Seattle Staff Faves 2023: Fiction
Every year we ask our staff across the system for their favorite books published in a given year. Enjoy this variety of fiction staff favorites, with annotations by staff members or as noted. (Created November 2023)
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Chain-gang All-stars
"In this book about a not too distant future, where the prison system has been turned into a bloodsport, Nana Kwame Adjei-Brenyah manages to balance entertaining his audience with hand to hand combat, against villifiying his own action sequences and advocating for abolition." --Dylan Z.
Format: Book
Availability: Available
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The Man in the McIntosh Suit
"This fast-paced story of love and intrigue from Eisner finalist Ayuyang (Blame This on the Boogie) immerses readers in a noirish take on the Manong Generation, mostly male Filipino immigrants who arrived in the United States in the 1920s and '30s." (Publishers Weekly)
Format: Graphic Novel
Availability: Available
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Dayswork
"Married writers with a daughter cope with the pandemic lockdown. The woman, who narrates, embarks on a voyage through the vast ocean deep of Herman Melville scholarship, reporting her soundings in pithy and provocative paragraphs, creating a journal of an obsession and a log of a marriage and a household under pressure, a veritable domestic submarine." (Booklist)
Format: Book
Availability: Available
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The Crane Husband
"On a family farm lives an artist with her daughter and her son. The teen daughter manages not only her mom's business but also the household and care of her little brother. It is a life that she can handle until mom brings home a crane and declares him her husband." (LibraryReads)
Format: Book
Availability: Available
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Big Swiss
"Living in a crumbling and purposely bee-infested eighteenth-century manse, Greta Work works as a transcriptionist for a sex therapist called Om and falls a bit in love with a patient she nicknames Big Swiss." (Booklist)
Format: Book
Availability: Available
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Grave Expectations
"A queer/trans inclusive cozy mystery with a gal that talks to her dead best friend and other Ghosts." --Faye V.
Format: Book
Availability: Available
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The Fiancée Farce
"Tansy has been lying to her family about having a girlfriend just so they’ll get off her back. Her fake girlfriend, Gemma, happens to be a real life cover model for romance novels who shows up at a wedding Tansy is attending! Gemma surprises Tansy by going along with the ruse since she needs a fiancée in order to inherit her grandfather’s company." (LibraryReads)
Format: Book
Availability: Available
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To Shape A Dragon's Breath
"Revered as a Nampeshiweisit, a person in a unique relationship with a dragon, by her people, 15-year-old Indigenous girl Anequs, at odds with the “approved” way of doing things, is forced by Anglish conquerors to attend a proper dragon school – and if she cannot succeed there, her dragon will be killed." (NoveList Plus)
Format: Book
Availability: Available
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Iris Kelly Doesn't Date
"A bisexual romance author burned by love and an anxious actress fake-date in hope of keeping their meddling friends at bay." (Kirkus)
Format: Book
Availability: Available
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How to Love your Daughter
"A woman thousands of miles from home secretly watches the grandchildren she's never met, still struggling to understand why she and her beloved daughter have become estranged." (Library Journal)
Format: Book
Availability: Available
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