Peak Picks Current Titles Book List
New titles from the Peak Picks collection that are currently in rotation. Stop by any branch to see what's available today!
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Parable of the Sower
Adult Fiction. “When global climate change and economic crises lead to social chaos in the early 2020s, California becomes full of dangers… 15-year-old Lauren Olamina lives inside a gated community… sheltered from the surrounding anarchy. In a society where any vulnerability is a risk, she suffers from hyperempathy, a debilitating sensitivity to others' emotions. Lauren must make her voice heard in order to protect her loved ones from the imminent disasters her small community stubbornly ignores. But what begins as a fight for survival soon leads to something much more...” Pub description
Format: Book
Availability: Available
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Annie Bot
“Annie Bot was created to be the perfect girlfriend for her human owner Doug. Designed to satisfy his emotional and physical needs, she has dinner ready for him every night, wears the pert outfits he orders for her, and adjusts her libido to suit his moods. Doug says he loves that Annie’s AI makes her seem more like a real woman, so Annie explores human traits such as curiosity, secrecy, and longing. But becoming more human also means becoming less perfect… And in such an impossible paradox, what does Annie owe herself?” Publisher description
Format: Book
Availability: Available
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The Emperor and the Endless Palace
Adult Fiction. “Across seemingly unrelated timelines woven together only by the twists and turns of fate, two men are reborn, lifetime after lifetime. Within the treacherous walls of an ancient palace and the boundless forests of the Asian wilderness to the heart-pounding cement floors of underground rave scenes, our lovers are inexplicably drawn to each other… As their many lives intertwine, they begin to realize the power of their undying love—a power that transcends time itself…but one that might consume them both.” Publisher description
Format: Book
Availability: Available
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The Great Divide
Adult Fiction. "'WORK IN PARADISE’ the notice declared, calling for laborers to come to Panama to build a canal. Ada Bunting, a 16-year-old from Barbados, is lured there, anxious to earn money to help her ailing sister. Henríquez… casts the disruptive and dangerous digging of the massive canal as a magnet that pulls together disparate characters. [The author] reveals the forgotten blood, sweat, and tears that made this engineering marvel possible, while dramatizing…how ‘the great divide’ not only split the land but also communities, families, culture, and a sense of wholeness.” Booklist
Format: Book
Availability: Available
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The House of Hidden Meanings
Adult Nonfiction. “RuPaul strips away all artifice and recounts the story of his life with breathtaking clarity and tenderness, bringing his signature wisdom and wit to his own biography. From his early years growing up as a queer Black kid in San Diego navigating complex relationships with his absent father and temperamental mother, to forging an identity in the punk and drag scenes of Atlanta and New York, to finding enduring love with his husband Georges LeBar and self-acceptance in sobriety, RuPaul excavates his own biography life-story, uncovering new truths and insights in his personal history.” Publisher description
Format: Book
Availability: Available
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James
Adult Fiction. “Everett portrays in this ingenious retelling of The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn a Black man who’s mastered the art of minstrelsy to get what he needs from gullible white people. Many of the same things happen as they do in Twain’s original… The main difference is in the telling. Jim narrates, not Huck… Everett also pares down the prose and adds humor in place of sentimentality. Jim’s wrenching odyssey concludes with remarkable revelations, violent showdowns, and insightful meditations on literature and philosophy. Everett has outdone himself.” Publishers Weekly
Format: Book
Availability: Available
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The Manicurist's Daughter
Adult Nonfiction. “The youngest of four children, and the only one born in the U.S., Lieu grew up helping her Vietnamese mother, Hà Thi (or ‘Jennifer’ to her American clients) operate several nail salons in Northern California. When Hà Thi died suddenly after receiving an abdominoplasty from a surgeon with a history of malpractice, 11-year-old Lieu was set adrift. Lieu's candor about her mother's faults…and righteous anger at the surgeon who killed her set this apart from similar fare. It's a generous portrait of grief that will touch those who've struggled with loss.” Publisher description
Format: Book
Availability: Available
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Parasol Against the Axe
Adult Fiction. “Years ago, Hero, Sofie, and Dorothea were united in a criminal venture, but now they're barely friendly. Yet when Sofie invites both Hero and Thea to her bachelorette weekend in Prague, they both show up. …Hero opts to lose herself in Paradoxical Undressing, a novel gifted to her by her 15-year-old son. Little does she know that Thea… is reading the same book. Or that the story within changes depending on who is reading it and when they pick it up. Oyeyemi's latest is a loving and lively tribute to Prague… as well as the complexities of both female friendship and storytelling” Publishers Weekly
Format: Book
Availability: Available
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Slow Productivity
Adult Nonfiction. “Our current definition of ‘productivity’ is broken. It pushes us to treat busyness as a proxy for useful effort, leading to impossibly lengthy task lists and ceaseless meetings. We're overwhelmed by all we have to do and on the edge of burnout, left to decide between giving into soul-sapping hustle culture or rejecting ambition altogether. But are these really our only choices? Newport deconstructs the absurdities inherent in standard notions of productivity, and then provides step-by-step advice for cultivating a slower, more humane alternative.” Publisher description
Format: Book
Availability: Available
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There's Always This Year
Adult Nonfiction. “Growing up in Columbus, Ohio, in the 1990s, Hanif Abdurraqib witnessed a golden era of basketball, one in which legends like LeBron James were forged and countless others weren't. His lifelong love of the game leads Abdurraqib into a lyrical, historical, and emotionally rich exploration of what it means to make it, who we think deserves success, the tension between excellence and expectation, and the very notion of role models, all of which he expertly weaves together with intimate, personal storytelling." Publisher description
Format: Book
Availability: Available
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