Adult

Stephen R. Donaldson may have been quiet since the release of THE LAST DARK in 2013, but that doesn’t mean he wasn’t busy during that time. While he is most well known for his 10-volume series featuring Thomas Covenant --- a vast epic rivaling those who garner more press raves than he does --- it is an often overlooked fact that Donaldson is just as comfortable with shorter works as he is with sprawling page counts. With THE KING’S JUSTICE, Donaldson provides readers with two finely crafted and riveting page-turners.

In his role as an undercover investigator for the British Horseracing Authority, Jeff Hinkley is approached by a multi-time champion jockey to discuss the delicate matter of losing races on purpose. Little does he know that the call will set off a lethal chain of events, including the apparent suicide of the jockey and an attempt on Hinkley’s own life. Never one to leave suspicious events alone, Hinkley begins investigating the jockey and the races he may have thrown. But there are others out there who intend to prevent his inquiry from probing further…at any cost.

Emily and husband Colin have come to the French Riviera for what should be a joyous occasion --- the engagement party of her lifelong friend Jeremy, Duke of Bainbridge, and Amity Wells, an American heiress. But the merrymaking is cut short with the shocking death of one of the party in an apparent suicide. Not convinced by the coroner's verdict, Emily must employ all of her investigative skills to discover the truth and avert another tragedy.

Twin brothers Omar and Yaqub may share the same features, but they could not be more different from one another. And the possessive love of their mother, Zana, stirs the troubled waters between them even more. After a brutally violent exchange between the young boys, Yaqub, “the good son,” is sent from his home in Brazil to live with relatives in Lebanon, only to return five years later as a virtual stranger to the parents who bore him, his tensions with Omar unchanged. Family secrets engage the reader in this profoundly resonant story about identity, love, loss, deception and the dissolution of blood ties.

With a history of violence and bad decisions behind him, and the threat of prison dogging his every step, Colin Hancock is determined to walk a straight line. Maria Sanchez, the hardworking daughter of Mexican immigrants, is the picture of conventional success. Yet she has a traumatic history of her own, one that compelled her to return to her hometown and left her questioning so much of what she once believed. A chance encounter on a rain-swept road will alter the course of both Colin and Maria's lives, challenging deeply held assumptions about each other and, ultimately, themselves.

When Thomas Jefferson became president in 1801, America was deeply in debt and needed its economy to grow quickly. But its merchant ships were under attack by pirates from North Africa’s Barbary coast who routinely captured American sailors and held them as slaves. In response, Jefferson sent the U.S. Navy’s new warships and a detachment of marines to blockade Tripoli --- launching the Barbary Wars and beginning America’s journey toward future superpower status.

In this revealing collection of essays written in his irreverent, hilarious and self-deprecating voice, Kunal Nayyar (Raj from “The Big Bang Theory”) traces his journey from a little boy in New Delhi who mistakes an awkward first kiss for a sacred commitment, gets nosebleeds chugging Coca-Cola to impress other students, and excels in the sport of badminton, to the confident, successful actor on the set of TV’s most-watched sitcom since “Friends.”

Oliver Otway Orme --- a man equally self-aggrandizing and self-deprecating --- is a painter of some renown and a petty thief who has never been caught…until now. Unfortunately, the purloined possession in question is the wife of the man who was, perhaps, his best friend. Fearing the consequences, Ollie has fled --- not only from his mistress, his home and his wife, but from the very impulse to paint, and from his own demons. He sequesters himself in the house where he was born and sets about trying to uncover the answer to how and why things have turned out as they did.