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Reviews

Reviews

by Ian McEwan - Fiction

MACHINES LIKE ME takes place in an alternative 1980s London. Charlie, drifting through life and dodging full-time employment, is in love with Miranda, a bright student who lives with a terrible secret. When Charlie comes into money, he buys Adam, one of the first synthetic humans and --- with Miranda's help --- designs Adam's personality. The near-perfect human that emerges is beautiful, strong and clever. It isn't long before a love triangle soon forms, and these three beings confront a profound moral dilemma.

by Robert A. Caro - Memoir, Nonfiction

For the first time in book form, Robert Caro gives us a glimpse into his own life and work in these evocatively written, personal pieces. He describes what it was like to interview the mighty Robert Moses; the combination of discouragement and exhilaration he felt confronting the vast holdings of the Lyndon B. Johnson Library in Austin, Texas; his encounters with witnesses, including longtime residents wrenchingly displaced by the construction of Moses' Cross-Bronx Expressway and Lady Bird Johnson acknowledging the beauty and influence of one of LBJ's mistresses. He gratefully remembers how, after years of working in solitude, he found a writers' community at the New York Public Library, and details the ways he goes about planning and composing his books.

by David Rosenfelt - Fiction, Suspense, Thriller

Doug Brock hasn't had it easy since getting shot in the line of duty as a New Jersey state police officer. Between the amnesia and having to solve two murder cases, it hasn't been the most restful recovery. But now an old case of his has resurfaced, and it’s up to him to retrace his steps --- steps he can’t remember --- to solve it. Eighteen months ago, Walter Brookings was shot through the heart. With no clear motive and no similar murders, the investigation stalled and became a cold case. When another man is murdered in the same fashion and the ballistics come back as a match, Doug begins to reinvestigate and starts to question his own actions from the previous investigation.

by Harriet Tyce - Fiction, Psychological Suspense, Psychological Thriller, Suspense, Thriller

Alison has it all: a doting husband, an adorable daughter and a career on the rise --- she's just been given her first murder case to defend. But Alison drinks too much. She's neglecting her family. And she's having an affair with a colleague whose taste for pushing boundaries may be more than she can handle. Alison's client doesn't deny that she stabbed her husband --- she wants to plead guilty. And yet something about her story is deeply amiss. Saving this woman may be the first step to Alison saving herself. But someone knows Alison's secrets. Someone who wants to make her pay for what she's done, and who won't stop until she's lost everything.

by W.K. Stratton - Entertainment, History, Nonfiction

Sam Peckinpah's film The Wild Bunch is the story of a gang of outlaws who are one big steal from retirement. When their attempted train robbery goes awry, the gang flees to Mexico and falls in with a brutal general of the Mexican Revolution, who offers them the job of a lifetime. Conceived by a stuntman, directed by a blacklisted director, and shot in the sand and heat of the Mexican desert, the movie seemed doomed. Instead, it became an instant classic with a dark, violent take on the Western movie tradition. Fifty years after its release, W.K. Stratton tells the fascinating history of the movie and documents for the first time the extraordinary contribution of Mexican and Mexican-American actors and crew members to its success.

by Andrew Grant - Fiction, Mystery, Suspense, Thriller

As a young man, Paul McGrath rebelled against his pacifist father by becoming a standout Army recruit and the star of his military intelligence unit. But lingering regrets about their relationship make him return home, only to find his father dead, seemingly murdered. When the case ends in a mistrial, something doesn’t smell right to McGrath. So he puts his arsenal of skills to work to find out just how corrupt the legal system is. And to keep digging, he gets a job at the courthouse as a janitor. While McGrath knows that nothing he discovers can undo his past wrongs or save his father, he finds his new calling brings him something else: the chance to right current wrongs and save others --- that is, if the powerful and corrupt don’t kill him first.

by John Boyne - Fiction

Maurice Swift is handsome, charming and hungry for fame. Working as a waiter in a West Berlin hotel in 1988, he has a chance encounter with celebrated novelist Erich Ackermann. Maurice quickly ingratiates himself with the powerful --- but desperately lonely --- older man, teasing out of Erich a terrible, long-held secret about his activities during the war. Perfect material for Maurice’s first novel. Moving from the Amalfi Coast, where he matches wits with Gore Vidal, to Manhattan and London, Maurice hones his talent for deceit and manipulation, preying on the talented and vulnerable in his cold-blooded climb to the top. But the higher he climbs, the further he has to fall.

by Andrew Roberts - Biography, History, Nonfiction

When we seek an example of great leaders with unalloyed courage, the person who comes to mind is Winston Churchill: the iconic, visionary war leader immune from the consensus of the day, who stood firmly for his beliefs when everyone doubted him. But how did young Winston become Churchill? What gave him the strength to take on the superior force of Nazi Germany when bombs rained on London and so many others had caved? In CHURCHILL, Andrew Roberts gives readers the full and definitive Winston Churchill, from birth to lasting legacy.

by John Feinstein - Nonfiction, Sports

In the National Football League, one player becomes the face of a franchise, one player receives all the accolades and all the blame, and one player's hand will guide the rise or fall of an entire team's season --- and the dreams of millions of fans. There are 32 starting quarterbacks in the NFL on any given Sunday, and their lives are built around pressure, stardom and incredible talent. Legendary bestselling sportswriter John Feinstein shows readers what it's really like to play the glory position and to live that life --- mapping out a journey that runs from college stardom to the NFL draft to taking command of the huddle and marching a team down the field with a nation of fans cheering.

by Michael Harvey - Fiction, Suspense, Thriller

In a small apartment in Boston, 16-year-old Daniel Fitzsimmons is listening to his landlord describe a seemingly insane theory about invisible pulses of light and energy that can be harnessed by the human mind. He longs to laugh with his brother Harry about it, but Harry doesn’t know he’s there. None of that matters, though, because the next night Harry, a Harvard football star, is murdered in an alley. Detectives “Bark” Jones and Tommy Dillon are assigned to the case. The veteran partners thought they’d seen it all, but they are stunned when Daniel wanders into the crime scene. Even stranger, Daniel claims to have known the details of his brother’s murder before it ever happened.