORS:  Veena Deo, Audrey Estebo, Margaret Green, Faye Herold, Scott Magnuson, Brian Nerney, Mary Scanlan, Eileen Smith, Victoria Tirrel, Carol Van Why, Helga Visscher, Coco Weber, Katie Weiblen, Catherine Wengler, Barbara Woshinsky and Richard Zeyen

Revised: 12/18/2024