The Alex Awards are given to ten books written for adults that have special appeal to teens. They were first given annually beginning in 1998 and became an official American Library Association award in 2002.  For more information about current and previous winners, click here.  The 2013 Alex Award winning books are:

Caring is Creepy by David Zimmerman

Girlchild by Tupelo Hassman

Juvenile in Justice by Richard Ross

Mr. Penumbra’s 24-Hour Bookstore by Robin Sloan

My Friend Dahmer by Derf Backderf

One Shot Forever by Chris Ballard

Pure by Juliana Baggott

The Round House by Louise Erdrich

Tell the Wolves I’m Home by Carol Rifka Brunt

Where’d You Go, Bernadette? by Maria Semple

Journalist Mitchell Zuckoff knew there was a story that must be told when he set out in 2012 on a recovery mission to the isolated polar cap of Southeast Greenland. There, almost exactly sixty years before, in the winter of 1942, three downed planes were part of a unbelievable story of survival and heroism, a compelling mystery that he was now a part of.

On November 5th, 1942, a lost cargo plane carrying five American servicemen crashed into a glacier due to hazardous weather conditions. Four days after that initial crash, the crew of an American B17 ferrying a long-rang bomber across the Atlantic to England were redirected towards Greenland, attempting to follow an increasingly weak radio signal from the downed cargo plane. They flew into a complete whiteout and crashed, breaking in half on impact, the tail of the plane hanging precariously over a crevasse. Nine airmen found themselves in one of the most inhospitable places on earth with hardly any resources. For five months, the B17 crew battled starvation, madness, frost-bite and failed attempts to walk more than a few yards into hurricane-strength blizzards. Amazingly, some were able to survive by sheer will, camaraderie and ingenuity.

But the glacier was not finished. It claimed a third plane, this one a Coast Guard Grumman “Duck” carrying a pilot and radioman whose mission it was to locate and rescue the B17 crew. They were successful in rescuing some of the survivors but vanished into a storm, not to be recovered until 2012, when a perilous expedition was launched to repatriate the bodies of these lost heroes from under 30 feet of ice. The book flips between this expedition and the events that began to unfold in November 1942, providing maps and the details on the scientific techniques needed to locate missing aircrafts. Together a fascinating and complex narrative is woven; one that will not disappoint fans of military history and true adventure stories. If you enjoyed books like Laura Hillenbrand’s Unbroken and Zuckoff’s previous book, Lost in Shangri-la, be sure to pick this one up.

April is National Poetry Month.  What better time to read a book of poetry?  Come into the library and check out our display of poetry books in the Adult Services Room.  You might also be interested in picking up the Gary Snyder Reader.  Gary Snyder was recently awarded the Wallace Stevens Award, which recognizes outstanding and proven mastery in the art of poetry.  Snyder, associated with the Beat Generation, is also a former winner of a Pulitzer Prize for Poetry.  For a list of other Wallace Stevens Award winners, click here.    

Having just finished the fifth installment of the endlessing entertaining Flavia De Luce series by Alan Bradley, I thought this would be a good time to promote an oftentimes underappreciated genre, the Cozy Mystery.  "Cozies" are a subgenre of crime fiction, usually set in small communities and feature amateur sleuths who have great senses of humor. What's not to love, right?

Below is a list of some notable Cozies. Even if you are not a mystery reader, these books are a great light read. The plots are fast moving but the real focus is on the wonderfully witty characters who you will quickly fall in love with.

• Emma Graham mysteries by Martha Grimes

• No. 1 Ladies Detective Agency by Alexander McCall Smith

• Isabel Dalhousie mysteries by Alexander McCall Smith

• Agatha Raisin mysteries by M.C. Beaton

• Aunt Dimity mysteries by Nancy Atheron

• Flavia De Luce mysteries by Alan Bradley