Staff Picks

Looking for a book you can’t put down? Check out Lisa Unger’s In The Blood.  It’s one of the most talked about books at FCPL this summer.

In this gripping mystery involving family secrets and deadly consequences, a college student with a tragic past offers her services as nanny to a boy with behavioral issues.  The games start off innocent enough but soon intensify into violence that raises questions about who’s really calling the shots.

Alicia Cavitt

Information Specialist

Page Turners

Odd, Weird & Little by Patrick Jennings
Page Turners book discussion group for grades 3-5

Befriending a very strange new student, Toulouse helps outsider Woodrow stand up to the class bullies who have been picking on them both. As Woody says, "It's harder to feel like a weirdo when there's someone who's weirder than you." This is a story of kindness, friendship and tolerance for those who are different.  The alert reader will pick up many clues throughout the story to solve the mystery of who (or more accurately what) is Toulouse.


The Cumming Library will host Page Turners on Thursday, August 28 at 4:30 p.m.  Register here to attend.


Holly Raus
Information Specialist - Youth Services

My Favorite Books of 2014...so far (4th in a Series)

In The Blood by Lisa Unger

The Silent Wife by A. S. A. Harrison

Empty Mansions by Bill Dedman

Frog Music by Emma Donoghue

It's hard to say which has been my very favorite, but I will say that In the Blood and The Silent Wife both had moments where I had to put the book down because I was so mad at the character or what was revealed was such a surprise and I had to rethink bits and pieces and put them together.

Mendy Gunter
Branch Manager

Staff Picks

The Apple Orchard by Susan Wiggs

The Beekeeper's Ball by Susan Wigg






I just completed The Beekeeper's Ball by Susan Wiggs. It can be read as a "stand-alone" book; but, I recommend reading the first book in the series, The Apple Orchard, so that the storyline is easier to follow.  Both books refer back to their grandparents history in World War II and I found it fascinating.  I learned things about the Nazis that I never knew!  Both books included romance, laughter and recipes that sound just divine.  The ending makes it seem like there just might be another book in the future...

Kim Cavalenes
Cataloging Assistant

My Favorite Books of 2014...so far (3rd in a series)

My top 10 for the first half of 2014 are:

All Fall Down by Jennifer Weiner

The Dead Will Tell by Linda Castillo

In the Blood by Lisa Unger

The Invention of Wings by Sue Monk Kidd

Mr. Mercedes by Stephen King

The Secret Life of Violet Grant by Beatriz Williams

We Were Liars by E. Lockhart

The Weight of Blood by Laura McHugh

The Winter People by Jennifer McMahon

Until You're Mine by Samantha Hayes






Beth Moore
Information Specialist

My Favorite Books of 2014...so far (2nd in a series)

This has been a great year for reading.  It's been hard to narrow down my favorite books so far this year, but here they are: 

Astonish Me by Maggie Shipstead

Bellweather Rhapsody by Kate Racculia

Fosse by Sam Wasson

Fourth of July Creek by Smith Henderson

The Goldfinch by Donna Tartt






 Little Failure: A Memoir by Gary Shteyngart

The Lowland by Jhumpa Lahiri

The Snow Queen by Michael Cunningham

The Two Hotel Francforts by David Leavitt

Two Serious Ladies by Jane Bowles

Stephen Kight

Assistant Director for Public Services

Juvenile and Teen picks!

Lockwood & Co: The Screaming Staircase by Jonathan Stroud 
Set in a fictionalized England where paranormal visitors roam the countryside and psychically sensitive children are tasked with hunting and trapping ghosts, this fantasy novel is full of scares, screams, and unforgettable characters. A chilly read perfect for a hot day! 

Three Times Lucky by Sheila Turnage
Plucky orphan Mo LoBeau is out to solve a murder in the small, sleepy, southern town of Tupelo Landing, NC while also trying to solve the mystery of her “upstream mother.” This book is perfect for upper elementary readers looking for a good laugh, great characters, and a mystery to die for. 

           Both of these titles also come in very well done audio versions!

Coffee Talk Book Discussion - August 12, 2014

A Constellation of Vital Phenomena by Anthony Marra

The novel takes place in post-war Chechnya and brings together an assortment of characters that might not otherwise cross paths.  Sonja the only doctor in the local hospital, Akhmed who barely passed medical school, and Haava the child Akhmed brought to Sonja to stay with her.  They are all finding different ways to survive and not dwell on the reality that is theirs at the time.    What do you do when you are afraid to hear a knock on the door?  When your family, friends, and neighbors disappear after midnight visits from the Feds?  It is dangerous to walk the streets?  While reading this, I found some disturbing similarities to the recent crisis in the Ukraine.  This first book from Anthony Marra was long-listed for the 2013 National Book Award and won the National Book Critics Circle Award last year, and was just recently shortlisted for the PEN Literary Award and Robert W. Bingham Prize.  Come join us for Coffee Talk Book Discussion on Tuesday, August 12th at 1:30 p.m at the Cumming Library. Haven’t read the book yet?  There’s still time, or simply join us and gain insight into the story and history behind it.

Joan Dudzinski
Collection Support Supervisor
Cumming Library

Staff Picks - Adult

Two Serious Ladies by Jane Bowles



Two Serious Ladies, the only novel by author Jane Bowles, is the story of two women who, as the back cover expresses it so well, "descend into debauchery."  Mrs. Copperfield takes up with a teenage prostitute in Panama, and Miss Goering engages in a variety of encounters with men.  Tennessee Williams and Truman Capote were both big fans of this eccentric novel, published in 1943, and I can see why.  In both style and substance it's refreshingly unique.

Stephen Kight
Assistant Director for Public Services

My Favorite Books of 2014...so far (1st in a series)

My favorite books of the year so far:

The Storied Life of A.J. Fikry by Gabrielle Zevin
If you are a true bibliophile, you may also love the charmingly cranky curmudgeon bookseller A.J. Fikry. His "Storied Life" among books, along with his journey toward overcoming family tragedy to find a new path, are all at once humorous, sad, and romantic. As a bonus, the author includes literary blurbs at the beginning of each chapter.  

The Last Enchantments by Charles Finch

If you have ever yearned for the "dreaming spires of Oxford," or if you've ever gone to school far from home, or if you have ever simply fallen in love with the wrong person (and who hasn't?), then you may enjoy The Last Enchantments. Brilliant young writer Charles Finch based this novel on his own past experience as an American student in England.

Virginia McCurry
Information Specialist

Staff Pick

Shiloh, 1862 by Winston Groom

Winston Groom, author of Forrest Gump upon which the movie is based, uses his skill as a fiction writer to make a military history read very interesting.  His background research on battlefield leaders as well as eyewitness accounts by soldiers and civilians on both sides of the conflict keeps this from being another dry historical accounting of troop movements on the battlefield.  Green troops, untried leadership, and a terrain that would been have a challenge to our modern military leads to a knock-down drag-out battle that wakes up both the North and South that this was not going to be the war that everyone had envisioned.  After all the carnage on both sides, it’s a wonder that the soldiers on both sides did not just throw down their weapons and run for home.  Groom lets you see the development of this battle through the leaders' eyes and then he lets you experience the impact of the battle’s aftermath on civilians at home as well as those who lived next to the battlefield.  The troops on both sides called going into combat as “seeing the elephant.”  The ones who survived Shiloh saw a massive herd of elephants as this was the first major battle of the Civil War.

Jon McDaniel
Director