In the show, old-school U.S. Marshal Raylan Givens is reassigned from Miami to his childhood home in the poor, rural coal-mining towns in Eastern Kentucky where he encounters characters from his past. You can borrow the first 2 seasons of Justified on DVD from the Essex Library. Writers for the series, when stuck for ideas on plot resolution, ask themselves, “What would Elmore do?”  Now, readers can know firsthand what Elmore would do because he’s just published a new novel entitled, “Raylan”.

From the publisher of Raylan: “The bad guys are mostly gals this time around: Layla, the nurse who collects kidneys and sells them for ten grand a piece; Carol Conlan, a hard-charging coal-mine executive not above ordering a cohort to shoot point-blank a man who’s standing in her way; and Jackie Nevada, a beautiful sometime college student who can outplay anyone at the poker table and who suddenly finds herself being tracked by a handsome U.S. marshal.

Dark and droll, Raylan is pure Elmore Leonard—a page-turner filled with the sparkling dialogue and sly suspense that are the hallmarks of this modern master.”

Watch Elmore Leonard discuss his characters in Raylan and Justified:

The Lost Kingdom : Hawaii’s last queen, the sugar kings and America’s first imperial adventure by Julia Flynn Siler
Around 200 A.D., intrepid Polynesians arrived at an undisturbed archipelago. For centuries, their descendants lived with little contact from the western world. In 1778, their isolation was shattered with the arrival of Captain Cook. Deftly weaving together a memorable cast of characters, Lost Hawaii brings to life the ensuing clash between a vulnerable Polynesian people and relentlessly expanding capitalist powers.  At the center of the story is Lili’uokalani, the last queen of Hawai’i. Born in 1838, she lived through the nearly complete economic transformation of the islands. Lucrative sugar plantations gradually subsumed the majority of the land, owned almost exclusively by white planters, dubbed the “Sugar Kings.” Hawai’i became a prize in the contest between America, Britain, and France, each seeking to expand their military and commercial influence in the Pacific. The monarchy had become a figurehead, victim to manipulation from the wealthy sugar plantation owners. Lili’uokalani was determined to enact a constitution to reinstate the monarchy’s power but was outmaneuvered by the U.S.

Elizabeth the Queen : the life of a modern monarch by Sally Bedell Smith
In this magisterial new biography, a “New York Times”-bestselling author brings to life one of the world’s most fascinating and enigmatic women: Queen Elizabeth II. Compulsively readable and scrupulously researched, “Elizabeth the Queen” illuminates the lively personality, sense of humor, and canny intelligence with which she meets the most demanding work and family obligations.

The Magic Room : a story about the love we wish for our daughters by Jeffrey Zaslow
The New York Times bestselling journalist and author of The Girls from Ames , Jeffrey Zaslow, takes us to a multi- generational family owned small-town bridal shop to explore the emotional lives of women in the 21st century. You may not have heard of Fowler, Michigan, much less Becker’s Bridal. But for the thousands of women who have stepped inside, Becker’s is the site of some of the most important moments of their lives-moments that speak to us all. Housed in a former bank, the boutique owners transformed the vault into a “magic room,” with soft church lighting, a circular pedestal, and mirrors that make lifelong dreams come true. Illuminating the poignant aspects of a woman’s journey to the altar, The Magic Room tells the stories of memorable women on the brink of commitment. Run by the same family for years, Becker’s has witnessed transformations in how America views the institution of marriage; some of the shop’s clientele are becoming stepmothers, or starting married life for a second time. In The Girls from Ames , beloved author Jeffrey Zaslow used friendships to explore the emotional lives of women. In The Magic Room , he turns his perceptive eye to weddings and weaves together secrets, memories and family tales to explore the hopes and dreams we have for our daughters.

A Train In Winter : an extraordinary story of women, friendship, and resistance in occupied France by Caroline Moorehead
They were teachers, students, chemists, writers, and housewives; a singer at the Paris Opera, a midwife, a dental surgeon. They distributed anti-Nazi leaflets, printed subversive newspapers, hid resisters, secreted Jews to safety, transported weapons, and conveyed clandestine messages. The youngest was a schoolgirl of fifteen who scrawled “V” for victory on the walls of her lycÉe; the eldest, a farmer’s wife in her sixties who harbored escaped Allied airmen. Strangers to each other, hailing from villages and cities from across France, these brave women were united in hatred and defiance of their Nazi occupiers. Eventually, the Gestapo hunted down 230 of these women and imprisoned them in a fort outside Paris. Separated from home and loved ones, these disparate individuals turned to one another, their common experience conquering divisions of age, education, profession, and class, as they found solace and strength in their deep affection and camaraderie. In January 1943, they were sent to their final destination: Auschwitz. Only forty-nine would return to France. A Train in Winter draws on interviews with these women and their families; German, French, and Polish archives; and documents held by World War II resistance organizations to uncover a dark chapter of history that offers an inspiring portrait of ordinary people, of bravery and survival-and of the remarkable, enduring power of female friendship.

In addition to our other Great Courses, patrons will now be able to enjoy borrowing:

The American Revolution taught by Allen C. Guelzo

Comparative Religion taught by Charles Kimball

The Emperors Of Rome taught by Garrett G. Fagan

Greek Tragedy taught by Elizabeth Vandiver

The Italian Renaissance taught by Kenneth Bartlett

The Long 19th Century: European History from 1789 to 1917  taught by Robert I. Weiner

It’s unique for having five categories: First Novel, Novel, Biography, Poetry and Children’s Book.

The winner in each category receives £5,000, and then one of the five winning books is selected as the overall Costa Book of the Year, receiving a further £30,000, and making a total prize fund of £55,000. The Costa is the only prize which places children’s books alongside adult books in this way.

The Costa Book Awards started life in 1971 as the Whitbread Literary Awards. From 1985 they were known as the Whitbread Book Awards until 2006, when Costa Coffee took over ownership from Whitbread.

The 2011 Category winners were announced earlier this month.  The five category winners, each of whom will receive £5,000, were selected from 568 entries.  The five successful authors who will now compete for the 2011 Costa Book of the Year are:

Biography:  Poet and debut biographer Matthew Hollis for his first work of prose,  Now All Roads Leads to France: The Last Years of Edward Thomas.

Novel:  Andrew Miller for his sixth novel,  Pure.

First Novel:  Debut novelist and former Great Ormond Street nurse, Christie Watson for Tiny Sunbirds Far Away.

Poetry:  Carol Ann Duffy for The Bees, her first collection since being appointed Poet Laureate in 2009.

Children’s Book:  Former opera singer and debut children’s writer, Moira Young for Blood Red Road, currently being adapted for film by Scott Free, Ridley Scott’s production company.

The winner, selected by a panel of judges chaired by Editor of the London Evening Standard, Geordie Greig and
comprising Hugh Dennis, Dervla Kirwan, Mary Nightingale, William Fiennes, Flora Fraser, Patrick Gale,
Jojo Moyes and Eleanor Updale, will be announced on Tuesday 24th January 2012.

Since the introduction of the Book of the Year award in 1985, it has been won nine times by a novel, four
times by a first novel, five times by a biography, seven times by a collection of poetry and once by a
children’s book. The 2010 Costa Book of the Year was Of Mutability by Jo Shapcott.

“It’s Christmastime, and the precocious Flavia de Luce—an eleven-year-old sleuth with a passion for chemistry and a penchant for crime-solving—is tucked away in her laboratory, whipping up a concoction to ensnare Saint Nick. But she is soon distracted when a film crew arrives at Buckshaw, the de Luces’ decaying English estate, to shoot a movie starring the famed Phyllis Wyvern. Amid a raging blizzard, the entire village of Bishop’s Lacey gathers at Buckshaw to watch Wyvern perform, yet nobody is prepared for the evening’s shocking conclusion: a body found, past midnight, strangled to death with a length of film. But who among the assembled guests would stage such a chilling scene? As the storm worsens and the list of suspects grows, Flavia must use every ounce of sly wit at her disposal to ferret out a killer hidden in plain sight.” The titles in the series are all wonderful curiosities and the book covers alone make readers dive in to see what’s what. This time around the title comes from Alfred Lord Tennyson’s The Lady of Shalott. 

“I am half-sick of shadows,’ said The Lady of Shalott.”

The first book in the series, The Sweetness At The Bottom Of The Pie, won The Macavity Award for Best First Mystery Novel, the Agatha Award for Best First Novel, the CWA Debut Dagger Award, among others.  Our mystery readers found much to enjoy with Flavia de Luce, the 11-year-old sleuth.  From the publisher: “It is the summer of 1950–and at the once-grand mansion of Buckshaw, young Flavia de Luce, an aspiring chemist with a passion for poison, is intrigued by a series of inexplicable events: A dead bird is found on the doorstep, a postage stamp bizarrely pinned to its beak. Then, hours later, Flavia finds a man lying in the cucumber patch and watches him as he takes his dying breath. For Flavia, who is both appalled and delighted, life begins in earnest when murder comes to Buckshaw. “I wish I could say I was afraid, but I wasn’t. Quite the contrary. This was by far the most interesting thing that had ever happened to me in my entire life.””  The title  comes from William King’s The Art of Cookery, published in 1708.

Unless some sweetness at the bottom lie,
Who cares for all the crinkling of the pie?

The second book in the series is The Weed That Strings The Hangman’s Bag. From the publisher: “Flavia de Luce, a dangerously smart eleven-year-old with a passion for chemistry and a genius for solving murders, thinks that her days of crime-solving in the bucolic English hamlet of Bishop’s Lacey are over—until beloved puppeteer Rupert Porson has his own strings sizzled in an unfortunate rendezvous with electricity. But who’d do such a thing, and why? Does the madwoman who lives in Gibbet Wood know more than she’s letting on? What about Porson’s charming but erratic assistant? All clues point toward a suspicious death years earlier and a case the local constables can’t solve—without Flavia’s help. But in getting so close to who’s secretly pulling the strings of this dance of death, has our precocious heroine finally gotten in way over her head?”  This title comes from Sir Walter Raleigh in a poem to his son:

THREE things there be that prosper all apace,
And flourish while they are asunder far;
But on a day, they meet all in a place,
And when they meet, they one another mar.

And they be these; the Wood, the Weed, the Wag:
The Wood is that that makes the gallows tree;
The Weed is that that strings the hangman’s bag;
The Wag, my pretty knave, betokens thee.

Now mark, dear boy—while these assemble not,
Green springs the tree, hemp grows, the wag is wild;
But when they meet, it makes the timber rot,
It frets the halter, and it chokes the child.

 A Red Herring Without Mustard is the third book in the series and continues with Flavia’s sleuthing successes. “Flavia had asked the old Gypsy woman to tell her fortune, but never expected to stumble across the poor soul, bludgeoned in the wee hours in her own caravan. Was this an act of retribution by those convinced that the soothsayer had abducted a local child years ago? Certainly Flavia understands the bliss of settling scores; revenge is a delightful pastime when one has two odious older sisters. But how could this crime be connected to the missing baby? Had it something to do with the weird sect who met at the river to practice their secret rites? While still pondering the possibilities, Flavia stumbles upon another corpse—that of a notorious layabout who had been caught prowling about the de Luce’s drawing room. Pedaling Gladys, her faithful bicycle, across the countryside in search of clues to both crimes, Flavia uncovers some odd new twists. Most intriguing is her introduction to an elegant artist with a very special object in her possession—a portrait that sheds light on the biggest mystery of all: Who is Flavia?” This time the title comes from Thomas Lodge and Robert Greene in A Looking Glasse for London and Englande (1592):

Fiction:

The Art Of Fielding by Chad Harbach
A baseball star at a small college near Lake Michigan launches a routine throw that goes disastrously off course and inadvertently changes the lives of five people, including the college president, a gay teammate and the president’s daughter.

11/22/63 by Stephen King
Receiving a horrific essay from a GED student with a traumatic past, high-school English teacher Jake Epping is enlisted by a friend to travel back in time to prevent the assassination of John F. Kennedy, a mission for which he must befriend troubled loner Lee Harvey Oswald.

Swamplandia! by Karen Russell
A first novel by the author of the short-story collection, St. Lucy’s Home for Girls Raised by Wolves finds the Bigtree children struggling to protect their Florida Everglades alligator-wrestling theme park from a sophisticated competitor after losing their parents.

Ten Thousand Saints by Eleanor Henderson
When his best friend Teddy dies of an overdose on the last day of 1987, Jude Keffy-Horn finds his relationship with drugs and his parents devolving into the extreme when he gets caught up in an underground youth culture known as straight edge.

The Tiger’s Wife by Téa Obreht
Remembering childhood stories her grandfather once told her, young physician Natalia becomes convinced that he spent his last days searching for “the deathless man,” a vagabond who claimed to be immortal. As Natalia struggles to understand why her grandfather, a deeply rational man would go on such a farfetched journey, she stumbles across a clue that leads her to the extraordinary story of the tiger’s wife.

NonFiction:

Arguably by Christopher Hitchens
A collection of the noted author’s essays includes his early writings on civil rights, Vietnam, and international incidents, as well as columns on the Clintons, the Catholic Church, Mother Theresa, radical Islam, and an array of reflections on politics.

The Boy In The Moon by Ian Brown
A Canadian journalist traces his efforts to understand the extremely rare genetic mutation that causes his son to possess an unusual facial appearance, an inability to speak and a compulsion to hit himself, a disorder for which the author has traveled the world to speak with medical specialists and connect with other affected families.

Malcolm X by Manning Marable
An authoritative biography of Malcolm X draws on new research to reveal information not contained in his autobiography, including the true story behind his assasination. By the author of Beyond Black and White: Transforming African-American Politics.

Thinking, Fast And Slow by Daniel Kahneman
A Nobel Prize-winning psychologist draws on years of research to introduce his “machinery of the mind” model on human decision making to reveal the faults and capabilities of intuitive versus logical thinking, providing insights into such topics as optimism, the unpredictability of happiness and the psychological pitfalls of risk-taking.

A World On Fire by Amanda Foreman
An award-winning author presents a history of the role of British citizens in the American Civil War that offers insight into the interdependencies of both nations and how the Union worked to block diplomatic relations between England and the Confederacy, tracing the military service of British volunteers on both sides of the conflict.

420 Characters by Lou Beach
A first volume of prose by the acclaimed artist and illustrator best known for his daily stand-alone stories published online features selections that represent his lyrical and whimsically surreal style and are accompanied by original collage artwork. Alternately surreal, funny, ominous, and lyrical, 420 Characters offers an experience as dazzling as any in contemporary fiction, revealing worlds of meaning in single paragraphs. Beach’s work has found admirers in Jonathan Lethem, Terry Gilliam, J. Robert Lennon, and others.

The Angel Makers by Jessica Gregson
Enjoying freedom and friendship with neighbor women in her 1916 Hungarian village when the abusive men in their lives go off to war, medicine woman Sari uses her skills to kill her returned husband and is quickly sought by her new friends for the same service, with dire results. A first novel.

Covert Warriors by W E B Griffin
When a hostile Third World country begins to receive military training and nuclear technology from foreign nations, Charley Castillo and his team investigate only to be abandoned by the U.S. government and placed on hit lists throughout the world. By the best-selling authors of The Outlaws.

D. C. Dead by Stuart Woods
Evaluating his life in New York as a Woodman & Weld partner after a shocking loss, Stone Barrington is summoned by the President to Washington, D. C. and assigned to a special ops mission that reunites him with his former partner, Holly Barker. By the Edgar Award-winning author of Bel-Air Dead.

Death Comes To Pemberley by P D James
A rare meeting of literary genius: P. D. James, long among the most admired mystery writers of our time, draws the characters of Jane Austen’s beloved novel Pride and Prejudice into a tale of murder and emotional mayhem. Pemberley is thrown into chaos after Elizabeth Bennett’s disgraced sister Lydia arrives and announces that her husband Wickham has been murdered.

Down The Darkest Road by Tami Hoag
A latest entry in the series that began with Deeper Than the Dead finds 1980s California FBI agent Vince Leone tapping the powers of science-based forensic techniques to unveil dark secrets and stop a killer who is terrorizing the citizens of Oak Knoll.

The Forgotten Affairs Of Youth by Alexander McCall Smith
Isabel and her fiancé know who they are and where they come from. But not everybody is so fortunate. Jane Cooper, a visiting Australian philosopher on sabbatical in Edinburgh, has more questions than answers. Adopted at birth, Jane is trying to find her biological father, but all she knows about him is that he was a student in Edinburgh years ago. When she asks for Isabel’s help in this seemingly impossible search . . . well, of course Isabel obliges.

Harbor by John Lindqvist
Two years after his 6-year-old daughter disappears during a family visit to a snowy island lighthouse, Anders struggles with alcoholism while searching for answers and discovers that the island’s residents are hiding a deadly secret about a dark power from the sea.

The Hurt Machine by Reed Coleman
Entreated by his ex-wife to solve the murder of her estranged sister, private investigator Moe Prager learns that the victim, a New York EMT, died amid hostilities regarding a dying man she refused to help, a case that is further complicated by bureaucratic greed, sexual harassment and blackmail.

Kill Switch by Neal Baer & Jonathan Greene
Criminal psychologist Dr. Claire Waters finds her life unraveling when she mistakenly recommends the release of a brutal serial killer, after which a woman is murdered and the crime bears all the signs of the serial killer’s work.

The Leopard by Jo Nesbo
Two young women are found murdered in Oslo, both drowned in their own blood. Media coverage quickly reaches fever pitch: Could this be the work of a serial killer? There is little to go on: a piece of rope, a scrap of wool, a bit of gravel, an unexpected connection between the victims.

Locked On by Tom Clancy
Coming out of retirement to run for president, Jack Ryan finds himself in the middle of a high-stakes attack from his opponent as his close comrade, John Clark, is the subject of treacherous charges, at the same time Jack Ryan, Jr. and other members of Campus struggle to stop terrorists.

Lonely Death by Charles Todd
A latest entry in the Edgar Award-nominated series finds the intrepid Scotland Yard detective investigating the Sussex village murders of three former soldiers, a case that puts Rutledge’s career and life on the line.

Micro by Michael Crichton
Three men are found dead in the locked second-floor office of a Honolulu building, with no sign of struggle except for the ultrafine, razor-sharp cuts covering their bodies. The only clue left behind is a tiny bladed robot, nearly invisible to the human eye.

Red Mist by Patricia Cornwell
Determined to find out what happened to her former deputy chief, Jack Fielding, murdered six months earlier, Kay Scarpetta travels to the Georgia Prison for Women, where an inmate has information not only on Fielding, but also on a string of grisly killings.

The Scottish Prisoner by Diana Galbadon
In the 18th century, paroled prisoner-of-war Jamie Fraser and his old friend Tobias Quinn must travel from London to Ireland on a mission of intrigue surrounding packet of documents and an ancient relic. By the best-selling author of Outlander.

The Third Reich by Roberto Bolano
On vacation with his girlfriend, Ingeborg, the German war-game champion Udo Berger returns to a small town on the Costa Brava where he spent the summers of his childhood. Soon they meet another vacationing German couple, Charly and Hanna, who introduce them to a band of locals–the Wolf, the Lamb, and El Quemado–and to the darker side of life in a resort town. Late one night, Charly disappears without a trace, and Udo’s well-ordered life is thrown into upheaval; when Ingeborg and Hanna return to their lives in Germany, he refuses to leave the hotel. Soon, he and El Quemado are enmeshed in a round of Third Reich, his favorite World War II strategy game, and Udo discovers that the game’s consequences may be all too real.

From December 1 through 30, 2011 the Essex Library will be accepting non-perishable food items in exchange for your Essex Library fines. Up to $1.00 will be forgiven for each item you donate.

All items collected will be brought to the Shoreline Soup Kitchen and Pantries. Please be sure that any item you donate has not reached its expiration date. Glass jars and bottles will not be accepted, but we will gladly accept canned goods and anything contained in plastic or a cardboard box.

Start the New Year off right with a clean Essex Library record, while simultaneously helping your neighbors in need!

Lionel Barber, Financial Times editor and chair of the judges said he had been “blown away by the thoroughness of [Banerjee and Duflo's] empirical research. This is going to be a real basis for innovation in policy, innovation in government, and a guide to intellectual debate. This is a business book in the broadest sense.”

Click here to watch an interview with author Abhijit Banerjee.

The other shortlisted books are:
Exorbitant Privilege by Barry Eichengreen;

Good Strategy/Bad Strategy by Richard Rumelt;

The Quest by Daniel Yergin;

Triumph of the City by Edward Glaeser; and

Wilful Blindess by Margaret Heffernan.

The five shortlisted books each receive £10,000.

The Books will be highlighted in the Sunday, November 13th Book Review.

This year’s selections, in alphabetical order are:

“Along a Long Road” written and illustrated by Frank Viva (Little, Brown Books for Young Readers);

“A Ball for Daisy” written and illustrated by Chris Raschka (Schwartz & Wade);

“Brother Sun, Sister Moon: Saint Francis of Assisi’s Canticle of the Creatures” written by Katherine Paterson, illustrated by Pamela Dalton (Chronicle Books);

“Grandpa Green” written and illustrated by Lane Smith (Roaring Brook Press);

“Ice” written and illustrated by Arthur Geisert (Enchanted Lion Books);

“I Want My Hat Back” written and illustrated by Jon Klassen (Candlewick Press);

“Me … Jane” written and illustrated by Patrick McDonnell (Little, Brown Books for Young Readers);

“Migrant” written by Maxine Trottier, illustrated by Isabelle Arsenault (Groundwood Books);

“A Nation’s Hope: The Story of Boxing Legend Joe Louis” written by Matt de la Peña, illustrated by Kadir Nelson (Dial);

and “A New Year’s Reunion” written by Yu Li-Qiong, illustrated by Zhu Cheng-Liang (Candlewick Press).