Sterling Staff Picks - Beth

"A surprising and moving romance set in an old-fashioned seaside town on the verge of unwelcome change Liza McCullen will never fully escape her past. But the unspoiled beaches and tight-knit community of Silver Bay offer the freedom and safety she craves--if not for herself, then for her young daughter, Hannah. That is, until Mike Dormer arrives as a guest in her aunt's hotel. The mild-mannered Englishman with his too-smart clothes and distracting...

"The Other Einstein offers us a window into a brilliant, fascinating woman whose light was lost in Einstein's enormous shadow. It is the story of Einstein's wife, a brilliant physicist in her own right, whose contribution to the special theory of relativity is hotly debated and may have been inspired by her own profound and very personal insight. Mitza Maric has always been a little different from other girls. Most twenty-year-olds are wives by now,...

In Bringing Nature Home, Doug Tallamy encourages the use of native plants in gardening. This book asks and answers questions for modern gardeners inclined to good stewardship. How can we adjust our planting palette to be both beautiful and environmentally useful? How much more does a local oak species contribute to habitat richness then an out-of-ecological-context exotic tree? What do violets and fritillary butterflies, or pawpaws and zebra swallowtails...

"In this uplifting memoir, a professor and activist shares what birds can teach us about life, social change, and protecting the environment"-- Provided by publisher.

Staying busy has helped Tova cope ever since her son disappeared decades ago. So when her husband dies, she takes a job at the aquarium, where she meets Marcellus, an octopus that deduces what happened to her son. For fans of A Man Called Ove, a charming, witty and compulsively readable exploration of friendship, reckoning, and hope that traces a widow's unlikely connection with a giant Pacific octopus After Tova Sullivan's husband died, she began...

"In 1943 Nazi-occupied Amsterdam, teenage Hanneke--a 'finder' of black market goods--is tasked with finding a Jewish girl a customer had been hiding, who has seemingly vanished into thin air, and is pulled into a web of resistance activities and secrets as she attempts to solve the mystery and save the missing girl"-- Provided by publisher.

"This stunning new novel is Jodi Picoult at her finest--complete with unflinching insights, richly layered characters, and a page-turning plot with a gripping moral dilemma at its heart. Ruth Jefferson is a labor and delivery nurse at a Connecticut hospital with more than twenty years' experience. During her shift, Ruth begins a routine checkup on a newborn, only to be told a few minutes later that she's been reassigned to another patient. The parents...

For one special security guard, tracking people down is a paranormal sort of hobby. Able to use his rare abilities to find people, David Dunn is suddenly given a job that seems more daunting than all the others before it. He'll need to find Kevin Wendell Crumb, and time is of the essence. But part of the problem is that Crumb is an extremely disturbed man and with 24 personalities, he's a lot more complicated than the others Dunn has found.

The beloved characters of Downton Abbey take to the big screen, and it turns out that they've got a major event to prepare for. After all, it's not every day that royalty makes an appearance. Of course, it's not long before tensions are running high. The property isn't even close to ready when it becomes clear that Carson the butler will need to come out of retirement to help run this sinking ship before it's too late.

New Orleans judge Michael Desiato is forced to confront his own deepest convictions when his son is involved in a hit and run that embroils an organized crime family.