Britt's Staff Picks


Showing 1 - 20 of 43  There are a total of 173 valid entries on the list.
Book cover for "The three-body problem"
Star rating for The three-body problem
Author:
Series:
Average Rating:
4.1 stars
Description:
"With the scope of Dune and the commercial action of Independence Day, this near-future trilogy is the first chance for English-speaking readers to experience this multple-award-winning phenemonenon from China's most beloved science fiction author. Set against the backdrop of China's Cultural Revolution, a secret military project sends signals into space to establish contact with aliens. An alien civilization on the brink of destruction captures the...
Book cover for "The fifth season"
Star rating for The fifth season
Series:
Average Rating:
4.2 stars
Description:
This is the way the world ends. . .for the last time. It starts with the great red rift across the heart of the world's sole continent, spewing ash that blots out the sun. It starts with death, with a murdered son and a missing daughter. It starts with betrayal, and long dormant wounds rising up to fester. This is the Stillness, a land long familiar with catastrophe, where the power of the earth is wielded as a weapon. And where there is no mercy....
Book cover for "All systems red"
Star rating for All systems red
Series:
Average Rating:
4.6 stars
Description:
"In a corporate-dominated spacefaring future, planetary missions must be approved and supplied by the Company. Exploratory teams are accompanied by Company-supplied security androids, for their own safety. But in a society where contracts are awarded to the lowest bidder, safety isn't a primary concern. On a distant planet, a team of scientists are conducting surface tests, shadowed by their Company-supplied 'droid--a self-aware SecUnit that has hacked...
Book cover for "A psalm for the wild-built"
Star rating for A psalm for the wild-built
Series:
Monk & robot volume 1.
Average Rating:
4.2 stars
Description:
"In A Psalm for the Wild-Built, Hugo Award-winner Becky Chambers's delightful new Monk & Robot series gives us hope for the future. It's been centuries since the robots of Panga gained self-awareness and laid down their tools; centuries since they wandered, en masse, into the wilderness, never to be seen again; centuries since they faded into myth and urban legend. One day, the life of a tea monk is upended by the arrival of a robot, there to honor...
Book cover for "Take a hint, Dani Brown"
Star rating for Take a hint, Dani Brown
Series:
Average Rating:
4.3 stars
Description:
Danika Brown knows what she wants: professional success, academic renown, and an occasional roll in the hay to relive all that career-driven tension. When big, brooding security guard Zafir Ansari rescues Dani from a workplace fire drill gone wrong, it's an obvious sign: they are destined to sleep together. Dani's plan is simple, fake a relationship in public, and seduce Zaf behind the scenes. The trouble is, grumpy Zaf's secretly a romantic.
Book cover for "Red Rising"
Star rating for Red Rising
Series:
Average Rating:
4.3 stars
Description:
A tale set in a bleak future society torn by class divisions follows the experiences of secret revolutionary Darrow, who after witnessing his wife's execution by an oppressive government joins a revolutionary cell and attempts to infiltrate an elite military academy.
Book cover for "The song of Achilles"
Star rating for The song of Achilles
Average Rating:
4.5 stars
Description:
Patroclus, an awkward young prince, follows Achilles into war, little knowing that the years that follow will test everything they have learned, everything they hold dear. And that, before he is ready, he will be forced to surrender his friend to the hands of Fate. Set during the Trojan War.
Book cover for "The fellowship of the ring"
Star rating for The fellowship of the ring
Series:
Average Rating:
4.7 stars
Description:
Following Bilbo's 111th birthday, Frodo Baggins and his companion Sam Gamgee, set off along the same East Road down which Bilbo the Hobbit had accompanied Thorin Oakenshield and his dwarves all those years before.
Book cover for "Pet sematary"
Star rating for Pet sematary
Average Rating:
4.6 stars
Description:
When a little boy's pet dies, and he persuades his parents to bury it in an old Indian cemetary, reputed by legend to house restless spirits, a nightmare of death and destruction begins.
Book cover for "Plastic"
Star rating for Plastic
Description:
Relates the near-crisis status of the world's usage of plastic and the environmentally harmful disposal of it through the story of eight familiar plastic objects--a comb, a chair, a Frisbee, an IV bag, a disposable lighter, a grocery bag, a soda bottle, and a credit card.
Book cover for "The Martian"
Star rating for The Martian
Author:
Average Rating:
4.5 stars
Description:
"Six days ago, astronaut Mark Watney became one of the first people to walk on Mars. Now, he's sure he'll be the first person to die there. After a dust storm nearly kills him and forces his crew to evacuate while thinking him dead, Mark finds himself stranded and completely alone with no way to even signal Earth that he's alive--and even if he could get word out, his supplies would be gone long before a rescue could arrive. Chances are, though, he...
Book cover for "The goldfinch"
Star rating for The goldfinch
Author:
Average Rating:
3.9 stars
Description:
"A young boy in New York City, Theo Decker, miraculously survives an accident that takes the life of his mother. Alone and abandoned by his father, Theo is taken in by a friend's family and struggles to make sense of his new life. In the years that follow, he becomes entranced by one of the few things that reminds him of his mother: a small, mysteriously captivating painting that ultimately draws Theo into the art underworld. Composed with the skills...
Book cover for "Being mortal"
Star rating for Being mortal
Average Rating:
4.2 stars
Description:
Gawande, a practicing surgeon, addresses his profession's ultimate limitation, arguing that quality of life is the desired goal for patients and families of the terminally ill.
Book cover for "Circe"
Star rating for Circe
Average Rating:
4.4 stars
Description:
Follows Circe, the banished witch daughter of Helios, as she hones her powers and interacts with famous mythological beings before a conflict with one of the most vengeful Olympians forces her to choose between the worlds of the gods and mortals.
Book cover for "Norse mythology"
Star rating for Norse mythology
Author:
Average Rating:
4.3 stars
Description:

From the #1 New York Times bestselling author and "one of the modern masters of fantasy writing," (Huffington Post) a dazzling, witty telling of the Norse myths.

"A lively, funny, and very human rendition of Thor the thunder god, his father Odin, and the dark-hearted trickster Loki (plus countless other gods and monsters)." — Petra Mayer, NPR

Neil Gaiman, long inspired by ancient mythology in

...
Book cover for "Educated"
Star rating for Educated
Average Rating:
4.2 stars
Description:
"An unforgettable memoir about a young girl who, kept out of school, leaves her survivalist family and goes on to earn a PhD from Cambridge University"--Amazon.com.
Book cover for "Gender queer"
Star rating for Gender queer
Author:
Average Rating:
4.5 stars
Description:
"Gender Queer is here. Maia's intensely cathartic autobiography charts eir journey of self-identity, which includes the mortification and confusion of adolescent crushes, grappling with how to come out to family and society, bonding with friends over erotic gay fanfiction, and facing the trauma and fundamental violation of pap smears. Started as a way to explain to eir family what it means to be nonbinary and asexual, Gender Queer is more than a personal...
Book cover for "The outsiders"
Star rating for The outsiders
Average Rating:
4.2 stars
Description:
The struggle of three brothers to stay together after their parent's death and their quest for identity among the conflicting values of their adolescent society.
Book cover for "And then there were none"
Star rating for And then there were none
Average Rating:
4.1 stars
Description:
A killer stalks a group of ten total strangers on an isolated island off the Devon coast, in a story of murder and retribution set to a sinister nursery rhyme.
Book cover for "The hitchhiker's guide to the galaxy"
Star rating for The hitchhiker's guide to the galaxy
Series:
Average Rating:
4.2 stars
Description:
Seconds before Earth is demolished to make room for a galactic freeway, an earthman is saved by his friend. Together they journey through the galaxy. Chronicles the journeys, notions, and acquaintances of reluctant galactic traveler Arthur Dent, accompanied by never-before-published material from the late author's archives as well as commentary by famous fans.