On the shelves — Aug. 24

The following books are available at the:

Clovis-Carver Public Library

Lincoln’s Boys: John Hay, John Nicolay, and the War for Lincoln’s Image by Joshua Zeitz revolves around two presidential secretaries who served as Lincoln’s closest confidants and who enjoyed more access, witnessed more history, and knew Lincoln better than anyone else outside the president’s immediate family.

Steeped in Evil by Laura Childs includes delicious recipes and tea time tips with a new mystery in which Indigo Tea Shop owner Theodosia Browning has her pick of suspects after the son of a winery owner is found murdered.

Memories of Margaret Thatcher: A Portrait by Those Who Knew Her Best by Ian Dale brings together over 200 personal reminiscences and anecdotes from those who experienced close encounters with the Iron Lady and whose amusing, revealing, sympathetic, and occasionally antagonistic observations reveal the personality of the remarkable woman who served as Britain’s greatest peacetime Prime Minister.

Keep Quiet by Lisa Scottoline provides a suspenseful story about one man whose split-second impulse to protect his son plunges them both into a world of guilt, lies, and devastating consequences as both struggle to live under the crushing weight of their secret.

When Will My Grown Up Kid Grow Up? Loving and Understanding Your Emerging Adult by Jeffrey Arnett explains what’s really happening to your 20-somethings, and how you as a parent can help with -– and survive -– their complicated transition to adulthood.

By Its Cover by Donna Leon explores politics, morality, and contemporary Italian culture as the director of a prestigious Venitian library calls on Guido Brunetti to look into the theft and vandalism of priceless books shortly after an American professor fled the building.

John Wayne: The Life and Legend by Scott Eyman profiles an iconic actor whose projected dignity, integrity, and strength became a symbol of the American western film and, 30 years after his death, remains the standard by which male stars are judged.

Portales Public Library

Love Letters by Debbie Macomber: During the summer in Cedar Cove, Jo Marie Rose, the proprietor of Rose Harbor Inn, and local handyman Mark Taylor are spending a lot of time together fixing up the inn and keeping everything running smoothly, so much time in fact that people are beginning to talk.

Jo Marie insists that Mark is just a friend, and yet she can't stop thinking about him and wondering about his life.

Mark, however, is private and refuses to discuss the details of his past, while Jo Marie herself must confront some things from her own past before she can even think about becoming more than friends with Mark.

Meanwhile, Jo Marie welcomes visitors to the inn with their own love stories to tell.

The first is Ellie, a young woman who has come to finally meet Tom, a man she has started to fall for through Facebook, despite her mother's disapproval.

Next come Roy and Maggie Porter, a married couple on vacation without their children in order to save their crumbling marriage.

For each of these couples, it will take the power of the written word to sort out the outcomes of their relationships.

Never Turn Your Back on an Angus Cow by Dr. Jan Pol with David Fisher: In this memoir by the star of the National Geographic series, “The Incredible Dr. Pol,” veterinarian Jan Pol writes about his life treating animals, from the time he was 12 years old, through nearly 40 years of practice, to his experience with television.

Born and raised in the Netherlands, Pol went to veterinary school in his home country before immigrating to the United States, where he has lived in Weidman, Michigan with his wife Diane since the 1970s.

Pol has run his practice since 1981, and in his book he relates incredible stories involving animals, from hiding cows from the Nazis as a child to treating every animal, both pets and livestock imaginable, to helping the people in his town part with their animals when nothing else can be done.

Pol is both compassionate and straightforward, treating his patients with old-fashioned medicine and treatments that liken him more to James Herriot than most modern vets practicing today.

The 6th Extinction by James Rollins: In the Sierra Nevada Mountains of northern California, the scientists at the U.S. Army Test Command site, TECOMM, have been working on a secret project involving biology and different kinds of life forms on Earth.

One day, the research station broadcasts a distress call that speaks of danger and commands whoever hears it to kill them, and when Commander Gray Pierce and his Sigma team arrive to investigate the site, they find that everyone and everything in the area, including the scientists, animals, insects, plants and bacteria, are dead, due to an explosion in the lab that has unleashed an unknown threat.

As Pierce and Sigma dig deeper, they find that they must explore the past to avoid an apocalyptic future, as they follow clues from a map originally from the ancient Library of Alexandria, and discover that a new life buried beneath the ice of a prehistoric continent.

What they find may bring about the worst kind of extinction yet — the extinction of mankind-unless they can learn how to stop it.