2026 reading list 03

Bill Pennington, Billy Martin. NY: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2016. The book opens with a notorious drunk dead in a ditch after an auto accident, then spends five hundred pages showing why thousands of people jammed his funereal. Peter Brown, Wild Robot. NY Little, Brown, 2016. Source of the DreamWorks film, this elementary school chapter book follows Roz from her accidental activation on an island after her cargo ship sinks through her escape from it -- but the real story is, of course, the friends made along the way. Talia Hibbert, Highly Suspicious and Unfairly Cute. NY: Joy Revolution, 2023. A young adult romance in which former best friends are forced together and, y’know. One suffers OCD, which adds a distinct color. Laurent Hopman & Renaud Roche, Lucas Wars. NY: 23d Street, 2025. A biography of filmmaker George Lucas, told, appropriately, as a graphic novel. The expressive black and white is emotionally accented with color to produce a story almost as thrilling as the Star Wars movie at its center. Ally Carter, Blonde Who Came in from the Cold. NY: Avon, 2025. This installment either closes the clamshell on the Blonde Identity, by telling the other twin’s tale, or sets the stage for Further clandestine adventure with now-familiar characters. Hope for the later. Eric Larson, Hadrea Broccardo, Marika Cresta, et. al; Spider-Man Noir: The Gwen Stacy Affair. NY: Marvel, 2026. NYC, 1939. Spider-Man is back from visiting other dimensions to take on the Nazi threat in this source material for the Amazon series staring Nic Cage. Loren Esleman, Stress. NY: Open Road, 1996. Stop the Robberies, Enjoy Safe Street -- it sounds like Rudy Guliani’s Broken Windows plan for stopping crime, and was just as (in)effective. The Detroit PD unit existed to abuse and accuse Black folk, an inappropriate response to rising murder rates after the 1967 riots. Coleman Young’s first act as mayor was to disband the group. Stephen King, Misery. NY: Viking, 1987. Another book about the writing life, from one of our favorite authors. The title says it all.