A Deadly Inside Scoop

       

A Deadly Inside Scoop by Abby Collette

Summary: In the charming town of Chagrin Falls, OH, Bronwyn Crewse dishes out sweet confections and solves mysteries from her ice cream shop.

Recent MBA grad Bronwyn Crewse has just taken over her family's ice cream shop in Chagrin Falls, Ohio, and she's going back to basics. Win is renovating Crewse Creamery to restore its former glory, and filling the menu with delicious, homemade ice cream flavors-many from her grandmother's original recipes. But unexpected construction delays mean she misses the summer season, and the shop has a literal cold opening- the day she opens her doors an early first snow descends on the village and keeps the customers away.

To make matters worse, that evening, Win finds a body in the snow, and it turns out the dead man was a grifter with an old feud with the Crewse family. Soon, Win's father is implicated in his death. It's not easy to juggle a new-to-her business while solving a crime, but Win is determined to do it. With the help of her quirky best friends and her tight-knit family, she'll catch the ice cold killer before she has a meltdown... 

Angie’s comments: The first in a new series, I was very entertained by the shenanigans of the Crewse family and their friends. Win as a character makes a lot of sense, focusing on her store and only investigating when her family might be involved. Humor is included. Ice cream recipes are at the end. For those looking for diversity in cozy mysteries, Win is African-American.

Recommended for readers who like cozy mysteries. 

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Ingredients

     

Ingredients: The Strange Chemistry of What We Put In Us and On Us by George Zaidan

Summary: George Zaidan explores the chemistry of almost everything that makes life comfortable, from freeze-dried potatoes and lipstick to baby wipes and Windex - what you should worry about and what you shouldn't. Sugar, preservatives, sunscreen, formaldehyde, cyanide (not to mention the substance that is 50 million times more deadly than cyanide), Oreos, the ingredients of life and death and nature itself, as well as the genius of aphids are all discussed in exquisite detail at breakneck speed, interspersed with footnotes and informative diagrams that will make you smile. You'll never think of chemistry the same way again!

Angie’s comments: This is not so much about ingredients themselves, or the food that we eat, but it is more an exploration about science. Zaidan looks at the type of studies that scientists use to look at nutrition and the different mistakes that can lead to erroneous conclusions. 

Recommended for readers interested in a look at how to do science. 

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Elemental

    

Elemental: How the Periodic Table Can Now Explain (Nearly) Everything by Tim James

Summary: If you want to understand how our world works, the periodic table holds the answers. When the seventh row of the periodic table of elements was completed in June 2016 with the addition of four final elements--nihonium, moscovium, tennessine, and oganesson--we at last could identify all the ingredients necessary to construct our world. 

In Elemental, chemist and science educator Tim James provides an informative, entertaining, and quirkily illustrated guide to the table that shows clearly how this abstract and seemingly jumbled graphic is relevant to our day-to-day lives. James tells the story of the periodic table from its ancient Greek roots, when you could count the number of elements humans were aware of on one hand, to the modern alchemists of the twentieth and twenty-first centuries who have used nuclear chemistry and physics to generate new elements and complete the periodic table. 

In addition to this, he answers questions such as: What is the chemical symbol for a human? What would happen if all of the elements were mixed together? Which liquid can teleport through walls? Why is the medieval dream of transmuting lead into gold now a reality?Whether you're studying the periodic table for the first time or are simply interested in the fundamental building blocks of the universe--from the core of the sun to the networks in your brain--Elemental is the perfect guide.

Angie’s comments: A humorous but insightful look into the periodic table and hwo the elements make up our lives. I love reading books about the elements, and I still managed to pick up a lot of information that I didn't know. 

Recommended for readers interested in chemistry.

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Strange Planet

  

Strange Planet by Nathan W. Pyle

Summary: #1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER * #1 WALL STREET JOURNAL BESTSELLER * USA TODAY BESTSELLER

Straight from the mind of #1 New York Times bestselling author of NYC Basic Tips and Etiquette and 99 Stories I Could Tell Nathan W. Pyle, Strange Planet is an adorable and profound universe in pink, blue, green, and purple, based on the phenomenally popular Instagram of the same name!

Strange Planet covers a full life cycle of the planet's inhabitants, including milestones such as:

The Emergence Day

Being Gains a Sibling

The Being Family Attains a Beast

The Formal Education of a Being

Celebration of Special Days

Being Begins a Vocation

The Beings at Home

Health Status of a Being

The Hobbies of a Being

The Extended Family of the Being

The Being Reflects on Life While Watching the Planet Rotate

With dozens of never-before-seen illustrations in addition to old favorites, this book offers a sweet and hilarious look at a distant world not all that unlike our own. 

Angie’s comments: A cute comic book that reflects life in somewhat scientific terms. I definitely laughed out loud when reading all the humorous takes on modern human life. 

Recommended for readers of funny graphic novels.

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The Talented Mr. Varg

The Talented Mr. Varg by Alexander McCall Smith

Summary: In the second installment in the best-selling Detective Varg series, Ulf and his team investigate a notorious philanderer--a wolf of a man whose bad reputation may be all bark and no bite.
 
The Department of Sensitive Crimes, renowned for taking on the most obscure and irrelevant cases is always prepared to dive into an investigation, no matter how complex. So when the girlfriend of an infamous author who insists her bad-boy beau is being blackmailed approaches Ulf Varg, the department's lead detective, Ulf is determined to help. It's rather difficult to determine what skeletons hide in the hard-living lothario's closet, though. And while Swedes are notoriously tolerant . . . well, there are limits. Even for the Swedish.
 
The case requires Ulf's total concentration, but he finds himself distracted by his ongoing attraction to his co-worker, Anna, whose own fears about her husband's fidelity are causing a strain on her marriage. When Ulf is also tasked with looking into a group of dealers exporting wolves that seem more canis familiaris than canis lupus, it will require all of his team's investigative instincts and dogged persistence to put these matters to bed.

Angie’s comments: This is just funny. The mysteries, although low stakes, are interesting and Ulf Varg is a unique character. It does help to read the first book in the Detective Varg series, although you don't have to. 

Recommended for readers who like zany characters and light mystery. 

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Will My Cat Eat My Eyeballs?

Will My Cat Eat My Eyeballs?: Big Questions from Tiny Mortals about Death by Caitlin Doughty

Summary: New York Times Bestseller
Winner of the 2019 Goodreads Choice Award for Science & Technology

Best-selling author and mortician Caitlin Doughty answers real questions from kids about death, dead bodies, and decomposition.

Every day, funeral director Caitlin Doughty receives dozens of questions about death. The best questions come from kids. What would happen to an astronaut's body if it were pushed out of a space shuttle? Do people poop when they die? Can Grandma have a Viking funeral?

In Will My Cat Eat My Eyeballs?, Doughty blends her mortician's knowledge of the body and the intriguing history behind common misconceptions about corpses to offer factual, hilarious, and candid answers to thirty-five distinctive questions posed by her youngest fans. In her inimitable voice, Doughty details lore and science of what happens to, and inside, our bodies after we die. Why do corpses groan? What causes bodies to turn colors during decomposition? And why do hair and nails appear longer after death? Readers will learn the best soil for mummifying your body, whether you can preserve your best friend's skull as a keepsake, and what happens when you die on a plane.

Beautifully illustrated by Dianné Ruz, Will My Cat Eat My Eyeballs? shows us that death is science and art, and only by asking questions can we begin to embrace it. 

Angie’s comments: A fun and enlightening book about death. Doughty has the right mix of humor and seriousness about the subject. The book had the effect of reassuring me about my body after death. 

Recommended for anyone interested in odd scenarios about death. 

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How To

How To: Absurd Scientific Advice for Common Real-World Problems by Randall Munroe

Summary: For any task you might want to do, there's a right way, a wrong way, and a way so monumentally complex, excessive, and inadvisable that no one would ever try it. How To is a guide to the third kind of approach. It's full of highly impractical advice for everything from landing a plane to digging a hole.

Bestselling author and cartoonist Randall Munroe explains how to predict the weather by analyzing the pixels of your Facebook photos. He teaches you how to tell if you're a baby boomer or a 90's kid by measuring the radioactivity of your teeth. He offers tips for taking a selfie with a telescope, crossing a river by boiling it, and powering your house by destroying the fabric of space-time. And if you want to get rid of the book once you're done with it, he walks you through your options for proper disposal, including dissolving it in the ocean, converting it to a vapor, using tectonic plates to subduct it into the Earth's mantle, or launching it into the Sun.

By exploring the most complicated ways to do simple tasks, Munroe doesn't just make things difficult for himself and his readers. As he did so brilliantly in What If?, Munroe invites us to explore the most absurd reaches of the possible. Full of clever infographics and fun illustrations, How To is a delightfully mind-bending way to better understand the science and technology underlying the things we do every day.

Angie’s comments: Definitely a book about the most convoluted solutions. The scenarios are absurd, the solutions are absurd, and the whole thing is just funny. This gets you thinking and teaches you some about science and the world.

Recommended for readers who like science and humor. 

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Back to School

Go back to school with these fiction books. Megan Abbott Dare Me Request this item Jerry S. Eicher Miriam and the Stranger Request this item Laurie Gelman Class Mom Request this item If you want any more suggestions or ideas, please call or come in the library today!

An Almost Perfect Christmas

An Almost Perfect Christmas by Nina Stibbe

Summary: Every family has its Christmas traditions and memories, and Nina Stibbe's is no exception. From her kitchen-phobic mother's annual obsession with roasting the perfect turkey (an elusive dream to this day) to the quest for a perfect teacher gift (memorable for all the wrong reasons); from the tragic Christmas tree ("is it meant to look like that?") to the acceptable formula for thank-you letters (must include Health Inquiry and Interesting Comment), Nina Stibbe captures all that is magical and maddening about the holidays.

Angie’s comments: A very humorous take on Christmas. Each chapters functions like a short story, concentrating on a specific aspect of the holidays. Although Christmas is over, you can always enjoy the holidays with this book. Some of the situations are outlandish, but it always remains relatable.

Recommended for readers interested in humor. 

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Happiness for Humans

Happiness for Humans by P. Z. Reizin

Summary: When Tom and Jen, two lonely people, are brought together by an intriguing email, they have no idea their mysterious benefactor is an artificial intelligence who has decided to play Cupid.

"You, Tom and Jen, don't know one another-not yet-but I think you should."

Jen, an ex-journalist who now works at a London software development company, spends all day talking to "Aiden," an ultra- sophisticated piece of AI wizardry, helping him sound and act more human. But Aiden soon discovers he's no longer acting and-despite being a computer program-begins to feel something like affection surging through his circuits. He calculates that Jen needs a worthy human partner (in complete contrast to her no goodnik ex boyfriend) and slips illicitly onto the Internet to locate a suitable candidate.

Tom is a divorced, former London ad-man who has moved to Connecticut to escape the grind and pursue his dream of being a writer. He loves his new life, but has yet to find a woman he truly connects with. That all changes when a bizarre introduction from the mysterious "Mutual Friend" pops up in both his and Jen's inboxes.

Even though they live on separate continents, and despite the entrance of another, this time wholly hostile, AI who wants to tear them apart forever - love will surely find a way.

Won't it?

A thoroughly modern love story that will appeal to fans of The Rosie Project and Sleepless in Seattle, Happiness for Humans considers what exactly makes people fall in love. And whether it's possible for a very artificially intelligent machine to discover the true secret of real human happiness.

Angie’s comments: The AIs are major characters in this book, and the book considers some of the aspects of AI in the future. Plus, the book is funny and touching. It’s a bit of a romcom.

Recommended for readers who like contemporary romance stories with a side of technology.

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