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13 Things Mentally Strong People Don’t Do

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13 Things Mentally Strong People Don’t Do by Amy Morin
Format: Book
Who it’s for: Adults, Teens

Let’s say you’re trying to get your body into good physical shape, you might go to the gym and have a long, heavy work out and feel like you’re moving in the right direction.  However, if you eat a box of donuts on the way home from the gym then you’ve just erased all your hard work!

The same thing can happen with our mental health.  There are many very positive things we can do for ourselves like practicing mindfulness, gratitude, or yoga but author Amy Morin points out that we might be sabotaging our best efforts with some bad mental habits.

Do I stress about things I can’t control?  Do I try to please everyone? Do I resent other people’s success? These are just three out of the thirteen bad mental habits that can drag us down and undermine our happiness.

Check this book out and give your mental health a workout. We can’t always change our circumstances but we do have control over our attitude and that can make all the difference!

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Math Doesn’t Suck

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Math Doesn’t Suck by Danica McKellar
Format: Book
Who it’s for:  Teens, Middle School

It may be hard to believe, but math really doesn’t suck.  In fact, it can be fun, or at least you can be successful at it if it’s presented the right way.  Author Danica McKellar started out as a TV actress, who you may recognize as Winnie from the Wonder Years or Elsie from The West Wing, then went on to earn a Ph.D. in mathematics and has created a series of math books for middle and high school girls that presents math in a fun and relatable way.

Math Doesn’t Suck features early middle school math concepts, along with Danica’s personal stories, real life applications, and personality quizzes – because what middle schooler doesn’t love those? The second book in the series is titled: Kiss My Math, followed by Hot X: Algebra Exposed.  The last in the series is Girls Get Curves, and yes of course, it’s about geometry!

I was a girl who loved math in school so I hope these books will inspire today’s young women to try on their smarty pants and wear them with pride!

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The Nightingale

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The Nightingale by Kristin Hannah
Format: Book
Who it’s for: Adults & Teens

Vianne and Isabelle are estranged sisters living through their new reality of a Nazi occupied France during World War II.  Isabelle is the younger, impulsive, defiant sister who speaks her mind about any injustice while Vianne is the older, cautious, and practical sister trying to manage the household and keep her own daughter safe under rapidly worsening conditions.  With the men in their lives taken away by the war, they both find themselves in roles they never imagined and have to reach deep inside themselves to decide which risks are truly worth taking.
This is a wonderfully told story about love, war, sisters, friendship, and true heroism.  It makes you ask yourself ‘What would I do?’

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Tradition

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Tradition by Brendan Kiely
Format: Book & Audiobook
Who it’s for: Teens & Adults

Jules Devereux is starting her senior year at Fullbrook Academy, an elite boarding school in New England, and is already counting the days to graduation so she can leave behind her ex-boyfriend, her ex-best friends, and everything she thinks is wrong with Fullbrook.
Always an outspoken advocate, Jules finds herself strangely silenced when she becomes the victim of sexual assault at the annual fall drinking party. Finding an administration unwilling to act, she and her new found friends launch a plan to get everyone’s attention and challenge what is accepted just because it’s always been that way.

I heard the author, Brendan Kiely, speak at a conference and his genuine concern for responsible and respectful behavior made me want to read this book.  It’s thought provoking and made me see how we often let things stay the same for no better reason than that’s how it’s always been. Brendan Kiely also co-authored the 2016 One Maryland One Book: All American Boys.
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Killers of the Flower Moon. The Osage Murders and the Birth of the FBI

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Killers of the Flower Moon. The Osage Murders and the Birth of the FBI  by David Grann
Format: Book
Who it’s for: Adults

The Osage Native American tribe was living the good life in the 1920s thanks to the oil fields lying under their reservation in Oklahoma.  Living the good life, that is, until their members start dying at an alarming rate under suspicious circumstances.  When tribe members are found blatantly murdered, an investigation is launched by J. Edgar Hoover who is desperately trying to make a name for himself and his budding Federal Bureau of Investigation. Newly appointed FBI Agent Tom White assembles an undercover team to infiltrate the close knit and increasingly dangerous Osage community and risks his own life in order to discover who is behind the heinous crimes.

David Grann is an award winning journalist from The New Yorker who weaves this true tale of mystery, conspiracy, and racial injustice. Grann reexamines this case through his investigation and manages to tie up the loose ends that the FBI was unable to resolve almost one hundred years ago.
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