Billiken Bookmarks: Holiday Edition

Baby to Age 5: Julián is a Mermaid by Jessica Love

The Billiken Says: Who doesn't love a story about a child's passion for mermaids and the power of self-transformation?

Ages 5 to 8: We Don't Eat Our Classmates by Ryan T. Higgins. 

The Billiken Says: A lot of students have trouble adjusting to a new school but for Penelope Rex, a T-Rex starting kindergarten, discovering that classmates make tasty snacks makes for a hilarious read for parent and child alike.

Ages 9 to 13: Catherine Called Birdy by Karen Cushman

The Billiken Says: Travel back in time to medieval England with a heroine with a short temper and literary ambitions in Cushman's imagined maiden's diary. Gods bones, but this is a good read!

The Lunar Chronicles Series by Marissa Meyer

The Billiken Says: Cinderella (and other fairy tale heroes and heroines) get futuristic in these clever re-tellings of the fairy tales we all thought we knew. Filled with snarky wit, these novels are surprisingly insightful as their characters cope with issues ranging from self-image to the origins of cruelty to the power of the individual to triumph over destructive systems and overwhelming odds.

Bud, Not Buddy by Christopher Paul Curtis

The Billiken Says: Nothing can stop Bud Caldwell as he embarks on his quest to find his father at the height of the Great Depression, and nothing will stop you from reading Curtis's classic, award-winning novel from cover-to-cover. Imaginative, funny, and capturing the complexities of coming of age in one of history's most turbulent and creative periods, Bud, Not Buddy isn't to be missed.

A Gentleman of Moscow by Amor Towles

The Billiken Says: How can one be civil in an uncivil world? How does one preserve the best essences of the past in an ever-changing present? For Count Alexander Ilyich Rostov, the answers to these questions lie in the relationships he forms with the staff and guests of the Moscow Hotel where he will spend decades under house arrest following the Russian Revolution. In times where decency and good manners seem destined for the dustbin, there are gentle laughs and lessons to be learned from A Gentleman in Moscow.

The Writer's Map: An Atlas of Imaginary Lands by Huw Lewis-Jones

The Billiken Says: In the spirit of the great Jesuit explorers like Matteo Ricci, Lewis-Jones's work brings the incredible worlds imagined by fantasy authors to us, inviting us to travel into the parts unknown of great literary imaginations and through the intricate worlds that live in authors' minds and that come to life on the pages of our favorite books.

The Art of Gathering: How We Meet And Why It Matters by Priya Parker

The Billiken Says: Although we have more ways to connect than ever - Snapchat, Instagram, Facebook, texts, you name it - meetings often leave many of us cold and wondering if there's another puppy cam to help us pass the time. Parker's in-depth work tells us why we find gatherings falling short of our expectations and gives us ways to make getting together more rich and meaningful.

 Circe by Madeline Miller

The Billiken Says: For everyone who mastered Latin or Greek (or at least might have attempted them) during their SLU coursework, Miller opens a new chapter in the story of Homer's epic Odyssey by letting the witch Circe tell her side of the classic tale. Circe's advice about changing the world - "child, make another" - will resonate with those of us who keep St. Ignatius's call to "go forth and set the world on fire" close to our hearts.

Eternal Life by Dara Horn

The Billiken Says: Just when one thinks life has become hum-drum, consider how Rachel, the heroine of Horn's imaginative novel, keeps things lively after 2,000 years. 

American Eden, David Hosack, Botany and Medicine in the Garden of the Early Republic by Victoria Johnson

The Billiken Says: Missed out on Hamilton! at the Fox? Get a bit of a fix with Johnson's compelling and quirky look at the doctor who witnessed the infamous Burr-Hamilton duel. Hosack's recovered legacy as the founder of a legendary botanical garden has a surprising story that will make your next trip to the Missouri Botanical Gardens all the more thought-provoking as we consider the power of the past to create our present.