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All you can kill / by Malla, Pasha,1978-author.;
"White Lotus meets Shaun of the Dead in this absurdist take on the wellness retreat. Our narrator and his accidental companion, K. Sohail, inadvertently find themselves on an island wellness retreat impersonating a couple, the Dhaliwals, who have probably been killed in a helicopter crash. After being welcomed by Jerome the robot, the new Dhaliwals eagerly partake of the all-you-stomach buffet, the motivational speechifyings on Trunity by the berobed Brad Beard, and some erotic counselling by Professor Sayer. But things quickly take an ominous turn when an excursion to a nearby deserted village reveals a guillotine and a haunted chapel. And then one of the retreaters is murdered and the real Dhaliwals show up. Accusations, counter-accusations, and counter-counter-accusations are made, until the whole retreat is caught up in a bizarre trial. In All You Can Kill, Pasha Malla, with his inimitable absurdist style, collides horror and humour into an utterly unforgettable satire."--
Subjects: Black humor.; Satirical fiction.; Novels.; False personation; Man-woman relationships; Murder; Spiritual retreats;
Available copies: 1 / Total copies: 1
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Humor me / by Shook, Cat,1993-author.;
"Presley Fry is not amused. She's been an assistant at the Late Night Show for way too long, she's adopted a "business casual" approach to dating to save herself from the embarrassment of seeking genuine connection, and she's content to allow her gregarious roommate, Isabelle, to orchestrate her entire social life. And yet, Presley is absolutely enamored with her job and the world of stand-up comedy. The joy she finds in discovering up-and-coming comedians, the beauty and connection in their shared humor - it's enough for now. Enter Susan Clark, the childhood best friend of Presley's late mother, whose death still knocks the wind out of Presley whenever she reaches for the phone. Susan is married to the head of the network where Presley works, and she is determined to take Presley under her wing and ease her way through life in the big city. She's also determined to connect Presley with her son, the bright and affable Lawrence, who couldn't be further from Presley's type. As Presley grapples with the loss of her mother and finds her people among those who seek out comedy to make the world a bit brighter, Humor Me reminds us that friendship can emerge from where you least expect it, and shared laughter can ease some of the deepest pain"--
Subjects: Bildungsromans.; Novels.; Friendship; Grief; Man-woman relationships; Mothers and daughters; Mothers; Stand-up comedy;
Available copies: 1 / Total copies: 1
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Three days in June / by Tyler, Anne,author.;
"Gail Baines is long divorced from her husband, Max, and not especially close to her grown daughter, Debbie. Today is the day before Debbie's wedding. To start, Gail loses her job--or quits, depending on who you ask. Then, Max arrives unannounced on Gail's doorstep, carrying a cat, without a place to stay and without even a suit. But the true crisis lands when Debbie shares with her parents a secret she has just learned about her husband-to-be. It will not only throw the wedding itself into question but also send Gail back into her past and how her own relationship fell apart. Told with deep sensitivity and a tart sense of humour, full of the joys and heartbreaks of love and marriage and family life, Three Days in June is a triumph, and gives us the perennially bestselling, Pulitzer Prize-winning writer at the height of her powers."--
Subjects: Domestic fiction.; Novels.; Man-woman relationships; Secrecy; Weddings;
Available copies: 1 / Total copies: 2
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The Dickens boy : a novel / by Keneally, Thomas,author.;
Includes bibliographical references."In the late 1800s, rather than run the risk of his under-achieving sons tarnishing his reputation at home, Charles Dickens sent two of them to Australia. The tenth child of Charles Dickens, Edward Bulwer Lytton Dickens, known as Plorn, had consistently proved unable 'to apply himself ' to school or life. So aged sixteen, he is sent, as his brother Alfred was before him, to Australia. Plorn arrives in Melbourne in late 1868 carrying a terrible secret. He has never read a word of his father's work. He is sent out to a 2000-square-mile station in remotest New South Wales to learn to become a man, and a gentleman stockman, from the most diverse and toughest of companions. In the outback he becomes enmeshed with Paakantji, colonists, colonial-born, ex-convicts, ex-soldiers, and very few women. Plorn, unexpectedly, encounters the same veneration of his father and familiarity with Dickens' work in Australia as was rampant in England. Against this backdrop, and featuring cricket tournaments, horse-racing, bushrangers, sheep droving, shifty stock and station agents, frontier wars and first encounters with Australian women, Plorn meets extraordinary people and enjoys wonderful adventures as he works to prove himself. This is Tom Keneally in his most familiar terrain. Taking historical figures and events and reimagining them with verve, compassion and humour. It is a triumph."--Publisher's website.
Subjects: Bildungsromans.; Biographical fiction.; Historical fiction.; Dickens, Charles, 1812-1870; Country life; Families; Immigrants; Secrecy;
Available copies: 1 / Total copies: 1
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Double eagle / by King, Thomas,1943-author.;
"From the #1 bestselling author of Indians on Vacation and Deep House. Buffalo Mountain is set to host a gold coin exhibition with dealers coming from all over, and Thumps DreadfulWater winds up with the task of making sure the event goes off without a hitch. As if he didn't already have enough to do. For starters, he and Claire Merchant are trying to work out their relationship. Should they move in together or should they continue on as they have in the past? And there's Sheriff Duke Hockney, who wants Thumps to give up landscape photography and return to law enforcement. And last but not least, Cisco Cruz, the ninja assassin, shows up in town with a fiancée in tow. Can things get any more complicated for our hero? Yes, they can. When one of the dealers at the exhibition winds up dead, Cruz's fiancée is revealed to be an FBI agent responsible for his protection. And Claire's adoption of Ivory hits a major snag. Like it or not, Thumps is going to have to help Claire as best he can, discover why Cruz is really back in town and try to unravel the murder of the coin dealer--before anyone else dies. In this new DreadfulWater instalment, our favourite reluctant investigator returns with his signature wit and wry humour to solve a mystery that only Thomas King could create."--
Subjects: Detective and mystery fiction.; Novels.; Assassins; Exhibitions; Man-woman relationships; Murder; Private investigators; Cherokee;
Available copies: 1 / Total copies: 1
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The Bittlemores : a novel / by Arden, Jann,author.;
On mean Harp Bittlemore's blighted farm, hidden away in the Backhills, nothing has gone right for a very long time. Crops don't grow, the pigs and chickens stay skinny and the three aged dairy cows, Berle, Crilla and Dally, are so desperate they are plotting an escape. The one thing holding them back is the thought of abandoning young Willa, the single bright point in their life since her older sister, Margaret, ran away. But Willa Bittlemore, just turning 14, is planning her own rebellion. Something doesn't add up in the story she's been told about her missing sister, and she's beginning to question if her horrible parents are even her parents at all. Just as things are really coming to a head, a bright young police officer starts investigating a cold case involving a baby stolen from a little rural hospital 28 years earlier, and Willa and the cows find out exactly how far the Bittlemores will go to protect a festering secret. Written with Jann's trademark outrageous humour and full of her down-to-earth wisdom, The Bittlemores is a rural fairytale, a coming-of-age story and a prairie mystery all-in-one, saturated with her observations of the world she grew up in and her deep connection to the animals we exploit. This marvel of a first novel digs into how people come to be so cruel, but it also glories in the miracle of human kindness.
Subjects: Bildungsromans.; Magic realist fiction.; Novels.; Country life; Cows; Farms; Human-animal relationships; Secrecy; Teenage girls;
Available copies: 0 / Total copies: 2
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Three days in June [text (large print)] / by Tyler, Anne,author.;
"Gail Baines is long divorced from her husband, Max, and not especially close to her grown daughter, Debbie. Today is the day before Debbie's wedding. To start, Gail loses her job--or quits, depending on who you ask. Then, Max arrives unannounced on Gail's doorstep, carrying a cat, without a place to stay and without even a suit. But the true crisis lands when Debbie shares with her parents a secret she has just learned about her husband-to-be. It will not only throw the wedding itself into question but also send Gail back into her past and how her own relationship fell apart. Told with deep sensitivity and a tart sense of humour, full of the joys and heartbreaks of love and marriage and family life, Three Days in June is a triumph, and gives us the perennially bestselling, Pulitzer Prize-winning writer at the height of her powers."--
Subjects: Domestic fiction.; Large print books.; Novels.; Man-woman relationships; Secrecy; Weddings;
Available copies: 0 / Total copies: 1
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The tragedy of Eva Mott : a novel / by Richards, David Adams,author.;
"The Raskin brothers were once proud to be producers of a much sought-after material of great benefit to society--asbestos. But now their mine is under close scientific scrutiny, with reports of serious illness linked to the place. The world is changing, no doubt for the better ... But in the shadow of the mine, the values of a whole community are transforming, in more sinister ways. The Raskins' nephew Byron, a war hero and man of wealth, urges the brothers to look for other, less toxic minerals to extract. But meanwhile his own world is unravelling in ways that are unlikely ever to be fixed. His wife Carmel, whom he vaingloriously believed he was rescuing with his marriage proposal, has become an intellectual and political poseur. She and her son Albert are contemptuous of the values of Byron and his kind, while still finding use for his wealth and property. Carmel and Albert, it seems, are heralds of a new world addicted to mimicry and empty self-promotion, to delusions and temptations. Its victims are growing in number: a college professor in town is falsely accused of sexual harassment; a young woman is slipped an hallucinogen at a party with appalling consequences for her and two boys. And what of poor, naive Eva Mott, the captivating beauty who wished to be like her talented cousin Clara? Her story and the book that bears her name will haunt you. The Tragedy of Eva Mott has all the power and brilliance--and many flashes of wry humour--of David Adams Richards at the very top of his form. It will attract controversy but its fierce authenticity cannot be denied"--
Subjects: Domestic fiction.; Historical fiction.; Novels.; Asbestos mines and mining; Brothers; Businessmen; Families;
Available copies: 2 / Total copies: 2
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The spoon stealer / by Crewe, Lesley,1955-author.;
"Born into a basket of clean sheets -- ruining a perfectly good load of laundry -- Emmeline never quite fit in on her family's rural Nova Scotian farm. After suffering multiple losses in the First World War, her family became so heavy with grief, toxicity, and mental illness that Emmeline felt their weight smothering her. And so, she fled across the Atlantic and built her life in England. Now she is retired and living in a small coastal town with her best friend, Vera, an excellent conversationalist. Vera is also a small white dog, and so Emmeline is making an effort to talk to more humans. When she joins a memoir-writing course at the library, her classmates don't know what to make of her. Funny, loud, and with a riveting memoir, she charms the lot. As her past unfolds for her audience, friendships form, a bonus in a rather lonely life. She even shares with them her third-biggest secret: she has liberated hundreds of spoons over her lifetime -- from the local library, Cary Grant, Winston Churchill. She is a compulsive spoon stealer. When Emmeline unexpectedly inherits the farm she grew up on, she knows she needs to leave, to see what remains of her family one last time. She arrives like a tornado in their lives, an off-kilter Mary Poppins bossing everyone around and getting quite a lot wrong. But with her generosity and hard-earned wisdom, she gets an awful lot right, too. A pinball ricocheting between people, offending and inspiring in equal measure, Emmeline, in her final years, believes that a spoonful -- perhaps several spoonfuls -- of kindness can set to rights the family so broken by loss and secrecy. The Spoon Stealer is a classic Crewe book: full of humour, family secrets, women's friendship, lovable animals, and immense heart."--Provided by publisher.
Subjects: Historical fiction.; Domestic fiction.; Families; Family secrets; Homecoming; Human-animal relationships; Inheritance and succession;
Available copies: 0 / Total copies: 1
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A few of the girls / by Binchy, Maeve,author.;
From her earliest writing to her most recent, Maeve Binchy's work has included both nostalgic pieces and sharp, often witty, writing which is insightful and topical. But at the heart of all her fiction are the people and their relationships with each other. This volume offers a glorious collection of the very best of her stories, full of the warmth, charm and humour that has always been an essential part of her writing.
Subjects: Short Stories.; Friendship;
Available copies: 1 / Total copies: 1
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