In We Do Not Part, Han Kang, now crowned with the 2024 Nobel Prize in Literature, continues to unravel the raw sinews of the human spirit with her trademark elegance, restraint, and haunting brutality. If you’ve read The Vegetarian or Human Acts, you already know that she is not here to comfort you. She is here to disarm you, to offer silence as indictment of past sins, and pain as a kind of testimony.

This latest novel is perhaps her most distilled expression of sorrow and connection yet. It is a story soaked in grief, not just personal grief, but historical and national grief, a grief that simmers beneath the skin, unnamed and yet entirely felt. Her language is stripped down to the bone, almost surgical in its precision, leaving vast, aching white space between sentences like unspoken truths hanging in the air.

At its core, We Do Not Part is about the relationship between two friends. But it’s also about war, memory, intimacy, and the ways violence echoes through generations like a haunting melody. The lines between presence and absence, love and loss, flesh and memory blur.

Han Kang does not offer resolution. She never has. But what she does offer is something far more rare: an invitation to sit in discomfort, to witness the beauty in fracture, and to confront the quiet devastation of history without blinking.

It is no surprise that the Nobel committee recognized her. Han writes not with ink but with absence, making you feel the ghosts between the words. We Do Not Part is not just a novel, it is a requiem for everything we cannot hold on to, and a prayer for what lingers anyway.

A devastating, masterful work. Read it, but don’t expect to emerge unchanged. Her books are always a favorite of mine even though they leave me devastated, and this did not disappoint. 

Check it out at the library.

Aimee Clark, IT Librarian

​Allen Eskens’ The Quiet Librarian is one of those books you just can’t put down. Think The Nightingale by Kristin Hannah with a tiny sprinkle of John Wick.

The story follows Hana Babic, a quiet, mousy, unassuming librarian in Minnesota with a dark, complicated past. When her best friend is murdered, Hana suddenly finds herself responsible for a young boy and pulled into a web of danger tied to a life she thought she’d left behind. Back during the Bosnian War, she was a teenage resistance fighter known as the Night Mora, a figure who became something of a boogeyman to the oppressing army. She buried that part of herself long ago, but now it’s all bubbling back up as she tries to protect the boy and figure out what really happened to her friend.

What really makes this book stand out is Hana. She’s complex, brave, and haunted in a way that feels totally real. Watching her shift from someone who just wants to stay invisible to someone who has no choice but to face her past is both powerful and heartbreaking.

Eskens does a fantastic job weaving together past and present, showing how trauma leaves its mark, but also how strength and healing can grow from it. The writing is sharp, the pace is spot-on, and the emotional moments really land.
​
If you’re into stories about hidden identities, strong women, and a bit of mystery with real emotional weight, The Quiet Librarian is 100% worth the read.

Reserve the book at the library here.

​Aimee Clark, IT Librarian

American War by Omar El Akkad was hard. This was a messed-up, dystopian take on another US Civil War brought on by climate change. It's about a girl, Sarat, growing up in the middle of it all, and how all the violence and loss turns her into a rebel.

This book is dark and gripping though, and it feels all too real. El Akkad mixes war, politics, and what happens to people in a way that just punches you in the gut. Definitely not a beach read, but if you're into those dystopian stories that make you think way too much about what could actually happen, you should check it out.

Reserve the hard copy at the library, or the eBook or audiobook with your SPL card.

Aimee Clark, IT Librarian

The Sympathizer is a thrilling mix of spy thriller and historical drama set during and after the Vietnam War. The nameless narrator—a conflicted double agent—struggles with divided loyalties between communist Vietnam and capitalist America, all while delivering sharp, sarcastic insights. With twists, dark humor, and a deep dive into identity and betrayal, this book is a solid, thought-provoking read that hooks you from the beginning and keeps you on your toes, never knowing where it will go.

Reserve the book from the library or get the eBook with your SPL card.

Viet Thanh Nguyen won the Pulitzer for this novel and well as many other awards, and he certainly deserved all of them! It has since been made into an HBO series starring Robert Downey Jr. playing multiple roles that the narrator meets during his life. Hoa Xuande of Cowboy Bebop plays our narrator, and Sandra Oh also stars. The showrunner and director of several episodes is Park Chan-wook, famous for Decision to Leave and the Vengeance Trilogy (Oldboy, Lady Vengeance, and Sympathy for Mr. Vengeance) which can be viewed on Kanopy with your SPL card at the time of this post.

Aimee Clark, IT Librarian