A Cuban Girl’s Guide to Tea and Tomorrow by Laura Taylor Namey

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“Thing is, when you put something back together it’s never exactly the same as it was before.”
― Laura Taylor Namey, A Cuban Girl’s Guide to Tea and Tomorrow

A Cuban Girl’s Guide to Tea and Tomorrow by Laura Taylor Namey is gorgeously written, exactly what my heart needed. Even though this cover is bubblegum pink, it deals with heavy topics like grief and heartbreak in a sensitive manner. The writing pulled me in from the start with richly descriptive settings and characters that popped off the page.  (FYI the companion book, A British Girl’s Guide to Hurricanes and Heartbreak, is set to be released at the end of September 2023 and I CANNOT WAIT!)

Lila Reyes did not have ‘spend a summer in England’ on her wishlist after graduation. If everything had worked out the way she planned, she would be moving in with her best friend, taking over as head baker at her abuela’s bakery, and spending more time with her boyfriend. Her plans destroyed when the Trifecta happened. Lila, like her plans, fell apart.

After a twenty mile run leaves Lila crying in a field and her family searching for her, her parents, worried about her mental health, send her to Winchester, England for three months. Her instructions are to relax, reset, and recharge. A complete change of scenery is in order, which combined with a family member she hasn’t seen in years has the possibility to rejuvenate her(if Lila would open up a bit). The lack of anything Miami, no sun, no flavorful food, and grumpy people has Lila anxious and wishing desperately to go back home to Miami.

Lila’s attitude changes when she meets Orion Maxwell. Orion is a clerk in his family’s teashop. He doesn’t swoop in to solve Lila’s problem, quite the opposite. Orion has his own heap of problems, helping him understand that Lila needs an ear to listen and a shoulder to cry on. Volunteering to be her personal tour guide, Orion takes Lila on trips across the English countryside, showing her that England isn’t as bad as she thinks. Instead England is charming and full of people who only want to help. Lila realizes that the future she originally wanted just months ago may not be where her heart is anymore; part of her may have fallen for England and the boy who showed her how to trust again.

This book is also available as a Libby eBook and Libby eAudiobook.

“I’ve grown to find peace and acceptance in not fighting what I can’t control.”
― Laura Taylor Namey, A Cuban Girl’s Guide to Tea and Tomorrow

Did this book catch your interest? Join See YA and discuss this book with us at our October meeting! See YA is our adult book club with a teen book twist. See why so many teen books are being turned into movies and are taking over the best seller lists.

Registration is not required. Books are available on a first-come, first-serve basis at the Eastern Avenue library. We meet the first Wednesday of the month at Eastern at 6:30pm. Stop by the service desk for more information.

October 4 – A Cuban Girl’s Guide to Tea and Tomorrow by Laura Taylor Namey

November 1 – Firekeeper’s Daughter by Angeline Boulley

September’s Celebrity Book Club Picks

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It’s a new month which means that Jenna Bush Hager and Reese Witherspoon have picked new books for their book clubs! Reminder that if you join Simply Held, these titles will automatically be put on hold for you.

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Jenna Bush Hager has selected Amazing Grace Adams by Fran Littlewood for her September pick.

Curious what Amazing Grace Adams is about? Check out the following description provided by the publisher.

Grace Adams gave birth, blinked, and now suddenly she is forty-five, perimenopausal and stalled—the unhappiest age you can be, according to the Guardian. And today she’s really losing it. Stuck in traffic, she finally has had enough. To the astonishment of everyone, Grace gets out of her car and simply walks away.

Grace sets off across London, armed with a £200 cake, to win back her estranged teenage daughter on her sixteenth birthday. Because today is the day she’ll remind her daughter that no matter how far we fall, we can always get back up again. Because Grace Adams used to be amazing. Her husband thought so. Her daughter thought so. Even Grace thought so. But everyone seems to have forgotten. Grace is about to remind them . . . and, most important, remind herself.

This title is also available as a Libby eBook.

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Reese Witherspoon has selected Mother-Daughter Murder Night by Nina Simon for her September pick.

Curious what Mother-Daughter Murder Night is about? Check out the following description provided by the publisher.

High-powered businesswoman Lana Rubicon has a lot to be proud of: her keen intelligence, impeccable taste, and the L.A. real estate empire she’s built. But when she finds herself trapped 300 miles north of the city, convalescing in a sleepy coastal town with her adult daughter Beth and teenage granddaughter Jack, Lana is stuck counting otters instead of square footage—and hoping that boredom won’t kill her before the cancer does.

Then Jack—tiny in stature but fiercely independent—happens upon a dead body while kayaking. She quickly becomes a suspect in the homicide investigation, and the Rubicon women are thrown into chaos. Beth thinks Lana should focus on recovery, but Lana has a better idea. She’ll pull on her wig, find the true murderer, protect her family, and prove she still has power.

With Jack and Beth’s help, Lana uncovers a web of lies, family vendettas, and land disputes lurking beneath the surface of a community populated by folksy conservationists and wealthy ranchers. But as their amateur snooping advances into ever-more dangerous territory, the headstrong Rubicon women must learn to do the one thing they’ve always resisted: depend on each other.

Join Simply Held to have Oprah, Jenna, and Reese’s adult selections automatically put on hold for you!

Relationships : learning to love by the School of Life

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Who doesn’t need more help with their relationships? Whether you are single and seeking companionship or have been in a long-term relationship for decades, everyone has something to learn when it comes to interpersonal connection. Fortunately for all of us we have The School of Life.

The School of Life is a team of writers and educators who offer articles, books, films, therapeutic services and even an app to help teach people how life can be lived and what can make it truly worthwhile, effective and fulfilling. Their book Relationships: learning to love offers readers strategies to find love and maintain it over time. If you want to become the kind of partner that can foster satisfying, long-term relationships, check out Relationships: learning to love. You’ll be glad you did!

You may be interested in other books by The School of Life, that can be found in the Davenport Public Library’s Learning and Literacy Collection (LC), including: On being nice: a guide to friendship and connection and On failure

 

 

 

 

Simply Held September Author: Karin Slaughter

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Want the hottest new release from your favorite author? Want to stay current with a celebrity book club? Love nonfiction and fiction? You should join Simply Held. Choose any author, celebrity pick, nonfiction and/or fiction pick and the Davenport Public Library will put the latest title on hold for you automatically. Select as many as you want! If you still have questions, please check out our list of FAQs.

New month means new highlighted authors from Simply Held. September’s fiction author is Karin Slaughter.

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Our September fiction author is Karin Slaughter. She has written more than twenty New York Times bestselling novels. Slaughter has also sold more than 40 million copies of her books which have been published in 120 countries. In addition to her three stand-alone novels, novellas/short stories, collections, and anthologies edited, Slaughter has written several series. Her series include Grant County, Will Trent, Charlie Quinn, Andrea Oliver, and a title for the Jack Reacher series written with Lee Child. She has also contributed to the MatchUp Collection series with Michael Koryta. Two of her novels, False Witness and The Good Daughter, are currently in development for television. Pieces of Her has been made into a Netflix original series starring Toni Collette, while her Will Trent series is now on ABC, streaming on Hulu in the United States and on Disney+ internationally.

When she isn’t busy writing, Slaughter is also the founder of the Save the Libraries project. This is a nonprofit organization that was established to support libraries and library programming. Slaughter currently lives in Atlanta. She is a native of Georgia. Slaughter writes mysteries and thrillers.

Slaughter’s newest book is After That Night, which is book 11 in the Will Trent series. This book was published in June 2023.

Curious what this book is about? Check out the following description provided by the publisher.

After that night, everything changed . . .

Fifteen years ago, Sara Linton’s life changed forever when a celebratory night out ended in a violent attack that tore her world apart. Since then, Sara has remade her life. A successful doctor, engaged to a man she loves, she has finally managed to leave the past behind her.

Until one evening, on call in the ER, everything changes. Sara battles to save a broken young woman who’s been brutally attacked. But as the investigation progresses, led by GBI Special Agent Will Trent, it becomes clear that Dani Cooper’s assault is uncannily linked to Sara’s.

And the past isn’t going to stay buried forever . . .

This title is also available in large print, as a Libby eAudiobook and Libby eBook.

Library Closed for Labor Day

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All three Davenport Public Library branches will be closed Monday, September 4th in observance of Labor Day. Normal business hours will resume Tuesday, September 5th.

Even though the physical libraries are closed on September 4th, you can still access our digital content and online resources with your Davenport Public Library card. You can use your card to access FREE digital materials, including eBooks, digital audiobooks, magazines, movies, and music online 24/7.

Whether you are looking for digital media materials for adults, teens, or children, Davenport Public Library has you covered. You can easily download an app to your mobile device or access these services online.

If you don’t have a Library card, you can register for a Digital Access Card that will give you immediate access to all Davenport Public Library online resources. Once you register, you will receive a temporary barcode number. Your account will be confirmed by the Library within two business days, and your permanent barcode number will be emailed to you. Be sure to choose “Digital Access Card” when you register online.

Curious what resources we have available?

Digital Content:

  • Libby – All you need to access eBooks, digital audiobooks, and digital magazines is your Davenport Public Library card. We recommend downloading the Libby app for best performance.
  • Freegal Music – Freegal Music gives you access to millions of songs from over 40,000 labels. Stream 24-hours a day. Download up to 5 songs per week.
  • TumbleBooks – Both children and their parents will enjoy this online collection of animated, talking picture books that teach kids the joys of reading in an exciting, new format they are sure to love.
  • QC Beats – Built in partnership with Bettendorf Public Library, St. Ambrose University Library, and River Music Experience, QC Beats is an online streaming audio collection of original music featuring Quad Cities musicians and artists.
  • Kanopy – Kanopy provides a variety of popular and classic movies, documentaries, and foreign films to stream. Kanopy Kids includes parental controls. The Great Courses present a wealth of learning.

In addition to our digital content, we also have a wide variety of online resources and tools available for you to use. Whether you are interested in starting a business, purchasing a new car, looking for a place to move in retirement, or helping an elderly parent get the services they need, we’ve got resources and to assist you.

Have fun exploring and we will see you back in person on Tuesday, September 5th!

Online Reading Challenge – September

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Welcome Readers!

This month the Online Reading Challenge travels to New York City. Our Main title for September is The Lions of Fifth Avenue by Fiona Davis. (This book takes place partly in the New York Public Library!) Here’s a quick summary from the publisher.

In New York Times bestselling author Fiona Davis’s latest historical novel, a series of book thefts roils the iconic New York Public Library, leaving two generations of strong-willed women to pick up the pieces.

It’s 1913, and on the surface, Laura Lyons couldn’t ask for more out of life—her husband is the superintendent of the New York Public Library, allowing their family to live in an apartment within the grand building, and they are blessed with two children. But headstrong, passionate Laura wants more, and when she takes a leap of faith and applies to the Columbia Journalism School, her world is cracked wide open. As her studies take her all over the city, she is drawn to Greenwich Village’s new bohemia, where she discovers the Heterodoxy Club—a radical, all-female group in which women are encouraged to loudly share their opinions on suffrage, birth control, and women’s rights. Soon, Laura finds herself questioning her traditional role as wife and mother. And when valuable books are stolen back at the library, threatening the home and institution she loves, she’s forced to confront her shifting priorities head on . . . and may just lose everything in the process.

Eighty years later, in 1993, Sadie Donovan struggles with the legacy of her grandmother, the famous essayist Laura Lyons, especially after she’s wrangled her dream job as a curator at the New York Public Library. But the job quickly becomes a nightmare when rare manuscripts, notes, and books for the exhibit Sadie’s running begin disappearing from the library’s famous Berg Collection. Determined to save both the exhibit and her career, the typically risk-averse Sadie teams up with a private security expert to uncover the culprit. However, things unexpectedly become personal when the investigation leads Sadie to some unwelcome truths about her own family heritage—truths that shed new light on the biggest tragedy in the library’s history.

This title is also available in large print and as a Libby eBook.

As always, check each of our locations for displays with lots more titles to choose from!

Online Reading Challenge – August Wrap-Up

- Stephanie Leave a comment

Hello Fellow Challenge Readers!

How did your reading go this month? Did you read something set in Japan that you enjoyed? Share in the comments!

“After all the years I’ve spent with him not seeing me, I don’t see him anymore either. We exist like two blind fish, sliding past each other cordially in our parallel universes.”
― Emily Itami, Fault Lines

I read our main title: Fault Lines by Emily Itami. This was a very quick read and honestly, I wasn’t quite sure what I thought of it as I was reading. At the end, I found myself wanting to know more about the lives of the characters and their own justifications for their actions.

Mizuki is a Japanese housewife. She has everything she could ever want: a hardworking husband, a beautiful apartment in Tokyo, and two adorable children. She should be happy, right? Wrong. Sometimes Mizuki finds herself standing on her high-rise balcony wanting to throw herself off and end it all. Her husband spends what little time he has with them glued to his phone, plus he is constantly being pulled away to work. All she does is clean up after her kids and hang up endless laundry.

One night while out with friends, Mizuki meets Kiyoshi and her whole life changes. Kiyoshi is a successful restaurateur. As the two get to know each other, Mizuki’s world starts to expand. She feels alive again and starts to rediscover all of the things that she has lost through the years. He is a breath of freedom, bringing her a new friendship she greatly needed. The two dive into exploring Tokyo, becoming closer. Their relationship changes overtime, illuminating for Mizuki that she is actually living two lives. In the end, Mizuki has to choose one: her family or Kiyoshi.

All in all, this debut novel was relatable and discussed choices, adulthood, and the dichotomy between freedom and tradition in ways that actually made sense. A mother’s desire cannot be ignored. Watching Mizuki battle with herself while she tried to figure out what she wanted was riveting. Her discussion of the morals and mores of Japan and how they butt up against those of people from outside Japan was enlightening. The warring cultural expectations complicated Mizuki’s life as she tried to find a balance between her past and present, her life as a sexual being and her life as a dutiful mother. This was a refreshing read and I have high hopes for the author’s next book!

In September, we’re headed to New York City!

It Won’t Always Be Like This: A Graphic Memoir by Malaka Gharib

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Malaka Gharib has been on my radar ever since I saw her debut graphic memoir, I Was Their American Dream, on the shelves at the library. In that book, she discusses being first-generation Filipino Egyptian American. Three years later, she published It Won’t Always Be Like This, which talks about her summers in the Middle East visiting family.  Graphic memoirs are one of my favorite forms of nonfiction, specifically when authors write about their childhoods and their families growing up. Watching the authors come to realizations about their lives is riveting, yet also heartbreaking. I was excited to start It Won’t Always be Like This to see what Malaka Gharib had to say.

Malaka Gharib’s childhood was a bit rocky. Her mother is Filipino and her father Egyptian making Malaka Filipino Egyptian American, plus first generation! Her parents divorced when she was young. Her father eventually left the United States and moved back to Egypt. Sha always thought that her father would eventually come back to the States, but every time she visited, he seemed to have settled into his new life even more.

Her annual summer vacation trip to Egypt when she was nine changed everything. On this trip, her father announced that he had remarried. Malaka now has to navigate her space in her father’s new family. She spends the next fifteen years traveling back to Egypt to visit her father and his growing family. Those years are rough. She is navigating adolescence both in America and in a country where she doesn’t fully understand the religion, language, or culture. She is constantly reevaluating how she fits into her father’s new life. Malaka doesn’t look anything like her siblings (they are fair-haired) and she sticks out. The longer she spends with them, the more Malaka starts to adapt. She opens up to new experiences, new food, new music, and starts to see that Hala, her new stepmother, isn’t actually that different as she thought. She’s actually a bit like Malaka. Seeing Malaka’s childhood memories expressed through an adult lens shows how powerful our memories are in helping form ourselves and our relationships with other. It is all messy and complicated, yet necessary.

YWCA Iowa Empowerment Center is on a Mission!

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YWCA is on a Mission!

We are starting a new segment on the blog: a monthly social work spotlight submitted by the library’s very own social worker, Quinn! This month our resource spotlight will focus on families as August marks the back-to-school period for families within the Davenport Community School District. As the new school year begins, many families encounter challenges in ensuring a seamless transition while also securing the well-being of their loved ones. Statistics reveal that 33% of families in the Quad Cities struggle to meet their fundamental needs.

YWCA Quad Cities Empowerment Center, part of  YWCA Quad Cities, is a place dedicated to providing essential resources that support families in overcoming challenges and ensuring their well-being as they work towards their goals. The center is designed to help families and individuals stay out of poverty long term. Its mission is to uplift women and their families by offering various resources and opportunities designed to be easily accessible.

Serving as a pivotal resource hub, YWCA Quad Cities Empowerment Center is a sanctuary for women and families seeking support and individualized assistance plans. These plans help identify impactful solutions that resonate for each individual fostering confidence, independence, and self-worth regardless of age, gender, race, or geographic location and promoting a more inclusive and equitable society.

These, amongst others, are the services provided by the YWCA Cities Empowerment Center:

  • A Clothing Closet, which contains all types of clothing for women, men, and children.
  • An Immediate Needs Pantry, which includes a variety of shelf-stable food items, cleaning and laundry supplies, feminine products, hygiene products, and baby items like food, formula, diapers, and wipes.
  • A Learning Center, which offers access to computers, printers, free Wi-Fi, and various continuing education programs, all provided free of charge. Additionally, the center offers resume and job search assistance.
  • Crisis funding is available for those in immediate need when resources permit.
  • ThePlace2B, a drop-in center located at the Rock Island YWCA facility, which offers resources to at-risk and homeless youth.

YWCA Quad Cities’ Empowerment Center is currently located at 1225 E River Dr., Ste 140, Davenport, IA 52803; a move to a much larger facility is in the near future – you’ll definitely want to stay tuned for more information on this. To learn more about YWCA Quad Cities and its programs and services, please visit their website at www.ywcaqc.org  or call 563-340-0310 for more information or to seek assistance.

Vera Wong’s Unsolicited Advice for Murderers by Jesse Q Sutanto

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“In her experience, it’s best to nod and agree with what people say before doing exactly what you wanted from the very beginning.”
― Jesse Q. Sutanto, Vera Wong’s Unsolicited Advice for Murderers

Jesse Q Sutanto proves herself a master of character sketches in Vera Wong’s Unsolicited Advice for Murderers. Instead of telling her story from one character’s perspective, Sutanto has crafted five characters to share secrets from their own points of view: Sana, Riki, Julia, Oliver, and the title-mentioned Vera Wong. This is a story of found family and the love, friendship, and kindness that can be spread by serving tea.

Vera Wong is a lonely shopkeeper, well really a lonely little old lady, who lives above her tea shop in San Francisco’s Chinatown. Her shop, aptly named Vera Wong’s World-Famous Teahouse, sadly isn’t doing as well as she would hope. She only has one customer. Her husband is dead and her son Tilbert hardly ever visits. Granted, Tilly is a successful lawyer, but that doesn’t mean he can’t answer her daily texts. She is his mother after all!

Vera enjoys nothing more than designing new tea combinations and trying to figure out just what Tilly is doing that is more important than talking to his mother.  That and waking up at 4:30am and starting her day by going on a power walk. One morning, Vera discovers a dead man lying in the middle of her tea shop. Vera calls the cops, but not before tidying up the shop and investigating the area around the body for clues. When the police show up, the detectives don’t inspire much confidence, leading Vera to decide that she could do a better job than the police and will solve this murder herself! After all, Vera loves her police shows. She is also a Chinese mother who can sniff out guilt just by looking at a person. This shouldn’t be a problem at all. Vera has this all under control.

This title is also available in large print and as a Libby eBook.

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