Book Recs with a purpose

America Flores-Hernandez

Chronicle Reporter

With the new year in full swing, authors within the thrillers and fantasy genre have caused a spurge in fresh titles that reciprocate to their readers needs in the unexpected. According to the New York Times Best-Sellers, the following list is categorized based on the author’s notoriety and impact in the list:

Where the Forest Meets the Stars by Glendy Vanderah

After the loss of her mother and her own battle with breast cancer, Joanna Teale returns to her graduate research on nesting birds in rural Illinois, determined to prove that her recent hardships have not broken her. She throws herself into her work from dusk to dawn, until her solitary routine is disrupted by the appearance of a mysterious child who shows up at her cabin barefoot and covered in bruises.

The girl calls herself Ursa, and she claims to have been sent from the stars to witness five miracles. With concerns about the child’s home situation, Jo reluctantly agrees to let her stay—just until she learns more about Ursa’s past.

Freedom Road by William Lashner

Instead of willing to live out his final years in despair, Oliver Cross is fresh out of jail. However, he finds out his granddaughter, a wild child who reminds him of his late wife, has vanished, thus Oliver jumps parole. With a sketchy teen and an abandoned dog, he hits the blacktop to find her.

On the road and on the run from a vengeful Russian drug dealer, he finds himself on a trip across America and into his own past, fueled by fumes from a Ford F-250 plus a reason to live. It’s a journey that could all end in redemption or a hail of bullets. And either’s okay by him.

An Anonymous Girl: A Novel by Greer Hendricks and Sarah Pekkanen

Looking to earn some easy cash, Jessica Farris agrees to be a test subject in a psychological study about ethics and morality. But as the study moves from the exam room to the real world, the line between what is real and what is one of Dr. Shields’s experiments blurs.

Dr. Shields seems to know what Jess is thinking… and what she’s hiding.

Jessica’s behavior will not only be monitored, but manipulated.

Caught in a web of attraction, deceit and jealousy, Jess quickly learns that some obsessions can be deadly.

Overall, what makes these three books stand out besides the subject matter they tackle, the authors themselves are persistent, thoughtful, and cunning when adding on symbolic and thematic elements into the stories which leads on the reader into questioning their own stances in a fixated arc of doubt. In turn, this revolves unto making the protagonists realize not only their right to self-satisfaction, but giving up personal happiness so that those in vulnerable positions can attain and understand the true meaning behind togetherness with others, and individually.

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