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Reviews

Reviews

by Fredrik Backman - Fiction

Grandpa and Noah are sitting on a bench in a square that keeps getting smaller every day. As they wait together there, they tell jokes and discuss their shared love of mathematics. Grandpa recalls what it was like to fall in love with his wife, and what it was like to lose her. She’s as real to him now as the first day he met her, but he dreads the day when he won’t remember her. Sometimes Grandpa sits on the bench next to Ted, Noah’s father; in their love of Noah, they have found a common bond. Grandpa, Grandma, Ted and Noah all meet in this peculiar space that is growing dimmer and more confusing all the time.

by Pepper Harding - Fiction

Henry Quantum has several thoughts going through his head at any given time, so it’s no surprise when he forgets something very important --- specifically, a Christmas gift for his wife, which he realizes on the morning of December 23rd. Henry sets off that day in search of the perfect present for her: a bottle of Chanel No. 5 perfume. But much like Henry’s ever-wandering mind, his quest takes him in different and unexpected directions, including running into the former love of his life, Daisy. His wife, meanwhile, is hiding a secret of her own. And Daisy, who has made the unsettling choice of leaving her husband to strike out on her own, finds herself questioning whether she and Henry belong together after all.

by W. Bruce Cameron - Fiction, Humor, Mystery

Ruddy McCann is finally getting his life back on track. He has a beautiful fiancé, a somewhat stable job stealing cars, and a lazy, lovable basset hound. With his job suddenly in jeopardy, his fiancé wanting a break, and a new court-ordered psychiatrist insisting he take his medication or violate the terms of his probation, Ruddy finds himself missing the one thing he thought he would be happy to be rid of --- the voice of Alan Lottner, dead realtor and Ruddy's future father-in-law. When a woman tells Ruddy that the tragedy that defines his life may be a lie, Ruddy starts to investigate the disappearances of women in the area and soon discovers that his own redemption may be within reach.

by Laura McHugh - Fiction, Mystery, Psychological Suspense, Psychological Thriller, Suspense, Thriller

Arrowood, the most ornate and grand of the historical houses that line the Mississippi River, has a mystery it has never revealed: It’s where Arden Arrowood’s younger twin sisters vanished on her watch 20 years ago, never to be seen again. After the twins’ disappearance, Arden’s parents divorced and the Arrowoods left the big house that had been in their family for generations. Arden has held on to the hope that her sisters are still alive, and it seems she can’t move forward until she finds them. When her father dies and she inherits Arrowood, Arden returns to her childhood home determined to discover what really happened to her sisters that traumatic summer.

by Heather Young - Fiction, Mystery

In 1935, six-year-old Emily Evans vanishes from her family’s vacation home on a remote Minnesota lake. Sixty years later, Emily’s sister, Lucy, lives in the lake house alone. Before her death, she writes the story of that devastating summer in a notebook that she leaves, along with the house, to her grandniece, Justine. Justine’s only neighbor is a strange old man who seems to know more about the summer of 1935 than he’s telling. Soon Justine’s troubled oldest daughter becomes obsessed with Emily’s disappearance, her mother arrives to steal her inheritance, and the man she left launches a dangerous plan to get her back.

written by Melanie Raabe, translated by Imogen Taylor - Fiction, Suspense, Thriller

For 11 years, bestselling author Linda Conrads has mystified fans by never setting foot outside her home. Haunted by the unsolved murder of her younger sister and the face of the man she saw fleeing the scene, Linda's hermit existence helps her cope with debilitating anxiety. But the sanctity of her oasis is shattered when she sees her sister's murderer on television. Hobbled by years of isolation, Linda resolves to use the plot of her next novel to lay an irresistible trap for the man. As the plan is set in motion and the past comes rushing back, Linda's memories --- and her very sanity --- are called into question.

by Flynn Berry - Fiction, Psychological Suspense, Psychological Thriller, Suspense, Thriller

When Nora takes the train from London to visit her sister in the countryside, she expects to find her waiting at the station, or at home cooking dinner. But when she walks into Rachel’s familiar house, what she finds is entirely different: Her sister has been the victim of a brutal murder. Stunned and adrift, Nora finds she can’t return to her former life. An unsolved assault in the past has shaken her faith in the police, and she can’t trust them to find her sister’s killer. Haunted by the murder and the secrets that surround it, Nora is under the harrow: distressed and in danger. As Nora’s fear turns to obsession, she becomes as unrecognizable as the sister her investigation uncovers.

by Steven Rowley - Fiction

Ted, a gay, single, struggling writer, is stuck: unable to open himself up to intimacy except through the steadfast companionship of Lily, his elderly dachshund. When Lily’s health is compromised, Ted vows to save her by any means necessary. By turns hilarious and poignant, an adventure with spins into magic realism and beautifully evoked truths of loss and longing, LILY AND THE OCTOPUS reminds us how it feels to love fiercely, how difficult it can be to let go, and how the fight for those we love is the greatest fight of all.

by Bill Pronzini - Fiction, Mystery

ZIGZAG includes two novellas and two short stories featuring Bill Pronzini's iconic Nameless Detective. “Zigzag” is an original novella, in which a safe and simple accident investigation becomes the unraveling of a twisted murder scheme. “Grapplin” deals with the kind of missing person case that can end in only one of two ways: closure or heartbreak. In the second short, “Nightscape,” readers discover how, indeed, one thing just leads to another. The final work, “Revenant,” is another original novella and entangles Nameless in a weird crime with fearful occult overtones.

by Max Allan Collins - Fiction, Historical Fiction, Historical Thriller, Suspense, Thriller

It's the early 1950s, and Joe McCarthy is campaigning to rid America of the Red Menace. Nate Heller is doing legwork for the senator, though the Chicago detective is disheartened by McCarthy's witch-hunting tactics. He's made friends with a young staffer, Bobby Kennedy, while trading barbs with a potential enemy, the attorney Roy Cohn, who rubs Heller the wrong way. Not the least of which for successfully prosecuting the so-called Atomic Bomb spies, Julius and Ethel Rosenberg. When Dashiell Hammett comes to Heller representing a group of showbiz and literary leftists who are engaged in a last-minute attempt to save the Rosenbergs, Heller decides to take on the case.