Books

This year was a boon for whodunit readers, with great books by Donna Leon, Richard Osman, Louise Penny and more.

Fairbanks author David Marusek covers familiar themes with familiar characters, but brings readers to a different conclusion this time.

From the streets of Philadelphia to the high seas, these novels brought history to life in vivid detail.

The book has plenty of the hallmarks of Straley’s crime novels, but a new protagonist gives “Big Breath In” a different perspective.

Carlstrom, who lived near Fairbanks for nearly two decades, completed the book in part as a gift for her grandchildren.

This wonderful children’s book invites readers of all ages and from every corner of the planet into the heart of a culture that arose in isolation from nearly all of the rest of the world.

In “Absent Here,” Bret Shepard, who grew up in North Slope villages including Atqasuk and Browerville, examines themes like absence and desire in a collection infused with landscape imagery.

A Montgomery County committee caused an outcry after labelling “Colonization and the Wampanoag story,” a children’s Native American history book, as fiction.

An anthropologist by training, an outdoors guide by profession, and a writer by nature and compulsion, Engelhard has wandered across the varied landscapes of Alaska for decades.

The New York Times and ProPublica now say Grisham went too far in his use of their reporting on a murder case in Texas, and they want changes made to the book.

Starbard, who is Tlingit/Dena’ina Athabascan, has worked as a playwright, magazine editor and Emmy-nominated TV writer.

The science writer returned to the 800-mile Alaska Pipeline corridor, telling his own story within the structure of a time travel through the change that’s facing Alaska

Nobel committee chairman Anders Olsson praised the South Korean writer’s “physical empathy for the vulnerable, often female lives” of her characters.

The book’s four sections focus on the topics of history and biography; language; folklore and folklife; and rituals and festivals.

In “Kissing Kevin,” recently deceased Homer author Sara Berg has given today’s Americans a true sense of the Vietnam War as she lived it.

Authors Against Book Bans has joined the growing pushback by parents, educators, librarians and groups seeking to prevent what members feel is a dangerous drift toward reducing the number and diversity of books on library shelves.

Fall reading suggestions: whodunnits by Katarina Bivald, Stella Sands, Ragnar Jonasson, Leonie Swann and Alan Bradley.

Attempts to censor or restrict books from U.S. schools and libraries have risen since 2020, reports show.

Clara and Grafton “Hap” Burke became deeply integrated into the community, and caused changes with rippling effects over time.

“The Curve of Equal Time” features well-drawn characters and precise and lyrical writing.

Author Mike Coppock reviews some more popular destinations but also covers communities like Pelican and Yakutat that are unfamiliar to most.

In “A Sea Full of Turtles,” author Bill Streever describes his journey to learn everything he could about sea turtles and consider how humans might find hope in a world of so much environmental destruction.

The middle book in a series of three set in the era of the Russian American Company is rich with details from Russian and Native populations from the time.