Here are some local and global book selections for the children and adults on your holiday shopping list.
By Mary Lyn Ray
Another dreamy picture book from New Hampshire writer Mary Lyn Ray and illustrator Cindy Derby celebrating birthdays everywhere. Joyful and utterly unique, this celebrates the best birthday gift of all: a whole day that is yours to unwrap. Every day is someone’s birthday to celebrate. Another classic from Ray.
By Kathy Lowe
Beloved New Hampshire songwriter and artist, Kathy Lowe has written a charming children’s book delighting in the magic of nature all around us. Based on Kathy’s “petreflection” photos capturing the land meeting the water, and paired with the artwork from Elaine Cox, we have a book that completely captures the beauty and miracle particular to our world here in New Hampshire.
By Jan Brett
Jan Brett’s latest release is sure to become another Christmas classic. Her gorgeous illustrations retell The Nutcracker, with all the detail and delight of her other books.
By Rotraut Susanne Berner
This charming large board book series, with no words, takes you and your beloved child deep into everyday life during the four seasons. One of Germany’s bestknown artists, the winter scenes take you deep into the homes, gardens, work, city and farms to explore endlessly.
By Jerry Pinkney
We recently lost one of our very best children’s authors and illustrators, Jerry Pinkney, and this version of the classic story was the last release before his death. Check out all his sumptuous books, and add this one to your library of fairy tales.
By Jesse Alexander McNeil
Warner is especially proud of our hometown boy who grew up to take on some of life’s most amazing adventures. In On the Hoof, Jesse has captured the grueling trek across the country with Pepper, a 5-year-old inexperienced Tennessee Walker. Told gracefully and honestly, with so many twists and turns and helpful people along the way, he has beautifully captured this transformative trip of a lifetime.
By David Graeber and
David Wengrow
This is a huge book carrying a huge rethinking of the entire history of our species, and I plan to spend the winter taking this in slowly and carefully. This brilliant anthropologist/archaeologist author team spent 10 years synthesizing the most current findings and retrieving documentation ignored by the traditional historians, to develop a new understanding of how we choose to organize and survive over time. There may be nothing “natural” in our beings to create hierarchy and inequality, and it is within our resiliency to turn things around. Their premise is that our future depends on it.
By J.R.R. Tolkien
The newest release of J.R.R. Tolkien’s grand masterwork is now in one beautiful hardcover, and this is illustrated with the art created by Tolkien himself as he envisioned Middle-earth. A must for the Tolkien fan in your family.
By Cherie Dimaline
This is the second in a series from the acclaimed author of The Marrow Thieves. In a futurist world that has stopped dreaming, the indigenous people of Native America have held on this ability “in their marrow”. What if the government found a way to harvest this…? A thrilling story about hope and survival, this YA series is being equally enjoyed by adult readers.
By Robert G. Goodby
Dr. Goodby, a New Hampshire anthropologist, has just released a wonderful Native American history of our Monadnock Region, from its oldest inhabitants 13,000 years ago, to their descendants, the Abenaki, who are still here today. An essential book for history buffs and for all to better understand the rich history and heritage of our home lands.
By James Rebanks
The New York Times bestselling author of The Shepherd’s Life has come out with another wonderful story of his family’s farm across three generations, describing the profound global transformation of agriculture and how this has so intimately effected our relationship to the land. He writes about what it means to have love and pride in a place, and how, against all the odds, it may still be possible to build a new pastoral: not a utopia, but somewhere decent for us all.
(Katharine Nevins is co-owner of MainStreet BookEnds of Warner, an independent, family-run, community bookstore since 1998.)