Our January 2026 creator spotlights feature artists, podcasters, advocates, and storytellers whose work deserves attention.

Check out The Overstory - <p> <em>The Overstory</em>, winner of the 2019 Pulitzer Prize in Fiction, is a sweeping, impassioned work of activism and resistance that is also a stunning evocation of--and paean to--the natural world. From the roots to the crown and back to the seeds, Richard Powers's twelfth novel unfolds in concentric rings of interlocking fables that range from antebellum New York to the late twentieth-century Timber Wars of the Pacific Northwest and beyond. There is a world alongside ours--vast, slow, interconnected, resourceful, magnificently inventive, and almost invisible to us. This is the story of a handful of people who learn how to see that world and who are drawn up into its unfolding catastrophe.</p> by Richard Powers on Bookshop.org US!

Check out A Pair of Aces - <b>A gripping novel about two trailblazing women on opposite sides of the law&mdash;a prosecutor and a madam&mdash;who team up to bring down notorious mob boss Lucky Luciano in 1930s New York, from the <i>New York Times</i> bestselling authors of the million-copy bestseller <i>The Personal Librarian.</i></b><br><br>Eunice Carter, assistant district attorney for the City of New York and Manhattan&rsquo;s first Black female prosecutor, has her sights set on the one and only Lucky Luciano, head of New York City&rsquo;s five largest organized crime families. Other prosectors have tried to bring down Lucky, but they&rsquo;ve all focused on the crime syndicate&rsquo;s traditional businesses&mdash;bootlegging, gambling, loan sharking, and drug dealing&mdash;or tax evasion. No one has thought to approach the mob through its hand in prostitution. Until Eunice. But she can&rsquo;t get Luciano alone.<br><br>Polly Adler has worked long and hard to build up her high-class brothel business. Her client list is filled with well-known names, both the famous and the infamous, who all know her booze is top-notch, her music first-rate, her food exquisite, and her girls the best. But Lucky has gone too far, putting her girls in danger, and Polly finally sees the chance to end his reign once and for all.<br><br>Together, Eunice and Polly fashion a case utilizing a network of women. Bridging the enormous divide between them and risking their own lives, they assemble evidence bit by bit, under the nose of the man they&rsquo;re trying to convict. It is this very alliance&mdash;of two women from vastly different worlds&mdash;that launches the most sensational trial New York City has ever seen. by Marie Benedict and Victoria Christopher Murray on Bookshop.org US!

Check out A Wizard of Earthsea - <p><strong>The first novel of Ursula K. Le Guin's must-read Books of Earthsea. </strong></p><p>Ged was the greatest sorcerer in Earthsea, but in his youth he was the reckless Sparrowhawk. In his hunger for power and knowledge, he tampered with long-held secrets and loosed a terrible shadow upon the world.</p><p>This is the tumultuous tale of his testing, how he mastered the mighty words of power, tamed an ancient dragon, and crossed death's threshold to restore the balance.</p><p>With stories as perennial and universally beloved as The Chronicles of Narnia and The Lord of the Rings&#8212;but also unlike anything but themselves&#8212;Ursula K. Le Guin&#8217;s Earthsea novels are some of the most acclaimed and awarded works in literature. They have received accolades such as the National Book Award, a Newbery Honor, the Nebula Award, and many more honors, commemorating their enduring place in the hearts and minds of readers and the literary world alike.</p><p>Join the millions of fantasy readers who have explored these lands. As <em>The Guardian</em> put it: "Ursula Le Guin's world of Earthsea is a tangled skein of tiny islands cast on a vast sea. The islands' names pull at my heart like no others: Roke, Perilane, Osskil . . ."</p><p>The Books of Earthsea include:</p><ul><li ><em>A Wizard of Earthsea</em></li><li ><em>The Tombs of Atuan</em></li><li ><em>The Farthest Shore</em></li><li ><em>Tehanu</em></li><li ><em>Tales from Earthsea</em></li><li ><em>The Other Wind</em></li></ul> by Ursula K. Le Guin on Bookshop.org US!

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