Cover to Cover Book Club: 'The Familiar'

Join the library's for this month's Cover to Cover Book Club. We'll be reading The Familiar by Leigh Bardugo. Pick up your copy at the upstairs desk! This special December session will be held at Cork & Barrel (123 N Water St).

Book description: In a shabby house, on a shabby street, in the new capital of Madrid, Luzia Cotado uses scraps of magic to get through her days of endless toil as a scullion. But when her scheming mistress discovers the lump of a servant cowering in the kitchen is actually hiding a talent for little miracles, she demands Luzia use those gifts to improve the family's social position. What begins as a simple amusement for the nobility takes a perilous turn when Luzia garners the notice of Antonio Perez, the disgraced secretary to Spain's king. Still reeling from the defeat of his armada, the king is desperate for any advantage in the war against England's heretic queen--and Perez will stop at nothing to regain the king's favor. Determined to seize this one chance to better her fortunes, Luzia plunges into a world of seers and alchemists, holy men and hucksters, where the lines between magic, science and fraud are never certain. But as her notoriety grows, so does the danger that her Jewish blood will doom her to the Inquisition's wrath. She will have to use every bit of her wit and will to survive--even if that means enlisting the help of Guillen Santangel, an embittered immortal familiar whose own secrets could prove deadly for them both.

You may also like the following events from Sparta Free Library:

• Next Tuesday, 2nd December, 02:00 pm, Sparta Kriskindlmarkt: Its History and Future in Sparta
• Next Wednesday, 3rd December, 04:30 pm, Squirrel Is Alive: A Teenager in the Belgian Resistance & French Underground (Presentation) in Sparta
• Next Thursday, 4th December, 09:30 am, Fall Storytime in Sparta