NBS recommends Gripping Confessions
WIND/PINBALL: HEAR THE WIND SING AND PINBALL, 1973 By Haruki Murakami and Ted Goossen P615
In the spring of 1978, a young Haruki Murakami sat down at his kitchen table and began to write. The result: two remarkable short novels — Hear the Wind Sing and Pinball, 1973 — that launched the career of one of the most acclaimed authors of our time. These powerful, at times surreal, works about two young men coming of age — he unnamed narrator and his friend the Rat — re stories of loneliness, obsession, and eroticism. HITMAN ANDERS AND THE MEANING OF IT ALL By Jonas Jonasson P589
In a former brothel turned low-rent hotel, the lives of three unusual strangers — a former female priest, the receptionist, and Killer-Anders, a murderer newly released from prison — accidentaly collide with darkly hilarious results. Seeing a lucrative opportunity in Killer-Anders, the unlikely trio forms an unusual new business. The Priest and The Receptionist will handle strategy and public relations, and coordinate Killer-Anders’ missions. Using the media’s obsessive need for sensational, headline-making stories to advertise their talent’s superb skill, they quickly build a clientele of rich Swedish gangsters. IN THIS LIFE By Cristine Brae P499
Anna runs away to Thailand, drags her best friend Dante with her and spends a few weeks away, taking on other people’s problems while getting away from her own. She meets the enigmatic Jude Grayson, and for as long as it’s clear to both of them that it ends when they leave, she thinks she’s got the perfect fling planned out. Or does she? Anna returns home to find that her life is no longer the way it once was, and that she can’t stop thinking about him. She learns through tragedy that nothing she’s ever believed in has turned out to be true. QUARTER LIFE POETRY: POEMS FOR THE YOUNG, BROKE & HANGRY By Samantha Jayne P599
At 25, Samantha began creating doodles and funny poems about her #struggle to share with friends on Instagram. To her surprise, these poems were picked up by 20-somethings all around the world who agreed, “This is literally us.” At a time when it seems like everyone else is getting married, snagging a dream job, and paying off their student loans, Samantha’s poetry captures the voice of young people everywhere who know that your 20s can sometimes be the exact opposite of “the best years of your life.” PRETTY GIRLS By Karin Slaughter P349
More than twenty years ago, Claire and Lydia’s teenaged sister Julia vanished without a trace. The two women have not spoken since, and now their lives could not be more different. Claire is the glamorous trophy wife of an Atlanta millionaire. Lydia, a single mother, dates an ex-con and struggles to make ends meet. But neither has recovered from the horror and heartbreak of their shared loss — a devastating wound that’s cruelly ripped open when Claire’s husband is killed.