What I'm Stoked to Read This Fall

One of the occupational hazards of being a teacher-librarian is you have this list. And on this list, are all of the titles of all of the books you are excited about and what to read and having been meaning to read and let me tell you THE LIST HAS NO END.

At the best of times, the list makes me feel like the luckiest girl in the world - I truly think I’d panic if I didn’t have a book to read, and half a dozen ready and waiting in the wings - but some days it can feel a little overwhelming.

So many books, so little time!!

We add plenty of great books all the time to the library collection, but I thought for today I’d give you a list of recently added books that I’m dying to read, myself. Some are brand-new releases and some are straight-up, old school classic literature - regardless, these titles have earned a spot on the list.

Take a peak…and if something catches your eye? Come arm wrestle me in the library to decide who gets to read it first.

(just kidding…but not really)

Daphne Du Maurier - Jamaica Inn and The House on the Strand

I have to confess: I came so late to the Daphne Du Maurier party. It was only last fall that I read (and became obsessed with) Rebecca - but hey, better late than never. Du Maurier is the queen of spooky, atmospheric novels that can totally creep you out and transport you to another place and time. So this fall I want to tackle two of her lesser-known novels - Jamaica Inn, about a crumbling inn on the windswept Cornish moors that is actually a front for a lawless gang of criminals and The House on the Strand, which is described as a “masterfully written tale of history and horror with a fresh approach to time travel" (from the publisher).

Bram Stoker - Dracula

Of course everyone has heard of this book, but I’m going to be honest with you all and tell you I’ve never actually read it! This classic tale is told in epistolary form - that is to say, the story is told through a collection of diary and journal entries from various characters in the story.

Time to cross this one of my reading “bucket list”.

Dana Mele - People Like Us

I am basically a sucker for any novel that’s set at a boarding school (I blame Hogwarts). After reading the publisher blurb, I feel like this book is equal parts Gossip Girl and Thirteen Reasons Why…

The seemingly perfect lives of an elite group of boarding school girls are shaken when a girl’s body is found in the lake on campus.

From the publisher: “The dead girl has left behind a computer-coded scavenger hunt, which, as it unravels implicates suspect after suspect…”

Kate Alice Marshall - I Am Still Alive

If I’m just basing my assumptions off the blurb on the back cover and inside flaps, I’d say this book is a modern day Hatchet but with a strong female lead. This survival story takes place in the Alaskan wilderness and the story is divided in two - BEFORE, and AFTER.

I mean, listen to this line:

“So if you’re reading this, I’m probably dead. But for a while, I survived.”

Tomi Adeyemi - Children of Blood and Bone

I’ll let my pal Jimmy Fallon introduce this one:

L.M. Montgomery - Anne of Avonlea

OK Anne of Green Gables is another literary example of me being SO LATE TO THE PARTY. There is an inexplicable gap in my upbringing that lead me to this point in my life having no read the Canadian classic Green Gables series.

Last spring I read the titular first novel in the series, Anne of Green Gables, and let me tell you - it was an absolute DELIGHT.

So now I’m onto book 2 - Anne of Avonlea, where we meet up again with Anne to find her 16 years old and about to start her new job as the town’s schoolteacher. I’m ridiculously excited.

Fredrik Backman - Us Against You

OK I am cheating. This book I have already read, but I couldn’t NOT include this title on the list of books I’m most excited about this fall.

This is the sequel to Beartown, which I told everyone and their dog about and made everyone and their dog read last year. (I’m still obsessed, still not over it. If you haven’t read Beartown, what on earth are you waiting for??)

If you did read Beartown, you know that the future of the town and its hockey team was up in the air following a horrific incident that split the town down the middle. The opening chapter says:

“This is the story of what happened afterward… it is a story about hockey rinks and all the hearts that beat around them, about people and sports and how they sometimes take turns carrying each other…. This town will rejoice, but it will also start to burn… People we love will die.”

IT’S SO GOOD. That is all.