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End-of-the-Year Contest 2019

Congratulations to the winners of our 2019 End-of-the-Year Contest! One Grand Prize winner received all 52 of Carol Fitzgerald's Bookreporter.com Bets On picks from 2019, while 13 others won a selection of four of these titles. You can see all the winners below, along with 2019's Bets On books.

Melanie Benjamin, author of Mistress of the Ritz

Blanche Auzello and her husband, Claude, the mistress and master of the Ritz, allow the glamour and glitz of the hotel to take their minds off their troubled marriage, and off the secrets that they keep from their guests --- and each other. Until June 1940, when the German army sweeps into Paris, setting up headquarters at the Ritz. Suddenly, Blanche and Claude must navigate a terrifying new reality. In order to survive, and strike a blow against their Nazi “guests,” they must spin a web of deceit that ensnares everything and everyone they cherish.

Mistress of the Ritz by Melanie Benjamin

May 2019

MISTRESS OF THE RITZ by Melanie Benjamin is set in Paris during World War II. There, Blanche Auzello and her husband, Claude, are the mistress and master of the Hôtel Ritz, one of the city's best-known hotels. Blanche is American and is hiding a secret from the Nazis who are encamped at the Ritz. She’s also a member of the Resistance, going to all lengths to try to outwit the Germans, who she feels are causing blight on a place she loves so much. Claude is trying to balance the demands of the Germans with those of the other hotel guests who have been decamped to the drearier part of the building.

Week of May 25, 2020

Paperback releases for the week of May 25th include THIS TENDER LAND by William Kent Krueger, a magnificent novel about four orphans on a life-changing odyssey during the early years of the Great Depression that shines new light on a pivotal time in American history; Melanie Benjamin's MISTRESS OF THE RITZ, a captivating novel based on the story of the extraordinary real-life American woman who secretly worked for the French Resistance during World War II, while playing hostess to the invading Germans at the iconic Hôtel Ritz in Paris; INLAND, a stunning tale of perseverance from Téa Obreht, the bestselling author of THE TIGER'S WIFE --- an epic journey across an unforgettable landscape of magic and myth; THE SENTENCE IS DEATH, the sequel to Anthony Horowitz's brilliantly inventive THE WORD IS MURDER, a mystery that delves deep into the killing of a high-profile divorce lawyer and the death, only a day earlier, of his one-time friend; and MET HER MATCH by Jude Deveraux, which examines the tensions between the wealthy townspeople, the summer vacationers and the working-class people who keep the town of Summer Hill, Virginia, and its resort running.