Staff Picks
Check the blog every Wednesday for updates on what our staff is reading and recommendations for our new and all-time favorite books. What is your favorite book? Post your answer in the comments section below. To see all previous Staff Picks posts, simply type "Staff Picks" in the search box at the top left of this blog and click the "search blog" button.

The Moon and Sixpence by William Summerset Maugham - recommended by Megan

This book is based on the life of painter Paul Gauguin. The lead character Charles Strickland leaves his former life which includes a wife a kids and a job as stockbroker to persue his true passion - painting.

American Gods by Neil Gaiman - recommended by Thea

One of the most talked-about books of the new millennium, "American Gods" is a kaleidoscopic journey deep into myth and across an American landscape at once eerily familiar and utterly alien. It is, quite simply, a contemporary masterpiece.

Maniac Magee By Jerry Spinelli - recommended by Cheryl
He wasn't born with the name Maniac Magee. He came into this world named Jeffrey Lionel Magee, but when his parents died and his life changed, so did his name. And Maniac Magee became a legend. Even today kids talk about how fast he could run;about how he hit an inside-the-park homer; how no knot, no matter how snarled, would stay that way once he began to untie it. But the thing Maniac Magee is best known for is what he did for the kids from the East Side and those from the West Side.