Advice from a Bookseller

an advice column for book lovers

Hello everyone! Some of our lovely community submitted some questions about holiday books, where to go after Dune, and finding books for young teenage readers, and our team of booksellers has done their best to find some answers.

Hit the button below to send questions for our next installment, and without further ado, let’s move into the advice…

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Question: I’m looking for books that are set during the holidays? I want that big winter seasonal vibe even though I'm in Southern California

Hi! 

Oh man, right?? Once the weather turns chilly and the magic of the holidays gets set into the air all I want is snow, wood fireplaces, hot toddies, a massive grandpa sweater on at all times and anything with gingerbread or cardamom in it! Then I head out into the Southern California world and find myself ALWAYS...MASSIVELY...over dressed! Hey, at least we have cold nights and the cozy wintry books to take us where we want to go. 

With the craziness of the holidays (all the pageants and Nutcrackers, holiday shopping and office parties, card writing and end-of-semester grading or testing) sometimes all we need is a light rom-com to remember what's it's like if you could spend the holidays the way you want to. Some of the reads I'm looking forward to this season are:

• Kiss Me at Christmas by Jenny Bayliss - she just always delivers on the heart feels! This one is about a woman whose college-age daughter wants to spend the Holidays in New York among the magic that is a New York. Alone and at home, Harriet takes the fall for some students breaking into the town's old theatre. Directing the town's final Christmas show & the continuation of a one-night stand begin to ignite the Christmas spirit that Harriet couldn't quite muster. 

• The Christmas Countdown by Holly Cassidy - you thought Advent Calendars were just for kids?! Heartbroken Callie is aching to hibernate but her sister has tasked her with completing a homemade, real life, in person advent calendar where she meets a baker whose heart is as closed as Callie's, or is it? (SO CUTE!)

• A Very Merry Bromance by Lyssa Kay Adams - this one is my favorite for the season and while it's set in Tennessee, I always imagine it during a Tennessee blizzard with the Smoky Mountains always in the background. But the Bromance Book Club series is fantastic, this one has the hottest Country Singer in a haters to lovers trope with the Whiskey Heiress as they work through their vulnerabilities and turn Gretchen around from being the Scrooge she thinks she is (the "book club" book is of course Charles Dickens "A Christmas Carol")

• Brightly Shining by Ingvild Rishoi - if you like the more literary feel. Translated from the Norwegian and set in Oslo (can't get more Holiday than that!!! Well...maybe a story set in the Swiss Alps) this one is about sisters and the magic and kindness of Christmas through found family when our family tends to disappoint. 

• Home for Christmas: Stories for Young and Old by Plough Publishing House - if you want to feel the Laura Ingalls Wilder vibe where the holidays are filled with: mittens, wool coats, feet of snow outside, ma & pa telling stories at any moment allowed to the children, the fire crackling, apple cider on the wood stove simmering and no one or anything within a 20mile radius. Home for Christmas is a compilation of stories from world-renowned authors and several little-known but who wrote some wonderful treasures. To be read aloud to the children, grandchildren or spouse during a peaceful moment, these can be enjoyed solo or together. The Holiday stories play on the nostalgia of childhood and times long gone, all the while filling your heart center with the glow or warmth & magic of the season. 

I'm excited to hear which book(s) you go for and all the feels you felt! I'm starting off this season with Brightly Shining and then will probably reread A Very Merry Bromance and sprinkle in Home for Christmas stories. I can't believe the Holiday Season is already here, but to be honest it couldn't come at a better time! Sometimes we just need those moments of magic. 

Have fun reading! Michelle

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Question: I just finished reading the Dune saga and don't know what to turn to next...

Congrats and take a deep breath — working through the entire Dune series is no small feat! We’re going to recommend a few directions you could move in next, depending on what it was about Dune that caught your attention.