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June is Pride Month!

 

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CHILDREN

       

      


STAFF RECOMMENDATIONS

The Eyes and the Impossible by Dave Eggers (in hardcover and deluxe wood-bound editions). This is the most fun book I’ve read in quite a while! Do not turn away from it because it’s “animal fiction;" you’ll be missing out. You will thoroughly enjoy Dave Eggers’ latest if you —
Love Golden Gate Park
Love dogs
Love entertaining wordplay
Love good friendship tales
Love the magic in everyday things
Love books that are fun for the whole family
Like Golden Gate Park, even just a little (beware of the ducks) - Eric

Same Time Next Summer by Annabel Monaghan. From the author of Nora Goes Off Script comes this delightful and charming second chance romance starring Sam and Wyatt, childhood friends turned teenage sweethearts turned strangers, as they reunite after 10+ years at their parents' neighboring Long Island beach houses where Sam has returned to plan her wedding to (boring but otherwise "perfect") fiancé Jack. Full of nostalgic nods to first love, quaint beach town vibes, lazy guitar tunes drifting over the dunes, early morning surf sessions, and dreamy pink and gold sunsets, this is everything you want in a perfect summer book. Read it (and by read I mean devour) poolside, on the plane, or curled up in bed. - Hannah

All the Sinners Bleed by S.A. Cosby. Racial tensions in a small Southern town impede a Black sheriff's determined search for a serial killer in a compelling and tension-filled thriller from one of the hot new voices of crime fiction. Cosby's gritty storytelling and rich characters - especially protagonist Titus Crown - definitely put All the Sinners Bleed a cut above. One of my new faves. - Hut

My Murder by Katie Williams. For fans of Blake Crouch and Sarah Gailey's The Echo Wife, this humorous, spellbinding, genre-bending sci-fi thriller, about a woman murdered by a serial killer who is then cloned back to life, reveals itself like an onion. Chapters like layers peel away to reveal more layers, the fascinating mystery at the core both dark and elusive up until the very shocking end. I loved every smart plot twist, and couldn't have put it down if I tried! - Hannah

Forget Me Not by Alyson Derrick. Stevie and Nora have been dating in secret for two years, hiding their relationship from everyone they know in their small conservative Pennsylvania town. They're preparing to move to California when Stevie has a terrible fall and forgets the last two years of her life. This beautiful YA love story explores Stevie's and Nora's shared histories and poses the question: What would you do if you forgot the love of your life ever even existed? Terrific for teen and adult readers alike. - Carolyn
 

Drowning by TJ Newman. Former flight attendant Newman (Falling) once again takes readers on a chilling plane ride, although this one doesn't last long. Just after takeoff, Flight 1421 crashes into the Pacific Ocean. During the evacuation, an engine explodes, the plane sinks and comes to a precarious rest on an underwater cliff with nine passengers and three crew members trapped. Can that unlucky but resourceful group surmount the challenges presented by the plane's increasing fragility long enough for a land-based crew to devise a rescue plan? Suffice to say, all does not go as planned. No fancy writing here, just page-turning escapism. - Hut

The Museum of Ordinary People by Mike Gayle (in paperback). This sweet and touching story follows Jess, a single Londoner who's been tasked with cleaning out her childhood home in the wake of her mother's death. It's proving difficult for her to part with the antiquated encyclopedias that were a gift from her mum, and her journey to give them a new life leads her to the oddest museum in existence and its enigmatic curator. Jess steps into her own life in a whole new way as a result of this connection, and I loved being along for the ride. - Carolyn

The Celebrants by Steven Rowley. After a sudden and heartbreaking loss, a group of best friends graduating from Cal make a pact to support one another in times of need with "living funerals". Over the course of 30 years each of them invokes the agreement to immediately  gather together, and it's through this clever plot device that we learn about the paths their lives have taken and the challenges they've faced. Steven's writing is funny and smart, the pacing is terrific and the resounding message of telling those we love how we feel while we're all here is one to remember long after the last page is turned. - Carolyn
 

Birnam Wood by Eleanor Catton. In this fast-paced eco thriller, members of a guerrilla gardening collective illegally occupy and farm a remote parcel of land near a national park in New Zealand. Then they discover they are not the only trespassers. Ideological conflicts, internal divisions, and personal jealousies complicate the cohesiveness of the collective, even as they face their most existential threat. A sophisticated page turner you won't want to put down. - Alison

Big Gay Wedding by Byron Lane. Barnett has returned home to rural Louisiana with a big announcement for his conservative mother Chrissy, but it's not what she's expecting. Hoping he's back to finally take over the animal rescue ranch she runs, she is caught off guard when he arrives with his fiancee Ezra and announces they're getting married on the farm in one week. Memorable characters (human and animal) are peppered throughout this funny and tender story, and Byron also shines a light on themes of homophobia, acceptance and ultimately love. - Carolyn

CELEBRATING PRIDE, NOW MORE THAN EVER

June is Pride month, and we invite you peruse our displays - one for young readers and one for young adults.


BACK IN STOCK - BAG ONE SOON!

Look what just arrived - the iconic canvas Mrs. Dalloway's logo tote bag! Heavy duty fabric and long straps will enable you to carry all your book treasures over your shoulder while you show off your favorite indie bookstore. If you would like to order a bag online, click here.


NEW EDITION OF BERKELEY AND ITS PATHWAYS!
We're celebrating 25 years of "Berkeley's Best Map" with the launch of the brand-new 10th edition.. Some of the updates include: more points of interest (public libraries, community and senior centers, swimming pools), a complete guide to streets and paths on UC and Clark Kerr campuses, protected bike lanes, and more. Also, we are now offering a bandana featuring the Berkeley Path map for $15.
 

  


 DON'T FORGET DADS - SUNDAY, JUNE 18


SPECIAL OFFSITE AUTHOR EVENT

  

In collaboration with Berkwood Hedge school, Mrs. Dalloway's hosted a very special evening with KWAME ALEXANDER (right) in conversation with W. KAMAU BELL at the First Congregational Church. The event was a celebration of Kwame's powerful and personal new book Why Fathers Cry at Night: A Memoir in Love Poems, Recipes, Letters, and Remembrances.

Following the talk, the pair signed copies of their respective books and posed with (from left) Mrs. Dalloway's co-owner Eric Green and our Children's Specialists Anne Whaling and Jennifer Gordon.  Meanwhile, Mrs. Dalloway's co-owner Jessica Green made sure that a full range of books by the authors were available for attendees.


AUTHOR DROP-INS TO MRS. DALLOWAY'S

One of our favorite author couples, BYRON LANE (front) and STEVEN ROWLEY, both have just-published new novels and they were happy to autograph our store copies. Byron's book, Big Gay Wedding, has a title that speaks for itself, although the event is no sure thing when one of the intended's mother discovers the wedding is planned on her farm in a small Louisiana town. Steven's The Celebrants finds five friends reuniting in Big Sur to honor a pact to throw each other living "funerals," celebrations to remind themselves life is worth living. As it turns out, their pact is upended when one of them reveals a shocking secret.

Acclaimed graphic novelist GARETH HINDS has masterfully adapted Homer's classic wartime epics, The Iliad and The Odyssey. The pair are staples of our graphic novel section and are ideal introductions for reluctant readers interested in the classics.

JOAN SCHOETTLER holds her new middle grade novel, The Honey Jar: An Armenian's Escape to Freedom, which is based on a true story about a family's escape from the Armenian genocide and one member's return to find a sister who was left behind.

ADA CALHOUN dropped by the store with a friend and graciously posed with the paperback edition of her engaging and thought-provoking memoir, Also A Poet: Frank O'Hara, My Father, and Me, in which she traces her fraught relationship with her father and their shared obsession with poet Frank O'Hara. It was featured on more than a dozen "Best Books of 2022" lists.

JAMES CANTON runs the Wild Writing MA at the University of Essex and is the author of Grounded: A Journey into the Landscapes of Our Ancestors, a meditation on how to foster a spiritual communion with the natural world, exploring how the sacred can be accessed by looking to the past, to our ancestors and how they tread through their worlds.


AUTOGRAPHED COPIES AT MRS. DALLOWAY'S

(Click on any cover to read more or order online)
 
 
 

 MAGGIE TOKUDA-HALL'S NEW FANTASY DUE THIS FALL - WE'RE TAKING PREORDERS!

One of our favorite authors, Oakland's MAGGIE TOKUDA-HALL, has a new YA book publishing in September! In The Siren, the Song, and the Spy, the vibrant companion to her best-selling fantasy debut, The Mermaid, the Witch, and the Sea, a diverse resistance force fights to topple an empire in a story about freedom, identity, and decolonization.

If you'd like to preorder a copy, click here. Maggie will sign and personalize all preorders. She will also provide a special sticker available exclusively for preorders placed through Mrs. Dalloway's.


EXCLUSIVE AUTHOR PARTNERSHIP!

Three photographers. Three perspectives. And through the lenses of their cameras, three different views of one bitter chapter of American history. Seen and Unseen: What Dorothea Lange, Toyo Miyatake, and Ansel Adams's Photographs Reveal about the Japanese American Incarceration is a compelling and important must read for everyone over the age of 9. It would make a great gift on your holiday list! Order copies here - personalization requests can be added in the Order Comment box at the bottom of the checkout form. On January 30, the American Library Association awarded Seen and Unseen the 2023 Robert F. Sibert Informational Book Award for most distinguished informational book for children.
 

LITTLE LIBRARY

Help start a library for a young reader in your life with Mrs. Dalloway’s Little Library subscription service! Every month for the length of your subscription, we'll gift wrap and send your recipient a book that fits their age and interests. Our experienced staff selects titles from our ever-changing inventory of new titles and rediscovered hidden gems. To find out more and sign up, click here.


LISTEN UP - Audiobooks from Libro.fm

We're delighted to be offering our customers an independent source for audiobooks, offered through our partnership with Libro.fm. Here's a little about the company, in its own words: 

"By choosing Libro.fm over other audiobook services, you support your local bookstore and invest in your local community. We offer over 125,000 audiobooks via our premium platform (which we built with love from scratch) and give you bookseller recommendations for great audiobooks. And when you contact us, you'll hear directly from one of our team members who will ensure your listening experience is unmatched."

Next Event

Local author and NPR personality AISHA HARRIS comes to Mrs. Dalloway's Bookstore on Wednesday, June 14th, 7pm to launch her new book Wannabe: Reckonings with the Pop Culture That Shapes Me. Aisha will read from and discuss her book and will sign copies after the presentation. In nine lively, incisive essays, the NPR Pop Culture Happy Hour co-host reflects on the cultural touchstones of her childhood and adolescence that have shaped her, setting them in context with current sensations transforming culture now. (Aisha's photo courtesy of Sheilby Macena)

This event is free, but you must register on Eventbrite or contact us a the store prior to the talk.

NPR listeners trust Aisha Harris for her engaging and incisive insights on popular culture and the music, television, movies, and more that are influencing our lives today. In this insightful collection, she uses her keen analytical skills to examine her own life and the culture that defined who she is and how she thinks. In essays that span the personal and political, the high-brow and low, she explores how elements of popular culture became the formative touchstones of her youth in the 1990s. Aisha probes the most personal aspects of her life, including her family, her adolescence, her relationships, and her work. In the opening essay, an interaction with Chance the Rapper prompts an investigation into the origin myth of her name that becomes an ode to Stevie Wonder, Roots, and her parents. In another, she takes us back to the days of the Spice Girls and being pressured by friends to dress up as Scary Spice even though she preferred Ginger—and how perfectly that feeling is captured in an episode of the award-winning series Pen15 streaming on Hulu. She traces the evolution of the “Black Friend” trope from its Twainian origins through Clueless and She’s All That to New Girl and the recent Sex and The City reboot. She also zooms way out into the overlap of taste and identity today, arguing for us to let go of the patriarchal ethos of selfhood that limits us to “you are what you like.”

Wannabe is a peak into Aisha’s brilliant mind and caring heart, an opportunity and a pleasure to sit back and jam with a smart, hilarious, pop-culture obsessed friend who opens new worlds with each entertaining and thought-provoking observation.

AISHA HARRIS is the co-host of the popular NPR podcast Pop Culture Happy Hour. From 2012 to 2018, she covered culture for Slate magazine as a staff writer, editor, and host of the film and television podcast, Represent. She joined the New York Times in 2018 as the assistant television editor on the Culture Desk and became culture editor for the Opinion Desk, where she wrote and edited a variety of pieces on the arts, society, and politics. Born and raised in Connecticut, she earned her bachelor's degree in theatre from Northwestern University and her master's degree in cinema studies from New York University. She lives in Oakland, California. Wannabe is her first book.

THIS EVENT is free but pre-registration is required. Registration ends at 4:30 pm on June 14th.

BECAUSE SEATING is limited, please register only if you plan to attend.

DUE TO SPACE limitations, we may not be able to accommodate every person at an event, so early registration is encouraged.

WALK-INS will be accommodated only if space allows.

WE ASK that attendees arrive between 6:45 and 7:00 PM for the event.

PLEASE leave your non-support companion animals at home.

OUR shared restrooms are not accessible after 6:30 PM, please plan accordingly.

Wednesday, June 14, 2023 - 7:00pm to 8:30pm
Pre-Order Now Badge
Wannabe: Reckonings with the Pop Culture That Shapes Me By Aisha Harris Cover Image
$29.99
ISBN: 9780063249943
Availability: Coming Soon - Available for Pre-Order Now
Published: HarperOne - June 13th, 2023

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