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Reviews

Reviews

by James Patterson and Matt Eversmann - Biography, Nonfiction

To be a bookseller or librarian, you have to play detective. Be a treasure hunter. A matchmaker. An advocate. A visionary. A person who creates “book joy” by pulling a book from a shelf, handing it to someone and saying, “You’ve got to read this. You’re going to love it.” Step inside THE SECRET LIVES OF BOOKSELLERS AND LIBRARIANS and enter a world where you can feed your curiosities, discover new voices, and find whatever you want or require. This place has the magic of rainbows and unicorns, but it's also a business. The book business.  Meet the smart and talented people who live between the pages --- and who can’t wait to help you find your next favorite book.

by Daniel de Visé - Biography, Entertainment, Nonfiction, Performing Arts, Popular Culture

“They’re not going to catch us,” Dan Aykroyd, as Elwood Blues, tells his brother Jake, played by John Belushi. “We’re on a mission from God.” So opens the musical action comedy The Blues Brothers, which hit theaters on June 20, 1980. Much delayed and vastly over budget, beset by mercurial and oft-drugged-out stars, the film opened to outraged reviews. However, in the 44 years since, it has been acknowledged a classic. Based on original research and dozens of interviews probing the memories of principals from director John Landis and producer Bob Weiss to Aykroyd himself, THE BLUES BROTHERS illuminates an American masterpiece while vividly portraying the creative geniuses behind modern comedy.

by Sarah Langan - Fiction, Psychological Suspense, Psychological Thriller, Suspense, Thriller

You’ll be safe here. That’s what the tour guide tells the Farmer-Bowens when they visit Plymouth Valley, a walled-off company town with clean air, pantries that never go empty, and blue-ribbon schools. On a very trial basis, the company offers to hire Linda Farmer’s husband, Russell, a numbers genius, and relocate her whole family to this bucolic paradise for the .0001 percent. Though Linda will have to sacrifice her medical career back home, the family jumps at the opportunity. But fitting in takes work. The pampered locals distrust outsiders, snubbing Linda, Russell and their teen twins. And the residents fervently adhere to a group of customs and beliefs called Hollow. But what exactly is Hollow? The more Linda learns, the more frightened she becomes. Should the Farmer-Bowens be fighting to stay, or fighting to get out?

by Andrew Mayne - Adventure, Fiction, Suspense, Thriller

After the Underwater Investigation Unit’s disbandment, public outcry ushers Sloan McPherson and her partner, former navy diver Scott Hughes, back into the depths of crime solving. But Sloan’s return comes with a personal case. Longtime family friend Fred Stafford has disappeared. Left behind: his abandoned truck in the vicinity of an unmarked sinkhole and new findings that have Sloan second-guessing everything she thought she knew about the man. There are his gambling debts, his association with a treasure-hunting band of underwater cavern junkies called the Dive Rats, and a discovery in Stafford’s storage shed that raises the stakes even higher and plunges Sloan into an unfathomable mystery. As Sloan’s investigation unfolds, a tragic Florida cold case, local superstitions and a shocking conspiracy collide.

by Scott Carson - Fiction, Horror, Supernatural Thriller, Suspense, Thriller

For a 16-year-old, a summer internship working for a private investigator seems like a dream come true --- particularly since the PI is investigating the most shocking crime to hit Bloomington, Indiana, in decades. A local woman has vanished, and the last time anyone saw her, she was in the backseat of a police car driven by a man impersonating an officer. Marshall Miller’s internship puts him at the center of the action, a position he relishes until a terrifying moment that turns public praise for his sharp observations and uncanny memory into accusations of lying and imperiling the case. His detective mentor withdraws, friends and family worry and whisper, and Marshall alone understands that the darkness visiting his town this summer goes far beyond a single crime. Now his task is to explain it --- and himself.

by Steve Cavanagh - Fiction, Psychological Suspense, Psychological Thriller, Suspense, Thriller

One dark evening on New York City’s Upper West Side, two strangers meet by chance. Over drinks, Amanda and Wendy realize they have much in common, especially loneliness and an intense desire for revenge against the men who destroyed their families. As they talk into the night, they come up with the perfect plan: If you kill for me, I’ll kill for you. In another part of the city, Ruth is home alone when the beautiful brownstone she shares with her husband, Scott, is invaded. She’s attacked by a man with piercing blue eyes, who disappears into the night. Will she ever be able to feel safe again while the blue-eyed stranger is out there?

by Abigail Dean - Fiction, Psychological Suspense, Psychological Thriller, Suspense, Thriller

A village hall, a primary school play, a beautiful Lake District town in England. Into this idyllic scene steps a lone gunman whose actions set off a train of events that will have devastating consequences for the close-knit community of Stonesmere. In the weeks following the cataclysm, conspiracy theorists start questioning what happened. Two young people find themselves at the epicenter of the uproar: Marty, the town’s golden girl and daughter of a teacher killed that day, and Trent, whose memories of his brief time trying to fit into Stonesmere fuel his attachment to the conspiracies. But what really happened at the Day One assembly? What secrets is Marty keeping, and what blindspots does Trent miss? In this world where news travels fast, and videos and gossip travel faster, how does a community move forward together?

by Don Winslow - Fiction, Suspense, Thriller

Danny Ryan --- former dock worker, Irish mob soldier and fugitive from the law --- is now a Las Vegas casino mogul and billionaire silent partner in a group that owns two lavish hotels. Finally, Danny has it all: a beautiful house, a child he adores, and a woman he might even fall in love with. But when Danny tries to convert an old hotel into his dream resort, he triggers a war against Las Vegas power brokers, a powerful FBI agent bent on revenge, and a rival casino owner with dark connections of his own. To save his life and everything he loves, Danny must become the ruthless fighter he once was --- and never wanted to be again. Following CITY ON FIRE and CITY OF DREAMS, CITY IN RUINS is the explosive conclusion to Don Winslow’s genre-defining crime trilogy and the final book of his extraordinary career.

by Stephen Graham Jones - Fiction, Horror, Supernatural Thriller, Suspense, Thriller

THE ANGEL OF INDIAN LAKE is the final installment in Stephen Graham Jones’ trilogy that kicked off with MY HEART IS A CHAINSAW and continued in DON’T FEAR THE REAPER. It’s been four years in prison since Jade Daniels last saw her hometown of Proofrock, Idaho, the day she took the fall, protecting her friend, Letha, and her family from incrimination. Since then, her reputation and the town have changed dramatically. There’s a lot of unfinished business in Proofrock, from serial killer cultists to the rich trying to buy Western authenticity. But there’s one aspect of Proofrock no one wants to confront…until Jade comes back to town. The curse of the Lake Witch is waiting, and now is the time for the final stand.

by Sulari Gentill - Fiction, Literary Fiction, Literary Mystery, Mystery, Suspense, Thriller

When Theodosia Benton abandons her career path as an attorney and shows up on her brother's doorstep with two suitcases and an unfinished novel, she expects to face a few challenges. What Theo never expects is to be drawn into a hidden literary world in which identity is something that can be lost and remade for the sake of an audience. When her mentor, a highly successful author, is brutally murdered, Theo wants the killer to be found and justice to be served. Then the police begin looking at her brother, Gus, as their prime suspect, and Theo does the unthinkable in order to protect him. But the writer has left a trail, a thread out of the labyrinth in the form of a story. Gus finds that thread and follows it, and in his attempt to save his sister, he inadvertently threatens the foundations of the labyrinth itself.