Peak Picks Current Titles Book List
A complete list of current Peak Picks titles.
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The Bewitching
Adult Fiction. “Minerva Contreras is a graduate student at Stoneridge College in 1998, researching obscure horror author Beatrice Tremblay, herself an alumna of the school whose roommate, Virginia Somerset, disappeared when they were students in the 1930s. When Minerva gains access to an unpublished manuscript of Beatrice’s, she realizes it’s an account of Virginia’s last days at Stoneridge. The tale details Virginia’s belief that she was being stalked by a malignant presence, a chain of events Minerva recognizes from her great-grandmother Alba’s stories of battling a witch in rural Mexico. Before long, Minerva feels the darkness coming for her as well and must draw on the wisdom inherited from Alba to survive. Moreno-Garcia immerses readers in multiple settings; the shifting perspectives keep the tension high as the book barrels to the final confrontation.” Booklist
Format: Book
Availability: Available
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The CIA Book Club
Adult Nonfiction. “British author English's book opens with an image of a simple-looking book, computer scientists on the cover, seemingly a technical manual. Had Polish security agents opened it, however, they would have discovered a copy of George Orwell's 1984, smuggled into the country from Paris. The French capital served as an entrepôt for books funded by the CIA, which, brought to Warsaw and other Polish cities by travelers to the West during the brief thaw following Stalin's death, were circulated via a ‘system of covert lending.’ By the program's end, thousands of books had been circulated, to the gratitude of their readers, one of whom exalted, ‘We read poetry and literature. It showed us that there are like-minded people who are above nationality, who we can empathize with, who admire beauty, who admire virtue.’ A well-crafted book about books--and spooks, skullduggery, and a time when ideas mattered.” Kirkus
Format: Book
Availability: Available
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The Convenience Store by the Sea
Adult Fiction. “In the seaside town of Mojiko, the eccentric Mr. Shiba manages a Tenderness store, where his magnetic personality and handsome figure are nothing compared to his love for his customers and employees. The story follows multiple Tenderness patrons as they navigate hardships, with the store bringing them closer together. Among them are employee Mitsuri, a mother who struggles with raising a difficult teenage boy and finds solace in publishing her popular online manga. There’s also customer Yoshirō, an aspiring manga artist who strives to leave his job as a tutor; and Azusa, a middle schooler who yearns to step out of her friend’s shadow and discovers joy in the sweet treats at Tenderness, fueling her desire to become a pastry chef. Mr. Shiba’s interventions in others’ lives has mixed results… but overall, the well-meaning proprietor seeds a sense of hope and purpose in those he encounters.” PW
Format: Book
Availability: Available
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A Marriage at Sea
Adult Nonfiction. “Elmhirst's narrative turns on two 1960s-era British dreamers who decided to pitch it all in and sail from grim, gray Britain around the globe to New Zealand, ‘discovering new lands on the other side of the world.’ The author discovered the story of Maurice Bailey, a printer by trade, who took a studious approach to the voyage, learning navigation and reading and rereading reference books. His wife, Maralyn, was eminently practical--certainly more so than Maurice, who insisted on having no radio transmitter aboard to ‘preserve their freedom from outside interference.’ That would prove a consequential decision when a whale collided with their boat and sank it….they floated, adrift and without a clue as to their location in the vast Pacific, for 117 days until finally being spotted, quite by chance, by a passing South Korean fishing boat. A nimbly told story that should serve as a caution--but oddly, too, as inspiration--to would-be escapists.’ Kirkus
Format: Book
Availability: Available
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Atmosphere
Adult Fiction. "Joan Goodwin has always been obsessed with space, which is why she became an astrophysics professor at Rice University. But then,...NASA announces that it's looking for female scientists to join the space program. Joan is accepted on her second try, and in 1980, she begins training...The story cuts back and forth between a disaster in 1984 and the story of Joan's journey through the space program. Reid keeps the tension high, making this perhaps her most propulsive novel yet as she balances the drama of Joan's personal life with the fast-paced action of a catastrophe in space. Even with the high-stakes action, the touching and surprising love story is the emotional heart of the book." Kirkus
Format: Book
Availability: Available
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Bad Company
Adult Nonfiction. "Greenwell debuts with a scathing indictment of private equity. Profiling individuals whose lives were upended by such firms...she recounts how private equity's takeover of Toys 'R' Us in 2005 led to staffing cuts that forced one Oregon floor supervisor to take on responsibilities previously covered by three employees until the company went bankrupt in 2017 and refused to pay her severance. Such stories outrage, but Greenwell finds reason for hope in ordinary people pushing back against private equity's worst abuses. The result is a stark reminder of the human toll of corporate penny pinching.” Publishers Weekly
Format: Book
Availability: Available
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So Far Gone
Adult Fiction. "Rhys Kinnick has gone off the grid. At Thanksgiving a few years back, a fed-up Rhys punched his conspiracy-theorist son-in-law in the mouth, chucked his smartphone out a car window and fled for a cabin in the woods...Now Kinnick’s old life is about to land right back on his crumbling doorstep. Can this failed husband and father, a man with no internet and a car that barely runs, reemerge into a broken world to track down his missing daughter and save his sweet, precocious grandchildren from the members of a dangerous militia? So Far Gone is a rollicking, razor-sharp, and moving road trip through a fractured nation." Publisher description
Format: Book
Availability: Available
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The AI Con
Adult Nonfiction. "Linguist Bender and sociologist Hanna, the founders of a merrily debunking podcast about all things AI, write that there's hoopla aplenty about how AI will make our lives better - or perhaps worse. There are real concerns, of course, especially for people of color...[and] those 'daily harms being done in its name' are more profound than a feared robot apocalypse (the authors add, AI probably won't replace your job, 'but it will make your job a lot shittier.') A refreshingly contrarian take on AI and the clouds of hyperbole surrounding it." Kirkus
Format: Book
Availability: Available
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The Emperor of Gladness
Adult Fiction. "Vuong follows up his first novel with a searching and beautiful story of a troubled young man. The reader first meets Hai on a bridge in East Gladness, Conn., where he's about to jump to his death. He's stopped by Grazina, an 82-year-old Lithuanian woman. She invites him to stay with her, and as her dementia worsens, he cares for her... Hai tells his mother he is attending medical school, but in fact, shortly before meeting Grazina, he was released from rehab for opioid addiction. Vuong's scenes are vivid, and the pitch-perfect dialogue cuts like a knife...This downbeat tale soars to astonishing heights." Kirkus
Format: Book
Availability: Available
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Storybook Ending
Adult Fiction. "April, a smart and lonely tech worker, worries work from home has gotten out of hand: she's left an anonymous note in a book for Westley, the clerk at her Seattle neighborhood bookstore... But thanks to fate, Laura - a busy single mom who had given up on love - buys the book, finds the note, and thinks Westley has left it for her. Meanwhile ,Westley...is too distracted...to notice either of the two women. But as April and Laura's anonymous correspondence continues back and forth, their mundane routines are challenged, sparking a glimmer of hope. Is a happy ending in the cards for them?" Publisher description.
Format: Book
Availability: Available
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