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Are you in the mood for a new book but unsure where to start? Let DC Public Library do the hard work for you! Staff Picks is designed to connect you with your next great read—whether you're a long-time book lover or just starting to explore new genres.
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Bloom by Delilah Dawson
Who would have thought cupcakes sold by a woman at a farmer’s market could taste so delicious but harbor a deadly secret? A sapphic romance blooms between a college literary professor, Ro, and a baker, Ash. As they get to know each other, Ro falls deeper in love with Ash and hopes for a happily ever after ending. She ends up getting much more than she bargained for.
Jackal by Erin E. Adams
Every summer equinox, for as long as she can remember, Black girls go missing from town. Liz Rocher returns to her home city in the Appalachian Mountains. A mostly white city where black girls go missing and the sheriff’s department doesn’t seem to care about it. Little does she know that when a friend’s daughter goes missing, Ro wraps herself up in a mystery that turns into something bigger than she thought.
A House with Good Bones by T. Kingfisher
A Southern Gothic horror romp in which our spunky protagonist, Sam, goes to visit her mother, only to find that there’s something weird about mom. Mom now lives in her mother’s house and there’s something going on. She finds mom leaving herself post it notes on the bathroom mirror, reminding herself to be nice and the roses in the garden…well the roses are a story all by themselves. A novel with a creepy vibe about a haunted house, vultures and an archaeoentomologist that will have you ripping through each page until the very end.
Small Horrors by Darcy Coates
A collection of fifty short, three-minute stories that will keep you up at night -- like children timing their eating to a macabre event, a person receives a mysterious music box and also a bunch of uninvited birds to go with it or when a man hits a dog accidentally and there’s much more to it. What do you find when you go looking in a crawl space in your new house? So many stories will have you biting your nails down to the quick but none will seriously disappoint.
The Black Girl Survives in this One-Desiree S. Evans and Saraciea J Fennell (eds)
A collection of fifteen short stories where…the Black girl survives!! What do you do when someone is chasing you in the corn? How about when you don’t know what’s out there with you in space? What happens at the Black Girl Camping Event where power needs to be exchanged? Well, one thing you do know is that the Black girl will always survive!
About the Author
Tracy Lucas is a horror aficionado and a nyctophile. She is a Technician at the main branch of the Martin Luther King Jr. Public Library and lives in Washington, DC.