Peak Picks Current Titles Book List
A complete list of current Peak Picks titles.
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Replaceable You
Adult Nonfiction. “The body is the most complex machine in the world, and the only one for which you cannot get a replacement part from the manu-facturer. For centuries, medicine has reached for what's available--sculpting noses from brass, borrowing skin from frogs and hearts from pigs, crafting eye parts from jet canopies and breasts from petroleum by-products. Today we're attempting to grow body parts from scratch using stem cells and 3D printers. How are we doing? Are we there yet? Irrepressible and accessible, Replace-able You immerses readers in the wondrous, improbable and surreal quest to build a new you.” Publisher description
Format: Book
Availability: Available
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The Summer War
Adult Fiction. “Celia discovered her talent for magic on the day her beloved oldest brother left home. Furious at him for abandoning her in a war-torn land, she lashed out, not realizing her childish, angry words would become imbued with the power of prophecy, dooming him to a life without love. …Celia attempts to undo the curse she placed on him. Yet …she cannot find the solution—until she learns the truth about the centuries-old war between her own people and the summerlings… Now…, Celia may be able to both undo her eldest brother’s curse and heal the lands so long torn apart by the Summer War.” Publisher description
Format: Book
Availability: Available
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The Wilderness
Adult Fiction. “Desiree, Danielle, January, Monique, and Nakia are in their early twenties and at the beginning. Of their careers, of marriage, of motherhood, and of big-city lives in New York and Los Angeles. Together, they are finding their way through the wilderness, that period of life when the reality of contemporary adulthood… swoops in and stays. As these friends move from the late 2000’s into the late 2020’s, from young adults to grown women, they must figure out what they mean to one another—amid political upheaval, economic and environmental instability, and the increasing volatility of modern American life.” Publisher description
Format: Book
Availability: Available
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Will There Ever Be Another You
Adult Fiction. “Amid a global pandemic, one young woman is trying to keep the pieces together – of her family, stunned by a devastating loss, and of her mind, left mangled and misfiring from a mystifying disease. She’s afraid of her own floorboards, and ‘WHAT IS LOVE? BABY DON’T HURT ME’ plays over and over in her ears. She hates her friends, or more accurately, she doesn’t know who they are. Has the illness stolen her old mind and given her a new one? Does it mean she’ll get to start over from scratch, a chance afforded to very few people?” Publisher description
Format: Book
Availability: Available
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Automatic Noodle
Adult Fiction. “When Staybehind and his fellow robots wake up after a mysterious shutdown, they find the restaurant is flooding. And worse, the owners of their shop are on the lam after running a crypto scam. But after conferring, the assorted robots, living in a postwar San Francisco in a future where California is liberated from the U.S. and robots have a first wave of basic civil rights, decide that if humans can run a restaurant, so can they. In a daring move, they reopen as Authentic Noodle, a shop that serves biang biang–style noodles. But when a robophobic group begins to flood their site with one-star reviews, they’ll have to fight to remain open. Newitz has gifted sf readers with a hopeful, postapocalyptic found-family tale.” Booklist
Format: Book
Availability: Available
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Jenny Cooper Has A Secret
Adult Fiction. “In Fielding's new psychological thriller, recent widow Linda Davidson is having trouble coping with her husband's death. To help out, her daughter Kleo and son-in-law Mick move in with her. Adding to her stress, her best friend Carol has dementia and is living in a nearby memory care facility. After one of her visits with Carol, Linda meets another resident, 92-year-old Jenny Cooper, who tells Linda that she has killed four people. At first shocked, Linda writes it off as a ploy for attention since Jenny never has visitors. When a resident dies at the facility, however, Linda can't help wondering if Jenny was behind it. This clever cat-and mouse game keeps readers guessing until the end about who is taking advantage of whom.” Library Journal
Format: Book
Availability: Available
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Moderation
Adult Fiction. “Castillo’s masterful latest follows the vagaries of a social media content moderator’s work and love lives. The protagonist is known only by her workplace handle Girlie Delmundo… Girlie specializes in flagging videos of child sexual abuse, and her exemplary work gets her recruited for a position with Reeden’s newest acquisition, a virtual reality endeavor called Playground. As Girlie flags objectionable content in Playground’s VR historical theme parks… she learns more about the original medical applications of Playground’s tech, and the fate of its founder, Edison Lau. Castillo shifts seamlessly in scale and tone, from a wide-angled systems novel to a love story, and from barbed satire to staggering emotional depth. It’s a triumph.” Publishers Weekly
Format: Book
Availability: Available
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People Like Us
Adult Fiction. “The latest semi-autobiographical novel by Mott follows two Black authors' adventures in Minnesota and Europe. Mott's writing is funny, intelligent, and sharp as a knife. Especially in the chapters from one author Mott modeled after himself, the language is high-energy and dazzling… He makes jokes about pretending to be Ta-Nehisi Coates or Colson Whitehead. The story encompasses perilous car rides, more than one close scrape with death, and an active shooter drill at a school. Gun violence and its pervasive impact in the United States permeate the story; one gun in particular is almost like a character. Along with all that excitement, the characters have conversations that deliver profound meditations on race, belonging, grief, and the meaning of home, though there's plenty to lighten the mood.” Library Journal
Format: Book
Availability: Available
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Positive Obsession
Adult Nonfiction. “Cultural critic Morris examines in this unique biography the ‘personal struggles, historical context, and creative obsessions’ behind the work of Octavia Butler (1947-2006). Morris notes that Butler's prolific oeuvre invites readers to imagine the future in a way that prioritizes seeking truth and rejecting tyranny, making use of ‘positive obsession,’ a term Butler coined to describe her desire to write. Morris demonstrates how Butler spoke to America's horrors, noting that her novels ‘pay close attention to the workings of white supremacy, patriarchy, and capitalism to spin a horrifying near future.’ Morris powerfully frames Butler's work and career through her politics and personal struggles, including the way poverty ‘threatened to crush her spirit.’ The result is a moving study of the life and creative pursuits of a literary pioneer.” Publishers Weekly
Format: Book
Availability: Available
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Sabzi
Adult Nonfiction. “Lifting its name from the Persian word for ‘herbs’, Sabzi brings you more than 80 accessible plant-forward recipes that celebrate the best of Mediterranean, Middle Eastern, and South Asian flavors. From bountiful salads to fragrant soups, colorful mezze, and heart-warming mains, Yasmin invites home cooks to make delicious meals that are good for the health of both people and the planet, while staying connected to the traditional food cultures that make us who we are. With easy-to-make recipes that put vibrant vegetables at the heart of a meal, dishes in the book include: Halloumi Lasagne; Smoky Tofu Shakshuka; Sweet Potatoes with Pistachio and Mint Pesto; Rhubarb and Cardamom Tart... and many more. An invitation into Yasmin's treasure trove of a kitchen, Sabzi is a celebration of the life-affirming and nourishing power of plants.” Publisher description
Format: Book
Availability: Available
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