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September Spotlight

MOLOKA'I
By Alan Brennert

From Publishers Weekly
 

Compellingly original in its conceit, Brennert's sweeping debut novel tracks the grim struggle of a Hawaiian woman who contracts leprosy as a child in Honolulu during the 1890s and is deported to the island of Moloka'i, where she grows to adulthood at the quarantined settlement of Kalaupapa. Rachel Kalama is the plucky, seven-year-old heroine whose family is devastated when first her uncle Pono and then she develop leprous sores and are quarantined with the disease. While Rachel's symptoms remain mild during her youth, she watches others her age dying from the disease in near total isolation from family and friends. Rachel finds happiness when she meets Kenji Utagawa, a fellow leprosy victim whose illness brings shame on his Japanese family. After a tender courtship, Rachel and Kenji marry and have a daughter, but the birth of their healthy baby brings as much grief as joy, when they must give her up for adoption to prevent infection. The couple cope with the loss of their daughter and settle into a productive working life until Kenji tries to stop a quarantined U.S. soldier from beating up his girlfriend and is tragically killed in the subsequent fight. The poignant concluding chapters portray Rachel's final years after sulfa drugs are discovered as a cure, leaving her free to abandon Moloka'i and seek out her family and daughter. Brennert's compassion makes Rachel a memorable character, and his smooth storytelling vividly brings early 20th-century Hawaii to life. Leprosy may seem a macabre subject, but Brennert transforms the material into a touching, lovely account of a woman's journey as she rises above the limitations of a devastating illness.
 

 

 

 


Do you have a favorite author and would like to find other authors who
write similar books?  The website READALIKES lists hundreds
of suggestions by author, series or genre.  Check it out!

New Adult Fiction for September

Outside the Ordinary World  by Dori Ostermiller

You Lost Me There  by Rosecrans Baldwin

Honolulu  by Alan Brennert

I'd Know You Anywhere  by Laura Lippman (Amazon Best Book August 2010)

Fragile  by Lisa Unger

The Red Queen  by Philippa Gregory  

The Postcard Killers by James Patterson & Liza Marklund

The Rule of Nine  by Steve Martini

Bijou Roy by Ronica Dhar

Rules of Betrayal  by Christopher Reich (Starred Review in Publishers Weekly

Veil of Night by Linda Howard

Cure by Robin Cook

Tough Customer by Sandra Brown

 

New Adult Non-Fiction for September

Confessions of a Prairie Bitch by Alison Arngrim

White House Doctor: a memoir by Dr. Connie Mariano

Converse with Charisma! How to Talk to Anyone and Enjoy Networking featuring Brian Tracy, Jim Rohn, and Dianna Booher  (on audio book)

Can I wear my Nose Ring to the Interview? the crash course: finding, landing, and keeping your first real job                                           by Ellen Gordon Reeves                                 
George, Nicholas and Wilhelm: three royal cousins and the road to World War I  by Miranda Carter
 Quiet Hero: secrets from my father's past by Rita Cosby 
Coppola: a pediatric surgeon in Iraq by Dr. Chris Coppola
 Spoken from the Heart by Laura Bush
 Gardening for a Lifetime: how to garden wiser as you grow older by Sydney Eddison
 

NEW LARGE PRINT FICTION

Frankly My Dear, I'm Dead  by Livia J. Washburn
 The Tehran Conviction  by Tom Gabbay
 The Devil's Punchbowl by Greg Iles
 Burn by Linda Howard
 Third Strike by Zoe Sharp
NEW MYSTERY

Pushing Up Daisies  by Rosemary Harris
Stirring Up Strife  by Jennifer Stanley
Bookmarked for Death  by Lorna Barrett
The Big Dirt Nap  by Rosemary Harris
Deadly Design  by Marion Moore Hill
Secrets of Eden by Chris Bohjalian
 

YOUTH FICTION

Indigo King:  Book Three of the chronicles of the imaginarium geographica  James A. Owen
Molly Moon & the morphing mystery Georgia Byng
The Red Pyramid by Rick Riordan
Storm Warning:  the 39 Clues  by Linda Sue Park
and more...

 NEW AUDIO & VIDEO

What's new to see and hear in September

NEW DVD'S OWNED BY OUR LIBRARY

Macgyver - 1st Season
The Office - Season One
Backdraft
Bolt
Dog Whisperer
Be My Baby
The Brave One
The Bridge on the River Kwai

and more!
 

New CLC Dvd's for September

DVD's that we have on loan for September and can be checked out
for two days include:


88 Minutes
American Gangster
Bucket List
Death at a Funeral
Failure to Launch
Munich
Pink Panther 2
Street Fighter
Wild Hogs
Creature Comforts:  The Complete Second Season
Queen
Spy School
Shaggy Dog
Very Hungry Caterpillar and other stories
Happy Feet

and more!
 

We have a selection of "PlayAways"...The self-playing digital audio book
All that you need is your own headphones in order to listen to them anywhere!

Huckleberry Finn  by Mark Twain
Hound of the Baskervilles by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
Exit Ghost  by Philip Roth

and more!

AUDIO BOOKS

Finger Licking Fifteen  by Janet Evanovich

Pilgrims  by Elizabeth Gilbert

Lost Symbol  by Dan Brown

In the President's Secret Service by Ronald Kessler

Dracula The Un-Dead by Ian Holt
 

and many more!

 

Don't forget that we have a large selection of weekly and monthly magazines that 
can be checked out for two weeks at a time!  These include:

Sports Illustrated
Consumer Reports Money Advisor
Allure
Teen Vogue
Birds and Blooms
Business Week
Newsweek
Domino
Connecticut Magazine
Discover
Organic Gardening
Consumer Reports
Photography
Prevention
Gourmet
Smithsonian
This Old House
Martha Stewart Living
National Geographic
Orion
Taste of Home
Mother Earth News
Time
Yankee Magazine
Car & Driver
Road & Track

and many more!

 

 

 

 

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