The Fact Checker by Austin Kelley

A quick glance at the cover of Austin Kelley’s novel, The Fact Checker, and you’ll recognize by font alone that the fact-checking taking place is at The New Yorker. The magazine in the novel is unnamed, but we get the gist. Plus, Kelley’s bio states that he was once a fact checker at—you got it—The New Yorker. The narrator, known to us as the Fact Checker, describes his life during a story he was assigned in 2004. An entertaining and sprightly read, it’s also a novel describing a world that manages to be both foundational to our current world and yet long gone at the same time.

Our fact checker is good at his job. We meet him as he describes investigating one story’s accuracy by quizzing (almost badgering) the widow of a fallen CIA officer. It’s all in service to the article, to its veracity. We also get the impression that he doesn’t mind name-dropping during casual conversation that he works for an esteemed New York magazine (even if he’s not authoring any of its stories). Still, he confesses that he’s “always drowning in a storm of information and doubt.” And he freely admits that he confuses his desires and disdains in both his personal and professional lives.

It’s pretty clear his girlfriend left him because she found his encyclopedic conversation corrections exhausting. It’s also evident he’s unsure of what to do about this pedantic trait of his. And it’s more than certain he doesn’t recognize that his internal moral outrage to boorish behavior he sees in others belies his own personal actions.

What provides him a singular purpose is a low-stakes story he’s assigned. A vendor at a city farmer’s market is selling a particular type of tomato that’s blowing everyone’s hair back. In the article, the Fact Checker is intrigued by a quote from a vendor employee, Sylvia, who says there’s also some “nefarious business” at the market. He finds Sylvia at the market and is completely beguiled by her. His opposite in almost every way, she takes him out one night to an underground supper club in the city. He learns a fair bit about her (she says she was raised in a cult). Yet, despite his repeated questions, he learns nothing about the supposed nefarious business.

Kelley captures the early aughts well. It’s a world where the George W. Bush administration had already presented their case for invading Iraq. To many, this presentation strained credulity as not only were there disagreements over what can be considered as fact, but also of what truths one can responsibly glean from said facts. Regardless, a presidential administration believing that they even need to justify its actions—to publicly persuade—seems like a bygone era.

We see the emerging urban hipsters, with some sporting a “jug band chic” look. The Fact Checker finds himself at a meeting of self-professed anarchists where there’s an unironic call to conduct a feasibility study of the group’s proposed actions. Food culture is taking off in New York City. One magazine writer, having just spent some time with a group of people who raise and harvest their own meat, decides to export the practice to his high-end NYC apartment.

In a tragi-comic scene, the Fact Checker stops by the author’s apartment and discovers that in the swanky bathroom there’s a lamb to be slaughtered. And kill it they do, the dead lamb ending up strung along the author’s back like a cape, which reminds our narrator of a skinny Hercules statue “with carefully coiffed hair and a dead sheep on his back, a lanky, stooped Hercules in a Picasso painter’s outfit in his blond Japanese soaking tub in his SoHo loft.”

Sylvia leaves the Fact Checker a cryptic note and promptly disappears. Hoping to find answers, he travels out to the communal New Jersey farm where she worked only to find that the commune’s inhabitants are just as clueless to her whereabouts. The Fact Checker is struggling to determine the facts and—without a doubt—the truth. The only thing he’s certain of is that the commune’s leader is “a lecherous hypocrite” who’s hiding something.

At the beginning of the novel, the Fact Checker chats with a woman he just met in a coffee shop, back when all “tentative and ambitious New Yorkers” had to meet each other through face-to-face conversation. Noticing that he’s nearsighted, she suggests he break periodically during the work day, look out a window, and then focus on the farthest object in view. He doesn’t believe this will benefit his eyesight, yet he does it at times. When helping with some farming work at the commune, he stops and looks out into the distance. “Someday it’s going to help, this staring into space, I thought, even if that help is nothing but a psychological balm, a sort of placebo effect on the problem of existence.”

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Review by Jason Sullivan

Every Deadly Suspicion by Janice Cantore

Janice Cantore’s Every Deadly Suspicion is set in present day Dry Oaks, California but the story begins in December 1990 when Joe Keyes’s wife announces she’s pregnant.

Once he gets over the shock, Joe is elated but knows he has to make some changes. Joe’s current source of income is cooking meth. He finds a job but it won’t be full time until the spring. His plan is to make one more batch of meth but cut out his partners. With the money all his, the proceeds should last until his job starts.

But something goes wrong. By the time baby Hanna arrives, Joe had pled guilty to the murder of his partners, Sophia and Blake, and is sentenced to life in prison. Details on the case are sketchy but whatever happened the bodies of the victims were never found, another man was badly injured, and a DEA agent went missing.

In present day Dry Oaks Hanna, all grown up, is now sheriff. Growing up as the child of a murderer was not easy but she had Mandy and Jared and her church. That Mandy was her best friend was extraordinary as it was her parents Joe confessed to killing. Mandy’s home with her grandparents was Hanna’s second family.

Jared was her supporter, friend, and confidant. As they grew into young adults they came to love each other. But Jared wanted more than Dry Oaks and he broke her heart when he left town. Now Jared is back but Hanna has moved on and is dating Nathan, a deputy with the county sheriff’s department.

Things are quiet in Dry Oaks until one morning she hears the sputtering of an engine and watches as Scott Buckley’s plane crashes into a field. The plane is in pieces and Scott dead. The Buckley’s are a prominent family in the county and Hanna is not looking forward to delivering the bad news.

But the news gets worse when the autopsy reveals Scott died of cyanide poisoning. Hanna now has a murder to investigate and Scott’s family is elusive when she requests an interview, especially his brother Chad. Chad is the man who was injured in the incident with Hanna’s father. Always wild, Chad’s injuries have left him reclusive and angry.

Nathan has his own murder investigation going, he and his partner are investigating a possible serial killer. The killer contacts woman though dating websites and talks them into giving him money. When they finally meet in person, he murders them.

Almost overshadowing all this for Hanna is a visit from the Department of Corrections. Joe Keyes is dying. The prison is issuing him a compassionate release if Hanna will let him live his last days in her home. Her first thought is I don’t want a killer in my home but Mandy wants her to say yes. Maybe Joe will finally tell them where the bodies of her parents are buried.

Hanna is torn and with Nathan so busy with his case, Hanna turns to the one person she could always talk to, Jared. Jared has a way of clarifying things for her and arrangements are made for Joe’s release. But when Joe comes and Mandy asks her question, things become even more confusing.

Then a beloved member of the Dry Oaks community becomes the serial killer’s latest victim. Can Hanna, Nathan, and Jared figure things out before anyone else dies? What happened 30 years ago and is it tied to what is happening right now?

The genre for this title is Christian Romantic Suspense. Faith is definitely a theme and the romance is light. Suspense drives the story and the author uses her background as a police officer to good effect. If you like Lynette Eason, Elizabeth Goddard, DiAnn Mills or just want a good story, you should give this one a try.

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Review by Patty Crane, Reference Librarian

The Love Haters by Katherine Center

In an effort to avoid being laid off from the video production company she works for, Katie Vaughn agrees to a month-long visit to Key West, Florida to shoot a recruiting video for the Coast Guard. The video will feature a rescue swimmer, Tom “Hutch” Hutcheson. Katie has previously heard of Hutch because he took the internet by storm several years before, after he rescued Jennifer Aniston’s dog.  

The first problem with Katie taking this assignment, which she omits from her co-worker Cole, who gives her the assignment, is that she cannot swim. Plus, there is no way she is getting into a swimsuit or announcing her weight before boarding the Coast Guard helicopter, like the requirement lists.

Katie struggles with low self-esteem, especially as it relates to body image. During childhood her stepmother often placed her on a diet because she thought she was overweight, and several years ago, during her relationship with a boyfriend who had just become a famous musician, internet trolls said mean and hurtful things about her physical appearance. Years later, she still struggles to maintain a positive body image. So thinking about sporting a swimsuit, even as part of an assignment, or sharing her weight gives her major anxiety.   

But first things first, Katie arrives in Key West and is greeted by her landlord and Hutch’s Aunt Rue.  Rue is the most colorful person that Katie has ever met and it is thanks to Rue that she begins to step outside her comfort zone, at least a bit.

Katie soon meets Hutch at a swim class event hosted by Rue, but their first interaction does not go as smoothly as she would have hoped.  His giant Great Dane plows into her at top speed and she ends up getting about a million splitters in her backside from the wood floor. Since Hutch is trained in first aid, he ends up getting a firsthand look at Katie’s bum as he removes them. 

She neglects to tell him that she will be working with him, but once he finds out, he is not happy.  He had thought that her co-worker Cole would be making the video. Even though he is angry, the two are soon working closely together and Katie makes it her mission to make a great recruiting video that features him, and also to record him as part of her personal side project, A Day in the Life YouTube series.  

A wrench is thrown in Katie’s plan when two surprise visitors show up at Aunt Rue’s. She will has to decide whether to risk her closeness with Hutch or possibly lose her job.

Center’s romantic comedies offer so much in addition to a good love story.  They have relatable conflicts as part of each story and THE LOVER HATERS is no exception.  It deals with self-esteem, friendship, confidence, imperfections and healing in a funny and accessible way.

Also noteworthy is this book’s cast of characters are eclectic and add dimension to the story. Katie’s cousin and best friend, Beanie, is such a hype woman for her, and Beanie’s personality is confident and no-nonsense.  Rue gives Blanche Devereaux from “The Golden Girls” vibes, but less man-hungry; and her group of friends, affectionately called “The Gals” provide Katie a circle of women who help her through several tricky situations.

If readers are looking for a summer beach read, this one would be perfect for most! 

Review written by: Jeana Gockley, Joplin Public Library Director

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Emily Wilde’s Encyclopaedia of Faeries by Heather Fawcett

It’s 1909 and Emily Wilde is a professor of dryadology at Cambridge University. A scholar that excels in her area of all things faerie, Emily is meticulous, devoted to her interests, logical, intelligent, and introverted, preferring the company of her dog Shadow, books, and the faerie folk she meets while pursuing her studies. People perplex her, and she finds social interactions very difficult. As part of her scholarly studies Emily has decided to create the world’s first Encyclopedia of Faeries, a source book for all things fair folk. 

Emily has been working on this project, traveling around the world to visit locations with different types of faeries. She frequently interacts with those she meets, although carefully and thoughtfully, as not every faerie is the same. What might entice one faerie to approach her could enrage another. This is one of the inspirations for Emily’s encyclopaedia, learning these things about faeries and recording them for other scholars and interested individuals. 

To her chagrin, Emily isn’t as isolated as she might prefer because of her office neighbor and friend Wendell Bambleby, although I highly doubt Emily would be pleased to label him as a friend. Wendell is Emily’s opposite: loud, lazy, dashing, energetic, and worse yet for Emily, very social. He is her scholarly rival and often reviews her papers for her, whether she wants him to or not, but something Emily cannot fault Wendell on is his deep knowledge of the folk. More so, Emily has a sneaking suspicion that Wendell himself might be fae, although she is yet to prove it. 

As part of her research for her encyclopaedia Emily sets off to the fictional village of Hrafnsvik. Its description is similar to rural Norway, and its people have what they call Hidden Ones, or faerie, living in their surrounding area. Emily arrives with bad luck after bad luck: her cabin is cold and dirty, she cannot chop the wood to warm it, sheep frequently find their way inside and destroy her belongings, and worst of all Emily unintentionally angers the village leader on her first day there. But silver lining: Emily immediately finds evidence of faerie, even befriending a brownie she names Poe. 

To her shock, her bad luck seemingly continues when Wendell unexpectedly shows up. It’s pretty clear to the reader that Wendell has a thing for Emily, and she for him, but Emily herself has no idea. Even though Emily is put out by Wendell’s appearance he arrives just in time, as citizens of Hrafnsvik are going missing and disturbing faerie things are afoot. Even though Emily attempts to observe simply from a research perspective her kind nature and knowledge of faerie culture pulls her into helping the villagers, Wendell at her side. Emily finds herself deeper and deeper in the faerie mystery at hand, Poe, Wendell, and the townsfolk contributing to save their village and ultimately Emily when she digs herself too deep into the mystery. 

Emily Wilde’s Encyclopedia of Faeries by Heather Fawcett is a fun historical fantasy with captivating world building. It’s magical to read with great descriptions, settings, fantasy, and characters. Emily is a bit of a curmudgeon, independent, and a lovable character that I really enjoyed. The story feels magical, like many of its faerie characters, and the budding romance between Emily and Wendell is cute to read. This novel is the first in a trilogy, with the final novel released earlier this year. After reading the trilogy I will say the first was definitely my favorite, as the independent spirit I so admired in Emily seems to take a slight backseat to her romantic life in the following novels. Overall, I fell into this cozy novel and enjoyed wandering the faerie-filled pages with Emily.

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Review by Sarah Turner-Hill, Adult Programming Coordinator

Children’s Art Books for Summer Reading 2025

Summer reading is well under way at Joplin Public Library. In the world of Youth Services, we have been reading lots of books, having a lot of fun, and making a lot of art. As you may recall, the theme of JPL’s 2025 summer reading program is “Color Our World.” In my last review, I shared Lian Cho’s picture book Oh, Olive! about a little girl who paints outside of the lines (literally and metaphorically).

We still have plenty of time left in summer break and it will likely only get hotter outside. For this month’s review, I want to share about a few art books that will entertain young readers and provide restless kids with some fun activities during the dog days of summer.

How To Be a Color Wizard: Forage and Experiment with Natural Color Making by Jason Logan combines art and nature activities for upper elementary and middle school-aged kids. The photographs are nature-based and aesthetically pleasing and the activities are fun and actually achievable for the target demographic. This book was published by mitKids Press, a publishing house affiliated with MIT that focuses on STEAM-based titles. Activities include making colors from natural materials such as berries and leaves, looking at colors in the world like a mantis shrimp, and making a paintbrush wand. Logan suffuses the book with magical language befitting a book a Hogwarts student might purchase from Flourish and Botts. I love that this book treats learning and experiment as serious work for kids, even when the actual experiment tasks the reader with pretending to be a shrimp.

The artwork and photos in the book are aesthetically pleasing, and the activities range from silly and easy for a preschooler to more challenging and appropriate for an upper elementary or middle school-aged reader (or even an adult reader). How to Be a Color Wizard is a beautiful, useful, and inspiring book to come back to over and over again.

Speaking of artistic inspiration, I first heard about the artist Alma Thomas through the picture book Ablaze With Color: A Story of Painter Alma Thomas. The 2022 biographical picture book was created by San Francisco Museum of Modern Art docent Jeanne Walker Harvey and illustrator Loveis Wise. Ablaze with Color tells the story of African American artist Alma Thomas beginning with her childhood in Georgia. Growing up in the early 1900s, Thomas experienced significant racial injustice. The author does not delve into the specifics of those injustices, though she does acknowledge how it impacted Alma’s family and how they responded. Her parents surrounded Alma and her sisters with art and culture, fostering a love of art in their daughters. At fifteen, their family moved to Washington D.C. so the girls could go to school. Alma taught art to local African American children, who were not permitted to attend segregated classes. Throughout her life, Alma taught and fostered art in her community. At age seventy, she began creating her own art. Loveis Wise does Thomas’ art justice through the use of patterns and bright colors, honoring, but not imitating, Thomas’ circular designs made up of colorful dashes and stripes. The writing is poetic without being overly sentimental, and it captures Alma Thomas’ aspirations and ability to see color and make art of her surroundings. The book begins with a quote from President Barack Obama that he made during Black History Month in 2015. Michelle Obama selected Alma Thomas’ painting Resurrection to hang in the White House, making Thomas the first African American woman with that honor. Ablaze with Color would be a great read aloud for early elementary-aged students and would provide many craft opportunities. Thomas’s use of patterns and colors lends itself well to creating with collages, painting with Legos or Blocks, printmaking, coloring, mosaics, and stamping. Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art in Bentonville, Arkansas is home to Alma Thomas’ Lunar Rendezvous–Circle of Flowers, which is well worth the drive. Happy reading and creating!

Challenger: A True Story of Heroism and Disaster on the Edge of Space by Adam Higginbotham

January 28, 1986, was the day NASA’s carefully cultivated image literally blew up at 46,000 feet. If you are of a certain age, you probably recall where you were when you heard the news. That morning, the space shuttle Challenger exploded just 73 seconds after launch, killing all seven crew members. The inquiry that followed revealed that in order to meet its frenetic launch schedules, NASA officials were willing to overlook known problems with the shuttle’s reusable solid rocket boosters. In Challenger: A True Story of Heroism and Disaster on the Edge of Space, Adam Higginbotham unpacks the story with methodical detail. It’s chilling because in reading the preceding engineering and managerial decisions, you know you are also reading the anatomy of a future catastrophe.

Tragedy is nothing new in NASA’s storied history of course, with Higginbotham taking us back to the deaths of the Apollo 1 crew during a lauchpad test. Going forward, astronaut trainees were required to listen to the audio of the crew members imploring that they be released from the command module because they were burning to death. Higginbotham also revisits how a fickle public became rather blasé with repeated moon landings, with some complaining to television networks that their favorite programs were being interrupted with yet more moon-landing footage.

Funding NASA has always been fraught, regardless of the space program. When the space agency decided to pursue flying a reusable space plane with reusable solid rocket boosters, the new astronaut class was preparing to fly missions under the very real possibility that the new shuttle program would not come to fruition. Cost overruns and delays continually tested Congress’ patience.

If you’re a space dork (like me), you’ll devour reading about the interregnum period between the Apollo and Space Shuttle programs. The focus changed from swaggering test pilots manning moon-shot rockets to research-based scientists conducting experiments in orbit. The test pilots still had their place, to be sure. Someone had to land an orbiter reentering as a glider. But gone were the days when Mercury astronauts enjoyed dollar-a-year leases on sports cars.

Nonetheless, as with any space program, defining “acceptable risk” is a necessity. Engineers didn’t really know if this new space plane/truck would survive reentry. And firing rockets with solid propellants may indeed save money, but it’s also exceptionally dangerous. Once lit, the rocket fires until it’s out of fuel. Higginbotham compares it to lighting a firework. When the various shuttles did eventually launch, the percussion waves were so pronounced and damaging, high-pressure streams of water were sprayed around the lauchpad to dampen the acoustics.

Thiokol, a private contractor based in Utah, designed and built the boosters. Given their massive size, they had to be built into segments for transportation. Once at Cape Canaveral, they were made vertical and sealed with rubber O-rings. After the boosters burned their fuel, they were released from the shuttle and then retrieved from the Atlantic Ocean. In the process of repurposing the rockets, Thiokol engineers discovered that the O-rings were less than reliable. If enough gas escaped from any given segment, the results would be catastrophic for the crew.

Higginbotham provides an in-depth history of the O-ring debacle. No internal memo or meeting escapes an airing. We know where this is heading of course, and it’s amazing the astronauts were never briefed on the suspect O-rings. As we winnow our way down to the January 1986 launch, we come across every frustrating misstep. There was extra publicity with this launch as one crew member was middle school teacher Christa McAuliffe. She was the first of NASA’s “teachernaut” program, a publicity effort to demonstrate the accessibility of space flight.

The unusually low air temps that week led to the unprecedented recommendation among Thiokol engineers to scrub the launch. The O-rings, they argued, would be compromised under such conditions. Administrators decided to fire the rockets anyway. Launch schedules had to be made and all eyes were on this launch in particular. On the morning of January 28, it looked as though it would be a successful booster firing, with the shuttle ascending as planned. But then at 11:39 A.M., it exploded in full view.

NASA originally reported that the crew was vaporized in the explosion. However, the wreckage pulled from the ocean revealed human remains. So it’s quite possible the crew was conscious as the orbiter plummeted to the ocean. After a dramatic investigation, changes were made with the booster rockets and space shuttle flights resumed. Still, make no mistake, there were deep rifts within NASA.

Throughout the book, Higginbotham gives us brief histories into the lives of the Challenger crew. President Reagan, along with his speechwriter Peggy Noonan, certainly did their part to humanize the first astronauts to perish during flight. In a public address just after the explosion, Reagan said, “We will never forget them, nor the last time we saw them, this morning, as they prepared for their journey and waved goodbye and slipped the surly bonds of earth to touch the face of God.” To Reagan’s credit, he understood that space exploration holds liminal space within our minds, and as such, during times of tragedy, words to describe what is almost indescribable matter.

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Review by Jason Sullivan

Finlay Donovan Is Killing It by Elle Cosimano

The fifth Finlay Donovan book is out and reminded me how much I enjoy this series. I could tell you about #5 but if you are going to read about Finlay’s crazy life you have to start at the beginning. Each book starts where the last one ended so it is one continuous story.

The first in the series, Finlay Donovan Is Killing It by Elle Cosimano, starts with a typical morning for Finlay. The nanny is late, she’s mopping up the coffee and grinds results of a forgotten filter, her two-year-old needs a diaper change, and five-year-old Delia gave herself a haircut. Of course Delia didn’t just whack off hair she took some scalp too. Finlay’s already late for an appointment with Sylvia, her editor, and the nanny is not answering her phone.

A call to ex-husband Steven nets a lecture and the news that he fired the nanny. With no time for a proper fix and at Delia’s insistence the blood flow is staunched with a burp rag then the cut hair is attached to her head with tape and covered with a cap. The duct tape, bloody rag and knife go in the diaper bag and they are out the door.

After dropping Delia at pre-school and Zach with his dad, Finlay just makes it to meet Sylvia hoping her wig-scarf and sunglasses are enough to hide her identity. Finlay is banned from this Panera for fighting with her exes fiancée, formerly their real estate agent and Steven’s mistress. As she and Sylvia discuss the progress or lack of for her latest thriller, the occupant of the next table notices the duct tape, knife and rag in Finlay’s bag. Sylvia leaves as does the woman from the adjacent table. Finlay then spies a note left on her tray.

$50,000 cash, Harris Mickler, address and a phone number. Intrigued by that dollar sign and all those zeroes, Finlay calls the number. It’s the woman who sat next to them and what she says is confusing. Her husband is not a nice man and has done terrible things so she wants him gone. She was going to take the money and leave him but it’s better this way and she wants Finlay to do it. Do what? After telling her Harris will be at The Lush that night she hangs up.

A confused Finley notices the bloodied items in her bag and starts to recall her conversation with Sylvia. Realization dawns that Mrs. Mickler thinks Finlay is a hit woman.

Even though she is desperate for money with bills unpaid and Steven threatening to sue for full custody of their children, Finlay is not a killer. But she is curious about Harris. Once her sister reluctantly agrees to babysit, Finlay dons her wig scarf and heads to The Lush.

When she observes Harris spiking the drink of his companion Finlay switches the drinks and Harris is the one drugged. She manages to get him out of the bar but he passes out by her minivan. Finlay’s intent is to take him to Mrs. Mickler but she adamantly refuses so Finlay heads home to figure things out. She parks in the garage but leaves the van running, it’s cold out, to go inside and call her sister. When she comes out the garage door is closed but the van is still running and Harris is dead.

As she is trying to do CPR the babysitter shows up to collect her belongings. Vero is ready to bolt and Finlay is going to turn herself in but then they find that Harris was involved with some very bad people. People who would hurt Finlay and her children if they find out Harris is dead.

For a cut of the money and room and board, Vero becomes her nanny again and her partner in crime. They have to hide Harris’ body and figure out who killed him so Finlay can stay out of jail and finish a novel she hasn’t even started.

Even with plenty of bodies, bad guys, and suspects this is a light-hearted read. There is a lot going on but Cosimano does a great job with the flow of the novel so you never get lost in the details. If you are a Stephanie Plum fan, you should check out Finlay Donovan. You won’t be sorry.

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Review written by: Patty Crane, Reference Librarian

Culture: the story of us from cave art to K-pop by Martin Puchner

It can be easy to dismiss popular culture as trite and inconsequential. Superhero movies, fantasy television shows, romance novels, Korean pop music; it can all seem a little meaningless, even to the fans. I, personally, have been known to lose interest in something if I sense that it is becoming “too popular.”

But Martin Puchner’s CULTURE: THE STORY OF US, FROM CAVE ART TO K-POP invites readers to take a deeper look at these fluffy topics from a historical perspective.

Consider this: novels have always been popular culture; all of the works that we think of now as classic literature survived because they were popular. Don Quixote was so popular when it was published that an unauthorized sequel became widely circulated – an early instance of what we would now call fanfiction.

As Puchner’s book shows, culture is often developed by borrowing. Interpreting traditions that you do not understand and giving them a new meaning. He illustrates this point by examining the ways that the Romans adapted Greek gods to suit their own needs.

The Chauvet cave paintings (which have intrigued me for a long time because of their significance in the history of animation) were created over a period of thousands of years. Each generation of humans visiting the site and adding new images to instruct or entertain future visitors.

Puchner appreciates this collective experience of culture and argues against the possibility of ownership over a culture. Culture is evolving, changing as it is passed from one group of people to another.

Modern viewers think of Hokusai’s Great Wave as being indicative of Japanese art because it became so culturally significant, but printmaking is actually a technique they borrowed from China.

Traditional Japanese art was generally created with watercolors and ink, but an interest in cheap, reproducible images brought printmaking into the country. Hokusai’s Thirty-Six Views of Mount Fuji took this popular technique and managed to show its versatility — and the potential it had in the hands of a master.

Cultural shifts are generally a result of this natural evolution, people passing down knowledge or rebelling against what came before. It changes to fit the needs of those currently using it.

It is not possible to know how future generations will view the culture that we are living in right now. But reading CULTURE inspired me to look at what is popular in a new way. Each chapter is dedicated to a new waypoint in our global cultural history. It examines how that moment in history is indicative of both its time and ours.

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Book review by Alyssa Berry, Technical Services Librarian

Great Big Beautiful Life by Emily Henry

Journalist Alice Scott longs to move from writing features and profiles on minor celebrities to writing a complete biography on someone uber famous. Someone like Margaret Ives, a former media darling who comes from one of the most famous families of the twentieth century. Despite Margaret being in hiding for at least three decades, without any known sightings, Alice thinks she has finally found her. Yes, it will be fun to try something new and grow her skills, but it will have the added bonus of making her mom finally take notice of her work. 

Alice is one of the most positive people you will ever meet and she can hardly believe her luck that she has finally managed to track down Margaret.  She arrives on Little Crescent Island, Georgia and can hardly wait to convince Margaret to start working with her.  That is until she bumps into Pulitzer prize-winning journalist Hayden Anderson as she is leaving Margaret’s house. Now Margaret’s comment about having “a couple of other branches to shake” makes more sense.  

Hayden Anderson is a music journalist, but is best known for writing a Pulitzer prize-winning celebrity biography on a famous Americana singer with dementia. Alice cannot believe that she might miss out on this opportunity after spending so much time tracking down Margaret.  

Margaret invites both of them to work with her for one month. They will take turns meeting with her, and at the end of the month, they will each have a chance to pitch their idea for the book, then she will choose who she wants to work with.   

Neither are happy about having to audition for this opportunity with Margaret, but it’s the chance of a lifetime, so they both agree to move forward. What follows is a month of meetings and competition for the coveted contract. Also during this time, the pair of writers get to know each other better thanks to run-ins at the small town’s local coffee shop and restaurants. Though talking about the book is off limits because they have both signed a NDA.  

My favorite part of this novel was Alice’s perpetually upbeat attitude and the story of Margaret’s life. I adore Emily Henry and her books. What a treat to have another one this year! 

Review written by: Jeana Gockley, Joplin Public Library Director

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How to Sell a Haunted House by Grady Hendrix

Louise never thought her family was weird, really. She’s always heard comments, even from her cousins, but Louise never agreed. Sure, her mom had an obsession, verging on unhealthy, with dolls and puppets. She packed their house full of them, various sizes and materials, and even created art with them, like when she recreated the painting of The Last Supper but with squirrel puppets coming out of the painting in place of the people. Louise, and her brother Mark, grew up with puppets as a big part of their lives, whether they always wanted it that way or not. When their parents unexpectedly die, Louise and Mark are forced to go back to their childhood home to take care of arrangements and sell the house. But when things start getting extra weird around the house, Louise can’t help but wonder: what is up with her weird family? This is the premise of horror author Grady Hendrix’s novel How to Sell a Haunted House.

When Louise is old enough she leaves home and moves across the country, getting as far away from her family as possible. She likes her reserved father well enough; it’s her mom that was always choosing Louise’s estranged younger brother, Mark, over Louise and insisting on filling the house with her weird art creations, puppets, and dolls that Louise couldn’t take any longer. Plus, her and Mark never get along, Louise annoyed by the way Mark always seems to get things handed to him so easily by their parents. Still, Louise loves her parents, despite their quirks. So when Louise gets an unexpected call from Mark telling her that their parents have died in a car accident, Louise is devastated.

Leaving her young daughter Poppy with her ex, Louise travels home to help Mark with arrangements. Louise is horrified to find that Mark has made all decisions and has arranged a company to come in and completely clean out their childhood home so it can be sold. Louise digs her heels in and insists on going through things herself, especially when she learns that all of her mom’s art collection has been left to her. Usually she would make a planned, organized list and get rid of the art, but because her and Mark are not getting along whatsoever she stubbornly refuses to get it done quickly (as only a sibling can). 

As Louise goes through the house questions begin popping up in her head. Why is her dad’s cane that he couldn’t get around without still in the living room? Why does the TV keep turning on with two of her mom’s dolls (named after Mark and Louise) sitting in front of it? Why is the attic access boarded up? One afternoon Louise falls asleep at the house, and wakes up to find one of the squirrels from her mom’s recreation of The Last Supper climbing onto the bed, and another curled around her throat. To be clear, these squirrels are not alive, but puppets. Louise attempts to rationalize what is happening, as our brains tend to do in high-stress situations, but after the squirrels attack Louise she isn’t sure if something is wrong with her and she is going through a mental break, or if something unthinkable is happening: haunted puppets. 

Louise gets her answer when their mom’s favorite puppet, Pupkin, somehow gets out of the trashcan Louise threw it in and attacks Louise, only to be saved by Mark. Now Mark and Louise must put aside their childhood dislike of one another and band together against the puppets, and ultimately learn how to sell a haunted house and confront their generational trauma. 

I appreciate the way Hendrix writes horror. He managed to make this novel spooky and funny and moving all at once. Rather than all scary all the time, Hendrix weaves in true to life emotions and situations for his characters, and adds a dash of humor. Part of the novel is horror and psychological thriller, yes – I mean come on, puppets that come to life? No thank you. However, the other part of the novel is about Mark and Louise reconciling with one another and traumatic experiences they had as children. They start the novel immersed in one set of emotions and opinions about one another, and those perceptions shift as the novel progresses. While some of the novel did read too slowly for me, I liked the combination of family dynamics and horror, and the dark humor sprinkled throughout. This is the first book I’ve read by Hendrix and it won’t be my last – I enjoy the way he navigates the genre of horror. 

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Review by Sarah Turner-Hill, Adult Programming Coordinator