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Too Good to Miss - January 2025

Posted by Jane J on Jan 10, 2025 - 3:59pm
A review of New Titles by

Every month there are new titles purchased for the Too Good to Miss collections at our libraries. If you're not familiar with TGTM (as we call it here in library-world), it's a special collection of popular books that are truly too good to miss. Some are new and popular titles, others are older titles that might not have had as much media attention as a bestseller or celebrity book club selection but are still great reads that deserve another look.

Beyond Bestsellers - Nonfiction, Winter 2025

Get ahead of the crowd with these great recent releases that may not be on the New York Times bestseller list, but that have critics and readers talking.

January - March 2025 Issue

       

See also:

Abrahamian, Atossa Araxia.  The Hidden Globe: How Wealth Hacks the World
Abu Toha, Mosab.  Forest of Noise: Poems
Aciman, André.  Roman Year: A Memoir.  
Anolik, Lili.  Didion & Babitz.  
Atwood, Margaret.  Paper Boat: New and Selected Poems: 1961 – 2023.  

Balascio, April.  Raised by a Serial Killer: Discovering the Truth About My Father.  
Brathwaite, Lester Fabian.  Rage: On Being Queer, Black, Brilliant . . . and Completely Over It.  
Bren, Paulina.  She-Wolves: The Untold History of Women on Wall Street.  
Brotton, Jerry.  Four Points of the Compass: The Unexpected History of Direction.  
Brown, Craig.  Q: A Voyage Around the Queen.  

Caffall, Eiren.  The Mourner's Bestiary.  
Carrère, Emmanuel.  V13: Chronicle of a Trial
Chomsky, Noam.  The Myth of American Idealism: How U.S. Foreign Endangers Policy the World.  
Collins, Billy.  Water, Water: Poems.  
Conger, Kate and Mac, Ryan.  Character Limit: How Elon Musk Destroyed Twitter
Cuadros, Alex.  When We Sold God's Eye: Diamonds, Murder, and a Clash of Worlds in the Amazon.  

Davis, Kenneth C.  The World in Books: 52 Works of Great Short Nonfiction.  
DiMeo, Nate.  The Memory Palace: True Short Stories of the Past.  

Edim, Glory.  Gather Me: A Memoir in Praise of the Books that Saved Me

Fensterstock, Alison.  How Women Made Music: A Revolutionary History from NPR Music.  
Fernando, S.H., Jr.  The Chronicles of DOOM: Unraveling Rap’s Masked Iconoclast.  
Frank, Edwin.  Stranger Than Fiction: Lives of the Twentieth-Century Novel.  
French, Paul.  Her Lotus Year: China, the Roaring Twenties, and the Making of Wallis Simpson.  

Gabriele, Matthew.  Oathbreakers: The War of Brothers that Shattered an Empire and Made Medieval Europe
Giaimo, Cara.  Atlas Obscura: Wild Life: An Explorer's Guide to the World's Living Wonders.  
Gilbert, Julie.  Giant Love: Edna Ferber, Her Best-Selling Novel of Texas, and the Making of a Classic American Film.  
Graham, Elyse.  Book and Dagger: How Scholars and Librarians Became the Unlikely Spies of World War II.  
Greenberg, David.  John Lewis: A Life

Hamilton, Kate.  Mad Wife: A Memoir.  
Hamilton, Nigel.  Lincoln vs. Davis: The War of the Presidents.  
Han, Hahrie.  Undivided: The Quest for Racial Solidarity in an American Church.  
Hargrove, Nikkya.  Mama: A Queer Black Woman’s Story of a Family Lost and Found
Hasegawa, Tsuyoshi.  The Last Tsar: The Abdication of Nicholas II and the Fall of the Romanovs.  
Hughes-Hallett, Lucy.  The Scapegoat: The Brilliant Brief Life of the Duke of Buckingham.  

Idle, Eric.  The Spamalot Diaries.  

Jacobsen, Rowan.  Wild Chocolate: Across the Americas in Search of Cacao's SoulEbook
Jähner, Harald.  Vertigo: The Rise and Fall of Weimar Germany.   
Johnson, Ayana Elizabeth.  What If We Get It Right?: Visions of Climate Futures
Jones, Dan.  Henry V: The Astonishing Triumph of England’s Greatest Warrior King.  

Kahler, Abbott.  Eden Undone: A True Story of Sex, Murder, and Utopia at the Dawn of World War II.  
King, Charles.   Every Valley: The Desperate Lives and Troubled Times That Made Handel’s Messiah.  

Labrie, Sarah.  No One Gets to Fall Apart: A Memoir.  
Levy, Deborah.  The Position of Spoons: And Other Intimacies.  

Mayer, Youngmi.  I’m Laughing Because I’m Crying: A Memoir.  
Miller, Douglas K.  Washita Love Child: The Rise of Indigenous Rock Star Jesse Ed Davis.  
Molesworth, Helen.  Precious: The History and Mystery of Gems Across Time.  
Moore, Marcus J.  High and Rising: A Book About De La Soul.  
Moss, Sarah.  My Good Bright Wolf: A Memoir
Munson, Richard.  Ingenious: A Biography of Benjamin Franklin, Scientist.  

National Museum of African American History and Culture.  In Slavery's Wake: Making 
Black Freedom in the World
.  
Neal, Jennifer.  My Pisces Heart: A Black Immigrant's Search for Home Across Four Continents.  

O’Heir, Jim.  Welcome to Pawnee: Stories of Friendship, Waffles, and Parks and Recreation.  
Omokha, Rita.  Resist: How a Century of Young Black Activists Shaped America.  

Panek, Richard.  Pillars of Creation: How the James Webb Telescope Unlocked the Secrets of the Cosmos.  
Parr, Patrick.  Malcolm Before X
Prem, Deja Vu.  Beyond the Mountains: An Immigrant's Inspiring Journey of Healing and Learning to Dance with the Universe.  

Rainbow, Randy.  Low-Hanging Fruit: Sparkling Whines, Champagne Problems, and Pressing Issues from My Gay Agenda.
Ramos, Paola.  Defectors: The Rise of the Latino Far Right and What It Means for America.  
Randall, David K.  Into Unknown Skies: An Unlikely Team, a Daring Race, and the First Flight Around the World.  
Reeder, Lydia.  The Cure for Women: Dr. Mary Putnam Jacobi and the Challenge to Victorian Medicine That Changed Women's Lives Forever.  
Richardson, Elsa.  Rumbles: A Curious History of the Gut: The Secret Story of the Body's Most Fascinating Organ.  
Robertson, Aaron.  The Black Utopians: Searching for Paradise and the Promised Land in America.  
Rosner, Elizabeth.  Third Ear: Reflections on the Art and Science of Listening.  
Rybczynski, Witold. The Driving Machine: A Design History of the Car.  

Sacks, Oliver.  Letters.  
Schmitt, Armin.  The Lost World of the Dinosaurs: Uncovering the Secrets of the Prehistoric Age.  
Schoch, Richard.  How Sondheim Can Change Your Life.  
Schuettpelz, Carrie Lowry.  The Indian Card: Who Gets to Be Native in America.  
Sobel, Dava.  The Elements of Marie Curie: How the Glow of Radium Lit a Path for Women in Science.  
Somerset, Anne.  Queen Victoria and Her Prime Ministers: Her Life, the Imperial Ideal, and the Politics and Turmoil That Shaped Her Extraordinary Reign.  
Stein, Eliot.  Custodians of Wonder: Ancient Customs, Profound Traditions, and the Last People Keeping Them Alive.  
Sullivan, Jared.  Valley So Low: One Lawyer’s Fight for Justice in the Wake of America’s Great Coal Catastrophe.   

Thomas, Abigail.  Still Life at Eighty: The Next Interesting Thing.  

Wawro, Geoffrey.  The Vietnam War: A Military History.  
Wilson, Randall K.  A Place Called Yellowstone: The Epic History of the World’s First National Park.  
Witt, Emily.  Health and Safety: A Breakdown.  

A Sand County Almanac

Cover of A Sand County Almanac
Aldo
Leopold
1949

A collection of essays written by ecologist and environmentalist Aldo Leopold describing the land around Leopold's home in Sauk County, Wisconsin and his thoughts on developing a "land ethic" that is now considered to be a landmark book in the American conservation movement.  

Power where she could find it

Posted by Jane J on Dec 17, 2024 - 4:07pm

A bit ago I read Emma Southon's A Fatal Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum and loved the deep dive into how murder and assassination were viewed in ancient Rome. Not long after posting that review I heard about another book about ancient roman history. The podcaster mentioned how much they'd enjoyed a biography about Agrippina, a woman who was a descendant of Julius Caesar. She was also a sister, niece, wife, and mother to three other emperors.

Greatness confirmed

Posted by Jane J on Dec 11, 2024 - 12:30pm

The Wisconsin Book Festival is pretty good at predicting the best books of the year! If you got to see some of these authors during the Fall Celebration or during standalone book events in 2024, maybe you already knew you were in the presence of greatness.

Master Slave Husband Wife: An Epic Journey from Slavery to Freedom

Cover of Master Slave Husband Wife: An Epic Journey from Slavery to Freedom
Ilyon
Woo
2023

"A rich narrative of the Crafts, an enslaved couple who escaped from Georgia in 1848, with light-skinned Ellen disguised as a disabled white gentleman and William as her manservant, exploiting assumptions about race, class, and disability to hide in public on their journey to the North, where they became famous abolitionists while evading bounty hunters." --The Pulitzer Prizes

Shaping the middle west

Posted by Jane J on Dec 9, 2024 - 1:21pm

In his history of Chicago in the 19th century Cronon's primary thesis is that rural and urban growth/development go hand in hand with one another. The two worlds are interdependent and rely on one another to continue to exist. And in the case of the rise of Chicago these connections are especially true.

Too Good to Miss - December 2024

Posted by Jane J on Dec 2, 2024 - 2:10pm
A review of New Titles by

Every month there are new titles purchased for the Too Good to Miss collections at our libraries. If you're not familiar with TGTM (as we call it here in library-world), it's a special collection of popular books that are truly too good to miss. Some are new and popular titles, others are older titles that might not have had as much media attention as a bestseller or celebrity book club selection but are still great reads that deserve another look.