New Releases for a New Summer Reading Challenge

The Button Book by Sally Nichols
Available for Hold and Curbside Pickup
Also available on OverDrive

Follow a group of animal friends as they discover a collection of mysterious buttons, all of which do different things! From a blue singing button to a purple tickle button, from a rude sound button to a mysterious white button, there’s only one way to find out what they do: press them all! And thankfully, there’s even a sleeping button to lull the animals to sleep after a busy day.

Tiny T. Rex and the Impossible Hug by Jonathan Stutzman, Jay Fleck
Available on Hoopla
Also Available for Hold and Curbside Pickup

Tiny T. Rex has a HUGE problem. His friend Pointy needs cheering up and only a hug will do. But with his short stature and teeny T. Rex arms, is a hug impossible? Not if Tiny has anything to say about it! Join this plucky little dinosaur in his very first adventure-a warm and funny tale that proves the best hugs come from the biggest hearts.

Memoirs of a Tortoise by Devin Scillian, Tim Bowers
Available on Hoopla

Oliver the tortoise has had his human, Ike, for a very, very long time now. In fact, they’re the same age–80 years old–and practically twins. They both enjoy the slowness of the garden, cool water from the hose on a hot day, and a nice slice of honeydew melon. But when Ike stops visiting the garden, Oliver wonders why his pet has left him so soon. So he makes the long journey to see his mother ten gardens away–she will certainly have the answer.

Accidental Trouble Magnet by Zanib Mian, Nasaya Mafaridik
Available for Hold and Curbside Pickup

Welcome to the imaginative brain of Omar! Omar and his family have just moved, and he is NOT excited about starting at a new school. What if the work is too hard or the kids are mean or the teacher is a zombie alien?! But when Omar makes a new best friend, things start looking up. That is, until a Big Mean Bully named Daniel makes every day a nightmare! Luckily, Omar’s enormous imagination and goofy family help him get through life’s ups and downs.

Llama Unleashes the Alpacalypse by Jonathon Stutzman
Available on Hoopla

Llama’s back and ready to destroy the world AGAIN…this time with his best camelid, Alpaca! Llama loves cooking…and baking…and, above all, eating. For breakfast, Llama makes one epic spread…as well as a big mess. But Llama hates cleaning. So by lunch, Llama has cooked up something really devious – an idea! – and by second lunch, Llama has cloned his most fastidious friend, Alpaca, to clean his house. And Llama doesn’t stop at just one clone. By dinner, the alpaca clones threaten to tidy the world into utter destruction – THE ALPACALYPSE* IS HERE! Will Llama be able to fix it all before dessert? *That’s “apocalypse” with an alpaca – get it?

The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes by Suzanne Collins
Available on Hoopla

The brand-new prequel to the Hunger Games series! It is the morning of the reaping that will kick off the tenth annual Hunger Games. In the Capitol, eighteen-year-old Coriolanus Snow is preparing for his one shot at glory as a mentor in the Games. The once-mighty house of Snow has fallen on hard times, its fate hanging on the slender chance that Coriolanus will be able to out charm, outwit, and outmaneuver his fellow students to mentor the winning tribute.

While you’re at it… the rest of the Hunger Games series is available on Hoopla too!

Most Likely by Sarah Watson
Available for Hold and Curbside Pickup

Ava, CJ, Jordan, and Martha (listed in alphabetical order out of fairness) have been friends since kindergarten. Now they’re in their senior year, facing their biggest fears about growing up and growing apart. But there’s more than just college on the horizon. One of these girls is destined to become the president of the United States. This is the story of four best friends who have one another’s backs through every new love, breakup, stumble, and success — proving that great friendships can help young women achieve anything…even a seat in the Oval Office.

Fractured Tide by Leslie Lutz
Available on Hoopla

Lost meets Stranger Things in this eerie, immersive YA thriller, thrusting seventeen-year-old Sia into a reality where the waters in front of her and the jungle behind her are as dangerous as the survivors alongside her. Sia practically grew up in the water scuba diving, and wreck dives are run of the mill. Take the tourists out. Explore the reef. Uncover the secrets locked in the sunken craft. But this time…the dive goes terribly wrong.

The Jetsetters by Amanda Eyre Ward
Available on RB Digital

When seventy-year-old Charlotte Perkins submits a sexy essay to the “Become a Jetsetter” contest, she dreams of reuniting her estranged children: Lee, an almost-famous actress; Cord, a handsome Manhattan venture capitalist who can’t seem to find a partner; and Regan, a harried mother who took it all wrong when Charlotte bought her a Weight Watchers gift certificate for her birthday. Charlotte yearns for the years when her children were young, when she was a single mother who meant everything to them.

Some assembly required : decoding four billion years of life, from ancient fossils to DNA by Neil Shubin
Available for Hold and Curbside Pickup

A lively and accessible account of the great transformations in the history of life, that enable us to further understand whether our presence on this planet is an accident or inevitable. The great transformations in the history of life brought about whole scale shifts in how animals live and how their bodies are organized: the evolution of fish to land-living creature, the origin of birds, the beginnings of bodies in single-celled creatures.

Mesa Verde Victim by Scott Graham
Available on Hoopla

Hounded by false accusations of murder, archaeologist Chuck Bender and his family risk their lives to track down an unknown killer on the loose in a rugged canyon on the remote western edge of Mesa Verde National Park, where ancient stone villages and secret burial sites, abandoned centuries ago by the Ancestral Puebloan people, harbor artifacts so rare and precious they’re worth killing over.