Howdy, readers! I hope you're enjoying the snow. I don't expect it to have quite the same charm in a few weeks. I was thrilled at the turnout of our Manga Club meeting last weekend, so thank you to everyone who came out! I hope everyone who's celebrating Thanksgiving has a great dinner. If you have complicated feelings about your in-laws, check out my staff pick in the last section -- that one's for you.

Saturday, December 3rd, starting at 1pm

In the 60s and 70s, pioneering Minnesotan hockey players like Bill Nyrop, Dave Langevin, Reed Larson, and Mike Ramsey established themselves as bona fide stars at the game’s highest and most competitive level. More recently, another remarkable group of native sons—including Zach Parise, Blake Wheeler, Dustin Byfuglien and T.J. Oshie—left their mark on the league. Profiling more than seventy players and compiling Minnesota NHL records gathered nowhere else, this book celebrates the brilliant achievements of Minnesotans in the National Hockey League. Jeff Olson has coached hockey at a number of levels. He also officiated youth and adult hockey and served as an organizer of the Gunderson Lake Conference Hockey Awards Scholarship Golf Classic.

Sunday, December 4th, starting at 2pm

In her first month away at college, Hannah spirals into a full-on breakdown. Campus mental health, prescribes her therapy and meds, but she finds that every new medication she tries comes with a new power and side effect. One makes her super-tough, and also makes her gain thirty pounds. Another gives her telepathy, while also screwing up her sleep schedule. Nothing balances, but the powers are handy; Hannah even manages to save a few of her friends from mortal peril, or at least minor annoyances. Hannah doesn't want to be a hero, though - she just wants to be well. But what does "well" even look like? Ted Anderson is a librarian, educator, and comics writer from Minnesota. He has written licensed and creator-owned comics for multiple publishers, including BOOM!, IDW, and Aftershock Comics. He lives in Minneapolis with several plants and zero regrets.

Saturday, December 10th, starting at 1pm

From her cabin on True North Island, Stephanie Hansen tells warm and witty stories and shares favorite recipes for the summer months. In May, she offers cozy dishes like Beef Bourguignon and Drunken Cowboy Beans, while June might call for Molasses Pork Chops accompanied by Roasted Carrots with Scallion-Ginger Sauce. Throughout the months, Hansen shares recipes for desserts both simple and adventurous, and refreshing cocktails to meet your every mood. Her straightforward, creative dishes will nourish those who gather at your table--whether at the cabin or at home. Stephanie Hansen is a food writer and blogger. From chatting about local dining on FM 107.1's Weekly Dish to sharing recipes on The Jason Show to highlighting local entrepreneurs through the Makers of Minnesota podcast, Hansen celebrates all things Minnesota.

Sunday, December 11th, starting at 2pm

After the untimely death of Elliot, the beloved co-owner of Over the Rainbow Bookshop, his grief-ridden business partner Irma has agreed to sell the store to condo developers. But Irma's daughters and Elliot's romantic partner conspire to save the bookshop, even if it takes some snooping, gossip and minor sabotage. Filled with humor, hijinks and actual reading recommendations, The Book Haters' Book Club is a love letter to the booksellers and librarians dedicated to putting the right books in the right hands every day. Gretchen Anthony is the author of The Kids Are Gonna Ask, recipient of the 2021 Alex Award from the American Library Association. Her debut novel, Evergreen Tidings from the Baumgartners, was a Midwestern Connections Pick and a best books pick by BookBub, PopSugar, and the New York Post. She lives in Minneapolis with her family.

Jean and David say... Shop Early, Shop Local! (And Shop Here!!) Beginning your holiday shopping now is the best way to support Next Chapter Booksellers and make sure you get the books you want for the people you love. Stop by the store today, browse our website, or call us at 651-225-8989. A Next Chapter gift card or a membership to our digital audiobook partner Libro.fm also make excellent gifts where specificity might not be rewarded.

Reminder: we are open until 6pm on weekdays through December 23rd! We're also running a holiday promotion: spend $200 and get a coupon for 20% off your purchase in January or February of 2023!

The Light We Carry – Michelle Obama

Drawing from her experiences as a mother, daughter, spouse, and First Lady, Michelle Obama shares the habits she has developed to successfully adapt to change and overcome obstacles. She details practices like “starting kind,” “going high,” and assembling a “kitchen table” of trusted friends. With humor, candor, and compassion, she also explores issues connected to race and gender, encouraging readers to work through fear, find strength in community, and live with boldness. A rewarding blend of powerful stories and profound advice that will ignite conversation, The Light We Carry inspires readers to examine their own lives, identify their sources of gladness, and connect meaningfully in a turbulent world.

Smitten Kitchen Keepers – Deb Perelman

Deb Perelman is the author of two best-selling cookbooks and one of the internet's most successful food bloggers. Here, in her third book, she gives us 100 recipes (including a few favorites from her site) that aim to make shopping easier, preparation more practical and enjoyable, and food more reliably delicious for the home cook. These are the fail-safe, satisfying recipes you’ll rely on for years to come—from Perelman’s forever files to yours.

Kurashi at Home – Marie Kondo

Inspired by the Japanese concept of kurashi, or “way of life,” this inspirational photo-guide invites you to visualize your best life from the moment you wake up until the end of each day. By applying Marie Kondo's time-tested query—“Does it spark joy?”—to your mindset and behaviors, take a holistic, personal approach to curating your environment. This vision becomes a touchpoint that helps you make conscious, mindful choices—from how you use every corner of your living space to how you take advantage of every moment.

The Twist of a Knife – Anthony Horowitz

Anthony Horowitz has had enough. He tells ex-detective Daniel Hawthorne that after three books their deal is over; he has other things on his mind. His new play, Mindgame, is getting panned. Sunday Times critic Margaret Throsby gives it a particularly savage review. When Throsby is stabbed in the heart, the murder weapon turns out to belong to Anthony, giving his old enemy Detective Inspector Cara Grunshaw an excuse to arrest him at last. Thrown into prison, Anthony fears for both his personal future and his writing career. The net closes in tighter when a second theatre critic is found dead. Ever more desperate, he realizes that only one man can help him. But will Hawthorne take the call?

A Book of Days – Patti Smith

A World of Curiosities – Louise Penny

As the villagers prepare for a spring celebration, a young man and woman have reappeared, many years after their mother was murdered, leading Gamache and Beauvoir’s memories of that tragic case to come rushing back. What's more, Gamache discovers a letter written by a long dead stone mason, describing his terror when bricking up an attic room somewhere in the village. When the room is found and reopened, Gamache, Beauvoir, and the villagers discover a world of curiosities. But there’s more in that room than meets the eye: puzzles within puzzles, hidden messages warning of mayhem and revenge. In unsealing that room, an old enemy is released into the very heart of Armand Gamache’s home.

A Dangerous Business – Jane Smiley

Monterey, 1851. Ever since her husband was killed in a bar fight, Eliza Ripple has been working in a brothel. It seems like a better life, at least at first. But when the dead bodies of young women start appearing outside of town, a darkness descends that she can't resist confronting. Side by side with her friend Jean, and inspired by Edgar Allan Poe’s detective Dupin, Eliza pieces together an array of clues to try to catch the killer, all the while juggling clients who begin to seem more and more suspicious. Eliza and Jean are determined not just to survive, but to find their way in a lawless town on the fringes of the Wild West, as what will become the Civil War looms on the horizon.

On January 6, 2021, insurgents stormed the U.S. Capitol, an act of domestic terror without parallel in American history, designed to disrupt the peaceful transfer of power. In a resolution six months later, the House of Representatives called it "one of the darkest days of our democracy," and established a special committee to investigate how and why the attack happened. Celadon Books, in collaboration with The New Yorker, presents the committee's final report, the definitive account of January 6th and what led up to it, based on more than a year of investigation by nine members of Congress and committee staff, with a preface by Pulitzer Prize winner David Remnick, and an epilogue by Congressman Jamie Raskin of Maryland, a member of the committee.

There's no paperback releases of particular note this week, but as always, our newsletter can't fit everything, so check out the other new arrivals and recent bestsellers on our website!

In the aftermath of her husband’s logging accident, Elsa struggles to carry on while caring for their two small children in the unfinished house he was building for them in the woods of rural Wisconsin. To cope with the challenges of winter, she forges her own relationship with the land, learning from and taking comfort in the trees her husband had so loved. If she wants to stay in their home, she must discover her own capabilities, and accept help from the people and places she least expects. Carol Dunbar is a former actor, playwright, and coloratura soprano who left her life in the city to move off the grid. Her writing has appeared in The New York Times, The South Carolina Review, Midwestern Gothic, and on Wisconsin Public Radio. Peter Geye is author of the award-winning novels Safe from the Sea, The Lighthouse Road, Wintering (winner of the Minnesota Book Award), and The Ski Jumpers. He teaches the yearlong Novel Writing Project at the Loft Literary Center. Born and raised in Minneapolis, he continues to live there with his family.

Motherthing – Anslie Hogarth

With depravity, psychological acuity, and social commentary in Palahniukan proportions, Ainslie Hogarth secures a spot in the vaulted though admittedly slight canon of the domestic-horror-comedy. Callback jokes become disturbing mantras and prose dips into feverish stream-of-consciousness as our lovers sink deeper into the idic heart of hetero-patriarchal culture, where devotion becomes desperation and the lines between mother, child, and husband grow hazy. The tonal fluidity and constantly retooled motifs make each paragraph a surprise, along with the most laugh-out-loud upsetting similes I've ever read. Here, I'll try one: Motherthing is droll, approachable, and on closer inspection, utterly raw, like a New Yorker cartoon drawn in menstrual blood.

-Graham

If the universe stopped expanding today, driving to the edge of the observable universe (in a straight line at 65 mph) would still take 480,000,000,000,000,000 years. In a car getting 33 miles per gallon, this trip would require a volume of gasoline equivalent to the size of Earth's moon. Assuming you have an aux cable, you would be able to listen to every episode of every podcast, plus every audiobook ever recorded, before even leaving the solar system. By the time you reached the edge of the universe, all that would be left in every direction would be burned-out stars and black holes.

What If? 2 by Randall Munroe

Years and years and years ago, when I was a boy,

when there were wolves in Wales, and birds

the color of red-flannel petticoats whisked past

the harp-shaped hills, when we sang and wallowed

all night and day in caves that smelt like Sunday

afternoons in damp front farmhouse parlors,

and we chased, with the jawbones of deacons,

the English and the bears, before the motor car,

before the wheel, before the duchess-faced horse,

when we rode the daft and happy hills bareback,

it snowed and it snowed. But here a small boy says:

"It snowed last year, too. I made a snowman

and my brother knocked it down and I knocked

my brother down and then we had tea."

"But that was not the same snow," I say. "Our snow

was not only shaken from whitewash buckets

down the sky, it came shawling out of the ground

and swam and drifted out of the arms and hands

and bodies of the trees; snow grew overnight

on the roofs of the houses like a pure and grandfather

moss, minutely white-ivied the walls and settled

on the postman, opening the gate, like a dumb, numb

thunderstorm of white, torn Christmas cards"

-Dylan Thomas, "A Child's Christmas In Wales"

What's your favorite classic children's fantasy series? (From your childhood or your child's!)

Wow, this is surprising to me! I guess Harry Potter doesn't have the supremacy that I expected. Personally, I love His Dark Materials, which I would definitely describe as being in conversation with Narnia. I didn't get any email responses, but I'd love to hear if anyone has another classic children's fantasy series to recommend. Thanks for voting, everyone!

Now for this week's poll! Click on "Select" to choose your answer! The results will be in the next newsletter. And our question is: