Check It Out

This is Kelsey Patterson with the Sioux City Public Library and you’re listening to Check It Out. Today, I’m recommending Beth O’Leary’s debut novel, The Flatshare.

This is Kelsey Patterson with the Sioux City Public Library and you’re listening to Check It Out. Today, I’m recommending Rough Magic: Riding the World’s Loneliest Horse Race by Lara Prior-Palmer.   

This is Jenn Delperdang with the Sioux City Public Library and you’re listening to Check It Out.

Today, I’m recommending Nothing to See Here by Kevin Wilson-- a funny and offbeat novel about “family”.  If you’ve read either of Kevin Wilson’s previous novels (The Family Fang or Perfect Little World) you might know to expect this author to craft an everyday family drama and then introduce one strange element to make us see the story in a completely different way. 

This is Billie Voss, with the Sioux City Public Library, and you’re listening to Check It Out. 

This is Jenn Delperdang, with the Sioux City Public Library and you’re listening to Check It Out.

Charlotte’s Web

This is Preston and you’re listening to Check It Out.

Have you ever had to move a long distance, far away from the place you grew up in? Saying bye to the friends you’re used to and having to accomplish the somewhat difficult task in making new ones?  Well, in this week’s book for Check It Out, we are introduced to the unique friendship that is developed between a spider and a pig that is new to the farm in E.B. White’s classic novel, Charlotte’s Web.

I’m Mark Munger and you are listening to Check it Out.

A ship set in ice. An axe. A giant disappearing into arctic waters. Such are the uncommon beginnings to an uncommon Western. In the Distance by Hernan Diaz approaches one of the great American genres with a cold but intense embrace.

This is Kelsey Patterson with the Sioux City Public Library and you’re listening to Check It Out. Lately, I’ve been really drawn to reading wintery works of crime fiction and wanted to share with you, two of my favorites. Today, I’m recommending The Hunting Game by Helene Tursten and The Hunting Party by Lucy Foley. Apparently, I’m also a fan of books with the word “hunting” in the title, but I won’t even try to analyze what that says about me or my reading habits.

This is Kelsey Patterson with the Sioux City Public Library and you’re listening to Check It Out.

Support for Check It Out comes from Avery Brothers.

Support for Check It Out comes from Avery Brothers. 

Support for Check It Out comes from Avery Brothers.

Support for Check It Out comes from Avery Brothers.

This is Sarah Enright with the Sioux City Public Library and you’re listening to Check It Out. When a book begins to draw attention and quickly moves up on best-seller lists, I usually tend to steer clear. Many times hype has created expectations that have left me disappointed.

This is Kelsey Patterson with the Sioux City Public Library and you’re listening to Check It Out. Probably best known for his No. 1 Ladies’ Detective Agency series (which is one of my personal favorites), Alexander McCall Smith dives into a new mystery series set in Sweden in The Department of Sensitive Crimes. Dubbed “Scandi-Lite” by his publisher, this book doesn’t have the bleakness of Scandinavian noir, but it isn’t quite a cozy mystery either.

In this story the Mayan god of death sends a young woman on a harrowing, life-changing journey in this dark, one-of-a-kind fairy tale inspired by Mexican folklore.

Support for Check It Out comes from Avery Brothers.

Support for Check It Out comes from Avery Brothers.

Support for Check It Out comes from Avery Brothers.

Fantasy books may hold legends of heroes comprised of many tales. Some tall, some not. For some storytellers love to enhance details to make it more awe-inspiring. Or simply, details are lost through the passing of each generation. Such is true for this book which holds the tales of many such as Taborlin the Great, recognized for knowing “the name of the wind” which allowed him to call on it and bend to his will; The Fae, who live in a different realm and govern supernatural powers. Then there is the story of Kvothe, the protagonist of this book.

One sister risks it all to prove that her sister is not insane by sneaking into the infamous Goldengrove Asylum. But she realizes that many of the women in the asylum aren't acutally insane but are merely inconvenient.  As her search for the truth continues, it threatens to unearth some secrets that some very powerful people would rather keep hidden. 

Support for Check It Out comes from Avery Brothers. 

Support for Check It Out comes from Avery Brothers.

Herman Melville is “still vigorous,” said one article published in 1890, one year before the death of the author. It was news. Melville was, like Ishmael, a wandering survivor of a masterful wreck. When the obits followed in 1891, readers again needed reminding. Melville? Alive? No longer. And his books, perhaps, the obit writers said, Typee will be remembered. And one, Melville was “an untrained imagination” with an “inaccurate and unliterary” vocabulary.

With about a week and a half left before the drawing for the grand prize, make sure to stop by any Sioux City branch library or visit their website to get your launch sequence checklist with all the challenges on them. You only need to check off five to enter the drawing. So hurry!

Support for Check It Out comes from Avery Brothers.

This is Preston and you’re listening to Check It Out.

Do you believe in evil spirits? Do you wonder how departed souls get into the afterlife? Well you’re in luck today. For today’s Check It Out is going to be over Bleach, a manga series about one hot headed teenage boy named Ichigo Kurosaki and his life as a soul reaper one event after another written and illustrated by Tite Kubo. 

Support for Check It Out comes from Avery Brothers.

Support for Check It Out comes from Avery Brothers.

Support for Check It Out comes from Avery Brothers.

This is Kelsey Patterson with the Sioux City Public Library and you’re listening to Check It Out. Today, I’m changing things up a little and recommending you check out one of my new favorite rom-com writers, Jasmine Guillory. A Bay Area native who has towering stacks of books in her living room, a cake recipe for every occasion, and upwards of 50 lipsticks, Guillory is an author after my own heart. As a debut author, she hit the ground running by publishing not one, but two books in 2018—The Wedding Date and The Proposal, respectively.

Today, I am recommending Nine Perfect Strangers, the new novel by bestselling author Liane Moriarty.  After the runaway success of The Husband’s Secret and Big Little Lies, Liane Moriaty delivers a darkly humorous and satisfying story of nine individuals who book a “Mind and Body Total Transformation Retreat” at a secluded Australian wellness resort.