Did you know that reading can help improve your mental wellbeing, by reducing stress, improving relaxation and boosting concentration?
To find out about the BPP Library’s projects, and discover what your local public library can offer, please see the information below.
What is the 'Great Reads' project?
The Great Reads project is an ongoing project that supplements our wide range of professional studies material and online eBooks with fiction and non-fiction titles for students to browse and borrow. Please check our Reading Lists to discover our amazing collection:
The complete list of the 'Great Reads' project books can be accessed here.
To find and access the collection, please browse the Library Catalogue.
To discover more about the project and our current Library campaign, Learn Proud, please visit our blog or scan the QR code:
What is BookCrossing?
BookCrossing is a project that aims to connect people through books by creating a space where you can donate and swap your pre-loved titles.
Where?
You can find a BookCrossing zone at the Manchester campus, in the Library on the second floor.
How?
Browse the books in the BookCrossing zone; if you wish to take a book out, go to bookcrossing.com and enter the unique BCID number found on the inside front cover. Make sure to tell the BookCrossing community where you have found the book, and, once you have read it, release it in the wild for other people to find!
We accept donations! If you are based at the Manchester campus and you have any fiction books that you would like to donate, please speak to a member of the Manchester Library team.
For more information on BookCrossing, please click the icon below.
This reading list provides an overview of some of the Study Support resources that are available from the BPP Library.
Girl, woman, other by
With her historic Booker win, Bernardine Evaristo is the author everyone is talking about. The standout book of 2019, Girl, Woman, Other is the number book you need to read this year. ***WINNER OF THE BOOKER PRIZE 2019*** SUNDAY TIMES BESTSELLER This is Britain as you've never read it. This is Britain as it has never been told. From Newcastle to Cornwall, from the birth of the twentieth century to the teens of the twenty-first, Girl, Woman, Other follows a cast of twelve characters on their personal journeys through this country and the last hundred years. They're each looking for something - a shared past, an unexpected future, a place to call home, somewhere to fit in, a lover, a missed mother, a lost father, even just a touch of hope . . . 'Masterful . . . A choral love song to black womanhood in modern Great Britain' Elle 'Exceptional. Ambitious, flowing and all-encompassing, an offbeat narrative that'll leave your mind in an invigorated whirl... [It] unites poetry, social history, women's voices and beyond. You have to order it right now' Stylist 'Bernardine Evaristo can take any story from any time and turn it into something vibrating with life' Ali Smith, author of How to be both 'Sparkling, inventive' Sunday Times 'Funny, sad, tender and true, deserves to win awards' Red 'Brims with vitality' Financial Times SHORTLISTED FOR THE GORDON BURN PRIZE 2019
The Feminine mystique by
When Betty Friedan produced The Feminine Mystique in 1963, she could not have realized how the discovery and debate of her contemporaries' general malaise would shake up society. Victims of a false belief system, these women were following strict social convention by loyally conforming to the pretty image of the magazines, and found themselves forced to seek meaning in their lives only through a family and a home. Friedan's controversial book about these women - and every woman - would ultimately set Second Wave feminism in motion and begin the battle for equality. This ground-breaking and life-changing work remains just as powerful, important and true as it was sixty years ago, and is essential reading both as a historical document and as a study of women living in a man's world.
Moxie by
When an unlikely teenager stands up to sexism in her high school she unwittingly starts a feminist revolution that shakes her whole town. It's time to fight like a girl! Perfect for fans of Holly Bourne. Vivian Carter is fed up. Fed up with her high school teachers who think the football team can do no wrong. Fed up with sexist dress codes, hallway harassment and gross comments from guys during class. But most of all, Viv Carter is fed up with always following the rules. Viv's mum was a tough-as-nails, punk rock Riot Grrrl in the '90s, and now Viv takes a page from her mother's past and creates Moxie , a feminist zine that she distributes anonymously to her classmates. She's just blowing off steam, but other girls respond and spread the Moxie message. As Viv forges friendships with other young women across the divides of cliques and popularity rankings, she realises that what she has started is nothing short of a girl revolution. TIME TO FIGHT LIKE A GIRL A page-turning read with a feminist message, for anyone who has ever had to deal with #everydaysexism 'MOXIE is sweet funny and fierce. Read this and then join the fight!' AMY POEHLER Also by Jennifer Mathieu: The Liars : Perfect for fans of We Were Liars - two siblings wrestle with the secrets and lies that threaten to destroy their future. The Truth About Alice: Fans of Thirteen Reasons Why will love this powerful book about stereotypes, secrets and standing up for gender equality. Devoted: An empowering, feminist coming-of-age story about self-discovery, as a girl with a controlling family realizes that her life is her own - if only she can find the courage to fight for it. Afterward: A tragic kidnapping leads to an unlikely friendship in this novel about finding light in the midst of darkness.
Noughts and crosses by
' The Noughts & Crosses series are still my favourite books of all time and showed me just how amazing story-telling could be ' - Stormzy Sephy is a Cross- she lives a life of privilege and power. Callum is a nought- he's considered to be less than nothing - a blanker, there to serve Crosses. They've been friends since they were children, and they both know that's as far as it can ever go. Noughts and Crosses are fated to be bitter enemies - love is out of the question. Then - in spite of a world that is fiercely against them - these star-crossed lovers choose each other. But this is love story that will lead both of them into terrible danger . . . and which will have shocking repercussions for generations to come.
The Handmaid's tale by
** THE SUNDAY TIMES NO. 1 BESTSELLER ** Discover the dystopian novel that started a phenomenon. Offred is a Handmaid in The Republic of Gilead. She is placed in the household of The Commander, Fred Waterford - her assigned name, Offred, means 'of Fred'. She has only one function: to breed. If Offred refuses to enter into sexual servitude to repopulate a devastated world, she will be hanged. Yet even a repressive state cannot eradicate hope and desire. As she recalls her pre-revolution life in flashbacks, Offred must navigate through the terrifying landscape of torture and persecution in the present day, and between two men upon which her future hangs. 'A fantastic, chilling story. And so powerfully feminist' Bernadine Evaristo 'As relevant today as it was when Atwood wrote it' Guardian
The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo by
NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER "If you're looking for a book to take on holiday this summer, The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo has got all the glitz and glamour to make it a perfect beach read." --Bustle From the New York Times bestselling author of Daisy Jones & the Six--an entrancing and "wildly addictive journey of a reclusive Hollywood starlet" (PopSugar) as she reflects on her relentless rise to the top and the risks she took, the loves she lost, and the long-held secrets the public could never imagine. Aging and reclusive Hollywood movie icon Evelyn Hugo is finally ready to tell the truth about her glamorous and scandalous life. But when she chooses unknown magazine reporter Monique Grant for the job, no one is more astounded than Monique herself. Why her? Why now? Monique is not exactly on top of the world. Her husband has left her, and her professional life is going nowhere. Regardless of why Evelyn has selected her to write her biography, Monique is determined to use this opportunity to jumpstart her career. Summoned to Evelyn's luxurious apartment, Monique listens in fascination as the actress tells her story. From making her way to Los Angeles in the 1950s to her decision to leave show business in the '80s, and, of course, the seven husbands along the way, Evelyn unspools a tale of ruthless ambition, unexpected friendship, and a great forbidden love. Monique begins to feel a very real connection to the legendary star, but as Evelyn's story near its conclusion, it becomes clear that her life intersects with Monique's own in tragic and irreversible ways. "Heartbreaking, yet beautiful" (Jamie Blynn, Us Weekly), The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo is "Tinseltown drama at its finest" (Redbook): a mesmerizing journey through the splendor of old Hollywood into the harsh realities of the present day as two women struggle with what it means--and what it costs--to face the truth.
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