“What’s the Story?”
is a KRSH Radio podcast

Hosted by Joy Lanzendorfer and
co-sponsored by the Sonoma County Library

Listen to "What’s the Story"

God Help the Child
by Toni Morrison

Morrison herself narrates the audiobook version of her searing, powerful novel of family trauma, childhood, and redemption.

(eAudiobook, book on CD, Playaway)

Grace
by Natashia Deon

The dual stories of a mother, a runaway plantation slave and the child she never knew are woven through the historic events of the mid-19th Century.

(Print book, eBook, eAudio)

Long Way Down
by Jason Reynolds

As 15-year-old Will sets out to avenge his brother Shawn's fatal shooting, seven ghosts who knew Shawn board the elevator and reveal truths Will needs to know.

(Print book, large print book, graphic novel, Spanish book, Playaway, book on CD, eBook, eAudiobook)

She Came to Slay: The Life and Times of Harriet Tubman
by Erica Armstrong Dunbar

A fresh take on this American icon blending traditional biography, illustrations, photos, and engaging sidebars that illuminate the life of Tubman as never before.

(Print book, book on CD, eBook, eAudiobook)

La esclava de Juana Inés
por Ignacio Casa

La esclava de sor Juana Inés de la Cruz fue también, a su modo, una discípula, la primera escucha de versos, sonetos y redondillas. Una mujer mulata cuyas aventuras y peripecias nos exaltan y nos llevan a descubrir los contrastes de la Nueva España del siglo XVII.

(Print book, eBook, eAudiobook)

Sing, Unburied, Sing
by Jesmyn Ward

Living with his grandparents and sister on a Gulf Coast farm, Jojo navigates the challenges of his mother's addictions and his grandmother's cancer before the release of his father from prison prompts a road trip of danger and hope.

(Print book, large print book, book on CD, eBook, eAudiobook)

Narrative of Sojourner Truth
by Gilbert Olive

The autobiography of the pioneer for racial and sexual equality discusses her years as a slave in upstate New York and describes the spiritual revelations that turned her into an abolitionist.

(Print book, eBook, eAudiobook)

Zora & Me: The Cursed Ground
by T. R. Simon

A fictionalized account of Zora Neale Hurston's childhood with her best friend Carrie, as they learn about life, death, and the differences between truth, lies, and pretending.

(Children's book, eBook)

Black Tudors: the untold story
by Miranda Kaufmann

From long forgotten records, Kaufmann has unearthed the remarkable stories of Africans who lived free in Tudor England.

(Print book, eAudiobook)

Twain and Stanley Enter Paradise
by Oscar Hijuelos

Another historical fiction title that examines real literary figures, this title chronicles the sojourn of journalist-explorer Henry Stanley; his wife, the painter Dorothy Tennant; and Mark Twain, Stanley's longtime friend, as they head for Cuba in search of Stanley's father.

(Print book, Book on CD)

Shakespeare's Wife
by Germaine Greer

Challenges popular beliefs about the estranged nature of Shakespeare's marriage to Ann Hathaway, placing their relationship in a social and historical context that poses alternative theories about her rural upbringing and role in the bard's professional life.

(Print book)

12 Days of Tudor Christmas

If you're just in the mood to immerse yourself in the Tudor world, and also want to get into the Christmas spirit, this BBC/PBS special might just be the thing. Lucy Worsley recreates how Christmas was celebrated during the age of Henry VIII.

(DVD)

The Hidden Lives of Tudor Women: A Social History
by Elizabeth Norton

A well-researched description of the lives of women in 16th-century Britain.

(Print book, eBook, eAudiobook)

A Cloud of Outrageous Blue
by Vesper Stamper

After her parents' deaths, Edyth is sent to live in a priory, where she begins to make a new life--a life that will be threatened by the approach of the Great Plague.

(Print book)

Alice I Have Been
by Melanie Benjamin

Now in her twilight years, Alice Liddell looks back on a remarkable life. From a pampered childhood in Oxford to difficult years as a widowed mother, Alice examines how she became who she is – and how she became immortalized as Alice in Wonderland.

(Print book)

The Mersault Investigation
by Kamel Daoud

A love story and a political manifesto. He was the brother of "the Arab" killed by the infamous Meursault, the antihero of Camus’ classic novel. Seventy years after that event, Harun, who has lived since childhood in the shadow of his sibling’s memory, refuses to let him remain anonymous.

(Print book, eBook)

Midsummer’s Mayhem
by Rajani LaRocca

A contemporary retelling of A Midsummer Night’s Dream follows an 11-year-old Indian-American girl's effort to prepare a winning entry for a local baking contest, a competition that is challenged when her father mysteriously loses his sense of taste.

(Childrens' book, Book on CD, eAudiobook)

The Orchardist
by Amanda Coplin

Although The Cold Millions is more dramatic and The Orchardist is more haunting, young siblings follow different paths in both of these literary novels set in the Pacific Northwest during the turn of the century.

(Print book, Book on CD, eBook, eAudiobook)

Music of the Mill
by Luis Rodriguez

In a story of three generations of an American family who built their lives around a decaying, late-twentieth-century steel industry, 30-year-old Azucena Salcido struggles with the cancer death of her father, the racial polarization of their community, and the corrupt power struggles among her neighbors, their employers, and their unions.

(Print book)

Make Trouble: Standing Up, Speaking Out, and Finding the Courage to Lead
by Cecile Richards

In her autobiographical book on leadership, Richards, the quintessential cheerleader for activists of all ages, champions those who publicly take a stand for what they believe.

(Print book, Book on CD)

An Impossible Distance to Fall
by Miriam McNamara

1930. Birdie William's life has crashed along with the stock market. Her father's bank has failed, and he's disappeared along with his Jenny biplane. When she sees a leaflet for a barnstorming circus with a picture of Dad's plane on it, she goes to Coney Island in search of answers.

(Print book, eBook)

Sabrina & Corina
by Kali Fajardo-Anstine

Kali Fajardo-Anstine's magnetic story collection breathes life into her Latina characters of indigenous ancestry and the land they inhabit in the American West.

(Print book, eBook, eAudiobook)

Deep River
by Karl Marlantes

In the early 1900s, as the oppression of Russia's imperial rule takes its toll on Finland, the three Koski siblings – Ilmari, Matti, and the politicized young Aino ¬– are forced to flee to the United States. The brothers face the excitement and danger of pioneering the frontier wilderness while Aino devotes herself to organizing the industry's first unions.

(Print book, Book on CD, eBook, eAudiobook)

How Much of These Hills is Gold
by Pam Zhang

Newly orphaned children of immigrants, Lucy and Sam are suddenly alone in a land that refutes their existence.

(Print book, Large print book, eBook, eAudiobook)

Las Aventuras de la China Iron
por Gabriela Cabezón Cámara

Este es un juego desenfrenado que lleva al lector desde la turbulenta cultura fronteriza de las pampas hasta los territorios indígenas. Traza las aventuras de la señora China Iron, la esposa abandonada de Martín Fierro, en sus viajes por la pampa en un carromato cubierto con su nueva amiga, que pronto se convertirá en su amante, una escocesa llamada Liz.

(Print book, eBook)

Daring Darleen, Queen of the Screen
by Anne Nesbet

It's 1914, and 12-year old Darleen Darling has the most exciting job in the world – she gets to dangle from cliffs and stop moving trains and soar through the sky in runaway balloons! Yes, that's right: Darleen is a hero and a star – in the make-believe world of the movies ... but Darleen's fictional adventures collide with reality when a fake kidnapping intended as a publicity stunt becomes all too real.

(Print book, eBook)

Yes, Chef
by Marcus Samuelsson

The Top Chef: Masters winner and proprietor of Harlem's Red Rooster traces his Ethiopian birth, upbringing by an adoptive family in Sweden, and rise to a famous New York chef, sharing personal insights into his challenges as a black man in a deeply prejudiced industry.

(Print book, Book on CD, eBook, eAudiobook)

Eat a Peach
by David Chang

The chef behind Momofuku and star of Netflix’s Ugly Delicious traces his upbringing in a deeply religious Korean-American family, his search for identity, struggles with manic depression and unlikely rise as one of his generation’s most influential chefs.

(Print book, eBook, eAudiobook)

Hunger: A Memoir of (my) Body
by Roxane Gay

A heart-rending debut memoir from the outspoken feminist and essayist. The author exposes the personal demons haunting her life—namely weight and trauma—which she deems "the ugliest, weakest, barest parts of me."

(Print book, Book on CD, eBook, eAudiobook)

The Gourmands' Way
Six Americans in Paris and the Birth of a New Gastronomy
by Justin Spring

Six American writers introduced French cuisine to American restaurants and home kitchens and were responsible for the nation’s postwar love affair with French food and wine.

(Print book, eAudiobook)

Abe

Twelve-year-old Abe is an aspiring chef who wants his cooking to bring people together, but his half-Israeli, half-Palestinian family has never had a meal that didn't end in a fight. Ditching his traditional summer camp, Abe begins working with Chico, an adventurous street chef who encourages him to think outside his old cuisines. However, when Abe's deceit is uncovered, he must grapple with his family and his passions and whether even the most lovingly cooked family dinner can heal old wounds.

(DVD)

Mastering the Art of Soviet Cooking
A memoir of food and longing
by Anya Von Bremzen

Born in a surreal Moscow communal apartment where 18 families shared one kitchen, the author grew up singing odes to Lenin, black-marketeering Juicy Fruit gum at school, and longing for a taste of the mythical West.

(Print book)

Alimentamos una Isla
by Jose Andres

Basándose en la perspectiva de Andrés, así como en reuniones, mensajes y conversaciones que tuvo durante su estadía en Puerto Rico, Alimentamos una isla describe de manera conmovedora cómo una red de cocinas comunitarias logró realizar un verdadero cambio, y cuenta una extraordinaria historia de esperanza ante los desastres, tanto los naturales y como aquellos causados por el ser humano.

(Print book)

Yasmin la chef
by Saadia Faruqi

La familia de Yasmin está organizando una gran fiesta, pero a Yasmin le preocupa que la comida tradicional que cocina su familia sea demasiado picante. Su familia sugiere que Yasmin invente su propio plato.

(Children's book)

Brave Chef Brianna
by Sam Sykes

Brianna Jakobsson has big cooking dreams, and when her ailing father, a world-renowned chef, poses a challenge to his only daughter and 15 sons, she seizes the opportunity. She's going to have the best restaurant around and earn the family empire.

(Children's book, eBook)

A people's future of the United States
Speculative Fiction from 25 Extraordinary Writers
by Victor LaValle and John Joseph Adams

25 speculative stories imagining the future of America, with the collection featuring tales of both dystopias and utopias.

(Print book, eBook, eAudiobook)

Refugees by Viet Thanh Nguyen

A collection of stories, written over a 20-year period, examines the Vietnamese experience in America as well as questions of home, family, and identity.

(Print book, eAudiobook)

Uncommon Type by Tom Hanks

Opt for the audiobook version, narrated by the author/actor himself.

(Print book, large print book, book on CD, eBook, eAudiobook)

Flash!: Writing the Very Short Story by John Dufresne

Flash fiction is like the Twitter of the literary world. Dufresne offers an insightful guide to writing this increasingly popular form of fiction.

(Print book)

A Phoenix First Must Burn
Sixteen Stories of Black Girl Magic, Resistance, and Hope
Edited by Patrice Caldwell

From folktales retold to futuristic societies, this collection of stories centers on Black women and gender nonconforming individuals dealing with love and betrayal, strength and resistance.

(Print book, eBook, eAudiobook)

A House is a Body Stories by Shruti Anna Swamy

Dreams collide with reality, modernity collides with antiquity, myth with true identity; women grapple with desire, with ego, with motherhood and mortality.

(Print book, eBook, eAudiobook)

The Moths and other stories/Las Palomillas de la Noche by Helena Maria Viramontes

Beautifully translated Spanish-English bilingual version. Prejudice and the social and economic status of Chicanos form the backdrop for these haunting stories.

(Print book)

Stories from Suffragette City
Stories of a Fine and Proper Nuisance
by M. J. Rose and Fiona Davis

An anthology set during the Fifth Avenue women’s suffrage march of October 1915 includes depictions of leading rights advocates, from Ava Vanderbilt to Ida B. Welles.

(Print book)

Flying Lessons and Other Stories by Ellen Oh

From family fiascos to first crushes, this anthology, written by award-winning children's authors, celebrates the uniqueness and universality in all of us.

(Print book, book on CD, eBook, eAudiobook)

Super Puzzletastic Mysteries
Short Stories for Young Sleuths from Mystery Writers of America
Edited by Chris Grabenstein

A group of interactive short stories that invite the reader to solve the mystery themselves.

(Print book, eBook)

Charlotte Brontë: A Fiery Heart by Claire Harman

An expert portrait of Charlotte’s life and writings, life at Haworth Parsonage and its eccentric inhabitants.

(Print book, eAudiobook)

Vanessa and Her Sister by Priya Parmar

A historical novel examining the lives of Vanessa Bell, her sister Virginia Woolf, and the controversial and popular circle of intellectuals known as the Bloomsbury Group.

(Print book, Large Type Book, eBook, eAudiobook)

Glass Town by Isabel Greenberg

The entrancing story of the Brontë siblings' childhood imaginary world in graphic novel format.

(Print book, eBook)

Square Haunting: Five Writers in London Between the Wars by Francesca Wade

A gripping account of the lives of five women who lived at various times in the same square in London’s Bloomsbury district between 1916 and 1940.

(Print book, eBook, eAudiobook)

Empress Orchid by Anchee Min

A fictional portrait of the last empress of China follows Orchid, a beautiful teenager from an aristocratic family, who is chosen to become a low-ranking concubine of the emperor and rises to a position of power in the Chinese court.

(Print book, book on CD, eBook, eAudiobook)

The Daring Ladies of Lowell by Kate Alcott

Moving to the mill city of Lowell in 1832 to escape farm life, young Alice is disillusioned by the local factory's harsh working conditions and struggles to advocate on their behalf while recklessly falling in love with the mill owner's son, a situation that is complicated by a murder and sensational trial.

(Print book, eBook)

Proust's Duchess by Caroline Weber

A brilliant look at the glittering world of turn-of-the-century Paris through the first in-depth study of the three women Proust used to create his supreme fictional character, the Duchesse de Guermantes.

(Print book, eBook, eAudiobook)

Retrato en Sepia por Isabel Allende

Una saga familiar situada a finales del siglo XIX en Chile, narrada por una joven mujer. La novela explora los temas del amor y su traición, privilegio, y secretos de familia.

(Print book, eBook, eAudiobook)

The Glass Town Game by Catherynne M. Valente

Inside a small Yorkshire parsonage, Charlotte, Branwell, Emily, and Anne Brontë have invented a game called Glass Town, where their toy soldiers fight Napoleon and no one dies. This make-believe land helps the four escape from a harsh reality.

(Print book)

Adulthood is a Myth by Sarah Andersen

Confronts head-on the horrors, anxiety, and awkwardness of modern adult life.

(Print book, eBook)

Killing and Dying by Adrian Tomine

Collects six graphic stories that create a portrait of contemporary life, exploring the pride and disappointment of family, the anxiety and hopefulness of being alive, and the weight of love and its absence.

(Print book)

Furiously Happy: a Funny Book About Horrible Things by Jenny Lawson

The popular blogger presents a humorous and candid memoir about her lifelong battle with severe depression and anxiety, discussing how embracing both the flawed and the beautiful parts of life have enabled her to find joy in outrageous ways.

(Print book, Book on CD, eBook, eAudiobook)

Why Grizzly Bears Should Wear Underpants by Matthew Inman

A collection of comics, facts, and instructional guides from the online cartoonist and #1 New York Times Best-Selling Author known as The Oatmeal.

(Print book, eBook)

Failure is an Option: An Attempted Memoir by Jon H. Benjamin

The lead voice behind Archer and Bob's Burgers helps us all feel a little better about our own failures by sharing his own in a hilarious memoir-ish chronicle of failure.

(Print book)

You Can Only Yell at Me for One Thing at a Time: Rules for Couples by Patricia Marx

An illustrated collection of love and relationship advice from New Yorker writer Patricia Marx, with illustrations from New Yorker cartoonist Roz Chast.

(Print book, eBook)

The Odd 1s Out by James Rallison

Telling his own stories of growing up as the “odd one out,” the YouTube star, presenting his fan-favorite comics as well as some never-before-seen material, shares the life lessons he has learned on the road to adulthood.

(Print book, eBook)

The Bride Was a Boy by Chii

A diary comic with an upbeat, adorable flair that tells the charming tale of Chii, a woman assigned male at birth.

(Print book)

Be Prepared by Vera Brosgol

Her friends live in fancy houses and their parents can afford to send them to the best summer camps, but Vera’s single mother can’t afford that sort of luxury. There's only one summer camp in her price range—Russian summer camp. Nothing could prepare her for all the "cool girl" drama, endless Russian history lessons, and outhouses straight out of nightmares!

(Print book, eBook)

Little Gods by Meng Jin

Explores the complex web of grief, memory, time, physics, history and selfhood in the immigrant experience, and the complicated bond between daughters and mothers.

(Print book, audio CD, eBook, eAudiobook)

The Seasons of My Mother by Marcia Gay Harden

An uplifting memoir that traces the story of Harden’s childhood and career using the imagery of flowers to represent the unique bond she shares with her mother, who now suffers from Alzheimer's disease.

(Book, Large Print Book)

Los Falcón by Melissa Rivero

Una impresionante novela debut sobre la lucha de una joven madre peruana indocumentada que está dispuesta a darlo todo por su familia y su nueva vida en Nueva York.

(Book, eBook)

Homeland Elegies by Ayad Akhtar

A wrenching family drama about a Pakistani father and son making a home in the US in the aftermath of 9/11.

(Book, Audio CD, eBook, eAudiobook)

Almost American Girl by Robin Ha

A Korean teen struggles in a hostile blended home and a new school where she does not speak English before forging unexpected connections in a local comic drawing class.

(Book, eBook)

Red at the Bone by Jacqueline Woodson

Two families from different social classes are joined together by an unexpected pregnancy and the child that it produces.

(Book, Large Print Book, Audio CD, eBook, eAudiobook)

The Namesake

A young Indian immigrant in America balancing the ties to where he came from and where he's living now.

(DVD)

Vitalina Varela

A Cape Verdean woman travels to Lisbon to reunite with her husband, after two decades of separation, only to arrive mere days after his funeral.

(DVD)

I Can Make This Promise by Christine Day

Twelve-year-old Edie finds letters and photographs in her attic that change everything she thought she knew about her Native American mother's adoption.

(Children's Book, Audio CD, eBook, eAudiobook, Playaway)