On the shelves - April 10

The books listed below are now available for checkout at the Clovis-Carver Public Library. The library is open to the public, but patrons can still visit the online catalog at cloviscarverpl.booksys.net/opac/ccpl or call 575-769-7840 to request a specific item for curbside pickup.

“Along the Rio Grande” by Tracie Peterson. Recently widowed Susanna Jenkins has decided to follow her family to the booming town of San Marcial, New Mexico, to aid in her family’s sudden change in fortune. They are tasked with managing her uncle’s new Grand Hotel, and it takes all her patience to try to help her parents see the good of their circumstances and relinquish their sense of entitlement. Owen Turner works as a boilermaker for the Santa Fe’s train shops in San Marcial. He’s immediately attracted to Susanna upon meeting her, but he hesitates to risk opening his heart again. When misguided choices put Susanna’s family in an even more precarious situation, she needs someone to rely on. But if Owen can’t face the past, he’ll miss out on his greatest chance at love.

“The Dickens Boy” by Thomas Keneally. Edward Dickens, the tenth child of England’s most famous author Charles Dickens, has consistently let his parents down. Unable to apply himself at school and adrift in life, the teenaged boy is sent to Australia in the hopes that he can make something of himself—or at least fail out of the public eye. He soon finds himself in the remote Outback, surrounded by Aboriginals, colonials, ex-convicts, ex-soldiers, and very few women. Determined to prove to his parents and more importantly, himself, that he can succeed in this vast and unfamiliar wilderness, Edward works hard at his new life amidst various livestock, bushrangers, shifty stock agents, and frontier battles.

“The Book of Cold Cases” by Simone St. James. In 1977, Claire Lake, Oregon, was shaken by the Lady Killer Murders: Two men were murdered with the same gun, with strange notes left behind. Beth Greer was the perfect suspect—a rich 23-year-old woman, seen fleeing one of the crimes. But she was acquitted, and she retreated to the isolation of her mansion. In 2017, Shea Collins is a receptionist, but by night, she runs a true crime website, the Book of Cold Cases. When she meets Beth by chance, Shea asks her for an interview. To Shea’s surprise, Beth says yes. They meet regularly at Beth’s mansion, though Shea is never comfortable there. The allure of learning the truth about the case from the smart, charming Beth is too much to resist, but even as they grow closer, Shea senses something isn’t right.

“Stolen Focus: Why You Can’t Pay Attention-and How to Think Deeply Again” by Johann Hari. In the United States, teenagers can focus on one task for only sixty-five seconds at a time, and office workers average only three minutes. Like so many of us, Johann Hari was finding that constantly switching from device to device and tab to tab was a diminishing and depressing way to live. He tried all sorts of self-help solutions, but nothing seemed to work. So, Hari went on an epic journey across the world to interview the leading experts on human attention—and he discovered that everything we think we know about this crisis is wrong.

“The Best New True Crime Stories: Partners in Crime” by Mitzi Szereto. From serial killers to your aAverage jJoes, this chilling new collection of original crime stories takes you into the lawless and deadly activities of criminal couples who find more pleasure in crime than in each other.

“Dark City: The Lost World of Film Noir” by Eddie Muller. Dark City expands with new chapters and a fresh collection of restored photos that illustrate the mythic landscape of the imagination. It’s a place where the men and women who created film noir often find themselves dangling from the same sinister heights as the silver-screen avatars to whom they gave life. Eddie Muller takes readers on a spellbinding trip through treacherous terrain: Hollywood in the post-World War II years, where art, politics, scandal, and style produced a new approach to moviemaking, and a new type of cultural mythology.

— Summaries provided by library staff