Sideways on a Scooter; Life and Love in India
By Miranda Kennedy
Kennedy was a New Delhi-based
correspondent for Marketplace and National Public Radio for five years.
When
twentysomething reporter Miranda Kennedy leaves her job in New York
City and travels to India with no employment prospects, she longs to
immerse herself in the turmoil and excitement of a rapidly developing
country. What she quickly learns in Delhi about renting an apartment as a
single woman—it’s next to impossible—and the proper way for women in
India to ride scooters—perched sideways—are early signs that life here
is less Westernized than she’d counted on.
Living
in Delhi for more than five years, and finding a city pulsing with
possibility and hope, Kennedy experiences friendships, love affairs, and
losses that open a window onto the opaque world of Indian politics and
culture—and alter her own attitudes about everything from food and
clothes to marriage and family. Along the way, Kennedy is drawn into the
lives of several Indian women, including her charismatic friend Geeta—a
self-described “modern girl” who attempts to squeeze herself into the
traditional role of wife and mother; Radha, a proud Brahmin widow who
denies herself simple pleasures in order to live by high-caste Hindu
principles; and Parvati, who defiantly chain-smokes and drinks whiskey,
yet feels compelled to keep her boyfriend a secret from her family.
In
her effort to understand the hopes and dreams that motivate her new
friends, Kennedy peels back India’s globalized image as a land of call
centers and fast-food chains and finds an ancient place where, in many
ways, women’s lives have scarcely changed for centuries. Incisive,
witty, and written with a keen eye for the lush vibrancy of the country
that Kennedy comes to love, Sideways on a Scooter is both a remarkable
memoir and a cultural revelation.
To Kill a Mockingbird
By Harper Lee
Nelle
Harper Lee was an American novelist widely known for To Kill a
Mockingbird, published in 1960. Immediately successful, it won the 1961
Pulitzer Prize and has become a classic of modern American literature.
One of the most cherished stories of all time, To Kill a Mockingbird
has been translated into more than forty languages, sold more than
forty million copies worldwide, served as the basis for an enormously
popular motion picture, and was voted one of the best novels of the
twentieth century by librarians across the country. A gripping,
heart-wrenching, and wholly remarkable tale of coming-of-age in a South
poisoned by virulent prejudice, it views a world of great beauty and
savage inequities through the eyes of a young girl, as her father—a
crusading local lawyer—risks everything to defend a black man unjustly
accused of a terrible crime.
The Traitor's Wife: A Novel; February 11, 2014 by Allison Pataki; 496 pages
Allison
Pataki is the New York Times bestselling author of THE TRAITOR'S WIFE,
THE ACCIDENTAL EMPRESS, SISI: EMPRESS ON HER OWN, WHERE THE LIGHT FALLS,
and the nonfiction memoir BEAUTY IN THE BROKEN PLACES. Allison's novels
have been translated into more than a dozen languages.
A
riveting historical novel about Peggy Shippen Arnold, the cunning wife
of Benedict Arnold and mastermind behind America’s most infamous act of
treason...
Everyone
knows Benedict Arnold—the Revolutionary War general who betrayed
America and fled to the British—as history’s most notorious turncoat.
Many know Arnold’s co-conspirator, Major John André, who was apprehended
with Arnold’s documents in his boots and hanged at the orders of
General George Washington. But few know of the integral third character
in the plot: a charming young woman who not only contributed to the
betrayal but orchestrated it.
Socialite
Peggy Shippen is half Benedict Arnold’s age when she seduces the war
hero during his stint as military commander of Philadelphia. Blinded by
his young bride’s beauty and wit, Arnold does not realize that she
harbors a secret: loyalty to the British. Nor does he know that she
hides a past romance with the handsome British spy John André. Peggy
watches as her husband, crippled from battle wounds and in debt from
years of service to the colonies, grows ever more disillusioned with his
hero, Washington, and the American cause. Together with her former love
and her disaffected husband, Peggy hatches the plot to deliver West
Point to the British and, in exchange, win fame and fortune for herself
and Arnold.
Told
from the perspective of Peggy’s maid, whose faith in the new nation
inspires her to intervene in her mistress’s affairs even when it could
cost her everything, The Traitor’s Wife
brings these infamous figures to life, illuminating the sordid details
and the love triangle that nearly destroyed the American fight for
freedom.
The Map of Salt and Stars
by Jennifer Zeynab Joukhadar (Goodreads Author)
Jennifer
Zeynab Joukhadar is the Syrian American author of the novel THE MAP OF
SALT AND STARS (Touchstone/Simon & Schuster) and a member of the
Radius of Arab American Writers (RAWI) as well as American Mensa.
Joukhadar's debut novel was the recipient of the 2018 Middle East Book
Award in Youth Literature and a Goodreads Choice Awards Finalist in
Historical Fiction. Joukhadar’s work has appeared in Salon, The Paris
Review Daily, The Kenyon Review, The Saturday Evening Post, PANK
Magazine, and elsewhere, and has been nominated for the Pushcart Prize
and the Best of the Net.
The
story of two girls living eight hundred years apart—a modern-day Syrian
refugee seeking safety and a medieval adventurer apprenticed to a
legendary mapmaker.
It
is the summer of 2011, and Nour has just lost her father to cancer. Her
mother, a cartographer who creates unusual, hand-painted maps, decides
to move Nour and her sisters from New York City back to Syria to be
closer to their family. But the country Nour’s mother once knew is
changing, and it isn’t long before protests and shelling threaten their
quiet Homs neighborhood. When a shell destroys Nour’s house and almost
takes her life, she and her family are forced to choose: stay and risk
more violence or flee as refugees across seven countries of the Middle
East and North Africa in search of safety. As their journey becomes more
and more challenging, Nour’s idea of home becomes a dream she struggles
to remember and a hope she cannot live without.
More
than eight hundred years earlier, Rawiya, sixteen and a widow’s
daughter, knows she must do something to help her impoverished mother.
Restless and longing to see the world, she leaves home to seek her
fortune. Disguising herself as a boy named Rami, she becomes an
apprentice to al-Idrisi, who has been commissioned by King Roger II of
Sicily to create a map of the world. In his employ, Rawiya embarks on an
epic journey across the Middle East and the north of Africa where she
encounters ferocious mythical beasts, epic battles, and real historical
figures.
