|
Wednesday, September 28th 2022
|
|
|
Some email providers, including Gmail, may "clip" this newsletter.
To view our complete newsletter, click "view entire message" at the bottom of your screen!
|
|
|
Regular Hours:
Open Everyday: 10am - 7pm
For online orders, you will be notified by email when your order is ready;
please wait for your confirmation email &
read carefully before coming to the store for pickup!
|
|
|
The Calendar Room is Open!
2023 Calendars and Planners are available now, with more arriving daily!
|
|
|
A breathtaking new novel from the bestselling author of Anxious People and A Man Called Ove, The Winners returns to the close-knit, resilient community of Beartown for a story about first loves, second chances, and last goodbyes.
Over the course of two weeks, everything in Beartown will change.Maya Andersson and Benji Ovich, two young people who left in search of a life far from the forest town, come home and joyfully reunite with their closest childhood friends. There is a new sense of optimism and purpose in the town, embodied in the impressive new ice rink that has been built down by the lake.
Two years have passed since the events that no one wants to think about. Everyone has tried to move on, but there's something about this place that prevents it. The destruction caused by a ferocious late-summer storm reignites the old rivalry between Beartown and the neighboring town of Hed, a rivalry which has always been fought through their ice hockey teams.
Maya's parents, Peter and Kira, are caught up in an investigation of the hockey club's murky finances, and Amat--once the star of the Beartown team--has lost his way after an injury and a failed attempt to get drafted into the NHL. Simmering tensions between the two towns turn into acts of intimidation and then violence. All the while, a fourteen-year-old boy grows increasingly alienated from this hockey-obsessed community and is determined to take revenge on the people he holds responsible for his beloved sister's death. He has a pistol and a plan that will leave Beartown with a loss that is almost more that it can stand.
As it beautifully captures all the complexities of daily life and explores questions of friendship, loyalty, loss, and identity, this emotion-packed novel asks us to reconsider what it means to win, what it means to lose, and what it means to forgive.
|
|
The author of Hamnet—New York Times best seller and National Book Critics Circle Award winner—brings the world of Renaissance Italy to jewel-bright life in this unforgettable fictional portrait of the captivating young duchess Lucrezia de' Medici as she makes her way in a troubled court.
Florence, the 1550s. Lucrezia, third daughter of the grand duke, is comfortable with her obscure place in the palazzo: free to wonder at its treasures, observe its clandestine workings, and devote herself to her own artistic pursuits. But when her older sister dies on the eve of her wedding to the ruler of Ferrara, Modena and Reggio, Lucrezia is thrust unwittingly into the limelight: the duke is quick to request her hand in marriage, and her father just as quick to accept on her behalf.
Having barely left girlhood behind, Lucrezia must now enter an unfamiliar court whose customs are opaque and where her arrival is not universally welcomed. Perhaps most mystifying of all is her new husband himself, Alfonso. Is he the playful sophisticate he appeared to be before their wedding, the aesthete happiest in the company of artists and musicians, or the ruthless politician before whom even his formidable sisters seem to tremble?
As Lucrezia sits in constricting finery for a painting intended to preserve her image for centuries to come, one thing becomes worryingly clear. In the court’s eyes, she has one duty: to provide the heir who will shore up the future of the Ferranese dynasty. Until then, for all of her rank and nobility, the new duchess’s future hangs entirely in the balance.
Full of the beauty and emotion with which she illuminated the Shakespearean canvas of Hamnet, Maggie O’Farrell turns her talents to Renaissance Italy in an extraordinary portrait of a resilient young woman’s battle for her very survival.
|
|
The 99 Boyfriends of Micah Summers, by Adam Sass, is a a touching story about discovering the beautifully messy truth that can blossom out of fantasy. Micah has sketched every boy he’s failed to date in his anonymous Instagram profile. 99 boyfriends that never were. But after a chance encounter with what is surely Boy 100 ends before he could ask him out, Micah sets out on a quest to find his mystery prince, and get the happy ending he has always imagined. In a sun-kissed Chicago that is itself a fairy tale, his quest for true love will grab your heart and squeeze in the most tender and earnest way possible.
|
|
Through the lens of horror--from Halloween to Hereditary--queer and trans writers consider the films that deepened, amplified, and illuminated their own experiences.
Horror movies hold a complicated space in the hearts of the queer community: historically misogynist, and often homo- and transphobic, the genre has also been inadvertently feminist and open to subversive readings. Common tropes--such as the circumspect and resilient "final girl," body possession, costumed villains, secret identities, and things that lurk in the closet--spark moments of eerie familiarity and affective connection. Still, viewers often remain tasked with reading themselves into beloved films, seeking out characters and set pieces that speak to, mirror, and parallel the unique ways queerness encounters the world.It Came from the Closet features twenty-five essays by writers speaking to this relationship, through connections both empowering and oppressive. From Carmen Maria Machado on Jennifer's Body, Jude Ellison S. Doyle on In My Skin, Addie Tsai on Dead Ringers, and many more, these conversations convey the rich reciprocity between queerness and horror.
|
|
|
Thanks to all who joined us for Our Year with Toni Morrison in 2021! In 2022, we're continuing the annual reading initiative with George Orwell, so read along with us each month! Orwell’s fiercely moral writing has consistently struck a chord with each passing generation. The intense honesty and insight of his essays and non-fiction made Orwell one of the foremost social commentators of his age. Added to this, his ability to construct elaborately imaginative fictional worlds, which he imbued with this acute sense of morality, has assured his contemporary and future relevance. A fierce opponent of authoritarianism, George Orwell is especially relevant in our own Orwellian times, where we have to look no further than Ukraine to witness what a totalitarian dictator is capable of destroying. Each month we will feature, and discount 10%, one of the author's books, alternating between fiction and nonfiction.
|
|
All animals are equal, but some animals are more equal than others.
Brilliant allegory and prophetic work whose message should be heeded if we are to avoid repeating history’s mistakes, Animal Farm is George Orwell’s seminal work of anti-Stalinist satire. Orwell originally had a hard time finding a publisher; he courageously insisted on the truth being told about Soviet Communism, even though in the early 1940’s criticizing Stalin and Soviet Russia was a very unpopular stance—the war against Hitler was raging and most in the West were reluctant to criticize ally Stalin. Now, as a modern classic, with the characters of Boxer the workhorse, Benjamin the donkey, Squealer the pig, Napoleon the pig (Stalin), and Snowball (Trotsky) part of the modern literary canon, Animal Farm's continued popularity and astonishing success are a tribute to its enduring relevance. Capturing the menace of totalitarian rule, it is a political satire, a passionate warning against the dangers of political innocence, a lesson about political terror, and a scathing indictment of political propaganda that flies in the face of the truth. (interesting in light of modern-day current events, Orwell gave the rights for free to a group of Ukrainian refugees to reprint Animal Farm in their language, for which he wrote an introduction.) Of course, it can also be read and enjoyed heedless of history and Stalinism, by people of all ages, enjoyed simply as a great fable in the Aesop tradition. Christopher Hitchens sums it up, speaking about Animal Farm and 1984: “These books can be read as a strong preventive medicine against the mentality of servility, and especially against the lethal temptation to exchange freedom for security, a bargain that invariably ends up with the surrender of both.” Ed loved and highly recommends!
|
|
|
In the summer of 2020, after the murder of George Floyd, Unabridged Bookstore made an ongoing commitment to each month support and contribute to organizations that work towards achieving racial justice in America. Since June 2020, Unabridged has contributed over $26,000 to 26 difference organizations, and we are now re-dedicating our ongoing commitment to support these kinds of organizations each month. Thank you for joining us in this commitment.
To honor the Black Lives Matter movement, and as part of our commitment to promoting the work of activists and organizations engaged in the fight for environmental justice and against systemic racism, social injustice, hunger, sexism, homophobia, and transphobia, we choose to support the Greater Chicago Food Depository and Brave Space Alliance this month:
|
|
|
In light of the Supreme Court’s ruling to overturn Roe v. Wade, we at Unabridged are renewing our support for the work of activists and organizations engaged in progressive causes.
We will continue to honor the Black Lives Matter movement with our monthly effort to highlight and donate to those engaged in the fight for social, environmental, and economic justice, and with reproductive rights at risk across the US, we will make an additional, monthly contribution to Chicago Abortion Fund and Midwest Access Coalition.
|
|
Gift Cards are available for purchase on our website, by phone, and in-store, and can be used to shop the same ways! We can mail a gift card to you, to your friends and family, or we can hold it here in the shop where it will be ready on your next visit. Click here to send a Gift Card!
|
|
|
|
|
Another great way to support indie bookstores, sign up at Libro.fm!
|
|
|
And don’t forget to share what you’re reading! Follow us and share your thoughts on:
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
