Suspense/Thriller Author Spotlight: THE MUNICH AFFAIR by James Patterson and David Ellis
Spanning a century, THE MUNICH AFFAIR is set in motion by the murder of Adolf Hitler's young lover by his own hand. A determined detective, Thomas Bauer, obsessively pursues Hitler --- putting Bauer’s Jewish wife and children in grave danger. A courageous journalist, Fritz Gerlich, writes story after story detailing the murder --- making Gerlich a target for Hitler’s Gestapo. An American professor, Eleanor Robbins, picks up the trail of evidence from present-day Neo-Nazis guarding the Führer’s long-held secrets to the death.
» Click here to read more in our Suspense/Thriller Author Spotlight.
» Click here to read our review.
Bookreporter.com Bets On: THE BIRTHING TREE by Amanda Peters
I had enjoyed THE BERRY PICKERS, so I was looking forward to THE BIRTHING TREE. Once again, Amanda Peters brings us to the Mi’kmaq community in Nova Scotia.
Aliet Paul was born under a tree in a small Nova Scotia town, delivered by her grandmother, Kiju. Her mother died during childbirth, and her father remains unknown except to a select few. She was raised by Kiju, who, in addition to being a midwife, knew of the use of herbs to heal various ailments. One family that came each year had a boy named John, who was a friend to Aliet and then much more. She wrote him letters when he returned home, and there was a real bond between them.
» Click here to read more of Carol's Bets On commentary.
» Click here to read our review.
Bookreporter.com's Word of Mouth Contest: Tell Us What You've Read --- and You Can Win Two Books!
Let us know by Friday, October 9th at noon ET what books you’ve read, and you’ll have a chance to win AMERICAN HAGWON by Min Jin Lee and THE VANISHING FAMILY: Love, Fate, and the Quest to End Dementia by Robert Kolker.
By turns sweeping and intimate, AMERICAN HAGWON reckons with ambition and moderation, lust and loyalty, personal dreams and familial duty. An upcoming Bookreporter.com Bets On selection, THE VANISHING FAMILY tells the heart-wrenching journey of a family facing an unthinkable destiny, whose flawed genetic code might hold the long-sought key to a cure for dementia.
» Click here to enter the contest.
Bookreporter.com's 16th Annual Fall Reading Contests and Feature
Fall is known as the biggest season of the year for books. The titles that release during this latter part of the year often become holiday gifts, and many are blockbusters. In our Fall Reading Contests and Feature, we are spotlighting a number of outstanding books that we know people will be talking about this fall.
We are hosting a series of 24-hour contests for these titles on select days through mid-October, so you will have to check the site each day to see the featured prize book and enter to win. We also are sending a special newsletter to announce the day's title, which you can sign up for here.
Our next prize book will be COME CLOSER: Childhood Wounds, Adult Love, and the Secrets of Emotional Intimacy by Dr. Galit Atlas, which reveals how our childhood wounds hold the key to understanding our adult relationships. The contest will be up at noon ET on the day of its release, Tuesday, September 29th.
» Click here to read all the contest details and learn more about our featured titles.
As part of our mission to expand The Book Report Network, we have been shooting video interviews with authors and posting them on our YouTube channel. We also have been making them available as podcasts. Carol loves interviewing authors, so this feels like a natural.
Carol had a wonderful conversation with Jonathan Santlofer about his new thriller, TEN PERFECT GUESTS, which will be a Bets On pick. Jonathan describes the book as a classic whodunit featuring 10 characters brought to an isolated island for a memorial, with an inheritance at stake. He wanted to use all classic tropes --- locked room, large cast, hidden motives --- without a detective figure. He explains that managing so many distinct characters was more difficult than anticipated, requiring a character chart and careful differentiation so readers would not need to look back. Watch the video or listen to the podcast.
Hank Phillippi Ryan's new novel, MOTHER DAUGHTER SISTER STRANGER, is a Bets On selection. This multilayered domestic thriller centers on two sisters, Eliza and Bea Ramsey, the sole survivors of a plane crash that killed their parents. When Bea disappears on the 11th anniversary of the tragedy, Eliza must find Bea while caring for her 11-year-old niece, Piper. The book was inspired by Hank reflecting on lying to her mother as a teenager and then wondering if her mother had also lied to her --- questioning the truth of family history and legacy. Watch the video or listen to the podcast.
GETTING AWAY WITH MURDER by Shari Lapena is a Bets On title. The novel centers on Jill and Ted, a privileged Manhattan couple who live in a Brooklyn Heights brownstone. Shari chose this as their home due to her personal fascination with these properties, using a coffee table book of floor plans and history for research. The two kill Ted's wealthy older brother, Greg (setting it up to look like a sailing accident), in order to inherit his estate and preserve their lifestyle. The settings throughout the book become characters of their own, and it is very interesting to see how this murder affects each character. Watch the video or listen to the podcast.
» Click here for a complete list of our "Bookreporter Talks To" videos and podcasts, along with upcoming interviews.
For more than half a century, Paul Theroux has traveled the globe and chronicled its far corners with curiosity, wit and an unflinching eye. With TRUE NORTH, he turns that eye to a country that has long been his quiet neighbor: Canada. What begins as the completion of a North American road trip trilogy becomes something more personal. Theroux meets his Quebcois friends and relations, then travels more widely through remote villages, multicultural cities and sweeping landscapes that have defined modern Canada. Along the way, he speaks with farmers, refugees, writers like John Irving and Michael Ondaatje, and Indigenous leaders such as Tanya Talaga, listening as Canadians reckon with identity, belonging and patriotism.
In 1981, KGB Major Vladimir Kuzichkin, codenamed “Redwood,” was the best Soviet officer in Iran, running spies in the wake of the Islamic revolution and working with a hidden network of Iranian communists to undermine the new regime. But Kuzichkin had a problem, a sexual secret that, if revealed, would humiliate him with his colleagues, cost him his job, and send him into exile. Desperate for a solution, he reached out to the only place he believed could help: Britain’s MI6. So begins one of the most astounding true spy stories of the Cold War, set against the terrifying prospect of nuclear armageddon. In REDWOOD, Ben Macintyre unfolds a world in turmoil, where no one’s motive is what it seems, and exposure means death.
Before he was known as the Four Monkey Killer, he was just a boy trying to survive. Charleston, 1999. Fifteen-year-old Anson Bishop didn't mean to kill --- not the first time, anyway. Raised by parents who taught him that murder was simply survival, Anson thought he'd escaped his dark past when his home burned and his mother vanished with stolen mob money. He was wrong. Someone is hunting Charleston's forgotten children --- runaways, the addicts, the ones no one will miss. When the few people Anson has come to care about vanish into the night, he discovers a truth more horrifying than anything his parents taught him: there are monsters in the world far worse than the one he sees in the mirror.
Dorothy Wagner has spent her whole life wanting nothing more than to be seen. But after failing to make her mark as an influencer, she takes a job working for a brilliant coder whose company is focused on cutting-edge deepfake technology. And there, in secret, is where she creates her salvation. Isabella. An impossibly gorgeous girl who takes social media by storm. Dorothy's artistry is brilliant, and Isabella seems so real that she garners millions of followers. But everybody knows that overnight success doesn’t just happen. And when someone gets a little too close to the truth, a violent confrontation sends Dorothy on the run, forcing her to confront what she’s willing to sacrifice to keep her secrets.
Peter Gammons is the preeminent baseball writer of his generation. Nearly every significant figure in the game has shared stories with him. IT’S ALL ABOUT THE PLAYERS reveals what Gammons has learned from those greats about baseball and life. He details the emergence of Latin and Asian players in Major League Baseball and the symbiotic relationships between manager and general managers, catchers and pitchers, and second basemen and shortstops. He recalls his chance childhood meeting with Roger Maris as he was falling in love with baseball. He speaks to the marriage between rock n' roll and baseball, and tells the story of how Ted Williams claimed he could smell the wood burning on his bat after smoking line drives to the outfield.
When a search dog locates a mass burial ground in the Oregon forest, Detective Noelle Marshall is plunged into a hunt for a killer who’s hiding in plain sight. The key to her case lies in a decades-old secret: a lone survivor who escaped and is still out there, living in fear. The murderer is a phantom who left behind a collection of victims with nothing in common but their final resting place. As pressure mounts to identify the bodies and find the killer, the investigation draws in FBI Agent Max Rhodes --- Noelle’s partner in work and in life. They’ve hunted monsters before, but this one has spent years preparing for this moment, and he craves revenge.
In this new collection of genre-defying stories by Cristina Rivera Garza, a woman visits what she thinks could be her old lover's hometown after being abandoned by her years earlier. Two herons hitchhike across Mexico. A group of workers build a new home, only to see it destroyed by the state. With little baggage and much bravado, the characters in TERRESTRIAL hitchhike, migrate, take trains, wander or, at times, fly to survive the mandates of patriarchy and capitalism. On dusty roads or by a lake turned suddenly ominous, they remain in close contact with the earth's surface, sensing its wild promise and capacity for violence, its degradation and enduring beauty.
Following a catastrophic plane crash, married couple Mam and Bunko have found themselves in Cloud Six. It's the newest --- and lowest --- tier of heaven, run by a slumlord demon named Widdershins who takes the form of an underwear model. With a rabbit skeleton as their guide, the pair do their best to remain hopeful and together in their quest: to navigate the strangest of places, to find help, and to catch even one glimpse of the teen daughter they left behind. While Mam and Bunko try to accept their fate, Widdershins navigates workplace politics and tries to impress an ex-lover. And Amy, who appears in the book as our guide and scribe, grapples with how to tell an honest story with Satan breathing down her neck.