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In this newsletter, you will find books releasing the weeks of February 5th and February 12th 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 New Release Spotlight of HELLBENT, the third installment in Gregg Hurwitz's Orphan X series, along with our review. It will be a Bookreporter.com Bets On pick; you can read Carol Fitzgerald's commentary in the February 9th Bookreporter.com Weekly Update newsletter.
We also are spotlighting the release of THE GREAT ALONE, Kristin Hannah's highly anticipated new novel about love and loss, the fight for survival, and the wildness that lives in both man and nature. Don't miss our review in the February 9th Weekly Update newsletter and Carol's Bets On commentary in the February 16th Weekly Update newsletter.
In the spirit of Andrew Carnegie and his extensive philanthropic endeavors, the publisher Sourcebooks is celebrating the recent release of CARNEGIE'S MAID by Marie Benedict with a very special contest. Vote for your library so they can win $2,000 --- and you will have the chance to receive a $100 gift card!
Finally, we encourage you to enter our Word of Mouth and Sounding Off on Audio contests for an opportunity to win some fabulous hardcovers and audiobooks. And please be sure to vote in our latest poll about rereading books.
For those of you who are doing online shopping, 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
Now Available: THE GREAT ALONE by Kristin Hannah
Ernt Allbright, a former POW, comes home from the Vietnam War a changed and volatile man. When he loses yet another job, he makes an impulsive decision: he will move his family north, to Alaska, where they will live off the grid in America’s last true frontier.
Thirteen-year-old Leni, a girl coming of age in a tumultuous time, caught in the riptide of her parents’ passionate, stormy relationship, dares to hope that a new land will lead to a better future for her family. She is desperate for a place to belong. Her mother, Cora, will do anything and go anywhere for the man she loves, even if means following him into the unknown.
At first, Alaska seems to be the answer to their prayers. In a wild, remote corner of the state, they find a fiercely independent community of strong men and even stronger women. The long, sunlit days and the generosity of the locals make up for the Allbrights’ lack of preparation and dwindling resources.
But as winter approaches and darkness descends on Alaska, Ernt’s fragile mental state deteriorates and the family begins to fracture. Soon the perils outside pale in comparison to threats from within. In their small cabin, covered in snow, blanketed in 18 hours of night, Leni and her mother learn the terrible truth: they are on their own. In the wild, there is no one to save them but themselves.
Click here to read an excerpt and listen to a clip from the audiobook.
Love Your Library Like a Carnegie!
Your Library Can Win $2,000 --- and
YOU Can Win a $100 Gift Card!
From the author of the acclaimed THE OTHER EINSTEIN comes a mesmerizing story of love, power and the woman who inspired an American dynasty. In celebration of Marie Benedict’s highly anticipated new novel, CARNEGIE'S MAID, its publisher, Sourcebooks, is giving the library who receives the most votes $2,000, and one lucky voter will win a $100 gift card!
Click here to enter the contest by Monday, March 19th.
This Week's Bonus News: Bookreporter.com's
New Release Spotlight of HELLBENT by Gregg Hurwitz
HELLBENT: An Orphan X Novel by Gregg Hurwitz (Thriller)
Evan Smoak --- government assassin gone rogue --- returns in HELLBENT, an engrossing, unputdownable thriller from Gregg Hurwitz, the latest in his #1 international bestselling Orphan X series.
Taken from a group home at age 12, Evan Smoak was raised and trained as an off-the-books government assassin: Orphan X. After he broke with the Orphan Program, Evan disappeared and reinvented himself as the Nowhere Man, a man spoken about only in whispers and dedicated to helping the truly desperate.
But this time, the voice on the other end is Jack Johns, the man who raised and trained him, the only father Evan has ever known. Secret government forces are busy trying to scrub the remaining assets and traces of the Orphan Program and they have finally tracked down Jack. With little time remaining, Jack gives Evan his last assignment: find and protect his last protégé and recruit for the program.
But Evan isn’t the only one after this last Orphan --- the new head of the Orphan Program, Charles Van Sciver, is mustering all the assets at his disposal to take out both Evan (Orphan X) and the target he is trying to protect.
HELLBENT will be a Bookreporter.com Bets On pick. You can read Carol Fitzgerald’s commentary in the February 9th Bookreporter.com Weekly Update newsletter.
- Click here to read a review.
Click here to read more in our New Release Spotlight.
On Sale the Week of February 5th in Hardcover
February 6th
AN AMERICAN MARRIAGE by Tayari Jones (Fiction)
Newlyweds Celestial and Roy are the embodiment of both the American Dream and the New South. He is a young executive, and she is an artist on the brink of an exciting career. But as they settle into the routine of their life together, they are ripped apart by circumstances neither could have imagined. Roy is arrested and sentenced to 12 years for a crime Celestial knows he didn’t commit. Though fiercely independent, Celestial finds herself bereft and unmoored, taking comfort in Andre, her childhood friend and best man at their wedding. As Roy’s time in prison passes, she is unable to hold on to the love that has been her center. After five years, Roy’s conviction is suddenly overturned, and he returns to Atlanta ready to resume their life together.
Algonquin Books | 9781616201340
THE ART OF VANISHING: A Memoir of Wanderlust by Laura Smith (Memoir)
At 25, as her wedding date approached, Laura Smith began to feel trapped. Not by her fiancé, but by the unsettling idea that it was hard to be at once married and free. She found in the strangely captivating story of another restless young woman determined to live without constraints both an enticement and a challenge. Barbara Newhall Follett was a free-spirited trailblazer who published her first novel at 11, enlisted as a deck hand on a boat bound for the south China seas at 15, and was one of the first women to hike the Appalachian trail. Then in December 1939, she walked out of her apartment, leaving behind a fraying marriage, and vanished without a trace. Obsessed by her story, Laura set off to find out what had happened.
Viking | 9780399563584
AS BRIGHT AS HEAVEN by Susan Meissner (Historical Fiction)
In 1918, Philadelphia was a city teeming with promise. Even as its young men went off to fight in the Great War, there were opportunities for a fresh start. Into this bustling town came Pauline Bright and her husband, filled with hope that they could now give their three daughters a chance at a better life. But just months after they arrive, the Spanish Flu reaches the shores of America. As the pandemic claims more than 12,000 victims in their adopted city, they find their lives left with a world that looks nothing like the one they knew. But even as they lose loved ones, they take in a baby orphaned by the disease who becomes their single source of hope.
Berkley | 9780399585968
ASYMMETRY by Lisa Halliday (Fiction)
Told in three distinct sections, ASYMMETRY explores the imbalances that spark and sustain many of our most dramatic human relations: inequities in age, power, talent, wealth, fame, geography and justice. The first section, “Folly,” tells the story of Alice, a young American editor, and her relationship with the famous and much older writer Ezra Blazer. By contrast, “Madness” is narrated by Amar, an Iraqi-American man who, on his way to visit his brother in Kurdistan, is detained by immigration officers and spends the last weekend of 2008 in a holding room in Heathrow. These two seemingly disparate stories gain resonance as their perspectives interact and overlap, with yet new implications for their relationship revealed in an unexpected coda.
Simon & Schuster | 9781501166761
BEAUTIFUL DAYS: Stories by Joyce Carol Oates (Fiction/Short Stories)
In BEAUTIFUL DAYS, Joyce Carol Oates explores the most secret, intimate and unacknowledged interior lives of characters not unlike ourselves, who assert their independence in acts of bold and often irrevocable defiance. In “Big Burnt,” a cunningly manipulative university professor exploits a too-trusting woman in a way she never could have anticipated. “The Nice Girl” depicts a young woman who has been infuriatingly “nice,” until she is forced to come to terms with the raw desperation of her deepest self. And the tragic “Undocumented Alien” depicts a young African student enrolled in an American university who is suddenly stripped of his student visa and forced to undergo a terrifying test of courage.
Ecco | 9780062795786
BERLIN 1936: Sixteen Days in August written by Oliver Hilmes, translated by Jefferson Chase (History)
BERLIN 1936 takes the reader through the 16 days of the Olympiad, describing the events in the German capital through the eyes of a select cast of characters --- Nazi leaders and foreign diplomats, sportsmen and journalists, writers and socialites, nightclub owners and jazz musicians. While the events in the Olympic stadium, such as when an American tourist breaks through the security and manages to kiss Hitler, provide the focus and much of the drama, it also considers the lives of ordinary Berliners --- the woman with a dark secret who steps in front of a train, the transsexual waiting for the Gestapo's knock on the door, and the Jewish boy fearing for his future and hoping that Germany loses on the playing field.
Other Press | 9781590519295
THE BOOKWORM by Mitch Silver (Thriller)
Europe, 1940: Belgium has been overrun by the German army. Posing as a friar, a British operative talks his way into a monastery just before Nazi art thieves plan to sweep through the area and whisk everything of value back to Berlin. The ersatz man of the cloth adds an old leather Bible to the monastery’s library and then escapes. London, 2017: A construction worker makes a grisly discovery --- a skeletal arm-bone with a rusty handcuff attached to the wrist. It’s all that remains of a courier who died in a V-2 rocket attack. The woman who will put these two disparate events together --- and understand the looming tragedy she must hurry to prevent --- is Russian historian and former Soviet chess champion Larissa Mendelovg Klimt.
Pegasus Books | 9781681776415
CALL ME ZEBRA by Azareen Van der Vliet Oloomi (Fiction)
Zebra is the last in a line of anarchists, atheists and autodidacts. When war came, her family didn’t fight; they took refuge in books. Now alone and in exile, Zebra leaves New York for Barcelona, retracing the journey she and her father made from Iran to the United States years ago. Books are Zebra’s only companions --- until she meets Ludo. Their connection is magnetic; their time together fraught. Zebra overwhelms him with her complex literary theories, her concern with death, and her obsession with history. He thinks she’s unhinged; she thinks he’s pedantic. Neither are wrong; neither can let the other go. They push and pull their way across the Mediterranean, wondering with each turn if their love, or lust, can free Zebra from her past.
Houghton Mifflin Harcourt | 9780544944602
DAPHNE by Will Boast (Fiction)
Born with a rare (and real) condition in which she suffers degrees of paralysis when faced with intense emotion, Daphne has few close friends and even fewer lovers. Like her mythic namesake, even one touch can freeze her. But when Daphne meets shy, charming Ollie, her well-honed defenses falter, and she’s faced with an impossible choice: cling to her pristine, manicured isolation or risk the recklessness of real intimacy. Set against the vivid backdrop of a San Francisco flush with money and pulsing with protest, DAPHNE is a modern fable that explores both self-determination and the perpetual fight between love and safety.
Liveright | 9781631493034
A DEATH IN LIVE OAK: A Jack Swyteck Novel by James Grippando (Legal Thriller)
When the body of Jamal Cousin, president of the preeminent black fraternity at Florida's flagship university, is discovered hogtied in the Stygian water swamps of the Suwanee River Valley, the death sets off a firestorm that threatens to rage out of control when a fellow student, Mark Towson, the president of a prominent white fraternity, is accused of the crime. Contending with rising political tensions, racial unrest and a sensational media, Townson’s defense attorney, Jack Swyteck, knows that the stakes could not be higher. The evidence against his client, which includes a threatening text message referencing "strange fruit" on the river, seems overwhelming. Then Jack gets a break that could turn the case.
Harper | 9780062657800
THE DECEIVERS: A John Wells Novel by Alex Berenson (Thriller)
The target was the American Airlines Center, the home of the Dallas Mavericks. The FBI had told Ahmed Shakir that his drug bust would go away if he helped them, and they'd supply all the weaponry, carefully removing the firing pins before the main event. It never occurred to Ahmed to doubt them, until it was too late. Vinnie Duto, the former CIA director and now president, wants John Wells to go to Colombia. An old asset there has information to share --- and it will lead Wells to the deadliest mission of his life, an extraordinary confluence of sleeper cells, sniper teams, false flag operations, double agents high in the U.S. government, and a Russian plot to take over the government itself. If it succeeds, what happened in Texas will be only a prelude.
G.P. Putnam's Sons | 9780399176166
A FALSE REPORT: A True Story of Rape in America by T. Christian Miller and Ken Armstrong (True Crime)
In 2008, 18-year-old Marie reported that a masked man broke into her apartment and raped her. Within days, police and even those closest to Marie became suspicious of her story. Confronted with inconsistencies in her story and the doubts of others, Marie broke down and said her story was a lie. Police charged Marie with false reporting. More than two years later, Colorado detective Stacy Galbraith was assigned to investigate a case of sexual assault, a case that bore an eerie resemblance to a rape that had taken place months earlier in a nearby town. She joined forces with the detective on that case, Edna Hendershot, and the two soon realized they were dealing with a serial rapist.
Crown | 9781524759933
FEEL FREE: Essays by Zadie Smith (Essays)
Arranged into five sections --- In the World, In the Audience, In the Gallery, On the Bookshelf, and Feel Free --- Zadie Smith’s new collection poses questions we immediately recognize. What is The Social Network --- and Facebook itself --- really about? Why do we love libraries? What will we tell our granddaughters about our collective failure to address global warming? Gathering in one place for the first time previously unpublished work, as well as already classic essays such as "Joy" and "Find Your Beach," FEEL FREE offers a survey of important recent events in culture and politics, as well as Smith's own life.
Penguin Press | 9781594206252
FORCE OF NATURE by Jane Harper (Mystery)
When five colleagues are forced to go on a corporate retreat in the wilderness, they reluctantly pick up their backpacks and start walking down the muddy path. But one of the women doesn’t come out of the woods. And each of her companions tells a slightly different story about what happened. Federal Police Agent Aaron Falk has a keen interest in the whereabouts of the missing hiker. In an investigation that takes him deep into isolated forest, Falk discovers secrets lurking in the mountains, and a tangled web of personal and professional friendship, suspicion and betrayal among the hikers. But did that lead to murder?
Flatiron Books | 9781250105639
FORTY DEAD MEN: An Alafair Tucker Mystery by Donis Casey (Historical Mystery)
World War I is over. Alafair Tucker is overjoyed that her elder son, George Washington Tucker, has finally returned home from the battlefields of France. Yet she is the only one in the family who senses that he has somehow changed. One rainy day, Gee Dub spies a woman trudging along the country road. Once made comfortable at the Tucker farm, Holly Johnson reveals she has forged her way from Maine to Oklahoma in hopes of finding the soldier she married before he shipped to France. At the war's end, Daniel Johnson disappeared without a trace. But when he finally turns up, shot dead, Gee Dub is arrested on suspicion of murder, and the entire extended Tucker family rallies to his defense.
Poisoned Pen Press | 9781464209376
THE FRIEND by Sigrid Nunez (Fiction)
When a woman unexpectedly loses her lifelong best friend and mentor, she finds herself burdened with the unwanted dog he has left behind. Her own battle against grief is intensified by the mute suffering of the dog, a huge Great Dane traumatized by the inexplicable disappearance of its master. While others worry that grief has made her a victim of magical thinking, the woman refuses to be separated from the dog except for brief periods of time. Isolated from the rest of the world and increasingly obsessed with the dog's care, she comes dangerously close to unraveling. But while troubles abound, rich and surprising rewards lie in store for both of them.
Riverhead Books | 9780735219441
THE GATE KEEPER: An Inspector Ian Rutledge Mystery by Charles Todd (Historical Mystery)
A restless Ian Rutledge drives aimlessly, haunted by the past, and narrowly misses a motorcar stopped in the middle of a desolate road. Standing beside the vehicle is a woman with blood on her hands and a dead man at her feet. She swears she didn’t kill Stephen Wentworth. A stranger stepped out in front of their motorcar and fired a single shot before vanishing into the night. Although he is a witness after the fact, Rutledge persuades the Yard to give him the inquiry, since he’s on the scene. But is he seeking justice --- or fleeing painful memories in London? When a second suspicious death occurs, the evidence suggests that a dangerous predator is on the loose, and that death is closer than Rutledge knows.
William Morrow | 9780062678713
GIRL UNKNOWN by Karen Perry (Literary Thriller)
David and Caroline Connolly are swimming successfully through their marriage’s middle years. The recent stresses of home renovation and of a brief romantic betrayal (Caroline’s) are behind them. The Connollys know and care for each other deeply. Then one early fall afternoon, a student appears in David’s university office and says, “I think you might be my father.” And the fact of a youthful passion that David had tried to forget comes rushing back. In the person of this intriguing young woman, the Connollys may have a chance to expand who they are and how much they can love, or they may be making themselves vulnerable to menace. They face either an opportunity or a threat --- but which is which?
Henry Holt and Co. | 9780805098747
THE GLASS FOREST by Cynthia Swanson (Historical/Literary Thriller)
In the autumn of 1960, Angie Glass is living an idyllic life in her Wisconsin hometown. At 21, she is married to charming, handsome Paul and has just given birth to a baby boy. But when Paul’s niece, Ruby, reports that her father, Henry, has committed suicide and that her mother, Silja, is missing, Angie and Paul drop everything and fly to the small upstate town of Stonekill, New York, to be by Ruby’s side. Angie thinks they’re coming to the rescue of Paul’s grief-stricken young niece, but Ruby is a composed and enigmatic 17-year-old who resists Angie’s attempts to nurture her. As Angie learns more about the complicated Glass family, she begins to question the very fabric of her own marriage.
Touchstone | 9781501172090
THE GONE WORLD by Tom Sweterlitsch (Science Fiction/Thriller)
Shannon Moss is part of a clandestine division within the Naval Criminal Investigative Service. In 1997, she is assigned to solve the murder of a Navy SEAL’s family --- and to locate his vanished teenage daughter. Though she can’t share the information with conventional law enforcement, Moss discovers that the missing SEAL was an astronaut aboard the spaceship U.S.S. Libra --- a ship assumed lost to the currents of Deep Time. Moss knows first-hand the mental trauma of time-travel and believes the SEAL’s experience with the future has triggered this violence. Determined to find the missing girl and driven by a troubling connection from her own past, Moss travels ahead in time to explore possible versions of the future, seeking evidence to crack the present-day case.
G.P. Putnam's Sons | 9780399167508
GOOD NEIGHBORS by Joanne Serling (Fiction)
In an idyllic suburb, four young families quickly form a neighborhood clique, their friendships based on little more than the ages of their children and a shared sense of camaraderie. When one of the couples, Paige and Gene Edwards, adopt a four-year-old girl from Russia, the group's loyalty and morality is soon called into question. Are the Edwards unkind to their new daughter? Or is she a difficult child with hidden destructive tendencies? As the seams of the group friendship slowly unravel, neighbor Nicole Westerhof finds herself drawn further into the life of the adopted girl, forcing Nicole to reexamine the deceptive nature of her own family ties, and her complicity in the events unfolding around her.
Twelve | 9781455541911
THE GREAT ALONE by Kristin Hannah (Historical Fiction)
Ernt Allbright, a former POW, comes home from the Vietnam War a changed and volatile man. When he loses yet another job, he makes an impulsive decision: he will move his family north, to Alaska, where they will live off the grid in America’s last true frontier. Thirteen-year-old Leni dares to hope that a new land will lead to a better future for her family. Her mother, Cora, will do anything and go anywhere for the man she loves, even if means following him into the unknown. At first, Alaska seems to be the answer to their prayers. But as winter approaches, Ernt’s fragile mental state deteriorates and the family begins to fracture. Soon the perils outside pale in comparison to threats from within.
St. Martin's Press | 9780312577230
HEAD WOUNDS: A Daniel Rinaldi Mystery by Dennis Palumbo (Psychological Thriller/Mystery)
Dr. Daniel Rinaldi becomes a participant in a domestic drama that blows up right outside his front door. In the chaos that follows, Rinaldi learns that his neighbor has told her boyfriend that Rinaldi is her lover. As things heat up, Rinaldi becomes a murder suspect. But this is just the first act in HEAD WOUNDS. As one savagery follows another, Rinaldi is forced to relive a terrible night that haunts him still. And to realize that now he --- and those he loves --- are being victimized by a brilliant killer still in the grip of delusion. Determined to destroy Rinaldi by systematically targeting those close to him, computer genius Sebastian Maddox strives to cause as much psychological pain as possible, before finally orchestrating a bold, macabre death for his quarry.
Poisoned Pen Press | 9781464208164
THE HEART IS A SHIFTING SEA: Love and Marriage in Mumbai by Elizabeth Flock (Family & Relationships/Sociology)
In 21st-century India, tradition is colliding with Western culture, a clash that touches the lives of everyday Indians. While ethnicity, class and religion are influencing the nation’s development, so too are pop culture and technology --- an uneasy fusion whose impact is most evident in the institution of marriage. THE HEART IS A SHIFTING SEA introduces three couples whose relationships illuminate these sweeping cultural shifts in dramatic ways: Veer and Maya, a forward-thinking professional couple whose union is tested by Maya’s desire for independence; Shahzad and Sabeena, whose desperation for a child becomes entwined with the changing face of Islam; and Ashok and Parvati, whose arranged marriage blossoms into true love.
Harper | 9780062456489
THE HOUSE OF IMPOSSIBLE BEAUTIES by Joseph Cassara (Fiction)
It’s 1980 in New York City, and nowhere is the city’s glamour and energy better reflected than in the burgeoning Harlem ball scene, where 17-year-old Angel first comes into her own. When she falls in love with Hector, a beautiful young man who dreams of becoming a professional dancer, the two decide to form the House of Xtravaganza, the first-ever all-Latino house in the Harlem ball circuit. But when Hector dies of AIDS-related complications, Angel must bear the responsibility of tending to their house alone. The Xtravaganzas --- Venus, Juanito and Daniel --- are ambitious, resilient and determined to control their own fates, even as they hurtle toward devastating consequences.
Ecco | 9780062676979
HOW TO STOP TIME by Matt Haig (Fiction)
Tom Hazard has a dangerous secret. He may look like an ordinary 41-year-old, but owing to a rare condition, he's been alive for centuries. He has lived history but now just wants an ordinary life. So Tom moves back to London, his old home, to become a high school history teacher --- the perfect job for someone who has witnessed the city's history firsthand. Better yet, a captivating French teacher at his school seems fascinated by him. But the Albatross Society, the secretive group that protects people like Tom, has one rule: Never fall in love. As painful memories of his past and the erratic behavior of the Society's watchful leader threaten to derail his new life and romance, the one thing he can't have just happens to be the one thing that might save him.
Viking | 9780525522874
I AM, I AM, I AM: Seventeen Brushes with Death by Maggie O'Farrell (Memoir)
I AM, I AM, I AM is Maggie O'Farrell's astonishing memoir of the near-death experiences that have punctuated and defined her life. The childhood illness that left her bedridden for a year, which she was not expected to survive. A teenage yearning to escape that nearly ended in disaster. An encounter with a disturbed man on a remote path. And, most terrifying of all, an ongoing, daily struggle to protect her from a condition that leaves her unimaginably vulnerable to life's myriad dangers. Seventeen discrete encounters with Maggie at different ages, in different locations, reveal a whole life in a series of tense, visceral snapshots.
Knopf | 9780525520221
THE KING'S CITY: A History of London During The Restoration: The City that Transformed a Nation by Don Jordan (History)
During the reign of Charles II, London was a city in flux. After years of civil war and political turmoil, England's capital became the center for major advances in the sciences, the theatre, architecture, trade and ship-building that paved the way for the creation of the British Empire. Throughout the quarter-century Charles was on the throne, London also suffered several serious reverses: the plague in 1665 and the Great Fire in 1666, and severe defeat in the Second Anglo-Dutch War, which brought about notable economic decline. But thanks to the genius and resilience of the people of London, and the occasionally wavering stewardship of the King, the city rose from the ashes to become the economic capital of Europe.
Pegasus Books | 9781681776385
THE KINGS OF BIG SPRING: God, Oil, and One Family's Search for the American Dream by Bryan Mealer (Memoir/History)
In 1892, Bryan Mealer’s great-grandfather leaves the Georgia mountains and heads west into Texas, looking for wealth and adventure in the raw and open country. But his luck soon runs out. Beset by drought, the family loses their farm just as the dead pastures around them give way to one of the biggest oil booms in American history. They eventually settle in the small town of Big Spring, where fast fortunes are being made from its own reserves of oil. For the next two generations, the Mealers live on the margins of poverty. After embracing Pentecostalism during the Great Depression, they rely heavily on their faith to steel them against hardship and despair. But for young Bobby Mealer, the author’s father, religion is only an agent for rebellion.
Flatiron Books | 9781250058911
THE LINE BECOMES A RIVER: Dispatches from the Border by Francisco Cantú (Memoir)
For Francisco Cantú, the border is in the blood: his mother, a park ranger and daughter of a Mexican immigrant, raised him in the scrublands of the Southwest. Haunted by the landscape of his youth, Cantú joins the Border Patrol. He and his partners are posted to remote regions crisscrossed by drug routes and smuggling corridors, where they learn to track other humans under blistering sun and through frigid nights. They haul in the dead and deliver to detention those they find alive. Plagued by nightmares, he abandons the Patrol for civilian life. But when an immigrant friend travels to Mexico to visit his dying mother and does not return, Cantú discovers that the border has migrated with him, and now he must know the whole story.
Riverhead Books | 9780735217713
LOOK FOR ME by Lisa Gardner (Mystery/Thriller)
The home of a family of five is now a crime scene: four of them savagely murdered, one --- a 16-year-old girl --- missing. Was she lucky to have escaped? Or is her absence evidence of something sinister? Detective D. D. Warren is on the case --- but so is survivor-turned-avenger Flora Dane. Seeking different types of justice, they must make sense of the clues left behind by a young woman who, whether as victim or suspect, is silently pleading, Look for me.
Dutton | 9781524742058
THE MASTERPIECE by Francine Rivers (Romance)
Successful LA artist Roman Velasco appears to have everything he could possibly want. Only Grace Moore, his reluctant, newly hired personal assistant, knows how little he truly has. The demons of Roman’s past seem to echo through the halls of his empty mansion and out across his breathtaking Topanga Canyon view. Like Roman, Grace is wrestling with ghosts and secrets of her own. After a disastrous marriage threw her life completely off course, she vowed never to let love steal her dreams again. But as she gets to know the enigmatic man behind the reputation, it’s as if the jagged pieces of both of their pasts slowly begin to fit together...until something so unexpected happens that it changes the course of their relationship --- and both their lives --- forever.
Tyndale House Publishers, Inc. | 9781496407900
ONLY CHILD by Rhiannon Navin (Fiction)
Squeezed into a coat closet with his classmates and teacher, first grader Zach Taylor can hear gunshots ringing through the halls of his school. A gunman has entered the building, taking 19 lives and irrevocably changing the very fabric of this close-knit community. While Zach's mother pursues a quest for justice against the shooter's parents, holding them responsible for their son's actions, Zach retreats into his super-secret hideout and loses himself in a world of books and art. Armed with his newfound understanding, and with the optimism and stubbornness only a child could have, Zach sets out on a captivating journey towards healing and forgiveness.
Knopf | 9781524733353
ONLY KILLERS AND THIEVES by Paul Howarth (Historical Fiction/Adventure)
It is 1885, and a crippling drought threatens to ruin the McBride family. When the rain finally comes, it is a miracle that renews their hope for survival. But returning home from an afternoon swimming at a remote waterhole filled by the downpour, 14-year-old Tommy and 16-year-old Billy meet with a shocking tragedy. Thirsting for vengeance against the man they believe has wronged them, the distraught brothers turn to the ruthless and cunning John Sullivan, their father’s former employer. As they ride across the barren outback in pursuit, their harsh and horrifying journey will have a devastating impact on Tommy and will hold enduring consequences for a young country struggling to come into its own.
Harper | 9780062690968
SELF-PORTRAIT WITH BOY by Rachel Lyon (Fiction)
Lu Rile is a relentlessly focused young photographer struggling to make ends meet. Working three jobs, responsible for her aging father, and worrying that the crumbling warehouse she lives in is being sold to developers, she is at a point of desperation. One day, in the background of a self-portrait, Lu accidentally captures on film a boy falling past her window to his death. The photograph turns out to be startlingly gorgeous, the best work of art she’s ever made. But the decision to show it is not easy, especially as she forges an intense bond with the boy’s mother. Lu becomes torn between equally fierce desires: to use the photograph to advance her career, and to protect a woman she has come to love.
Scribner | 9781501169588
THE STORM KING by Brendan Duffy (Literary Thriller)
After a tumultuous youth marked by his inexplicable survival of a devastating tragedy, Nate McHale left his Adirondack hometown of Greystone Lake and never looked back. Fourteen years later, he has become a respected New York City surgeon, devoted husband and loving father. Then a body is discovered deep in the forests that surround Greystone Lake. This disturbing news finally draws Nate home. While navigating a tense landscape of secrets and suspicion, resentments and guilt, Nate reconnects with estranged friends and old enemies, and encounters strangers who seem to know impossible things about him. Haunting every moment is the Lake’s sinister history and the memory of Lucy Bennett, with whom Nate is forever linked by shattering loss and youthful passion.
Ballantine Books | 9780804178143
TARNISHED CITY by Vic James (Dystopian Fantasy)
In a modern Britain where magic users control wealth, politics --- and you --- an uprising has been crushed. In its aftermath, two families will determine the country’s fate. The ruthless Jardines make a play for ultimate power. And the Hadleys, once an ordinary family, must find the extraordinary strength to fight back. Abi Hadley is a fugitive. Her brother, Luke, a prisoner. Both will discover that in the darkest places, the human spirit shines brightest. Meanwhile, amid his family’s intrigues, Silyen Jardine dreams of forgotten powers from an earlier age. As blood runs in the streets of London, all three will discover whether love and courage can ever be stronger than tyranny.
Del Rey | 9780425284124
THE UNDERTAKER'S DAUGHTER by Sara Blaedel (Thriller)
Ilka Nichols Jensen learns that her father --- who walked out suddenly on the family more than three decades ago --- has died and left her something in his will: his funeral home in Racine, Wisconsin. Clinging to this last shred of communication from the father she hasn't heard from since childhood, Ilka makes an uncharacteristically rash decision and jumps on a plane to Wisconsin. She plans to visit the funeral home and go through her father's things before preparing the business for a quick sale. But when she stumbles on an unsolved murder, and a killer who seems to still be very much alive, the undertaker's daughter realizes she might be in over her head.
Grand Central Publishing | 9781455541119
THE UNFORGOTTEN by Laura Powell (Mystery/Thriller)
Fifteen-year-old Betty Broadbent’s world is upended in the summer of 1956 when a string of brutal murders brings London’s press corps flooding into the village, many of whom find lodging at the Hotel Eden, a boarding house run by her mother. She is instantly transfixed by one of the reporters, Mr. Gallagher --- and he, fully twice her age, seems equally transfixed by her. The unlikely relationship that blooms between them is as overlaid with longing and desire as it is with impropriety and even menace. And as the shocking death toll rises, both Betty and Mr. Gallagher are forced to make a devastating choice, one that will shape their own lives --- and the life of an innocent man --- forever.
Gallery Books | 9781501181221
THE WHICH WAY TREE by Elizabeth Crook (Western)
Early one morning, a panther savagely attacks a family of homesteaders, mauling a young girl named Samantha and killing her mother. Samantha and her half-brother, Benjamin, survive, but she is left traumatized. THE WHICH WAY TREE is the story of Samantha's unshakeable resolve to stalk and kill the infamous panther and avenge her mother's death. In their quest, she and Benjamin enlist a charismatic Tejano outlaw and a haunted, compassionate preacher with an aging but relentless tracking dog. As the members of this unlikely posse hunt the panther, they are in turn pursued by a hapless but sadistic Confederate soldier with troubled family ties to the preacher and a score to settle.
Little, Brown and Company | 9780316434959
On Sale the Week of February 5th in Paperback
February 6th
4 3 2 1 by Paul Auster (Fiction)
Nearly two weeks early, Archibald Isaac Ferguson is born. From that single beginning, Ferguson’s life will take four simultaneous and independent fictional paths. Four identical Fergusons made of the same DNA, four boys who are the same boy, go on to lead four parallel and entirely different lives. Family fortunes diverge. Athletic skills and sex lives and friendships and intellectual passions contrast. Each Ferguson falls under the spell of the magnificent Amy Schneiderman, yet each Amy and each Ferguson have a relationship like no other. Meanwhile, readers will take in each Ferguson’s pleasures and ache from each Ferguson’s pains, as the mortal plot of each Ferguson’s life rushes on.
Picador | 9781250160010
ALMOST MISSED YOU by Jessica Strawser (Psychological Thriller)
Three years into their marriage, Violet and Finn have a wonderful little boy. Life is good, and Violet can’t believe her luck. So no one is more surprised than she when Finn leaves her at the beach and takes their son with him. Violet is suddenly in her own worst nightmare, and faced with the knowledge that the man she’s shared her life with, she never really knew at all. Caitlin and Finn have been best friends for the longest time. But when Finn shows up on Caitlin’s doorstep with the son he’s wanted for kidnapping, demands that she hide them from the authorities, and threatens to reveal a secret that could destroy her own family if she doesn’t, Caitlin faces an impossible choice.
St. Martin’s Griffin | 9781250107619
THE ATOMIC CITY GIRLS by Janet Beard (Historical Fiction)
Paperback Original
In November 1944, 18-year-old June Walker boards an unmarked bus, destined for Oak Ridge, Tennessee, which has sprung up in a matter of months. There, June joins hundreds of other young girls operating massive machines whose purpose is never explained. They spend their evenings socializing and flirting with soldiers, scientists and workmen. June longs to know more about their top-secret assignment and begins an affair with Sam Cantor, a young Jewish physicist who oversees the lab where she works and understands the end goal only too well. Across town, African-American construction worker Joe Brewer knows nothing of the government’s plans. But a breach in security will intertwine his fate with June’s search for answers.
William Morrow Paperbacks | 9780062666710
BEARTOWN by Fredrik Backman (Fiction)
A tiny community nestled deep in the forest, Beartown is slowly losing ground to the ever encroaching trees. But down by the lake stands an old ice rink, built generations ago by the working men who founded this town. And in that ice rink is the reason people in Beartown believe tomorrow will be better than today. Their junior ice hockey team is about to compete in the national semifinals, and they actually have a shot at winning. Being responsible for the hopes of an entire town is a heavy burden, and the semifinal match is the catalyst for a violent act that will leave a young girl traumatized and a town in turmoil. Accusations are made, and like ripples on a pond, they travel through all of Beartown, leaving no resident unaffected.
Washington Square Press | 9781501160776
THE BOOK THIEVES: The Nazi Looting of Europe's Libraries and the Race to Return a Literary Inheritance written by Anders Rydell, translated by Henning Koch (History)
Through extensive new research that included records saved by the Monuments Men themselves, Anders Rydell tells the untold story of Nazi book theft, as he himself joins the effort to return the stolen books. When the Nazi soldiers ransacked Europe’s libraries and bookshops, the books they stole were not burned. Instead, the Nazis began to compile a library of their own that they could use to wage an intellectual war on literature and history. But when the war was over, most of the books were never returned. Instead many found their way into the public library system, where they remain to this day. Now, Rydell finds himself entrusted with one of these stolen volumes, setting out to return it to its rightful owner.
Penguin Books | 9780735221239
BY THE BOOK by Julia Sonneborn (Fiction)
Paperback Original
An English professor in California, Anne Corey is determined to score a position on the coveted tenure track at her college. All she has to do is get a book deal, snag a promotion, and boom! She’s in. But then Adam Martinez --- her first love and ex-fiancé --- shows up as the college’s new president. Anne should be able to keep herself distracted. After all, she has a book to write, an aging father to take care of, and a new romance developing with the college’s insanely hot writer-in-residence. But no matter where she turns, there’s Adam, as smart and sexy as ever. As the school year advances and her long-buried feelings begin to resurface, Anne begins to wonder whether she just might get a second chance at love.
Gallery Books | 9781501175183
FULL WOLF MOON by Lincoln Child (Thriller)
When renowned "enigmalogist" Jeremy Logan travels to an isolated writers' retreat deep in the Adirondacks to work on his book, he discovers the remote community has been rocked by the grisly death of a hiker on Desolation Mountain. The attack occurred during the full moon and the body was severely mauled, but the unusual savagery calls into question the initial suspicions of a bear attack. Logan's theories take a dramatic turn when he meets Laura Feverbridge, a respected scientist who is still struggling with the violent loss of her father months earlier. As Feverbridge shares her research with Logan, he begins to wonder whether he is actually up against something he can’t believe is real.
Anchor | 9780307473769
GOLDEN HILL: A Novel of Old New York by Francis Spufford (Historical Fiction)
New York, a small town on the tip of Manhattan island, 1746. One rainy evening in November, a handsome young stranger fresh off the boat arrives at a countinghouse door on Golden Hill Street. Mr. Smith is amiable and charming, yet strangely determined to keep suspicion shimmering. In his pocket, he has what seems to be an order for a thousand pounds, a huge sum, and he won’t explain why, where he comes from, or what he is planning to do in the colonies that requires so much money. Should the New York merchants trust him? Should they risk their credit and refuse to pay? Should they befriend him, seduce him, arrest him --- maybe even kill him?
Scribner | 9781501163883
THE HEIRS by Susan Rieger (Fiction)
Six months after Rupert Falkes dies, leaving a grieving widow and five adult sons, an unknown woman sues his estate, claiming she had two sons by him. The Falkes brothers are pitched into turmoil, at once missing their father and feeling betrayed by him. In disconcerting contrast, their mother, Eleanor, is cool and calm, showing preternatural composure. Struggling to reclaim their identity, the brothers find Eleanor’s sympathy toward the woman and her sons confounding. Widowhood has let her cast off the rigid propriety of her stifling upbringing, and the brothers begin to question whether they knew either of their parents at all.
Broadway Books | 9781101904732
HIGH NOON: The Hollywood Blacklist and the Making of an American Classic by Glenn Frankel (History)
It's one of the most revered movies of Hollywood's golden era. Starring screen legend Gary Cooper and Grace Kelly in her first significant film role, High Noon achieved instant box-office and critical success. Yet what has been often overlooked is that the movie was made during the height of the Hollywood blacklist, a time of political inquisition and personal betrayal. In the middle of the film shoot, screenwriter Carl Foreman was forced to testify before the House Committee on Un-American Activities about his former membership in the Communist Party. Examined in light of Foreman's testimony, High Noon's emphasis on courage and loyalty takes on deeper meaning and importance.
Bloomsbury USA | 9781620409497
THE HOLLYWOOD DAUGHTER by Kate Alcott (Historical Fiction)
In 1950, Ingrid Bergman has a baby out of wedlock with her Italian lover, film director Roberto Rossellini. Previously held up as an icon of purity, Bergman's fall shocked her legions of American fans. Growing up in Hollywood, Jessica Malloy watches as her PR executive father helps make Ingrid a star. Over years of fleeting interactions with the actress, Jesse comes to idolize Ingrid. In a heated era of McCarthyism and extreme censorship, Ingrid's affair sets off an international scandal that robs 17-year-old Jesse of her childhood hero. When the stress placed on Jesse's father begins to reveal hidden truths about the Malloy family, Jesse's eyes are opened to the complex realities of life --- and love.
Anchor | 9781101912249
HUCK OUT WEST by Robert Coover (Historical Fiction)
At the end of HUCKLEBERRY FINN, on the eve of the Civil War, Huck and Tom Sawyer decide to escape “sivilization” and “light out for the Territory.” In Robert Coover’s vision of their Western adventures, Tom decides he’d rather own civilization than escape it, leaving Huck “dreadful lonely” in a country of bandits, war parties and gold. In the course of his ventures, Huck reunites with old friends, facing hard truths and even harder choices.
W. W. Norton & Company | 9780393355499
LAST HOPE ISLAND: Britain, Occupied Europe, and the Brotherhood That Helped Turn the Tide of War by Lynne Olson (History)
When the Nazi blitzkrieg rolled over continental Europe in the early days of World War II, the city of London became a refuge for the governments and armed forces of six occupied nations who escaped there to continue the fight. So, too, did General Charles de Gaulle, the self-appointed representative of free France. As the only European democracy still holding out against Hitler, Britain became known to occupied countries as “Last Hope Island.” Getting there, one young emigré declared, was “like getting to heaven.” Acclaimed historian Lynne Olson takes us back to those perilous days when the British and their European guests joined forces to combat the mightiest military force in history.
Random House Trade Paperbacks | 9780812987164
THE LIGHT WE LOST by Jill Santopolo (Fiction)
Lucy and Gabe meet as seniors at Columbia University on a day that changes both of their lives forever. Together, they decide they want their lives to mean something. When they meet again a year later, it seems fated --- perhaps they’ll find life’s meaning in each other. But then Gabe becomes a photojournalist assigned to the Middle East, and Lucy pursues a career in New York. What follows is a 13-year journey of dreams, desires, jealousies, betrayals and, ultimately, love. Was it fate that brought them together? Is it choice that has kept them away? Their journey takes Lucy and Gabe continents apart, but never out of each other’s hearts.
G.P. Putnam's Sons | 9780735212763
LINCOLN IN THE BARDO by George Saunders (Historical Fiction)
It’s February 1862, and the Civil War is less than one year old. The fighting has begun in earnest, and the nation has begun to realize it is in for a long, bloody struggle. Meanwhile, President Lincoln’s beloved 11-year-old son, Willie, lies upstairs in the White House, gravely ill. In a matter of days, despite predictions of a recovery, Willie dies and is laid to rest in a Georgetown cemetery. The boy finds himself in a strange purgatory where ghosts mingle, gripe, commiserate, quarrel and enact bizarre acts of penance. Within this transitional state --- called, in the Tibetan tradition, the bardo --- a monumental struggle erupts over young Willie’s soul.
Random House Trade Paperbacks | 9780812985405
THE MISSING WIFE by Sheila O'Flanagan (Fiction)
Paperback Original
When Imogen Naughton vanishes, everyone who knows her is shocked. She has a perfect marriage. Her handsome husband treats her like a princess. She’s always said how lucky she is. So why has she left? And how will she survive without Vince? What goes on behind closed doors is often a surprise, and Imogen surprises herself by taking the leap she knows she must. But as she begins her journey to find the woman she once was, Imogen's past is right behind her. Will it catch up with her? And will she be ready to face it if it does?
Grand Central Publishing | 9781538760543
THE POSSESSIONS by Sara Flannery Murphy (Romantic Suspense)
In an unnamed city, Eurydice works for the Elysian Society, a private service that allows grieving clients to reconnect with lost loved ones. She and her fellow workers, known as "bodies," wear the discarded belongings of the dead and swallow pills called lotuses to summon their spirits. But when Edie, a body, channels Sylvia, the dead wife of recent widower Patrick Braddock, she becomes obsessed with the glamorous couple. Despite the murky circumstances surrounding Sylvia’s drowning, Edie breaks her own rules and pursues Patrick. After years of hiding beneath the lotuses’ dulling effect, Edie discovers that the lines between her own desires and those of Sylvia have begun to blur, and takes increasing risks to keep Patrick within her grasp.
Harper Perennial | 9780062458384
RICHARD NIXON: The Life by John A. Farrell (Biography)
RICHARD NIXON opens with young Navy lieutenant "Nick" Nixon returning from the Pacific and setting his cap at Congress, an idealistic dreamer seeking to build a better world. Yet amid the turns of that now-legendary 1946 campaign, Nixon's finer attributes quickly gave way to unapologetic ruthlessness. It is a stunning overture to John A. Farrell's magisterial portrait of a man who embodied postwar American cynicism.
Vintage | 9780345804969
SEEING RED by Sandra Brown (Thriller)
Twenty-five years ago, Major Franklin Trapper became a national icon when he was photographed leading a handful of survivors to safety after the bombing of a Dallas hotel. For years, he gave frequent speeches and interviews but then suddenly dropped out of the public eye. Now TV journalist Kerra Bailey is willing to use any means necessary to get an exclusive with the Major --- even if she has to secure an introduction from his estranged son, former ATF agent John Trapper. When the interview goes catastrophically awry, Trapper realizes he needs Kerra under wraps if he's going to track down the gunmen and finally discover who was responsible for the Dallas bombing.
Grand Central Publishing | 9781455572083
A SEPARATION by Katie Kitamura (Fiction)
A young woman has agreed with her faithless husband: it's time for them to separate. For the moment it's a private matter, a secret between the two of them. As she begins her new life, she gets word that Christopher has gone missing in a remote region in the rugged south of Greece; she reluctantly agrees to go look for him, still keeping their split to herself. In her heart, she's not even sure if she wants to find him. As her search comes to a shocking breaking point, she discovers she understands less than she thought she did about her relationship and the man she used to love.
Riverhead Books | 9780399576119
THINGS TO DO WHEN IT’S RAINING by Marissa Stapley (Fiction)
Paperback Original
Mae Summers has it all: a loving fiancé, Peter, a job at the flourishing company he owns, and a beautiful New York City apartment. But Mae’s life shatters when she wakes up one morning to discover Peter gone and the company in shambles. There’s only one place for Mae to go: home to Alexandria Bay, where she was raised by her grandparents. And not all is right in Alex Bay, either: Mae finds her grandmother struggling with dementia, separated from Mae’s grandfather thanks to a terrible secret she never meant to reveal. She also finds Gabe, her childhood best friend who became the love of her young life --- now a handsome if brooding adult, working through a private trauma that still haunts him.
Graydon House | 9781525899010
A TIME OF LOVE AND TARTAN: A 44 Scotland Yard Novel by Alexander McCall Smith (Fiction)
Paperback Original
When Pat accepts her narcissistic ex-boyfriend Bruce's invitation for coffee, she has no idea of the complications in her romantic and professional life that will follow. Meanwhile, Matthew, her boss at the art gallery, attracts the attention of the police after a misunderstanding at the local bookstore. Whether caused by small things such as a cup of coffee and a book, or major events such as Stuart's application for promotion and his wife Irene's decision to pursue a PhD in Aberdeen, change is coming to Scotland Street. But for three seven-year-old boys --- Bertie Pollock, Ranald, and Big Lou's foster son, Finlay --- it also means getting a glimpse of perfect happiness.
Anchor | 9780525436553
UNRAVELING OLIVER by Liz Nugent (Psychological Thriller)
Oliver Ryan is happily married to his wife, Alice, who illustrates the award-winning children’s books he writes and devotedly cares for him in their comfortable suburban home. Their life together is one of enviable privilege and ease --- until, one evening, Oliver delivers blows to Alice that render her comatose. As Alice hovers between life and death in her hospital bed, the couple’s circle of friends, neighbors and acquaintances try to understand what could have driven Oliver to commit such an astonishing act of savagery. Oliver tells his story, peeling away the layers to reveal a life of shame, envy, breath-taking deception and masterful manipulation. As details about his past catch up with him, even he is in for a shock.
Gallery/Scout Press | 9781501173387
WHITE TEARS by Hari Kunzru (Literary Thriller)
Seth is a shy, awkward twentysomething. Carter is more glamorous, the heir to a great American fortune. But they share an obsession with music --- especially the blues. One day, Seth discovers that he accidentally has recorded an unknown blues singer in a park. Carter puts the file online, claiming it's a 1920s recording by a made-up musician named Charlie Shaw. But when a music collector tells them that their recording is genuine --- that there really was a singer named Charlie Shaw --- the two white boys, along with Carter's sister, find themselves in over their heads, delving deeper and deeper into America's dark, vengeful heart.
Vintage | 9781101973219
WILL’S RED COAT: The Story of One Old Dog Who Chose to Live Again by Tom Ryan (Memoir)
Drawn by an online post, Tom Ryan adopted Will, a frightened, deaf and mostly blind elderly dog, and brought him home to live with him and Atticus. Tom hoped to give Will a place to die with dignity, amid the rustic beauty of the White Mountains of his New Hampshire home. But when Will bites him numerous times and acts out in violent displays, Tom realizes he is in for a challenge. With endless patience and the kind of continued empathy Tom has nurtured in his relationship with Atticus, Will eventually begins to thrive. Soon, the angry, hurt, depressed and near-death oldster has transformed into a happy, gamboling companion with a puppy-like zest for discovery.
William Morrow Paperbacks | 9780062444998
On Sale the Week of February 12th in Hardcover
February 13th
ALL THE PIECES MATTER: The Inside Story of "The Wire" by Jonathan Abrams (Performing Arts)
Since its final episode aired in 2008, HBO’s acclaimed crime drama "The Wire" has only become more popular and influential. The issues it tackled, from the failures of the drug war and criminal justice system to systemic bias in law enforcement and other social institutions, have become more urgent and central to the national conversation. But while there has been a great deal of critical analysis of the show and its themes, until now there has never been a definitive, behind-the-scenes take on how it came to be made. With unparalleled access to all the key actors and writers involved in its creation, Jonathan Abrams tells the astonishing, compelling and complete account of "The Wire," from its inception and creation through its end and powerful legacy.
Crown Archetype | 9780451498144
THE CHATEAU by Paul Goldberg (Fiction/Humor)
Fired from his job as a science reporter for The Washington Post, Bill learns that his college roommate has fallen to his death under salacious circumstances. With nothing to lose, Bill boards a flight for Florida’s Gold Coast, ready to begin his own investigation. There’s just one catch: Bill’s father, Melsor, is angling for control of the condo board at the Château Sedan Neuve, a crumbling high-rise populated mostly by Russian Jewish immigrants. The current board is filled with fraudsters levying “special assessments” on residents, and Melsor will use any means necessary to win the board election. And who better to help him than his estranged son?
Picador | 9781250116093
DON'T SKIP OUT ON ME by Willy Vlautin (Fiction)
Horace Hopper has spent most of his life on a Nevada sheep ranch, but dreams of something bigger. Mr. and Mrs. Reese took him in and treated him like a son, intending to leave the ranch in his hands. But Horace feels as if he doesn’t belong on the ranch, or anywhere, and decides to leave the only loving home he’s known to prove his worth as a championship boxer. Reinventing himself as Hector Hildago, a scrappy Mexican boxer, he heads to Tucson and begins training and entering fights. His journey brings him to boxing rings across the Southwest and Mexico, and finally to the streets of Las Vegas, where Horace learns he can’t change who he is or outrun his destiny.
Harper Perennial | 9780062684455
THE DRIEST SEASON by Meghan Kenny (Historical Fiction)
As her Wisconsin community endures a long season of drought and feels the shockwaves of World War II, 15-year-old Cielle endures a more personal calamity: the unexpected death of her father. On a balmy summer afternoon, she finds him hanging in the barn --- the start of a dark secret that threatens her family’s livelihood. A war rages elsewhere, while in the deceptive calm of the American heartland, Cielle’s family contends with a new reality and fights not to be undone.
W. W. Norton & Company | 9780393634594
FRESHWATER by Akwaeke Emezi (Fiction)
Ada begins her life in the south of Nigeria as a troubled baby and a source of deep concern to her family. Her parents, Saul and Saachi, successfully prayed her into existence, but as she grows into a volatile and splintered child, it becomes clear that something went terribly awry. When Ada comes of age and moves to America for college, the group of selves within her grows in power and agency. A traumatic assault leads to a crystallization of her alternate selves: Asụghara and Saint Vincent. As Ada fades into the background of her own mind and these selves --- now protective, now hedonistic --- move into control, Ada's life spirals in a dark and dangerous direction.
Grove Press | 9780802127358
A GRAVE ISSUE: A Funeral Parlor Mystery by Lillian Bell (Cozy Mystery)
After an on-air gaffe goes viral and jeopardizes her career, journalist Desiree Turner retreats home to Verbena, California for some peace and quiet. She begins presiding over funerals for her great-grandfather’s funeral parlor. But the action seems to follow her as a fistfight breaks out between neighbors Rosemarie Brewer and Lola Hansen at one of the first funerals she’s in charge of running. Rosemarie’s husband, Alan, is found murdered shortly after. Lola’s husband, Kyle, is immediately arrested. Determined to clear his name, Desiree jumps head first into the investigation and quickly discovers that Alan had several unsavory habits at his job and in his personal life, including putting assets into his mistress’s account to hide them from Rosemarie.
Crooked Lane Books | 9781683314905
THE KISS: Intimacies from Writers edited by Brian Turner (Essays)
From Sioux Falls to Khartoum, from Kyoto to Reykjavik; from the panchayat forests of India to the Giant’s Causeway on the coast of Northern Ireland; in taxis and at bus stops, in kitchens and sleigh beds, haystacks and airports around the globe --- people are kissing one another. The sublime kiss. The ambiguous kiss. The devastating kiss. The kiss we can’t take back. The kiss we can never give. The kiss that changes a life. In this anthology, writers and thinkers share their thoughts on a specific kiss --- the unexpected and unforgettable --- in an attempt to bridge the gulf, to connect us to one another on a deeply human level, and to explore the messy and complicated intimacies that exist in our actual lives, as well as in the complicated landscape of the imagination.
W. W. Norton & Company | 9780393635263
THE KREMLIN'S CANDIDATE by Jason Matthews (Thriller)
In this final installment of the Red Sparrow trilogy, Russian president Vladimir Putin is planning the covert assassination of a high-ranking US official with the intention of replacing him with a mole whom Russian intelligence has cultivated for more than 15 years. Catching wind of this plot, Dominika, Nate and their CIA colleagues must unmask the traitor before he or she is able to reveal that Dominika has been spying for years on behalf of the CIA. Ultimately, the lines of danger converge on the spectacular billion-dollar presidential palace on the Black Sea during a power weekend with Putin’s inner circle. Does Nate sacrifice himself to save Dominika? Does she forfeit herself to protect Nate? Do they go down together?
Scribner | 9781501140082
THE LEGACY by Yrsa Sigurdardottir (Mystery/Thriller)
The only person who might have the answers to a baffling murder case is the victim’s seven-year-old daughter, found hiding in the room where her mother died. And she’s not talking. Newly promoted, out of his depth, detective Huldar turns to Freyja, a psychologist, for her expertise with traumatized young people. Freyja, who distrusts the police in general and Huldar in particular, isn’t best pleased. But she’s determined to keep little Margret safe. It may prove tricky. The killer is leaving them strange clues, but can they crack the code? And if they do, will they be next?
Minotaur Books | 9781250136268
THE LOST GIRLS OF CAMP FOREVERMORE by Kim Fu (Fiction)
A group of young girls descend on Camp Forevermore, a sleepaway camp in the Pacific Northwest, where their days are filled with swimming lessons, friendship bracelets, and camp songs by the fire. Filled with excitement and nervous energy, they set off on an overnight kayaking trip to a nearby island. But before the night is over, they find themselves stranded, with no adults to help them survive or guide them home. THE LOST GIRLS OF CAMP FOREVERMORE traces these five girls --- Nita, Andee, Isabel, Dina and Siobhan --- through and beyond this fateful trip.
Houghton Mifflin Harcourt | 9780544098268
MADNESS IS BETTER THAN DEFEAT by Ned Beauman (Historical/Literary Thriller)
In 1938, two rival expeditions descend on an ancient temple recently discovered in the jungles of Honduras --- one intending to shoot a screwball comedy on location there, the other to disassemble the temple and ship it back to New York. A seemingly endless stalemate ensues, and 20 years later a rogue CIA agent sets out to exploit it for his own ends, unaware that the temple is a locus of conspiracies far grander than anyone could have ever guessed.
Knopf | 9780385352994
MRS. by Caitlin Macy (Fiction)
Despite a shadowy past, Philippa Lye has somehow married the scion of the last family-held investment bank in New York City. Then, into her precariously balanced life, come two women: Gwen Hogan, a childhood acquaintance who uncovers an explosive secret about Philippa's single days, and Minnie Curtis, a newcomer whose vast fortune and frank revelations about a penurious upbringing in Spanish Harlem put everyone on alert. When Gwen's prosecutor husband stumbles over the connection between Philippa's past and the criminal investigation he is pursuing at all costs, this insulated society is forced to confront the rot at its core and the price it has paid to survive into the new millennium.
Little, Brown and Company | 9780316434157
NIGHT MOVES: An Alex Delaware Novel by Jonathan Kellerman (Psychological Thriller/Mystery)
There’s no spilled blood, no evidence of a struggle, and, thanks to the victim’s missing face and hands, no immediate means of identification. And no telling why the disfigured corpse of a stranger has appeared in an upscale L.A. family’s home. Chet Corvin, his wife and their two teenage children are certain the John Doe is unknown to them. Despite that, their cooperation seems guarded. And that’s more than LAPD homicide detective Milo Sturgis and psychologist Alex Delaware can elicit from the Corvins’ creepy next-door neighbor. As the investigation ensues, it becomes clear that this well-to-do suburban enclave has its share of curious eyes, suspicious minds and loose lips.
Ballantine Books | 9780345541468
OLYMPUS BOUND by Jordanna Max Brodsky (Urban Fantasy/Thriller)
Summer in New York: a golden hour on the city streets, but a dark time for Selene. She's lost her home and the man she loves. A cult hungry for ancient power has kidnapped her father and targeted her friends. To save them, Selene must face the past she's been running from --- a past that stretches back millennia, to when the faithful called her Huntress. Moon Goddess. Artemis. With the pantheon at her side, Selene must journey back to the seat of her immortal power: from the streets of Rome and the temples of Athens --- to the heights of Mount Olympus itself.
Orbit | 9780316385947
A PERFECT UNIVERSE: Ten Stories by Scott O'Connor (Fiction/Short Stories)
Welcome to the often-overlooked corners of sun-bleached Los Angeles, where a teenaged bicycle thief searches for a kidnapped boy, a young musician emerges as the lone survivor of a building collapse, and an aging actor faces the erasure of his past. There, far from the Hollywood spotlight, we also meet two sisters locked in a destructive cycle of memory and illness, coffee-shop regulars whose lives are torn apart by a stunning moment of violence, and the desperate, fraudulent writer whose fictions connect these characters in subtle and surprising ways.
Gallery/Scout Press | 9781507204054
THE PHILOSOPHER'S FLIGHT by Tom Miller (Historical Fantasy)
Robert Weekes is a practitioner of empirical philosophy --- an arcane, female-dominated branch of science used to summon the wind, shape clouds of smoke, heal the injured, and even fly. When a deadly accident puts his philosophical abilities to the test, Robert wins a scholarship to study at Radcliffe College, an all-women’s school. He falls hard for Danielle Hardin, a disillusioned young war hero turned political radical. However, Danielle’s activism and Robert’s recklessness attract the attention of the same fanatical anti-philosophical group that Robert’s mother fought years before. Robert and Danielle band together to fight for Robert’s place among the next generation of empirical philosophers --- and for philosophy’s very survival against the men who would destroy it.
Simon & Schuster | 9781476778150
THE PLEA by Steve Cavanagh (Legal Thriller)
Billionaire David Child swears he didn’t murder his girlfriend, Clara. But the evidence overwhelmingly shows that David killed her. The FBI believes that David’s arrest and obvious guilt could help them take down a huge money laundering scheme --- if they can get him to testify. Con-artist-turned-lawyer Eddie Flynn is given the job: persuade David to plead guilty and give the agents the evidence they need. If Eddie can’t get David to take a plea bargain, the FBI has incriminating files on Eddie’s wife --- and will send her to jail. But David insists that he didn’t murder anyone. As the FBI pressures Eddie to secure the guilty plea, Eddie becomes increasingly convinced that David is telling the truth.
Flatiron Books | 9781250105561
POISON: A Dismas Hardy Novel by John Lescroart (Legal Thriller)
Finally recovered from two glancing gunshot wounds, Dismas Hardy is looking forward to easing into retirement and reconnecting with his family. But he is pulled back into the courtroom when Grant Wagner, the steely owner of a successful family business, is murdered. The prime suspect is Wagner’s bookkeeper, Abby Jarvis, a former client of Hardy’s who had been receiving large sums of cash under-the-table from the company --- but she insists that she’s innocent. Preparing for trial, Dismas investigates the Wagner clan, discovering dark, twisted secrets, jealous siblings, gold-digging girlfriends, betrayals and blackmail. The closer he gets to the Wagners, the clearer it becomes that Dismas has a target painted on his back.
Atria Books | 9781501115707
THE RADICALS by Ryan McIlvain (Fiction)
When Eli first meets Sam Westergard, he is dazzled by his new friend's charisma, energy and determined passion. Both graduate students in New York City, the two young men bond over their idealism, their love of poetry, and their commitment to socialism, both in theory and in practice --- this last taking the form of an organized protest against Soline, a giant energy company that has speculated away the jobs and savings of thousands. As an Occupy-like group begins to coalesce around him, Eli realizes that some of his fellow intellectuals are more deeply --- and dangerously --- devoted to the cause than others.
Hogarth | 9780553417883
SADNESS IS A WHITE BIRD by Moriel Rothman-Zecher (Fiction)
The story begins in an Israeli military jail, where Jonathan recalls the series of events that led him there. Two years earlier: Moving back to Israel after several years in Pennsylvania, Jonathan is ready to fight to preserve and defend the Jewish state, which his grandfather --- a Salonican Jew whose community was wiped out by the Nazis --- helped establish. But he is also conflicted about the possibility of having to monitor the occupied Palestinian territories, a concern that grows deeper and more urgent when he meets Nimreen and Laith --- the twin daughter and son of his mother’s friend. From that winter morning on, the three become inseparable. But then that fateful day arrives, the one that lands Jonathan in prison and changes his relationship with the twins forever.
Atria Books | 9781501176265
SURPRISE ME by Sophie Kinsella (Fiction)
After 10 years together, Sylvie and Dan have a comfortable home, fulfilling jobs and beautiful twin girls, and they communicate so seamlessly they finish each other’s sentences. They have a happy marriage and believe they know everything there is to know about each other. Until it’s casually mentioned to them that they could be together for another 68 years…and panic sets in. They decide to bring surprises into their marriage to keep it fresh and fun. But in their pursuit of Project Surprise Me, mishaps arise, with disastrous and comical results. Gradually, surprises turn to shocking truths. And when a scandal from the past is uncovered, they begin to wonder if they ever really knew each other at all.
The Dial Press | 9780399592881
WALLIS IN LOVE: The Untold Life of the Duchess of Windsor, the Woman Who Changed the Monarchy by Andrew Morton (Biography)
Everyone has heard of Wallis Simpson, the woman for whom Edward VIII so infamously abdicated his throne and birthright. But although her life has constantly been the subject of much fascination, gossip and speculation, her whole story has yet to be told. Now historical biographer Andrew Morton uses diary entries, letters and other never-before-seen records to offer a fresh portrait of Wallis Simpson in all her vibrancy and brazenness as she climbed the social ladder, transforming from a hard-nosed gold digger to charming chatelaine.
Grand Central Publishing | 9781455566976
WHITE HOUSES by Amy Bloom (Historical Fiction)
Lorena Hickok meets Eleanor Roosevelt in 1932 while reporting on Franklin Roosevelt’s first presidential campaign. Having grown up worse than poor in South Dakota and reinvented herself as the most prominent woman reporter in America, “Hick,” as she’s known to her friends and admirers, is not quite instantly charmed by the idealistic, patrician Eleanor. But then, as her connection with the future first lady deepens into intimacy, what begins as a powerful passion matures into a lasting love, and a life that Hick never expected to have.
Random House | 9780812995664
On Sale the Week of February 12th in Paperback
February 12th
THE DEVIL AT YOUR DOOR: Lars and Shaine, Book Three by Eric Beetner (Thriller)
Paperback Original
Lars and Shaine have returned to a quiet life on the islands, but for Lars there is unfinished business. When he gets information that will lead him to exact revenge on behalf of his young protégé, the young woman he’s grown to think of as a daughter, he decides to take action in secret. When he lands in a hospital, Shaine is called in from a thousand miles away and must take the lead in the last job of Lars’ storied career of death for hire. Facing his own aging body, Lars struggles to take a back seat to the youngster he has trained in his image. They’ll face a local drug boss along with an old enemy as they work to fire the last bullet they’ll ever need to --- before one finds them first.
Down & Out Books | 9781946502438
February 13th
CASANOVA: The World of a Seductive Genius by Laurence Bergreen (Biography)
Today, “Casanova” is a synonym for “great lover,” yet the real story of this remarkable figure is little known. Giacomo Casanova was raised by his maternal grandmother, an illiterate peasant. His birthplace, Venice, was a republic in decline, reputedly the most debauched city in Europe. Casanova would add to the republic’s reputation. Over the course of his lifetime, he claimed to have seduced more than 100 women, among them married women, young women in convents, girls just barely in their teens, and, in one notorious instance, his own illegitimate daughter.
Simon & Schuster | 9781476716503
DEAD JOKER: A Hanne Wilhelmsen Novel by Anne Holt (Mystery)
Chief Public Prosecutor Sigurd Halvorsrud’s wife is found dead, the victim of a brutal decapitation. Her husband, who witnessed the grisly murder, immediately falls under suspicion, though he claims his wife’s killer was Ståle Salvesen, a man he had prosecuted years before. Despite the circumstantial evidence, Detective Inspector Hanne Wilhelmsen is unconvinced of Halvorsrud’s guilt --- that is, until a witness says he saw Ståle Salvesen commit suicide by jumping off a bridge days before the murder took place. Then a journalist at one of Oslo's largest newspapers is found beheaded. What links these two horrifically violent crimes?
Scribner | 9781501123276
A DIVIDED SPY by Charles Cumming (Thriller)
Thomas Kell thought he was done with spying. A former MI6 officer, he devoted his life to the Service, but it has left him with nothing but grief and a simmering anger against the Kremlin. Then Kell is offered an unexpected chance at revenge. Taking the law into his own hands, he embarks on a mission to recruit a top Russian spy who is in possession of a terrifying secret. As Kell tracks his man from Moscow to London, he finds himself in a high-stakes game of cat and mouse, in which it becomes increasingly difficult to know who is playing whom. As the mission reaches its boiling point, the threat of a catastrophic terrorist attack looms over Britain. Kell is faced with an impossible choice: loyalty to MI6, or to his own conscience?
St. Martin’s Griffin | 9781250025555
EDGAR AND LUCY by Victor Lodato (Fiction)
Eight-year-old Edgar Fini remembers nothing of the accident people still whisper about. He only knows that his father is gone, his mother has a limp, and his grandmother believes in ghosts. When Edgar meets a man with his own tragic story, the boy begins a journey into a secret wilderness where nothing is clear --- not even the line between the living and the dead. In order to save her son, Lucy has no choice but to confront the demons of her past.
Picador | 9781250096999
THE HOPE CHEST by Viola Shipman (Fiction)
Ever since she was diagnosed with ALS, fiercely independent Mattie doesn’t feel like herself. Her devoted husband, Don, doesn’t want to imagine life without his wife of nearly 50 years, but Mattie isn’t likely to make it past their anniversary. But when Rose, Mattie’s new caretaker, and her young daughter, Jeri, enter the couple’s life, happiness and the possibility for new memories return. Together they form a family, and Mattie is finally able to pass on her memories from the hope chest she received from her mother.
A Thomas Dunne Book for St. Martin's Griffin | 9781250111111
ISLAND OF SWEET PIES AND SOLDIERS by Sara Ackerman (Historical Fiction)
Paperback Original
Violet Iverson and her young daughter, Ella, are piecing their lives together one year after the disappearance of her husband. As rumors swirl and questions about his loyalties surface, Violet believes Ella knows something. But Ella is stubbornly silent. Something --- or someone --- has scared her. And with the island overrun by troops training for a secret mission, tension and suspicion between neighbors is rising. Violet bands together with her close friends to get through the difficult days. To support themselves, they open a pie stand near the military base, offering the soldiers a little homemade comfort. Try as she might, Violet can’t ignore her attraction to the brash marine who comes to her aid when the women are accused of spying.
Mira | 9780778319214
LOOK FOR HER by Emily Winslow (Psychological Thriller/Mystery)
Paperback Original
In 1976, a teenage girl named Annalise Wood disappeared, and though her body was later discovered, the culprit was never found. Decades later, when DNA linked to the Annalise murder unexpectedly surfaces, cold case detective Morris Keene and his former partner, Chloe Frohmann, hope to finally bring closure to this traumatized community. But the new evidence instead undoes the case's only certainty: the buried body that long ago had been confidently identified as Annalise may be someone else entirely. Whose body was unearthed all those years ago, and what happened to the real Annalise? Is someone interfering with the investigation? And is there a link to a present-day drowning with eerie connections?
William Morrow Paperbacks | 9780062572585
THE LUCKY ONES by Tiffany Reisz (Gothic Thriller/Mystery)
Paperback Original
They were seven children either orphaned or abandoned by their parents and chosen by legendary philanthropist and brain surgeon Dr. Vincent Capello to live in The Dragon, his almost magical beach house on the Oregon Coast. Allison was the youngest of the lucky ones living an idyllic life with her newfound family…until the night she almost died, and was then whisked away from the house and her adopted family forever. Now, 13 years later, Allison receives a letter from Roland, Dr. Capello’s oldest son, warning her that their father is ill and in his final days. Allison determines she must go home again and confront the ghosts of her past. She's determined to find out what really happened that fateful night.
Mira | 9780778331162
MISTER TENDER'S GIRL by Carter Wilson (Psychological Thriller)
Paperback Original
At 14, Alice Hill was viciously attacked by two of her classmates and left to die. The teens claim she was a sacrifice for a man called Mister Tender, but that could never be true: Mister Tender doesn't exist. His sinister character is pop-culture fiction, created by Alice's own father in a series of popular graphic novels. Over a decade later, Alice has changed her name and is trying to heal. But someone is watching her. They know more about Alice than any stranger could: her scars, her fears, and the secrets she keeps locked away. She can try to escape her past, but Mister Tender is never far behind. He will come with a smile that seduces, and a dark whisper in her ear.
Sourcebooks Landmark | 9781492656500
NEW BOY by Tracy Chevalier (Fiction)
Arriving at his fifth school in as many years, diplomat’s son Osei Kokote knows he needs an ally if he is to survive his first day --- so he’s lucky to hit it off with Dee, the most popular girl in school. But one student can’t stand to witness this budding relationship: Ian decides to destroy the friendship between the black boy and the golden girl. By the end of the day, the school and its key players --- teachers and pupils alike --- will never be the same again. The tragedy of Othello is transposed to a 1970s suburban Washington schoolyard, where kids fall in and out of love with each other before lunchtime, and practice a casual racism picked up from their parents and teachers.
Hogarth | 9780553447651
RATHER BE THE DEVIL by Ian Rankin (Mystery)
When Rebus starts reexamining the facts behind the long-ago murder of a glamorous woman at a luxurious hotel --- on the same night a famous rock star and his entourage were also staying there --- the past comes roaring back to life with a vengeance. And as soon as Rebus starts asking questions about the long forgotten crime, a fresh body materializes. His inquiries reunite him with his old pals --- Siobhan Clarke and Malcolm Fox --- as they attempt to uncover the financial chicanery behind the savage beating of an upstart gangster, a crime that suggests the notorious old school crime boss Big Ger Cafferty has taken to retirement as poorly as Rebus himself.
Back Bay Books | 9780316342568
SHADOWBAHN by Steve Erickson (Science Fiction/Alternative History)
When the Twin Towers suddenly reappear in the Badlands of South Dakota two decades after their fall, nobody can explain their return. To the tens of thousands drawn to the “American Stonehenge” --- including Parker and Zema, siblings driving from L.A. to Michigan --- the Towers seem to sing, even as everybody hears a different song. And on the 93rd floor of the South Tower, Jesse Presley, the stillborn twin of the most famous singer who ever lived, suddenly awakes. Over the days and months and years to come, he’s driven mad by a voice in his head that sounds like his but isn’t, and by the memory of a country where he survived in his brother’s place.
Blue Rider Press | 9780735212022
SOMEONE TO WATCH OVER ME: A Portrait of Eleanor Roosevelt and the Tortured Father Who Shaped Her Life by Eric Burns (Biography)
Eleanor Roosevelt is viewed as one of the most pioneering women in American history. But she was also one of the most enigmatic and lonely. Her loveless marriage with FDR was no secret, and she had a cold relationship with most of her family --- from her distant mother to her public rivalry with her cousin, Alice. Yet she was a warm person, beloved by friends, and her humanitarian work still influences the world today. But who shaped Eleanor? It was the most unlikely of figures: her father Elliott, a lost spirit with a bittersweet story.
Pegasus Books | 9781681776392
ULTIMATE POWER by Stephen Frey (Thriller)
Paperback Original
Andrew Falcon Jr. is the youngest hedge-fund manager to make partner at a powerful investment bank on Wall Street. But just as Falcon thought life couldn’t get better, his niece Claire is kidnapped --- yet her abductors have no interest in money. They want information. In exchange for Claire’s safe return, Falcon must dig deep into his firm’s affairs, uncovering secrets worse than he could ever imagine. He discovers a conspiracy tied to the US government --- a rogue faction is manipulating the American people to establish a new order. Now facing impossible odds and a plot that goes all the way up to the nation’s leaders, Falcon must find a way to save not only his family but also his country.
Thomas & Mercer | 9781503954083
WE’LL ALWAYS HAVE CASABLANCA: The Legend and Afterlife of Hollywood's Most Beloved Movie by Noah Isenberg (Performing Arts/History)
WE’LL ALWAYS HAVE CASABLANCA is celebrated film historian Noah Isenberg’s rich account of the origins of the famed Humphrey Bogart movie, which premiered over 75 years ago. Through extensive research and interviews with filmmakers, film critics, family members of the cast and crew, and diehard fans, Isenberg reveals the myths and realities behind Casablanca’s production, exploring the transformation of the unproduced stage play into the classic screenplay, the controversial casting decisions, the battles with Production Code censors, and the effect of the war’s progress on the movie’s reception.
W. W. Norton & Company | 9780393355666
WOMAN NO. 17 by Edan Lepucki (Fiction)
High in the Hollywood Hills, writer Lady Daniels has decided to take a break from her husband. Left alone with her children, she’s going to need a hand taking care of her young son if she’s ever going to finish her memoir. In response to a Craigslist ad, S arrives, a magnetic young artist who will live in the secluded guest house out back, care for Lady’s toddler, Devin, and keep a watchful eye on her teenage son, Seth. S performs her day job beautifully, quickly drawing the entire family into her orbit and becoming a confidante for Lady. But in the heat of the summer, S’s connection to Lady’s older son takes a disturbing, and possibly destructive, turn.
Hogarth | 9781101904275
THE YOUNG WIDOWER’S HANDBOOK by Tom McAllister (Fiction)
For Hunter Cady, meeting Kaitlyn is the greatest thing that has ever happened to him. Whereas he had spent most of his days accomplishing very little, now his life has a purpose. Smart, funny and one of a kind, Kait is somehow charmed by Hunter’s awkwardness and droll humor, and her love gives him reason to want to be a better man. And then, suddenly, Kait is gone, her death as unexpected as the happiness she had brought to Hunter. Numb with grief, he stumbles forward in the only way he knows how: by running away. He heads due west from his Philadelphia home, taking Kait’s ashes with him. Kait and Hunter had always meant to travel. Now, with no real plan in mind, Hunter is swept into the adventures of fellow travelers on the road.
Algonquin Books | 9781616207427
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