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In this newsletter, you will find books releasing the weeks of December 18th and December 25th that we think will be of interest to Bookreporter.com readers, along with Bonus News, where we call out a contest, feature or review that we want to let you know about so you have it on your radar.
This week, we are calling attention to our Holiday Author Blogs, which return for a 10th(!) straight year. Sharing with us some wonderful holiday memories are Chloe Benjamin, Alafair Burke, Karen Cleveland, Chris Fabry, A. J. Finn, Tayari Jones, Nick Petrie, Francine Rivers, Sarah Vaughan, Beatriz Williams and Lauren Willig.
Also, please keep in mind our very special End-of-the-Year contest featuring Carol Fitzgerald’s Bookreporter.com Bets On picks from 2017. One Grand Prize winner will be awarded all 40 books, while eight other winners will receive a selection of five of these titles. The deadline for your entries is Monday, January 8th at noon ET.
And be sure to check out our Reviewer Picks for 2017. Once again, we asked our reviewers to let us know what some of their favorite books of the year were. Take a moment to read these varied lists of titles and see if you agree with any of their selections!
For those of you who are doing online shopping --- including shopping for gifts --- if you use the store links below, Bookreporter.com gets a small affiliate fee on your purchases. We would appreciate your considering this.
Amazon | Barnes & Noble | Indiebound
This Week's Bonus News:
Bookreporter.com's Holiday Author Blogs
Our Holiday Author Blogs have returned for a 10th(!) consecutive year. We are featuring a new blog post from an author each weekday until December 22nd talking about the books they have given and/or received during the holidays.
Here are the pieces we have received so far:
Still to come are contributions from Chloe Benjamin, A. J. Finn and Nick Petrie.
Click here to read Bookreporter.com's 2017 Holiday Author Blogs.
On Sale the Week of December 18th in Hardcover
December 19th
MY BROTHER’S KEEPER by Donna Malane (Psychological Thriller/Mystery)
Diane Rowe is a missing persons expert. Ex-con Karen needs Diane's help to track down her 14-year-old daughter, Sunny, with whom she's lost contact while she's been in prison. To Diane, this appears at first glance to be a simple case of a mother wanting to reunite with a beloved daughter. Tracking the girl down is easy. However, convincing her to meet her mother is no easy task. And at the back of Diane's mind is a nagging thought --- that guilt and innocence aren't straightforward and nothing is quite what it seems. Does Karen really want to fix the wrongs of the past, or is there something darker at play here that will take all of Diane's skills to uncover?
Minotaur Books | 9781250111340
On Sale the Week of December 18th in Paperback
December 19th
THE LIFE AND TIMES OF PERSIMMON WILSON by Nancy Peacock (Historical Fiction)
Sitting in a jail cell on the eve of his hanging, freedman Persimmon “Persy” Wilson wants nothing more than to leave some record of the truth --- his truth. He may be guilty, but not of what he stands accused: the kidnapping and rape of his former master’s wife. Fifteen years earlier, Persy had been sold to a sugar plantation; his deep and instant connection with a house slave named Chloe fueled a love affair and inspired plans to escape their owner, Master Wilson. But on the eve of the Union Army’s attack on New Orleans, Wilson shot Persy, leaving him for dead, and fled with Chloe and his other slaves to Texas. So began Persy’s journey across the frontier, determined to reunite with his lost love.
Washington Square Press | 9781501116360
MAN OVERBOARD: An Ali Reynolds Novel by J.A. Jance (Mystery/Thriller)
Cybersecurity expert Roger McGeary finally has his life back on track after years of struggling with depression. But when he falls from the balcony of his suite on an all-expenses-paid cruise, the police quickly dismiss it as “death by misadventure,” a vague phrase leaving much to interpretation. Unsatisfied, Roger’s tough-as-nails aunt, Julia Miller, is determined to find answers and closure. By contacting Roger’s childhood friend, Stuart Ramey, to help her solve the mystery of his fate, Julia unwittingly sets up a collision course with a serial killer. Stuart, his sidekick Cami Lee, and journalist turned amateur sleuth Ali Reynolds put the full resources of cutting-edge online security firm High Noon Enterprises into learning the truth about Roger’s death.
Pocket Books | 9781501110825
NUMBER 11 by Jonathan Coe (Fiction)
Beginning in the early years of this century, NUMBER 11 follows two friends, Alison and Rachel, as they come of age. As the narrative progresses from the aftermath of the Iraq War to the present day, its scope broadens to include others who are variously connected to these two girls: Alison’s mother, a has-been singer, competes on a grisly reality TV show; Rachel’s university mentor finally confronts her late husband’s obsessive search for a German film he saw as a child; a young police constable investigates the seemingly unrelated deaths of two stand-up comedians; and a giant spider lurks in the darkness beneath one of London’s most staggeringly expensive neighborhoods.
Vintage | 9781101972809
OUR HEARTS WILL BURN US DOWN by Anne Valente (Fiction)
As members of the yearbook committee, Nick, Zola, Matt and Christina are eager to capture all the memorable moments of their junior year at Lewis and Clark High School. But how do you document a horrific tragedy --- a deadly school shooting by a classmate? Struggling to comprehend this cataclysmic event, these four survivors vow to honor the memories of those lost and the memories forgotten in the shadow of violence. But the shooting is only the first inexplicable trauma to rock their small suburban St. Louis town. A series of mysterious house fires have hit the families of the victims one by one, pushing the grieving town to the edge.
William Morrow Paperbacks | 9780062429148
OUT OF BOUNDS: A Karen Pirie Novel by Val McDermid (Mystery/Thriller)
When a teenage joyrider crashes a stolen car and ends up in a coma, a routine DNA test reveals a connection to an unsolved murder from 22 years before. It’s a cold case that should be straightforward. But it’s as twisted as the DNA helix itself. Meanwhile, Karen, mired in grief after the death of her partner, finds herself irresistibly drawn to a mystery that has its roots in a terrorist bombing two decades ago. Karen’s intuition is telling her something doesn’t add up. But is she on to something? Or has she, as her boss has been waiting for, gone too far this time?
Grove Press | 9780802127266
RING OF FIRE: A Pike Logan Thriller by Brad Taylor (Thriller/Adventure)
A former Delta Force commander, author Brad Taylor has lived in the world about which he writes, and his novels have tackled very real and current threats ranging from ISIS to Chechen terrorists to Boko Haram. In his latest action-packed thriller, RING OF FIRE, a chilling terrorist plot is about to unfold in the United States --- one involving simultaneous attacks across multiple locations in America --- and it’ll be up to Pike Logan, Jennifer Cahill and the Taskforce to prevent the threat from becoming a terrifying reality.
Dutton | 9781101984789
TRANSIT by Rachel Cusk (Fiction)
In the wake of her family’s collapse, a writer and her two young sons move to London. The process of this upheaval is the catalyst for a number of transitions --- personal, moral, artistic and practical --- as she endeavors to construct a new reality for herself and her children. In the city, she is made to confront aspects of living that she has, until now, avoided, and to consider questions of vulnerability and power, death and renewal, in what becomes her struggle to reattach herself to, and believe in, life.
Picador | 9781250151797
On Sale the Week of December 25th in Hardcover
December 26th
DEATH AT NUREMBERG: A Clandestine Operations Novel by W. E. B. Griffin and William E. Butterworth IV (Historical Thriller/Adventure)
When Jim Cronley hears he's just won the Legion of Merit, he figures there's another shoe to drop, and it's a big one: he's out as Chief, DCI-Europe. His new assignments, however, couldn't be bigger: to protect the U.S. chief prosecutor in the Nuremberg trials from a rumored Soviet NKGB kidnapping, and to hunt down and dismantle the infamous Odessa, an organization dedicated to helping Nazi war criminals escape to South America. It doesn't take long for the first attempt on his life, and then the second. NKGB or Odessa? Who can tell? The deeper he pushes, the more secrets tumble out.
G.P. Putnam’s Sons | 9780399176746
THE LAST MAN IN TEHRAN by Mark Henshaw (Thriller)
An attack on an Israeli port throws the Middle East into chaos. The Mossad, Israel’s feared intelligence service, responds with a campaign of covert sabotage and assassination, determined to protect the homeland. But evidence quickly turns up suggesting that a group of moles inside Langley are helping Mossad wage its covert war. Convinced that Mossad has heavily penetrated the CIA’s leadership, the FBI launches a counterintelligence investigation. New Red Cell Chief Kyra Stryker turns to her former mentors --- now-retired Red Cell Chief Jonathan Burke and his wife, former CIA Director Kathryn Cooke --- to help uncover who is trying to tear the CIA apart from the inside out.
Touchstone | 9781501161261
THE WANTED: An Elvis Cole and Joe Pike Novel by Robert Crais (Thriller)
When single mother Devon Connor hires Elvis Cole, it’s because her troubled teenage son Tyson is flashing cash and she’s afraid he’s dealing drugs. But the truth is devastatingly different. With two others, he’s been responsible for a string of high-end burglaries, a crime spree that takes a deadly turn when one of them is murdered and Tyson and his girlfriend disappear. They stole the wrong thing from the wrong man, and, determined to get it back, he has hired two men who are smart and brutal and the best at what they do. To even the odds, Cole brings in his friend, Joe Pike, but even the two of them together may be overmatched.
G.P. Putnam’s Sons | 9780399161506
On Sale the Week of December 25th in Paperback
December 26th
ANY DREAM WILL DO by Debbie Macomber (Fiction)
Shay Benson adored her younger brother, Caden, and that got her into trouble. Pastor Drew Douglas adored his wife. But when he lost her, it was all he could do to focus on his two beautiful kids, and his flock came in a distant third. Shay and Drew meet in church one day and strike up a friendship that, over time, turns into something deeper and possibly romantic. Shay learns to trust again as she, in turn, proves herself trustworthy to her adopted community. But Caden’s return to town and a disastrous secret threaten to undo the life Shay has tried so hard to rebuild. It will take the utmost courage and faith if she and Drew hope to find healing and open their hearts to a brighter future.
Ballantine Books | 9780399181214
ASSASSIN’S FATE: Book III of the Fitz and the Fool Trilogy by Robin Hobb (Fantasy)
FitzChivalry Farseer’s young daughter, Bee, has been kidnapped by the Servants, a secret society whose members not only dream of possible futures but use their prophecies to add to their wealth and influence. As Bee is dragged by her sadistic captors across half the world, Fitz and the Fool, believing her dead, embark on a mission of revenge that will take them to the distant island where the Servants reside --- a place the Fool once called home and later called prison. It was a hell the Fool escaped, maimed and blinded, swearing never to return. For all his injuries, however, the Fool is not as helpless as he seems. And though Fitz is no longer the peerless assassin of his youth, he remains a man to be reckoned with.
Del Rey | 9780553392968
GINNY MOON by Benjamin Ludwig (Fiction)
Ginny Moon is exceptional. Everyone knows it --- her friends at school, teammates on the basketball team, and especially her new adoptive parents. They all love her, even if they don't quite understand her. They want her to feel like she belongs. What they don't know is that Ginny has no intention of belonging. She has found her birth mother on Facebook and is determined to get back to her --- even if it means going back to a place that was extremely dangerous. Because Ginny left something behind and is desperate to get it back, to make things right. But no one listens. No one understands. So Ginny takes matters into her own hands.
Park Row | 9780778330882
THE HEARTS OF MEN by Nickolas Butler (Fiction)
Camp Chippewa, 1962. Thirteen-year-old Nelson Doughty, a social outcast and an overachiever, is the Bugler, sounding the reveille proudly each morning. Yet this particular summer marks the beginning of an uncertain and tenuous friendship with a popular boy named Jonathan. Over the years, Nelson, irrevocably scarred from the Vietnam War, becomes Scoutmaster of Camp Chippewa, while Jonathan marries, divorces and turns his father’s business into a highly profitable company. And when something unthinkable happens at a camp get-together with Nelson as Scoutmaster and Jonathan’s teenage grandson and daughter-in-law as campers, the aftermath demonstrates the depths --- and the limits --- of Nelson’s selflessness and bravery.
Ecco | 9780062469694
THE MIDNIGHT BELL by Jack Higgins (Thriller)
In Ulster, Northern Ireland, a petty criminal kills a woman in a drunken car crash. Her sons swear revenge. In London, Sean Dillon and his colleagues in the “Prime Minister's private army,” fresh from defeating a deadly al-Qaeda operation, receive a warning: You may think you have weakened us, but you have only made us stronger. In Washington, D.C., a special projects director with the CIA, frustrated at not getting permission from the President for his daring anti-terrorism plan, decides to put it in motion anyway. Soon, the ripples from these events will meet and overlap, creating havoc in their wake. Desperate men will act, secrets will be revealed --- and the midnight bell will toll.
G.P. Putnam’s Sons | 9780399185328
MISSISSIPPI BLOOD: The Natchez Burning Trilogy by Greg Iles (Thriller)
In this concluding volume to Greg Iles’ Natchez Burning trilogy, Penn Cage sees his family and his world collapsing around him. The woman he loves is gone, his principles have been irrevocably compromised, and his father, once a paragon of the community that Penn leads as mayor, is about to be tried for the murder of a former lover. Despite Penn's experience as a prosecutor in major murder trials, his father has frozen him out of the trial preparations --- preferring to risk dying in prison to revealing the truth of the crime to his son. The trial sets a terrible clock in motion, and unless Penn can pierce the veil of the past and exonerate his father, his family will be destroyed.
William Morrow | 9780062311184
NOW THAT YOU MENTION IT by Kristan Higgins (Fiction)
Paperback Original
The Tufts scholarship that put Nora Stuart on the path to becoming a Boston medical specialist was a step forward. Being hit by a car and then overhearing her boyfriend hit on another doctor when she thought she was dying? Two major steps back. There’s only one place to land: home. But the tiny Maine community she left 15 years ago doesn’t necessarily want her. At every turn, someone holds the prodigal daughter of Scupper Island responsible for small-town drama and big-time disappointments. Balancing loss and opportunity, dark events from her past with hope for the future, Nora will discover that tackling old pain makes room for promise…and the chance to begin again.
HQN | 9781335903358
THE WICKED CITY by Beatriz Williams (Fiction)
When she discovers that her banker husband has been harboring a secret life, Ella Gilbert escapes their sleek SoHo loft for a studio in a quaint building in Greenwich Village. Her charismatic musician neighbor, Hector, warns her to stay out of the basement after midnight, when a symphony of mysterious noise strikes up, even though it's stood empty for decades. Back in the Roaring Twenties, the building hosted one of the city’s most notorious speakeasies. As Ella unravels the strange history of the building --- and the family thread that connects her to flapper Geneva Kelly --- she senses the Jazz Age spirit of her incandescent predecessor invading her own shy nature, in ways that will transform her life in the wicked city.
William Morrow Paperbacks | 9780062405012
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