On October 14, 1974, under the direction of Librarian Jane Smith, Boone County Public Library opened its doors at 2 Girard Street in Florence, Kentucky. On that day, more than 180 patrons visited the library. Fifty years later, Boone County Public Library is made-up of six locations serving the county. Now that is a reason to celebrate!
JOIN THE READING CHALLENGE! | Complete fun activities such as watching a 1974 movie or tie-dyeing a shirt for a chance to win a $50 gift card and tube socks. (Oct. 1-31)
CONTRIBUTE TO THE COMMUNITY ART PROJECT! | Stop by any BCPL location to draw a design on a wooden gear. The gears will be pieced together to create an art installation at the Main Library in Burlington. (Oct. 1-31)
WIN A PRIZE! | Everyone’s a winner! During the week of October 14, stop by any location and pick up a scratch-off to win a BCPL prize, while supplies last. (Week of Oct. 14)
ATTEND A PROGRAM! | Enjoy fun retro-themed events throughout the month! (Oct. 1-31)
Recommended Reads
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Sunshine and Spice
When two complete opposites agree to fake date in order to solve their cultural dilemmas, they find the only force more powerful than an immigrant mother’s matchmaking schemes might just be true love.
Naomi Kelly will do anything to make her new brand consulting business a success. When she lands a career saving contract to rebrand the Mukherjee family’s failing local bazaar, she knows there can be no mistakes. But as the “oops” baby of a free-spirited Bengali mother, Naomi’s lack of connection to her roots represents everything Gia Mukherjee disdains.
Enter, Dev Mukherjee.
Dev knows everything his mother wants…including her wish for him to get married, like, yesterday. When Gia hires a matchmaker (without, you know, asking him), Dev vows to do whatever it takes to avoid ending up in a cold, loveless marriage. When a potential match assumes Naomi is his girlfriend, the solution to both their problems becomes clear: Naomi will pretend to date Dev in order to sabotage his mother’s matchmaking efforts in exchange for lessons in Bengali culture. Flawless plan, right?
But as Naomi and Dev bond over awful dancing at Garba, couples cooking classes, and tackling the rebrand as a team, they start to realize while their relationship may be fake, their feelings for each other are starting to become very real. As the line between reality and rumor blurs, Naomi and Dev must confront what it means to fit the mold, and decide how much they’re willing to risk for love. -
A Year of Ravens
From seven bestselling authors, including New York Times bestseller Kate Quinn, comes a gripping and vividly imagined novel following an epic struggle of rebellion against the might of Rome.
Britannia: land of mist and magic clinging to the western edge of the Roman Empire. A red-haired queen named Boudica led her people in a desperate rebellion against the might of Rome, an epic struggle destined to consume heroes and cowards, young and old, Roman and Briton . . . and these are their stories.
A calculating queen foresees the fires of rebellion in a king's death.
A neglected slave girl seizes her own courage as Boudica calls for war.
An idealistic tribune finds manhood in a brutal baptism of blood and slaughter.
A death-haunted Druid challenges the gods themselves to ensure victory for his people.
A conflicted young warrior finds himself torn between loyalties to tribe and to Rome.
An old champion struggles for everlasting glory in the final battle against the legions.
A pair of fiery princesses fight to salvage the pieces of their mother's dream as the ravens circle.
A novel in seven parts, overlapping stories of warriors and peacemakers, queens and slaves, Romans and Britons who cross paths during Boudica's epic rebellion. But who will survive to see the dawn of a new Britannia, and who will fall to feed the ravens
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Magical Meet Cute
"A laugh-out-loud funny romance with depth and heart, readers will love this spellbinding novel!" --Debbie Macomber, #1 New York Times bestselling author
Is he the real deal...or did she truly summon a golem?
Faye Kaplan used to be engaged. She also used to have a successful legal practice. But she much prefers her new life as a potter in Woodstock, New York. The only thing missing is the perfect guy.
Not that she needs one. She's definitely happy alone.
That is, until she finds her town papered with anti-Semitic flyers after yet another failed singles event at the synagogue. Desperate for comfort, Faye drunkenly turns to the only thing guaranteed to soothe her--pottery. A golem protector is just what her town needs...and adding all the little details to make him her ideal man can't hurt, right?
When a seriously hot stranger mysteriously turns up the next day, Greg seems too good to be true--if you ignore the fact that Faye hit him with her bike. And that he subsequently lost his memory...
But otherwise, the man checks Every. Single. Box. Causing Faye to wonder if Greg's sudden and spicy appearance might be anything but a coincidence.
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Quarterlife
Quarterlife is a groundbreaking portrait of a nation on the cusp of a new age. A group of young people converge in Mumbai after an election brings the divisive Bharat Party to power: Naren, a jaded Wall Street consultant lured home by the promise of "better days," is accompanied by Amanda, a restless New Englander eager to live her ideals through a social impact fellowship in a slum. Meanwhile, Naren's brother Rohit, the charismatic talent scout, sets out to explore his roots in the countryside and falls in with the fiery young men that drive the Hindu nationalist machine. As they each come to grips with the new India, their journeys coalesce into a riveting milieu characterized by brutal debates and desires as fraught as they are compulsive. The result is an ever-widening chorus that feeds into a festive night when all of Mumbai is on the streets--and the simmering unrest erupts.
Quarterlife is as sweeping as it is intimate. With grace and precision, Devika Rege lays bare the moral and psychological roots of political belief in a time of reckoning for democracies worldwide. No one is spared, not even the writer. An urgent and prismatic debut, Quarterlife announces Rege as an evocative new voice in fiction and an author who is unafraid to test the limits of what the novel can achieve.
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Perfectly Wicked
Charmed meets Ghosthunters in this magically wicked paranormal romance, perfect for fans of Not the Witch You Wed and The Ex Hex.
There have always been rumors that something magical is afoot at Wicked Good Apples. Rain during droughts and other inexplicable happenings have long haunted the Maine orchard, but only Holly Celeste and her family know the truth: the Celestes are just a little wicked.
Despite the magical secret ingredient in their cider, the family business is floundering. When Connor Grimm, a charming and nationally beloved paranormal investigator, requests to film an episode of his popular TV show on the mysterious farm, Holly reluctantly accepts. She knows the publicity could be the miracle her family needs—as long as Connor doesn’t manage to actually make any paranormal discoveries while he’s there.
Intent on keeping Connor in the dark and pushing him toward the ghost story believed by the locals, Holly joins him as he interviews eyewitnesses, hunts for old records, and unearths potentially devastating stories from the past. Despite her resolution to dislike him, she begins to fall for the only man who’s ever made her feel like strange could be normal.
As Connor gets closer to uncovering the real secrets behind the orchard, his and Holly’s blooming romance begins to threaten everything they value—Connor’s commitment to his career and Holly’s commitment to protect her family.
Wicked as a love spell, this witchy romance will enchant readers of The Very Secret Society of Irregular Witches and In Charm’s Way. -
In Charm's Way
A witch struggling to regain what she has lost casts a forbidden spell—only to discover much more than she expected, in this enchanting new rom-com by New York Times bestselling author Lana Harper.
Six months after having been hit by a power surge that nearly obliterated her memory, Delilah Harlow is still picking up the pieces. Her once diamond-sharp mind has become shaky and unreliable, and bristly, self-sufficient Delilah is forced to rely on friends, family, and her raven familiar for help. In an effort to reclaim her wits and former independence, she casts a dangerous blood spell meant to harness power with healing capacities.
While the spell does restore clarity, it also unexpectedly turns Delilah into an irresistible beacon for the kind of malevolent supernatural creatures that have never before ventured into Thistle Grove. One night—just as things are about to go terribly sideways with a rogue succubus—a mysterious stranger appears in the nick of time to save Delilah’s soul.
Gorgeous, sultry, and as dangerous as the knives she carries, Catriona Quinn is a hunter of monsters—and half-human, half-fae herself, she is the kind of sly and morally gray creature Delilah would normally find horrifying. Though Delilah balks at the idea of a partnership, she has no choice but to roll the dice on their collaboration. As the two delve deeper into the power that underlies Thistle Grove, they uncover not only the town’s hidden history but also a risky attraction that could upend Delilah’s entire life. -
A Sunny Place for Shady People
A diabolical collection of stories featuring achingly human characters whose lives intertwine with ghosts, goblins, and the macabre, by “Buenos Aires’s sorceress of horror” (Samanta Schweblin, The New York Times)
“Entertaining, political and exquisitely gruesome, these stories summon terror against the backdrop of everyday horrors. . . . A queen of horror delivers more delightfully twisted stories.”—Los Angeles Times
“As vivid and essential as Kafka’s tales.”—Minneapolis Star-Tribune
One of the Most Anticipated Books of the Fall: NPR, Time, Vulture, Chicago Review of Books, Paste, Chicago Tribune, Foreign Policy, Parade, Reactor, Publishers Weekly, Lit Hub, Book Riot, Polygon, Our Culture
On the shores of this river, all the birds that fly, drink, perch on branches, and disturb siestas with the demonic squawking of the possessed—all those birds were once women.
Welcome to Argentina and the fascinating, frightening, fantastical imagination of Mariana Enriquez. In twelve spellbinding new stories, Enriquez writes about ordinary people, especially women, whose lives turn inside out when they encounter terror, the surreal, and the supernatural. A neighborhood nuisanced by ghosts, a family whose faces melt away, a faded hotel haunted by a girl who dissolved in the water tank on the roof, a riverbank populated by birds that used to be women—these and other tales illuminate the shadows of contemporary life, where the line between good and evil no longer exists.
Lyrical and hypnotic, heart-stopping and deeply moving, Enriquez’s stories never fail to enthrall, entertain, and leave us shaken. Translated by the award-winning Megan McDowell, A Sunny Place for Shady People showcases Enriquez’s unique blend of the literary and the horrific, and underscores why Kazuo Ishiguro, winner of the Nobel Prize for Literature, calls her “the most exciting discovery I’ve made in fiction for some time.” -
The Ending Fire
Rebellions are like fires—something needs to burn to make a flame. Return to the Wardens’ Empire in this riveting conclusion to the visionary fantasy trilogy inspired by the mythology of Africa and Arabia.
The Wardens’ Empire is falling. A vigilante known only as the Truthsayer is raising an army against the wardens. Sylah and Hassa must navigate the politics of this new world, all the while searching for Anoor.
Across the sea, the Blood Forged prepare for war, requesting aid from other governments. Jond’s role as major general sees him training soldiers for combat, but matters of the heart will prove to be the hardest battlefield.
The Zalaam celebrate the arrival of the Child of Fire, heralding the start of the final battle. Anoor’s doubts are eclipsed by the powers of her new god. Soon the Zalaam will set off on their last voyage—and few expect to return.
Do you feel it? Cresting the horizon? The darkness drawing in, the shadows elongating . . .
The Ending Fire comes.
Book Three of the Ending Fire Trilogy
Don’t miss any of Saara El-Arifi’s searing Ending Fire Trilogy:
THE FINAL STRIFE • THE BATTLE DRUM • THE ENDING FIRE -
Peg and Rose Play the Ponies
Rival sisters-in-law Peg Turnbull and Rose Donovan spent their summer doing the unthinkable: sleuthing for dangerous suspects and becoming (almost) friends. But when a September trip leads to more murder, it’ll be a miracle if the dysfunctional duo is still a team—and alive—by autumn . . .
Murder, She Wrote meets The Golden Girls in the third Senior Sleuths Mystery!
From the moment Peg arrives in Kentucky, dragging level-headed Rose along for the week-long excursion proves a smart move. Because after she brings her canine expertise to prestigious conformation shows, next on the agenda is selling her Thoroughbred broodmare's offspring at a high-stakes yearling sale. And when the ladies arrive to meet the young horse at Six Oaks farm, something seems off about the place—especially Jim Grable, the yearling manager with serious anger issues . . .
While Peg feels comfortable again judging pedigree pups over Labor Day Weekend, Rose judges a shocking new turn of events. Jim has been found dead on the farm and a young employee needs help convincing police she didn’t kill him. As disjointed clues lead to a list of misdeeds swirling around Six Oaks, everyone connected to Jim agrees on one thing—he had it coming . . .
It isn’t until Peg guides her colt’s journey to the auction ring that she grasps how much Jim had been manipulating the process behind the scenes. Now, unable to rely on her instincts alone, Peg must also trust in Rose’s talents to expose the real culprit. But the two need to have each other’s backs before tangling with a killer—a deadly criminal set on halting their dog and pony show for good! -
Furever After
Librarian Kathleen Paulson is in for a spell of trouble when she finds a dead body, and only her reliable magical cats can help her tail a killer in the newest installment of this New York Times bestselling series.
Kathleen is busy running the library and planning her upcoming wedding to detective Marcus Gordon when she suddenly stumbles across a body in the library. She is surprised to learn that the deceased was in the middle of an unlikely heist—it seems he was trying to steal one of the paintings that had been in a box in the library’s workroom. Kathleen never knew any of the library’s rotating artwork was valuable and can’t imagine what the dead man wanted with it.
But then an art history expert called in by the police identifies the almost-purloined painting as a piece that might have been part of a previous high profile art theft. Owen’s and Hercules’s whiskers are already twitching, and events soon make Kathleen realize that whoever killed the wannabe art thief has more than murder on their mind. Kathleen and her clever cats will have to work fast to prevent anyone else from getting hurt. -
The Last Murder at the End of the World
"A gripping tale that reads like a Sherlock Holmes novel set in a broken future...Turton is an exciting writer with a knack for strange tales that push the envelope, and this strange story of murder, survival, and the importance of memory might be his best work yet." --Gabino Iglesias for NPR
From the bestselling author of The 7 1/2 Deaths of Evelyn Hardcastle and The Devil and the Dark Water comes an inventive, high-concept murder mystery: an ingenious puzzle, an extraordinary backdrop, and an audacious solution.
Solve the murder to save what's left of the world.
Outside the island there is nothing: the world was destroyed by a fog that swept the planet, killing anyone it touched.
On the island: it is idyllic. One hundred and twenty-two villagers and three scientists, living in peaceful harmony. The villagers are content to fish, farm and feast, to obey their nightly curfew, to do what they're told by the scientists.
Until, to the horror of the islanders, one of their beloved scientists is found brutally stabbed to death. And then they learn that the murder has triggered a lowering of the security system around the island, the only thing that was keeping the fog at bay. If the murder isn't solved within 107 hours, the fog will smother the island--and everyone on it.
But the security system has also wiped everyone's memories of exactly what happened the night before, which means that someone on the island is a murderer--and they don't even know it.
And the clock is ticking.
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The River View
Former sheriff Jules Clement returns in this new installment of the celebrated mystery series, set once again in the wild, strange, windy town of Blue Deer, Montana, where your neighbors or the tourists can be just as deadly as the weather
Jules Clement is back in Blue Deer, working as an archaeologist and private investigator. He’s a mostly happy man: he’s a new father, and he and his wife Caroline are building their dream house on an idyllic patch of river bottomland. But everything that can go wrong will, in terms of money, love, and murder. The horrible neighbors enlist Jules to spy on each other. The county hires him to find out if a road runs over some misplaced bodies in a long-abandoned potter’s field. A former priest with a side hustle in extortion ends up very dead. A crew of Russians in fast cars is running amok through the Montana landscape. All this as an old nemesis returns, pulling Jules back to confront what he’s been avoiding his entire life: the death of his father.
Published alongside newly reissued editions of the entire series, The River View is further proof that “you haven’t been west in any meaningful sense until you’ve been to Blue Deer” (The New York Times). -
Murder at the White Palace
In post-WWII London, the matchmakers of The Right Sort Marriage Bureau are involved in yet another murder.
In the immediate post-war days of London, two unlikely partners have undertaken an even more unlikely, if necessary, business venture—The Right Sort Marriage Bureau. The two partners are Miss Iris Sparks, a woman with a dangerous—and never discussed—past in British intelligence and Mrs. Gwendolyn Bainbridge, a genteel war widow with a young son entangled in a complicated aristocratic family. Looking to throw a New Year’s Eve soiree for their clients, Sparks and Bainbridge scout an empty building—only to find a body contained in the walls. What they initially assume is a victim of the recent Blitz is uncovered instead to be a murder victim—stabbed several times.
To make matters worse, the owner of the building is Sparks’ beau, Archie Spelling, who has ties to a variety of enterprises on the right and wrong sides of the law, and the main investigator for the police is her ex-fiancée. Gwen, too, is dealing with her own complicated love life, as she tentatively steps back into the dating pool for the first time since her husband’s death. Murder is not something they want to add to their plates, but the murderer may be closer to home than is comfortable, and they must do all they can to protect their clients, their business and themselves. -
The World After Alice
“The World After Alice is a lovely debut novel that glimmers with fine writing and notes of human insight. There's a quiet beauty to Lauren Aliza Green's work, and I am now a fan.”
—Ann Napolitano, New York Times bestselling author of Hello Beautiful
“A page-turner of a family drama. The World After Alice is at turns brutally honest, funny, and deeply empathic.” —Charmaine Wilkerson, New York Times bestselling author of Black Cake
Named One of Forbes’s 2024 30 Under 30 in Media
For readers of Seating Arrangements and The Most Fun We Ever Had, a gorgeous and gripping story of two families brought together to celebrate an unexpected marriage, twelve years after a devastating tragedy upended their lives
When Morgan and Benji surprise their families with a wedding invitation to Maine, they’re aware the news of their clandestine relationship will come as a shock. Twelve years have passed since the stunning loss of sixteen-year-old Alice, Benji’s sister and Morgan’s best friend, and no one is quite the same. But the young couple decide to plunge headlong into matrimony, marking the first time their fractured families will reunite since Alice’s funeral.
As the arriving guests descend upon the tranquil coastal town, they bring with them not only skepticism about the impromptu nuptials but also deep-seated secrets and agendas of their own. Peter, Morgan’s father, may be trying to dissuade his daughter from saying “I do,” while Linnie, Benji’s mother, introduces a boyfriend who bears a tumultuous past of his own. Nick, Benji’s father, is scheming to secure a new job before his wife—formerly his mistress—discovers he’s lost his old one. Morgan, too, carries delicate secrets that threaten to jeopardize the happiness for which she has so longed. And as for Benji—well, he’s just trying to make sure the whole weekend doesn’t implode.
As the whirlwind weekend unfolds, old passions reignite, deep wounds resurface, and unearthed secrets threaten to shatter the fragile peace the wedding promises. With each new revelation, the to-be-weds and their complicated families are forced to question just how well they know the ones they hold dear. -
State of Paradise
A New York Times Book Review Editors' Choice. Named a Most Anticipated Book by TIME, Oprah Daily, Esquire, the Los Angeles Times, The Boston Globe, Marie Claire, ELLE, Bustle, and Lit Hub. An Apple Best Book of July. One of ELLE's Best Novels of 2024 So Far.
"A brilliant ghost story and a profoundly moving and atmospheric meditation on place, memory, and the very nature of reality, where everything is truly not as it seems." —Mona Awad, author of Rouge
"At once an adventure and a treat, a deep study of Florida's psychogeography and a creepy story about ghosts, missing people, cults, and technology. Don't miss it." —Gabino Iglesias, NPR
A heart-racing fun house of uncanniness hidden in Florida’s underbelly from the celebrated Laura van den Berg
It’s another summer in a small Florida town. After an illness that vanishes as mysteriously as it arrived, everything appears to be getting back to normal: soul-crushing heat, torrential downpours, sinkholes swallowing the earth, ominous cats, a world-bending virtual reality device being handed out by a company called ELECTRA, and an increasing number of posters dotting the streets with the faces of missing citizens. Living in her mother’s home, a ghostwriter for a famous thriller author tracks the eerie changes. On top of everything else, she’s contending with family secrets, spotty memories of her troubled youth, a burgeoning cult in the living room, and the alarming expansion of her own belly button.
Then, during a violent rainstorm, her sister goes missing. She returns a few days later, sprawled on their mother’s lawn and speaking of another dimension. Now the ghostwriter must investigate not only what happened to her sister and the other missing people but also the uncanny connections between ELECTRA, the famous author she works for, and reality itself.
A sticky, rain-soaked reckoning with the elusive nature of selfhood and storytelling, Laura van den Berg’s State of Paradise is an intricate and page-turning whirlwind. With inimitable control and thrilling style, van den Berg reaches deep into the void and returns with a story far stranger than either reality or fiction.