BABY TEETH by Zoje Stage (Psychological Thriller)
Audiobook available, read by Gabra Zackman
Suzette is unable to form a bond with her seven-year-old daughter, who cannot --- or will not --- speak. Ever since Hanna was a baby, she felt rejected by her. It’s as if the child hates her, leaving Suzette very frightened. Alex wants to bTBRelieve his wife’s accounts of their daughter’s cruel and unusual behavior, but he’s never seen anything but her love. Is Hanna just a naughty girl whose antics reveal intelligence, creativity, maybe even charm? Or is she actually trying to kill her mother? Reviewed by Norah Piehl.
BELIEVE ME by JP Delaney (Psychological Thriller)
Audiobook available, read by Sally Scott and others
A struggling actor, a Brit in America without a green card, Claire needs work and money to survive. Then she gets both. But nothing like she expected. Claire agrees to become a decoy for a firm of divorce lawyers. Hired to entrap straying husbands, she must catch them on tape with their seductive propositions. The rules? Never hit on the mark directly. Make it clear you’re available, but he has to proposition you, not the other way around. The firm is after evidence, not coercion. The innocent have nothing to hide. Then the game changes. When the wife of one of Claire’s targets is violently murdered, the cops are sure the husband is to blame. Desperate to catch him before he kills again, they enlist Claire to lure him into a confession. Reviewed by Ray Palen.
THE BOY WITH THE PERPETUAL NERVOUSNESS: A Memoir by Graham Caveney(Memoir)
Audiobook available, read by Jonathan Cowley
Raised in a small town in the north of England known primarily for its cotton mills, football team and deep roots in the “Respectable Working Class,” Graham Caveney armed himself against the confusing nature of adolescence with a thick accent, a copy of Kafka, and a record collection including the likes of the Buzzcocks and Joy Division. All three provided him the opportunity to escape, even if just in mind, beyond his small-town borders. But, when those passions are noticed and preyed upon by a mentor, everything changes. Now, as an adult, Caveney attempts to reconcile his past and present, coming to grips with both the challenges and wonder of adolescence, music and literature. Reviewed by Bianca Ambrosio.
DAY OF THE DEAD by Nicci French (Psychological Thriller/Mystery)
Audiobook available, read by Beth Chalmers
A decade ago, psychologist Frieda Klein was sucked into the orbit of Dean Reeve, a psychopath who was obsessed with her. In the years since, Frieda has worked with --- and sometimes against --- the London police in solving their most baffling cases. But now she's in hiding, driven to isolation by Reeve. When a series of murders announces his return, Frieda must emerge from the shadows to confront her nemesis. Criminology student Lola Hayes has tracked Frieda down with a single-minded pursuit: she wants to delve inside the mind of a woman besieged by darkness. But in following every move Frieda makes, Lola is exposing herself to the same terrors --- and the same twisted fixation of a diabolical psychopath. Reviewed by Joe Hartlaub.
THE GARDEN PARTY by Grace Dane Mazur (Fiction)
Audiobook available, read by Bernadette Dunne
The Cohens are wildly impractical intellectuals --- academics, activists and artists. The Barlows are Wall Street Journal–reading lawyers steeped in trusts and copyrights, golf and tennis. The two families are reserved with and wary of each other. But tonight, the evening before the wedding that is supposed to unite them in marriage, they will attempt to set aside their differences over dinner in the garden. Reviewed by Julianne Holmquist.
GIVE ME YOUR HAND by Megan Abbott (Psychological Thriller)
Audiobook available, read by Chloe Cannon
Kit Owens harbored only modest ambitions for herself when the mysterious Diane Fleming appeared in her high school chemistry class. But Diane's academic brilliance lit a fire in Kit, and the two developed an unlikely friendship. Until Diane shared a secret that changed everything between them. More than a decade later, Kit thinks she's put Diane behind her forever and she's begun to fulfill the scientific dreams Diane awakened in her. But the past comes roaring back when she discovers that Diane is her competition for a position both women covet, taking part in groundbreaking new research led by their idol. Soon enough, the two former friends find themselves locked in a dangerous game of cat-and-mouse that threatens to destroy them both. Reviewed by Norah Piehl.
HANGMAN by Daniel Cole (Thriller)
Audiobook available, read by Alex Wyndham
Detective Emily Baxter is still reeling from the Ragdoll case, and from the disappearance of her friend, William “Wolf” Fawkes. Despite her reluctance to jump into another gruesome case, she’s summoned to a meeting of a new FBI/CIA/UK law enforcement task force in New York. There, she is presented with photographs of the latest copycat murder: a body contorted into a familiar pose, strung up from the Brooklyn Bridge, the word “BAIT” carved deep into its chest. As the media pressure intensifies, Baxter is ordered to assist with the investigation and attend the scene of another murder, again with a victim inscribed with a word: “PUPPET.” Baxter must shake off the grief and fear that have paralyzed her for the last year so she can stop another terrible killer before it’s too late. Reviewed by L. Dean Murphy.
HITS AND MISSES: Stories by Simon Rich (Fiction/Short Stories)
Audiobook available, read by Simon Rich
Humorist Simon Rich is back with a hilarious new collection of stories about dreaming big and falling flat, about ordinary people desperate for stardom, and the stars who are bored by having it all. Inspired by Rich's real experiences in Hollywood, HITS AND MISSES chronicles all the absurdity of fame and success alongside the heartbreaking humanity of failure. From a bitter tell-all by the horse Paul Revere rode to greatness, to a gushing magazine profile of everyone's favorite World War II dictator, these stories roam across time and space to skewer our obsession with making it big --- from the days of ancient Babylon to the age of TMZ. Reviewed by Norah Piehl.
IF YOU SEE ME, DON’T SAY HI: Stories by Neel Patel (Fiction/Short Stories)
Audiobook available, read by Neel Patel
In 11 sharp, surprising stories, Neel Patel gives voice to our most deeply held stereotypes and then slowly undermines them. His characters, almost all of whom are first-generation Indian Americans, subvert our expectations that they will sit quietly by. We meet two brothers caught in an elaborate web of envy and loathing; a young gay man who becomes involved with an older man whose secret he could never guess; three women who almost gleefully throw off the pleasant agreeability society asks of them; and, in the final pair of linked stories, a young couple struggling against the devastating force of community gossip. Reviewed by Barbara Bamberger Scott.
THE INTRUSIONS by Stav Sherez (Thriller)
Audiobook available, read by Kris Dyer
When a distressed young woman arrives at the police station claiming her friend has been abducted, and that the man threatened to return and "claim her next," Detectives Carrigan and Miller are thrust into a terrifying new world of stalking and obsession. Under scrutiny themselves, and with old foes and enmities re-surfacing, how long will Carrigan and Miller have to find out the truth behind what these two women have been subjected to? And how long until his next victim is claimed? Reviewed by Jesse Kornbluth for HeadButler.com.
THE LAST TIME I LIED by Riley Sager (Psychological Thriller)
Audiobook available, read by Nicol Zanzarella
Two Truths and a Lie. Vivian, Natalie, Allison and first-time camper Emma Davis played it all the time in their cabin at Camp Nightingale. But the games ended the night Emma sleepily watched the others sneak out of the cabin into the darkness. Now a rising star in the New York art scene, Emma is asked to return to the newly reopened camp as a painting instructor. Seeing an opportunity to find out what really happened to her friends all those years ago, she agrees. Emma is assigned to the same cabin she slept in as a teenager, and cryptic clues that Vivian left behind about the camp's twisted origins begin surfacing. As she digs deeper, Emma finds herself sorting through lies from the past while facing mysterious threats in the present. Reviewed by Ray Palen.
MARY B: An Untold Story of Pride and Prejudice by Katherine J. Chen (Historical Fiction)
Audiobook available, read by Marisa Calin
Mary Bennet possesses neither the beauty of her eldest sister, Jane, nor the high-spirited wit of second-born Lizzy. Even compared to her frivolous younger siblings, Kitty and Lydia, Mary knows she is lacking in the ways that matter for single, not-so-well-to-do women in 19th-century England who must secure their futures through the finding of a husband. As her sisters wed, one by one, Mary pictures herself growing old, a spinster with no estate to run or children to mind, dependent on the charity of others. At least she has the silent rebellion and secret pleasures of reading and writing to keep her company. But even her fictional creations are no match for the scandal, tragedy and romance that eventually visit Mary’s own life. Reviewed by Melanie Reynolds.
MY YEAR OF REST AND RELAXATION by Ottessa Moshfegh (Fiction)
Audiobook available, read by Julia Whelan
Our narrator should be happy, shouldn't she? She's young, thin, pretty, a recent Columbia graduate, works an easy job at a hip art gallery, lives in an apartment on the Upper East Side of Manhattan paid for (like the rest of her needs) by her inheritance. But there is a dark and vacuous hole in her heart, and it isn't just the loss of her parents, or the way her Wall Street boyfriend treats her, or her sadomasochistic relationship with her best friend, Reva. It's the year 2000 in a city aglitter with wealth and possibility. What could be so terribly wrong? Reviewed by Sarah Jackman.
A NOISE DOWNSTAIRS by Linwood Barclay (Psychological Thriller)
Audiobook available, read by George Newbern
College professor Paul Davis is a normal guy with a normal life. Until, driving along a deserted road late one night, he surprises a murderer disposing of a couple of bodies. That’s when Paul’s "normal" existence is turned upside down. After nearly losing his own life in that encounter, he finds himself battling PTSD, depression and severe problems at work. His wife, Charlotte, brings home a vintage typewriter to encourage him to get started on that novel he’s always intended to write. However, Paul swears that it is possessed and types by itself at night. But only Paul can hear the noise coming from downstairs; Charlotte doesn’t hear a thing. And she worries he’s going off the rails. Paul believes the typewriter is somehow connected to the murderer he discovered nearly a year ago. Reviewed by Joe Hartlaub.
THE OTHER WOMAN by Daniel Silva (Thriller/Adventure)
Audiobook available, read by George Guidall
In an isolated village in the mountains of Andalusia, a mysterious Frenchwoman begins work on a dangerous memoir. It is the story of a man she once loved in the Beirut of old, and a child taken from her in treason’s name. The woman is the keeper of the Kremlin’s most closely guarded secret. Long ago, the KGB inserted a mole into the heart of the West --- a mole who stands on the doorstep of ultimate power. Only one man can unravel the conspiracy: Gabriel Allon, the legendary art restorer and assassin who serves as the chief of Israel’s vaunted secret intelligence service. Gabriel and the Russians will engage in a final epic showdown, with the fate of the postwar global order hanging in the balance. Reviewed by Roz Shea.
A PLACE FOR US by Fatima Farheen Mirza (Fiction)
Audiobook available, read by Deepti Gupta and Sunil Malhotra
As an Indian wedding gathers a family back together, parents Rafiq and Layla must reckon with the choices their children have made. There is Hadia: their headstrong, eldest daughter, whose marriage is a match of love and not tradition. Huda, the middle child, determined to follow in her sister’s footsteps. And lastly, their estranged son, Amar, who returns to the family fold for the first time in three years to take his place as brother of the bride. What secrets and betrayals have caused this close-knit family to fracture? Can Amar find his way back to the people who know and love him best? Reviewed by Rebecca Munro.
RESCUED: An Andy Carpenter Mystery by David Rosenfelt (Mystery)
Audiobook available, read by Grover Gardner
Defense lawyer Andy Carpenter is reluctant to take on any more cases. He’d much rather spend his time working for his dog rescue organization, the Tara Foundation, than find himself back in a courtroom. However, when a truck carrying over 70 dogs from the South to the rescue-friendly northeast turns up with a murdered driver, Andy can’t help but get involved. The accused just happens to be his wife Laurie’s ex-fiance; her tall, good-looking, ex-Marine ex-fiance. Even though he acknowledges having argued with the victim, he swears that he is not a killer. And though he would rather not, Andy has to admit he believes he's telling the truth. Reviewed by Stuart Shiffman.
SPLINTER IN THE BLOOD by Ashley Dyer (Mystery/Thriller)
Audiobook available, read by Piers Hampton
After months of hunting a cold-blooded murderer that the press has dubbed the Thorn Killer, Detective Greg Carver is shot in his own home. His trusted partner, Ruth Lake, is alone with him. Yet instead of calling for help, she has rearranged the crime scene and wiped the room clean of prints. But Carver isn’t dead. Awakening in the hospital, Carver has no memory of being shot, but is certain that his assailant is the Thorn Killer. He insists the attack is retaliation, an attempt to scare the detective off the psychopath’s scent. One person knows the truth and isn’t telling. She’s also now leading the Thorn Killer investigation while Carver recuperates. Ruth is keeping a deadly secret, and she’ll cross every line to keep it from surfacing. Reviewed by Ray Palen.
UNLOADED VOLUME 2: More Crime Writers Writing Without Guns edited by Eric Beetner (Mystery & Thriller/Short Stories)
The Anthony-nominated collection of crime stories without guns is back for Volume 2. Two dozen more crime writers have come together to raise their voices and take pen in hand to call for a sensible and reasoned debate about guns in America. In stories of crime, mystery and suspense, these authors have left the guns out to show for a short while that we can do without them and the plot doesn’t fall apart. The top priority in these stories is to entertain with thrilling action and suspense that readers know and love about a crime story. To do so without guns leads to some creative leaps from writers who spin tales of simians on the loose, androids with buried secrets, punk rock shows and tattoo shops. Reviewed by L. Dean Murphy.
WHAT WE WERE PROMISED by Lucy Tan (Fiction)
Audiobook available, read by Jennifer Lim
After years of chasing the American dream, the Zhen family has moved back to China. Wei, Lina and their daughter, Karen, join an elite community of Chinese-born, Western-educated professionals who have returned to a radically transformed city. One morning, in the eighth tower of Lanson Suites, Lina discovers that a treasured ivory bracelet has gone missing. This incident sets off a wave of unease that ripples throughout the Zhen household. Lina is haunted by the circumstances surrounding her arranged marriage to Wei and her lingering feelings for his brother, Qiang. When Qiang reappears in Shanghai after decades on the run with a local gang, the family must finally come to terms with the past and its indelible mark on their futures. Reviewed by Maya Gittelman.
WHISTLE IN THE DARK by Emma Healey (Psychological Thriller)
Audiobook available, read by Julia Deakin and Laura Aikman
Jen and Hugh Maddox have just survived every parent’s worst nightmare. Their 15-year-old daughter, Lana, was found bloodied, bruised and disoriented after going missing for four days during a mother-daughter vacation in the country. She lies mute in her hospital bed, unwilling or unable to articulate what happened to her during that period. Even when she returns to the family home and her school routine, Lana only provides the same frustrating answer over and over: "I can’t remember." Without telling Hugh or their pregnant older daughter Meg, Jen sets off to retrace Lana’s steps, a journey that will lead her to a deeper understanding of her youngest daughter, her family and herself. Reviewed by Katherine B. Weissman.
THE WRONG HEAVEN: Stories by Amy Bonnaffons (Fiction/Short Stories)
Audiobook available, read by Alex Vaillant
In THE WRONG HEAVEN, anything is possible: bodies can transform, inanimate objects come to life, angels appear and disappear. Amy Bonnaffons draws us into a delightfully strange universe, in which her conflicted characters seek to solve their sexual and spiritual dilemmas in all the wrong places. The title story's heroine reckons with grief while arguing with loquacious Jesus and Mary lawn ornaments that come to life when she plugs them in. In "Horse," we enter a world in which women transform themselves into animals through a series of medical injections. In "Alternate," a young woman convinces herself that all she needs to revive a stagnant relationship is the perfect poster of the Dalai Lama. Reviewed by Sarah Rachel Egelman.