Adult Recommendations

On Desperate Ground by Hampton Sides

Hampton Sides’ latest book, On Desperate Ground, is full of stories about American heroes fighting and dying for their country during the Korean War.  Sharing their extraordinary stories, Sides focuses on several US Marine units and commanders fighting to take the Chosin Resevoir in North Korea.
These Marines endured snow, bitter cold temperatures and continuous attacks from the Chinese military while marching through miles of mountainous terrain.  Readers will find it fascinating and hard to put down.

Fox 8 by George Saunders

Fox 8 is a novella, by George Saunders, about a fox. This fox, Fox 8, is so fascinated with humans that he spends hours listening to and watching a family through the windows of their home. Through his observations, Fox 8 learns to read and write, while admitting his, “speling is nut so gud”. Fox 8 wants to learn all he can about the human world and how he and his fellow foxes can fit in as an impending shopping mall threatens their home.

Saunders story unfolds from Fox 8’s point of view, with a voice that floats between wide-eyed observations and satirical fable. And even though Fox 8 is a short and simple piece, it manages to tell a wonderful and emotional story that I wholeheartedly believe is worth your time.   

The Tattooist of Auschwitz by Heather Morris

In 1942 Lale Sokolov’s Slovakian Jewish family is given the difficult choice to send one family member to the concentration camps or they all must go – Lale volunteers, sparing his family, and soon finds himself being transported to Auschwitz-Birkenau. After nearly dying from Typhoid, Lale is taken under the wings of Pepan, the Tätowierer, and is given the opportunity to work as Pepan’s apprentice, ultimately becoming the Tattooist of Auschwitz and one step further from death.

Everything changes for Lale when he meets fellow prisoner, Gita, and in the brief moment of tattooing her, Lale knows that he must survive Auschwitz and marry her.

Lale uses his position as tattooist to gather extra rations of food and medicine to save countless prisoners. Throughout his time in Auschwitz, his mission is to save just one person, because “to save one is to the save the world”.

Truth meets fiction in this haunting debut novel by Heather Morris, based on actual conversations with Lale Sokolov, readers will find impossible to put down.

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