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New year, new books! Whether you order them online or head to a local bookstore to pick them up, here are the reads you should keep an eye out for in 2024.
Beautyland
By Marie-Helene Bertino • $28
On shelves: January 16
Find it on: Amazon or Barnes & Noble
“A recent Hudson Valley transplant, Bertino delivers her third novel and it’s a stunner. It’s the story of Adina, a young woman who also happens to be an alien in a human body, growing up in Philadelphia and later NYC. Bertino brings a rhapsodic attention to the little things about life that will make your heart sing, while also delivering a funny, moving story about growing up weird.” —James Conrad, co-owner of The Golden Notebook in Woodstock
The Mysterious Case of the Alperton Angels
By Janice Hallett • $28.99
On shelves: January 23
Find it on: Amazon or Barnes & Noble
“This is a fabulously complex mystery featuring backstabbing authors, devil worshipping teenagers, monks, aristocrats, and so much more. Everyone’s motives are questionable, and everyone has a secret agenda. And what an ending!” —Sharon Weinberg, owner of The Chatham Bookstore in Chatham
I Heard Her Call My Name: A Memoir of Transition
By Lucy Sante • $27
On shelves: February 13
Find it on: Amazon or Barnes & Noble
“Literary legend and Hudson Valley resident Lucy Sante tells the remarkable story of her journey to transition in her sixties.” —Suzanna Hermans, co-owner of Oblong Books in Millerton and Rhinebeck
“The iconic author of classics like Low Life, The Other Paris, and Kill All Your Darlings, Sante tells her own story of her journey from Belgium to New York City in the 1970s, where she found fame as a chronicler of the artistic world that struggled with drugs and AIDS. She depicts her own journey of transitioning to become a woman after living for sixty years as a man. This is the memoir we’re most excited about reading this year.” —James Conrad
My Beloved Life
By Amitava Kumar • $29
On shelves: February 27
Find it on: Amazon or Barnes & Noble
“Vassar professor Kumar’s new novel—which traces the arc of a man’s life in India—is highly anticipated, with Salman Rushdie saying ‘his novel offers magnificent witness, and is not ordinary but extraordinary.’” —Suzanna Hermans
Help Wanted
By Adelle Waldman • $28.99
On shelves: March 5
Find it on: Amazon or Barnes & Noble
“It’s a workplace comedy and an empathetic exploration of the business and the people working in a big-box store located in the Hudson Valley. It will forever change the way you feel about shopping.” —Sharon Weinberg
“This highly anticipated novel follows Waldman’s breakout debut The Love Affairs of Nathaniel P. She is a Hudson Valley-based author and we can’t wait for this one!” —Suzanna Hermans
The Paris Novel
By Ruth Reichl • $29
On shelves: April 30
Find it on: Amazon or Barnes & Noble
“This longtime Columbia County resident has written a lovely romantic novel that is an ode to Paris—the art, the fashion, the history and, of course, the food!” —Sharon Weinberg
“Legendary food writer and magazine editor Ruth Reichl is one of our favorite contemporary writers for the way that the literary and the culinary meld in her memoirs and her fiction. This is the novel that her late editor, Susan Kamil, asked her to write. It’s a fictionalization of Reichl’s time living in Paris in the ‘80s after her estranged mother’s passing. What more could you want? Plus, she is a Hudson Valley resident and a champion of the region.” —Angie Venezia, owner of Golden Hour Books in Newburgh
Say hi to one of the region’s newest indie bookshops! Golden Hour opened last summer on Broadway and has a curated collection of best sellers, used classics, cookbooks, and more.
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