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THE JAZZ BARN

In 1950 a well-off married couple, Philip and Stephanie Barber, opened Music Inn in Lenox, Massachusetts, in the Berkshires, a historically white area of deep cultural significance. They later fashioned a carriage house as a performance center for all kinds of music, lectures, and tutorials grounded in the Lenox School of Jazz. A “wellspring of […]

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TWO BULLETS IN A BAYOU

Assassin Erica Banks returns to New Orleans to execute a series of high-profile hits contracted by a Cuban drug ring. Banks is a highly experienced professional, and at first, the murders leave law enforcement baffled. Lawyer Harry Barnes, a fixer who doesn’t always stick to the right side of the law, gets involved when an […]

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THE UNDERACHIEVER

In the not-too-distant future, artificial intelligences and machine-minds handle most of humankind’s chores, including transportation, school admissions, and banking. Teenager Wyoming Plankston comes from a somewhat affluent family in the Washington, D.C., area (their fortune was largely lost in a poor investment in Crashlandia Airways). Wyoming is a good-natured, unmotivated third-year student at third-rate boarding […]

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GOD, THE SCIENCE, THE EVIDENCE

Since its 2021 French-language publication in Paris, this work by Bolloré and Bonnassies has sold more than 400,000 copies. Now translated into English for the first time by West and Jones, the book offers a new introduction featuring endorsements from a range of scientists and religious leaders, including Nobel Prize-winning astronomers and Roman Catholic cardinals. […]

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RACE TO THE SOUTH POLE

With this account of two early-20th-century teams attempting to be the first to reach the South Pole, Stewart plays up the dramatic contrast between Norwegian explorer Roald Amundsen’s arduous but successful expedition and the heroic but tragic saga of British Royal Navy officer Robert Falcon Scott, whose failure proved fatal to him and his team. […]

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AND TO ALL A GOOD BITE

One year after a gas leak killed financial director Lisa Dozier and six other employees of Marstan Industries, and one day after Jeff Wheeler, who’d planned to ask Lisa to marry him, publicly accused Marstan head Stanley Franklin of deliberately arranging the leak himself in order to kill his underlings, Franklin is obligingly found shot […]

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FIGHT LIKE HELL

In his debut memoir, the author, a former Arizona state representative, recounts the highlights and low points of an eventful life, including his wife Rhonda’s battle with breast cancer and his own nightmarish experience with Covid-19. Sierra describes himself as a classic “retail politician,” someone who regularly cuts ribbons or appears in parades. “I like […]

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OUR ISLANDS

In no geographical order, Zommer presents 13 islands or island groups from our planet’s estimated 600,000. For each, the author includes blocks of chatty commentary scattered around a stylized aerial view decorated with outsize flora, fauna, and volcanos or other geophysical highlights. Signs of human presence in these diverse locales are largely confined to glimpses […]

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MY SISTER’S DOLJABI

“Like cherry blossom petals, excitement [is] in the air” as Hoon and his family shop at Koreatown in preparation. Back at home, Hoon’s Eomma explains each ritual as she sews little Binna’s first hanbok. Hoon’s Appa notes that a child’s 1st birthday is significant because in the past, many babies died young, including several of […]

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THE DISENCHANTMENT OF NARCISSA TARVER

Narcissa “Cissa” Tarver was a surprise baby to her aging parents, born a decade after the Civil War in Mississippi. Her Black nurse, Julia, is her best, if not only, friend; a lonely child, Cissa spends much of her time playing in nature, especially with her favorite barn cat. Cissa’s future changes at age 6, […]