Akron Public Library

Set against the backdrop of World War II, this unforgettable novel, inspired by the true story of the Council of Books in Wartime, follows three women whose fates become intertwined by their belief in the power and goodness in the written word to triumph over the very darkest moments of war. Berlin 1933. Following the success of her debut novel, American writer Althea James receives an invitation from Joseph Goebbels himself to participate in a culture...

This is a story of moral corruption. A gothic melodrama, it is full of subtle impression and epigram. It touches on many of Wilde's recurring themes, such as the nature and spirit of art, aestheticism and the dangers inherent in it.In the wealthy and vain hedonist Dorian Gray, London painter Basil Hallward has found his muse. Only when the portrait of Dorian begins to age, while the man himself remains untouched by time, do they realize they may have...

Every morning A wakes in a different person's body, in a different person's life, learning over the years to never get too attached, until he wakes up in the body of Justin and falls in love with Justin's girlfriend, Rhiannon.

"New York Times bestselling author TJ Klune invites you deep into the heart of a peculiar forest and on the extraordinary journey of a family assembled from spare parts. In a strange little home built into the branches of a grove of trees, live three robots-fatherly inventor android Giovanni Lawson, a pleasantly sadistic nurse machine, and a small vacuum desperate for love and attention. Victor Lawson, a human, lives there too. They're a family, hidden...

When university student Ludwik meets Janusz at a summer agricultural camp, he is fascinated yet wary of this handsome, carefree stranger. But a chance meeting by the river soon becomes an intense, exhilarating, and all-consuming affair. After their camp duties are fulfilled, the pair spend a dreamlike few weeks camping in the countryside, removed from society and its constraints, Ludwik and Janusz fall deeply in love. But in their repressive communist...

"Douglas Stuart's first novel Shuggie Bain is one of the most successful literary debuts of the century so far. It was awarded the 2020 Booker Prize, and is now published or forthcoming in forty territories, having already sold more than a million copies worldwide. Now Stuart returns with Young Mungo, his extraordinary second novel. Five years in the writing, it is both a page-turner and literary tour de force, a vivid portrayal of working-class...

Originally published in 1898, "The Ballad of Reading Gaol" is a poem written by Oscar Wilde. Composed after his release from the titular prison whilst he was in exile in Berneval-le-Grand, the poem deals with the hanging at Reading Goal of Charles Thomas Wooldridge, a 30-year-old man who was imprisoned for cutting his wife's throat. Within the poem, Wilde narrates the execution in full and explores the brutal nature of the punishment that all inmates...

Jared, the son of a Baptist preacher, is forcibly outed by his parents and forced to participate in a church-supported gay conversion program.

They are Microserfs-six code-crunching computer whizzes who spend upward of sixteen hours a day "coding" and eating "flat" foods (food which, like Kraft singles, can be passed underneath closed doors) as they fearfully scan company e-mail to learn whether the great Bill is going to "flame" one of them. But now there's a chance to become innovators instead of cogs in the gargantuan Microsoft machine. The intrepid Microserfs are striking out on their...

"Seventeen-year-old Coley is still grieving her mother's death when she moves to rural Oregon and feels more alone than ever, but when she meets Sonya, Coley considers risking it all and opening up her heart to love again."--