Archives for December 2016

Welcome to the November 2016 round-up of what DC commuters read on public transit, plus observations of the readers themselves. Maybe it’s you… 🙂

Book: The Girl on the Train, by Paula Hawkins
From the publisher: Rachel takes the same commuter train every morning … past a stretch of cozy suburban homes, and stops at the signal that allows her to daily watch the same couple breakfasting on their deck. She’s even started to feel like she knows them … Their life-as she sees it-is perfect. Not unlike the life she recently lost. And then she sees something shocking. It’s only a minute until the train moves on, but it’s enough. Now everything’s changed. Unable to keep it to herself, Rachel offers what she knows to the police, and becomes inextricably entwined in what happens next, as well as in the lives of everyone involved. Has she done more harm than good?”

Reader: Woman in early- to mid- thirties, thin frame with long straight blonde hair pulled into a messy bun, wearing black trousers, black athletic sneakers, and a fitted black quilted jacket.

Book: The Greatest Stories Never Told: 100 Tales from History to Astonish, Bewilder, and Stupefy, by Rick Beyer
From the publisher: History isn’t always made by great armies colliding or by great civilizations rising or falling. Sometimes it’s made when a chauffeur takes a wrong turn, a scientist forgets to clean up his lab, or a drunken soldier gets a bit rowdy. That’s the kind of history you’ll find in The Greatest Stories Never Told.

This is history candy — the good stuff. Here are 100 tales to astonish, bewilder, and stupefy: more than two thousand years of history filled with courage, cowardice, hope, triumph, sex, intrigue, folly, humor, and ambition.

Reader: Middle-aged, east Indian woman with streaks of gray in long crimped black hair wearing a fitted gray pencil skirt, dark tights, and “commuter sneakers.”

Book: Lover Unleashed (Black Dagger Brotherhood Book #9), by J.R. Ward
Payne, twin sister of the Black Dagger Brother Vishous, suffers a devastating injury, and brilliant human surgeon Manuel Manello is called in to save her. Their attraction is instant, and as powerful as it is dangerous. But as human and vampire worlds collide, a centuries- old score catches up with Payne and puts both her love and her life in jeopardy.

Reader: African American woman in early- to mid-forties eating from a freshly popped bag of popcorn, wearing a long gray wool trench coat.

Book: Heart-Shaped Box, by Joe Hill
From Follett Titlewave: Aging rocker Judas Coyne, a collector of the macabre, pays a thousand dollars for a suit said to be inhabited by the owner’s ghost, and learns only after the angry spirit arrives that he has been set up by the family of his last young lover who committed suicide upon her return home.

Reader: Young woman in mid- to late-twenties with messy, short blonde hair, a silver nose stud and wearing a pink fleece

Book: Go Set a Watchman, by Harper Lee
From Follett Titlewave: In the mid-1950s, twenty-six-year-old Jean Louis Finch, “Scout,” returns to Maycomb, Alabama, to visit her father, Atticus, but her homecoming turns bittersweet and her values and assumptions are thrown into doubt as she uncovers truths about her family, friends, and town which are exposed by civil rights tensions and political turmoil.

Reader: Middle aged woman with graying, dark, frizzy hair, glasses and wearing a winter hat and fluffy pink winter coat; walking with the book in hand.

Book: Brown Girl Dreaming, by Jacqueline Woodson

From the publisher: Raised in South Carolina and New York, Woodson always felt halfway home in each place. In vivid poems, she shares what it was like to grow up as an African American in the 1960s and 1970s, living with the remnants of Jim Crow and her growing awareness of the Civil Rights movement. Touching and powerful, each poem is both accessible and emotionally charged, each line a glimpse into a child’s soul as she searches for her place in the world. Woodson’s eloquent poetry also reflects the joy of finding her voice through writing stories, despite the fact that she struggled with reading as a child. Her love of stories inspired her and stayed with her, creating the first sparks of the gifted writer she was to become.

Reader: African American woman in her early thirties with a short ponytail and glasses, wearing a navy peacoat and bright yellow scarf

Book: Goya, by Robert Hughes

From the publisher: With his salient passion for the artist and the art, Hughes brings Goya vividly to life through dazzling analysis of a vast breadth of his work. Building upon the historical evidence that exists, Hughes tracks Goya s development, as man and artist, without missing a beat, from the early works commissioned by the Church, through his long, productive, and tempestuous career at court, to the darkly sinister and cryptic work he did at the end of his life.

Reader: Tall man in his mid-thirties with short dark hair, wearing khakis and non-descript black winter jacket
What did YOU read in November? Share in the comments below!

All book cover images from www.amazon.com