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Good Reads for Cold Days

The weather outside might be frightful (or just unpredictable), which makes it the perfect time to curl up beside the fire or with a cozy blanket with a good read. Looking for a way to keep the kids (or yourself!) entertained while on break and to warm up after a day spent playing in the snow? With a range of books from fiction to non-fiction, picture books and graphic novels, local authors and beyond, look no further than our booklist!


With a special thanks to our friends at the Victor-Farmington Library and Rochester Public Library!



Picture Books (Toddler-Kindergarten)

  • Farm Lullaby by Karen Jameson

  • Hello, World! On the Farm by Jill McDonald

  • Here We Are: Book of Animals by Oliver Jeffers

  • How to Say Hello to a Worm: A First Guide to Outside by Kari Percival

  • Jeff Goes Wild by Angie Rozelaar

  • Play Outside! by Laurent Moreau


Picture Books (Grades K-3)

  • Have You Ever Seen a Flower? By Shawn Harris

  • Hello, Puddle! By Anita Sanchez

  • The Keeper of Wild Words by Brooke Smith

  • Some Questions About Trees by Toni Yuly

  • What’s in Your Pocket? Collecting Nature’s Treasures by Heather L. Montgomery

  • Wondering Around by Meg Fleming


Independent Readers (Grades 1-3)

  • Astronaut Girl #1: Journey to the Moon by Cathy Hapka

  • Hand-Me-Down Magic: Stoop Sale Treasure by Corey Ann Haydu

  • Once Upon a Tim by Stuart Gibbs

  • Polly Diamond and the Magic Book by Alice Kuipers

  • Sydney & Taylor Explore The Whole Wide World by Jacqueline Davies

  • Word Travelers and the Taj Mahal Mystery by Raj Haldar


Chapter Books (Grades 4-6)

  • The Anti-Book by Raphael Simon

  • The Ice Cream Machine by Adam Rubin

  • The Lion of Mars by Jennifer L. Holm

  • Lotería by Karla Arenas Valenti

  • The School for Whatnots by Margaret Peterson Haddix

  • Stuntboy, in the Meantime by Jason Reynolds


Young Adult

  • Indivisible by Daniel Aleman

  • Instructions for Dancing by Nicola Yoon

  • The Girl from the Sea by Molly Knox Ostertag

  • Heartstopper by Alice Oseman

  • The Assignment by Liza Wiemer

  • The Magic Fish by Trung Le Nguyen

  • You Should See Me in a Crown by Leah Johnson

  • Firekeeper’s Daughter by Angeline Boulley

  • Iron Widow by Xiran Jay Zhao

  • Lore Olympus by Rachel Smythe

  • A Good Girl’s Guide to Murder by Holly Jackson

  • Six Crimson Cranes by Elizabeth Lim


Teen

  • Akata Woman by Nnedi Okorafor

  • Once Upon a K-Prom by Kat Cho

  • Bitter by Akwaeke Emezi

  • Like a Charm by Elle McNicoll

  • TJ Powar Has Something to Prove by Jesmeen Kaur Deo

  • Kiss & Tell by Adib Khorram


For Her

  • One Italian Summer by Rebecca Serle

  • This Time Tomorrow by Emma Straub

  • The Last Grand Duchess by Bryn Turnbull

  • Woman of Light by Kali Fajardo-Anstine

  • The Family by Naomi Krupitsky

  • The House Across the Lake by Riley Sager


For Him

  • The Every by Dave Eggers

  • Sooley by John Grisham

  • Mercy by David Baldacci

  • Bullet Train by Kōtarō Isaka

  • Dandelion Wine by Ray Bradbury

  • Barbarian Days: A Surfing Life by William Finnegan


Reads from Roc

hometownreads.com/city/rochester


• Gaia Girls Enter The Earth by Lee Welles

Elizabeth Angier was happy to be at the end of the school year. However, Elizabeth didn't anticipate the Harmony Farms Corporation moving to her town. Her world starts to crumble as her best friend moves away and her parents whisper of farmers selling their land and the effects this factory farm operation could have on them.


When she thinks things can't get much worse, she meets the most unusual creature, Gaia, the living entity of the Earth. A dire mistake makes Elizabeth wonder if meeting Gaia has been a blessing or a curse.



• Murder in the Museum - An Edmund DeCleryk Mystery by Karen Shughart

Early one gray November morning, retired Lighthouse Cove, NY police chief, Edmund DeCleryk, finds Emily Bradford’s body on the beach at the base of the bluff where the local museum and historical society stands. At the same time, a break-in has been reported at the museum, and Emily’s coat and purse are found hanging on a peg in the museum’s gift shop where she worked. Was her death the result of a burglary gone bad or something more sinister?



• Come Back by Sally Crosiar

What if you ran away from home at 17? Would you want to go back? Vi Masters would rather eat nails, but this time she can’t say no. How bad can three days be? She can act like she has no secrets for that long, can’t she?


What if you know tongues are wagging again all over town because your kid's back at last, but she’s staying with her aunt and not you? Ben Johansen worries the girl will shame him again before he can make her say why she left.


What if you’ve schemed and plotted to get the perfect life? But your stepdaughter could take it all away? Tammy Johansen is scared. Down to her bones. What if Ben finds out why Vi ran, and that Tammy has always known? What if he won’t forgive her? What then?



Books from BuFfalo

hometownreads.com/city/buffalo


• Buffalo Blizzard of 1977 by Timothy Kneeland

The Blizzard of 1977 is still remembered in Western New York, especially in Buffalo, which received the brunt of the storm. The blizzard occurred during the most extreme cold the area had ever seen, accompanied by some of the largest winter snowfalls on record.


The blizzard struck with little warning on Friday morning, January 28, 1977, and the blowing snow and extreme cold paralyzed the Buffalo area until the first week of February. The storm made travel impossible and stranded thousands of people across the region, while snowdrifts buried houses up to the second story.


This is a story not only of survival, but also of community.



• The Odyssey and Dr. Novak - A Memoir by Ann C. Colley

One summer afternoon in northern England in 1946, when Ann Colley was a child, she met a man from Czechoslovakia named Dr. Novak. This encounter launched her lifelong fascination with Central and Eastern Europe, one that resulted in her spending two years, in 1995 and 2000, teaching at universities in Poland and Ukraine.


Colley’s journey ends with her return to the figure of Dr. Novak when she searches in the archives of the Harvard Divinity School Library for letters sent from Prague in 1945 – letters which, just like her memoir, speak of a past that pursues the present.

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