Independent Bookstore Day is this Saturday! To celebrate, we’re stopping by our favorite indie bookstores, of course, and we’re also reflecting on those times that booksellers recommended the most perfect books to us. Rest easy knowing that all the picks on this list come from expert bibliophiles, who know a good book when they read one.
Find out how your local bookstore is celebrating the day, and discover more about the occasion at Indiebound!
Emily’s Pick #1: I love reading all the different recommendations for MURDER YOUR EMPLOYER because it has such a unique premise to talk about. One of my all-time favorite recs comes from Nancy McFarlane, a bookseller at Fiction Addiction. She summed it up wonderfully, writing, “It is truly the sign of a gifted author that a book devoted to teaching people the correct way to kill someone and get away with it could be so entertaining, so clever, so funny, and also a really feel-good story.” I think what most intrigued me was the idea that this novel about an academy where students learn the proper ways to murder could be uplifting, and deeper than what you’d first expect.
From the diabolical imagination of Edgar Award–winning novelist, playwright, and story-songwriter Rupert Holmes comes a devilish thriller with a killer concept: The McMasters Conservatory for the Applied Arts, a luxurious, clandestine college dedicated to the fine art of murder where earnest students study how best to “delete” their most deserving victim.
Who hasn’t wondered for a split second what the world would be like if a person who is the object of your affliction ceased to exist? But then you’ve probably never heard of The McMasters Conservatory, dedicated to the consummate execution of the homicidal arts. To gain admission, a student must have an ethical reason for erasing someone who deeply deserves a fate no worse (nor better) than death. The campus of this “Poison Ivy League” college—its location unknown to even those who study there—is where you might find yourself the practice target of a classmate…and where one’s mandatory graduation thesis is getting away with the perfect murder of someone whose death will make the world a much better place to live.
Prepare for an education you’ll never forget. A delightful mix of witty wordplay, breathtaking twists and genuine intrigue, Murder Your Employer will gain you admission into a wholly original world, cocooned within the most entertaining book about well-intentioned would-be murderers you’ll ever read.
Rupert Holmes’s much celebrated career ranges from chart-topping story songs with surprising twists—“Escape (The Pina Colada Song)”—to Tony Award–winning whodunit musicals—The Mystery of Edwin Drood—Edgar Award–winning comedy-thrillers—Accomplice—and the Nero Wolfe Best American Mystery Novel nominated Where the Truth Lies, made into an Atom Egoyan motion picture starring Colin Firth and Kevin Bacon. Called “an American treasure” (Los Angeles Times), “a true Renaissance man” by Newsweek, “a comic genius” (Kirkus Reviews) and simply “a genius” (The Times, London), Rupert Holmes brings his wickedly clever storytelling talents to this outrageous and darkly comic mystery set in a secret, idyllic campus where students learn how to “do in others as you would have others do you in.”
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Emily’s Pick #2: I’m always a sucker for those staff pick sections at the bookstore. And the most recent one that reeled me in was from Liv at the Book Club Bar in NYC’s East Village. Liv calls FREE FOOD FOR MILLIONAIRES “a smart, funny, and tender-hearted story of one New Yorker at a personal and cultural crossroads,” and goes on to say that “this is a quintessentially American novel with a Dickensian scope.” I loved Min Jin Lee’s PACHINKO and felt like her characters lingered with me long after I finished that novel, so I’m excited to read about Casey Han, a young woman struggling to make it on her own in ’90s Manhattan. As she navigates her way with quirky characters in her community, from her Korean immigrant parents to her white boyfriend and coworkers, the story explores themes of addiction, quarter-life crises, and more!
Sara’s Pick: If you’re like me, when you enter a bookstore, you immediately book it to the employees’ recommendation table (and yes, pun absolutely intended). So, when the little card from one bookseller read, “a must read for fans of The Wicker Man,” I literally could not grab a copy fast enough. On LUTE, the titular scenic British island, it seems every resident is blessed with good fortune, and the community thrives without worrying about war or hunger. What’s their secret? Charity, kindness . . . oh, plus seven people die every seventh summer. And as island newcomer Nina Treadway finds out, this event is as gruesome and heartbreaking as it sounds. Folk horror at its best, LUTE takes the creepy, idyllic backdrop of the 1973 movie The Wicker Man and gives it a new, terrible twist.
Katya’s Pick: A memoir that explores the challenges and unique beauties of female friendship? A vulnerable, hilarious book that will leave you feeling validated, empowered, and refreshed? Yes, please, to all of the above! Christie Tate’s B.F.F. was a Powell’s Pick-of-the-Month in February, and it’s easy to see why. Tate’s prose is so witty and charming that she could probably write about anything and still have me hooked. But combine her writing style with a rare story about friendships “lost and found,” and I’m immediately sold. In this memoir, Tate recounts bonds with other females throughout her life, finally reflecting on one specific friendship with a vivacious woman she met in a support group. The author openly discusses her jealousy, shame in relationships, as well as her hope and growth as both a friend and an individual. B.F.F. is one of those books that I never knew I needed until I read it, because within its pages I felt seen in my own struggles and encouraged to continue to grow!
From the author of Group, a New York Times bestseller and Reese’s Book Club Pick, comes a moving, heartwarming, and powerful memoir about Christie Tate’s lifelong struggle to sustain female friendship, and the friend who helps her find the human connection she seeks.
After more than a decade of dead-end dates and dysfunctional relationships, Christie Tate has reclaimed her voice and settled down. Her days of agonizing in group therapy over guys who won’t commit are over, the grueling emotional work required to attach to another person tucked neatly into the past.
Or so she thought. Weeks after giddily sharing stories of her new boyfriend at Saturday morning recovery meetings, Christie receives a gift from a friend. Meredith, twenty years older and always impeccably accessorized, gives Christie a box of holiday-themed scarves as well as a gentle suggestion: maybe now is the perfect time to examine why friendships give her trouble. “The work never ends, right?” she says with a wink.
Christie isn’t so sure, but she soon realizes that the feeling of “apartness” that has plagued her since childhood isn’t magically going away now that she’s in a healthy romantic relationship. With Meredith by her side, she embarks on a brutally honest exploration of her friendships past and present, sorting through the ways that debilitating shame and jealousy have kept the lasting bonds she craves out of reach—and how she can overcome a history of letting go too soon. But when Meredith becomes ill and Christie’s baggage threatens to muddy their final days, she’s forced to face her deepest fears in honor of the woman who finally showed her how to be a friend.
Poignant, laugh-out-loud funny, and emotionally satisfying, B.F.F. explores what happens when we finally break the habits that impair our ability to connect with others, and the ways that one life—however messy and imperfect—can change another.
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Chris’s Pick #1: If there’s one thing a good bookseller knows how to do, it’s pull on my heart strings (with both the content of the books they read, and the heartwarming way they recommend them). Schuler Books, in particular, has stellar booksellers who do a great job of passionately recommending books on their TikTok channels. THE KEEPER OF LOST THINGS is one such great example. Ruth Hogan’s story is about Anthony Peardew, who, in the aftermath of his fiancée’s death, begins to collect lost, misplaced, or forgotten items. When nearing the end of his life, Anthony worries he hasn’t taken the time to try to return these objects. So, as his legacy, he leaves his home—and all its items—to his assistant, Laura, in hopes she can do the legwork for him. Struggling to move on after a nasty divorce, Laura sets out to fulfill Anthony’s last wish and, in doing so, finds friendship, redemption, and a new sense of connection.
Chris’s Pick #2: It takes a special kind of novel to “surprise” a bookseller—and by that, I mean introduce a plot unlike any they have ever read before. Such is the case with THIS IS HOW YOU LOSE THE TIME WAR, a story of love in the time of war. Completely unique and worthy of several readings, this novel blew the booksellers’ minds at Schuler Books, and mine as well! The war featured in the book takes place across time and space, with one side dominated by AI and cutting-edge technology and the other a kind of hive-consciousness. Each faction has an agent working on their behalf. These agents (Red and Blue) begin a secret correspondence in hopes of securing an imaginable future. What they aren’t expecting is to fall in love with each other, expressing themselves in beautiful, albeit cryptic messages.
“[An] exquisitely crafted tale...Part epistolary romance, part mind-blowing science fiction adventure, this dazzling story unfolds bit by bit, revealing layers of meaning as it plays with cause and effect, wildly imaginative technologies, and increasingly intricate wordplay...This short novel warrants multiple readings to fully unlock its complexities.” —Publishers Weekly (starred review).
From award-winning authors Amal El-Mohtar and Max Gladstone comes an enthralling, romantic novel spanning time and space about two time-traveling rivals who fall in love and must change the past to ensure their future.
Among the ashes of a dying world, an agent of the Commandment finds a letter. It reads: Burn before reading.
Thus begins an unlikely correspondence between two rival agents hellbent on securing the best possible future for their warring factions. Now, what began as a taunt, a battlefield boast, becomes something more. Something epic. Something romantic. Something that could change the past and the future.
Except the discovery of their bond would mean the death of each of them. There’s still a war going on, after all. And someone has to win. That’s how war works, right?
Cowritten by two beloved and award-winning sci-fi writers, This Is How You Lose the Time War is an epic love story spanning time and space.
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Photo credit: iStock / Canetti
