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Let us not wish away the winter. It is a season unto itself... —Greta Crosby Annual Night In We had a great evening at Night-In on January 17! Readers came from as far away as South Dakota and Missouri to hear Jen and Sally’s book recommendations, and everyone went home with a couple of books and a goody bag filled with bookie treasures. As promised, here are the titles we recommended: This is the Story of a Happy Marriage Shotgun Lovesongs Destroyer Angel Braiding Sweetgrass Love & Treasure The Scavengers In Reach Sacred Wilderness Fractured Land The Catalain Book of Secrets This Dark Road to Mercy Little Failure Sins of Our Fathers Pig’s Foot A Burnable Book If Nuns Ruled the World The Storied Life of A. J. Fikry Claire of the Sea Light The Bird Skinner The Blazing World   The grand prize winner!   Will You be Our Valentine? Businesses in downtown Park Rapids are having a promotion through February 14. Check the Facebook page Parker Loves Park Rapids for details. We’re offering a 10% discount on anything with the word Love on the front!   Now Hiring We’d like to add two people to our staff! These are permanent part-time positions; 16 hours a week plus one to two week-ends a month. If you’re interested, or know someone who is, email jen@beagle-books.com for an application.   BestSellers in January All of our bestsellers this month were Night-In picks! Catalain Book of Secrets   Fractured Land   The Storied Life of A.J. Fikry       Love & Treasure   Braiding Sweetgrass     Books to Movies Several movies nominated for Academy Awards are based on books or are book-related: Birdman, which centers on a Broadway stage adaptation of Raymond Carver's story "What We Talk About When We Talk About Love” The The Imitation Game, based on Alan Turing: The Enigma by Andrew HodgesGrand Budapest Hotel, inspired by the writings of Stefan Zweig American Sniper, based on American Sniper: The Autobiography of the Most Lethal Sniper in U.S. Military History by Chris Kyle and Scott McEwen The Theory of Everything, based on Jane Hawking's memoir, Traveling to Infinity: My Life with Stephen Foxcatcher, based on events depicted in Foxcatcher: The True Story of My Brother's Murder, John du Pont's Madness and the Quest for Olympic Gold Gone Girl, based on the novel by Gillian Flynn Still Alice, based on the novel by Lisa Genova Wild, based on the book by Cheryl Strayed Unbroken, based on the book by Laura Hillenbrand Inherent Vice, based on Thomas Pynchon's novel The Oscars will be presented February 22, so there’s still time to read the books and see the movies. Midwest Connections Books or authors of particular interest to our region The Swan Gondola A novel by Timothy Schaffert Swan Gondola is the romantic tale of Ferret and Cecily, a street savvy ventriloquist and a beautiful actress who fall in love during the fictional1898 World’s Fair in Omaha. Readers will be swept away by high wire acts, balloon rides, and midnight seances found along the Fair’s spectacular midway. Each and every page offers a glimmer of magic, a hint of mystery, a trick of hand and twist of fate. Magnificent! Our women’s book group will discuss The Swan Gondola in March. The Book of Catalain Secrets A novel by Jessica Lourey This book is Jen’s current favorite. It’s by Jess Lourey, author of the popular Murder by the Month series and is set in Faith Falls, a snug Minnesota town constructed over a mystery, a place where the most impressive building is a gorgeous Queen Anne with turrets, cantilevered gables, and a wraparound porch. When Katrine Catalain is called home to the Queen Anne, she must claim her true Catalain power to save her mother and sister from the dark family curse. Told in a mosaic of strong women’s voices, The Catalain Book of Secrets weaves together alchemy, hope, tragedy, and true love to spin an unforgettable tale. There’s Something I Want You to Do A collection of short stories by Charles Baxter The ten inter-related stories in There’s Something I Want You to Do are held together by a web of cause and effect that slowly ensnares readers. Benny, an architect and hopeless romantic, is robbed on his daily walk along the Mississippi River, and the blow of a baseball bat to the back of his knee feels like a strike from God. A drug dealer named Black Bird reads Othello while waiting for customers in a bar. Elijah, a pediatrician and the father of two, is visited nightly by visions of Alfred Hitchcock. Meanwhile, a dog won’t stop barking, a passenger on a transatlantic flight reads aloud from the book of Psalms during turbulence, and a scream carries itself through the early-morning Minneapolis air. As the collection progresses, Baxter delves more deeply into the private lives of these characters, who appear and reappear. Readers will puzzle over the meaning of virtue and the unpredictable and mysterious ways in which we behave. Baxter is a Minnesota writer.