Introducing The Friday List! Every week, new books are arriving at RLB Library and to keep you up-to-date on what has come in, we’ll be posting the most recent 30 days of arrivals every Friday. The link below will take you to a catalog listing so that you can explore and find titles that interest you. Be sure to check back regularly to see what else has arrived!
THE FRIDAY LIST
If you want some ideas on what to read, here are some highlights:
Mid-century modern furniture, Dominic Bradbury, 2022
From armchairs and chaises lounges to cabinets and nightstands, the period between the late 1930s and early 1970s was one of the most productive, inventive and exciting eras for objects and furniture in the home. Post-war optimism combined with new manufacturing methods and material techniques to create an explosion of new design and objects of desire. The appetite for mid-century modern remains as strong as ever, both for classic designs–many still in production since they were launched–and for rare, hard-to-find or out-of-production pieces from lesser-known designers. While numerous books surveying mid-century modern style have appeared over the years, no publication has been specifically conceived for the increasing collector’s market in mid-century modern design, focusing on each piece of furniture as an object of formal invention, manufacturing intelligence and material innovation. This definitive book profiles hundreds of pieces in a substantial format perfect for reference in design libraries, studios and the homes of private collectors–or as an object of design in its own right.
Hedge : a novel, Jane Delury, 2023
Maud is a talented garden historian and devoted mother to daughters Ella and Louise. Motivated to reinvigorate her career and escape her troubled marriage, she accepts a summer job restoring the garden of a lush, nineteenth-century Hudson Valley estate. While waiting for her daughters to join her at the end of their school year, Maud meets coworker and archaelogist Gabriel Crews, whose passion for landscape history matches her own. When their immediate and intense friendship ignites, it sets in motion a seismic shock that will profoundly change Maud’s life, as well as the lives of everyone she cares about.
Prom mom : a novel, Laura Lippman, 2023
Amber Glass has spent her entire adult life putting as much distance as possible between her and her hometown of Baltimore, where she fears she will forever be known as Prom Mom–the girl who allegedly killed her newborn baby that no one knew about, especially not her date, Joe Simpson, who had abandoned her that night to pursue the girl he really liked. But when circumstances bring Amber back to the city, she realizes she can have a second chance–as long as she stays away from Joe, now a successful commercial real estate developer, married to a plastic surgeon, Meredith, to whom he is devoted. The problem is, Amber can’t stay away from Joe. And Joe finds that it’s increasingly hard for him to ignore Amber, if only because she remembers the boy he was and the man he said he was going to be. Against the surreal backdrop of 2020 and early 2021, the two are slowly drawn to each other and eventually cross the line they’ve been trying not to cross. And then Joe asks Amber to help him do the unthinkable…
Alone : Reflections on Solitary Living, Daniel Schreiber, 2023
At no time before have so many people lived alone, and never has loneliness been so widely or keenly felt. Why, in a society of individualists, is living alone perceived as a shameful failure? And can we ever be happy on our own? Drawing on personal experience, as well as philosophy and sociology, Daniel Schreiber explores the tension between the desire for solitude and freedom, and the desire for companionship, intimacy, and love. Along the way he illuminates the role that friendships play in our lives—can they be a response to the loss of meaning in a world in crisis? A profoundly enlightening book on how we want to live, Alone spent almost a year on Germany’s bestseller list.