March 4, 2025

March 4, 2025

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In this newsletter, you will find books releasing the weeks of March 3rd and March 10th 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 Spring Reading Contests and Feature, which we have brought back for a 14th year. On select days in March and April, we are hosting a series of 24-hour contests spotlighting a book that we know people will be talking about this spring and giving five lucky readers the chance to win it.

This Week's Bonus News:
Bookreporter.com's 14th Annual
Spring Reading Contests and Feature

Upcoming Virtual Book and Author Events

Here are four upcoming virtual book and author events that you may be interested in attending. Click on the links for more info and to register.

Wednesday, March 5th at 7pm ET: “Friends & Fiction”: Join “Friends & Fiction” for a conversation with Colleen Oakley about her new novel, JANE AND DAN AT THE END OF THE WORLD. Date night goes off the rails in this hilariously insightful take on midlife and marriage when one unhappy couple find themselves at the heart of a crime in progress.

Wednesday, March 5th at 8pm ET: The Poisoned Pen Bookstore: Adrian McKinty will talk about HANG ON ST. CHRISTOPHER, which continues his Edgar Award–winning Sean Duffy series. This time, Duffy attempts to bring a killer to justice while trying to keep himself and his team alive as everything unravels around them.

Thursday, March 6th at 3pm ET: Barnes & Noble: Join Barnes & Noble as they welcome Sarah Crouch for a live virtual discussion of MIDDLETIDE as part of their B&N Midday Mystery Virtual Event series. Sarah will be in conversation with the New York Times bestselling author of THE SECRET BOOK OF FLORA LEA, Patti Callahan Henry.

Tuesday, March 11th at 9pm ET: Killer Author Club: Be there when the one and only Hannah Morrissey joins the Killer Author Club --- Kimberly Belle, Heather Gudenkauf and Kaira Rouda --- to talk all things writing and her latest bone-chilling page turner, THE UNLUCKY ONES.

On Sale the Week of March 3rd in Hardcover

March 4th

BABY, IT'S MURDER: The Concluding Mike Hammer Novel by Mickey Spillane and Max Allan Collins (Hard-boiled Mystery)
The concluding Mike Hammer novel begins with a 21st-century funeral before flashing back to the summer of 1973. Nine years after the events of Dig Two Graves, Hammer takes another unlikely vacation --- this time on Long Island to help look after his partner Velda Sterling’s 17-year-old sibling, Mikki. Mikki must deal with the attention of two boys vying for her affection --- Hammer preferring the good kid from a wealthy family over the long-haired doper with an Easy Rider vibe. When Mikki gets hooked on heroin, Hammer --- filled with contempt for dope dealers --- goes on a rampage. He will find those behind the drug racket and teach them what shooting up is all about. But a final resolution awaits him in the future at that funeral.
Titan Books | 9781803364599

BLOOD MOON by Sandra Brown (Romantic Suspense)
Recently divorced and slightly heavy-handed with his liquor, Detective John Bowie does all that he can to cope with the actions taken (or not taken) during the investigation of Crissy Mellin, a teenage girl who disappeared more than three years prior. But now, “Crisis Point,” a long-running true crime television series, is soon to air an episode documenting the unsolved case. Beth Collins, a senior producer on “Crisis Point,” is convinced that Crissy’s disappearance was not an isolated incident. A string of disappearances of teenage girls in nearby areas has only one thing in common: They took place on the night of a blood moon. In a last-ditch effort to find out the truth, Beth leaves New York City for Louisiana to enlist Detective Bowie in helping her figure out what happened to Crissy and find the true culprit before he acts on the next blood moon --- in four days’ time.
Grand Central Publishing | 9781538742983

BROKEN COUNTRY by Clare Leslie Hall (Fiction)
Beth and her gentle, kind husband, Frank, are happily married, though their relationship relies on the past staying buried. But when Beth’s brother-in-law shoots a dog going after their sheep, Beth doesn’t realize that the gunshot will alter the course of their lives. For the dog belonged to none other than Gabriel Wolfe, the man Beth loved as a teenager --- the man who broke her heart years ago. Gabriel has returned to the village with his young son, Leo, a boy who reminds Beth very much of her own son, who died in a tragic accident. As Beth is pulled back into Gabriel’s life, tensions around the village rise and dangerous secrets and jealousies from the past resurface, this time with deadly consequences. Beth is forced to make a choice between the woman she once was and the woman she has become.
Simon & Schuster | 9781668078181

COUNT MY LIES by Sophie Stava (Domestic Thriller)
Sloane Caraway is a liar. Harmless lies, mostly, to make her self-proclaimed sad little life a bit more interesting. So when Sloane sees a young girl in tears at a park one afternoon, she can’t help herself. She tells the girl’s (very attractive) dad that she’s a nurse and helps him pull a bee stinger from the girl’s foot. With this lie, and chance encounter, Sloane becomes the nanny for the wealthy and privileged Jay and Violet Lockhart. They’re the perfect New York couple, with a brownstone, a daughter in private school, and summers on Block Island. But maybe Sloane isn’t the only one lying, and all that’s picture-perfect harbors a much more dangerous truth.
Gallery/Scout Press | 9781668079348

DON'T TELL ME HOW TO DIE by Marshall Karp (Domestic Thriller)
I had it all: a fantastic husband, two great kids, an exciting career. And then, at the age of 43, I found out I would be dead before my next birthday. My mother also died at 43. I was 17, and she warned me that women would flock to my suddenly single father like stray cats to an overturned milk truck. They did. And one absolutely evil woman practically destroyed his life, mine and my sister’s. I am not letting that happen to my family. I have three months, and I plan to spend every waking minute searching for the perfect woman to take my place as Alex’s wife, and mother to Kevin and Katie. You’re probably thinking that I’ll never do it. Did I mention that in high school I was voted “Most Likely to Kill Someone to Get What She Wants”?
Blackstone Publishing | 9798874824396

DREAM COUNT by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie (Fiction)
Chiamaka is a Nigerian travel writer living in America. Alone in the midst of the pandemic, she recalls her past lovers and grapples with her choices and regrets. Zikora, her best friend, is a lawyer who has been successful at everything until --- betrayed and brokenhearted --- she must turn to the person she thought she needed least. Omelogor, Chiamaka’s bold, outspoken cousin, is a financial powerhouse in Nigeria who begins to question how well she knows herself. And Kadiatou, Chiamaka’s housekeeper, is proudly raising her daughter in America --- but faces an unthinkable hardship that threatens all she has worked to achieve.
Knopf | 9780593802724

THE DREAM HOTEL by Laila Lalami (Dystopian Fiction)
Sara has just landed at LAX when agents from the Risk Assessment Administration pull her aside and inform her that she will soon commit a crime. Using data from her dreams, the RAA’s algorithm has determined that she is at imminent risk of harming the person she loves most: her husband. For his safety, she must be kept under observation for 21 days. The agents transfer Sara to a retention center, where she is held with other dreamers, all of them women trying to prove their innocence from different crimes. With every deviation from the strict and ever-shifting rules of the facility, their stay is extended. Months pass, and Sara seems no closer to release. Then one day, a new resident arrives, disrupting the order of the facility and leading Sara on a collision course with the very companies that have deprived her of her freedom.
Pantheon | 9780593317600

EXPECT GREAT THINGS!: How the Katharine Gibbs School Revolutionized the American Workplace for Women by Vanda Krefft (History)
It’s a safe bet that most of the secretaries on the TV series “Mad Men” would have attended the Katharine Gibbs School in New York City. In its heyday in the 1950s and ‘60s, the iconic institution was synonymous with supplying secretaries --- always properly attired in heels, ladylike hats and white gloves --- to male executives. In EXPECT GREAT THINGS!, Vanda Krefft turns the notion of a “Gibbs girl” on its head, showing us that while the school was getting women who could type 90 words per minute into the C-suite, its more subversive mission was to get them out of the secretarial pool to assume positions of power on the other side of the desk. And Gibbs graduates did just that, tackling the sexism of the era and paving the way for 21st-century women to succeed in any profession.
Algonquin Books | 9781643753171

FAR FROM HOME by Danielle Steel (Historical Fiction)
In July 1944, Arielle von Auspeck arrives at the glamorous Hotel Ritz in occupied Paris. Half French, half German, she is happy to be back in France, where her husband, Gregor, a retired colonel, will join her soon from Germany. But then she receives word that Gregor was part of Operation Valkyrie, a failed attempt to assassinate Hitler in Poland, and has been shot as a traitor. Now, she is whisked away from Paris under cover of darkness for her own safety. As the Allies storm the beaches, she goes into hiding in a small village in Normandy under an assumed name. There, she forms a friendship with Sebastien Renaud, whose wife and daughter were deported in 1941, and who eventually reveals himself as a forger in the Resistance. As war rages on, Arielle and Sebastien work for the Resistance and hold out for the time when they can search for their loved ones.
Delacorte Press | 9780593498675

FINLAY DONOVAN DIGS HER OWN GRAVE by Elle Cosimano (Mystery/Humor)
Finlay Donovan and her nanny/partner-in-crime, Vero, have not always gotten along with Finlay’s elderly neighbor, Mrs. Haggerty, the community busybody and president of the neighborhood watch. But when a dead body is discovered in her backyard, Mrs. Haggerty needs their help. At first a suspect, Mrs. Haggerty is cleared by the police, but her house remains an active crime scene. She has nowhere to go…except Finlay’s house, right across the street. Finlay and Vero have no interest in getting involved in another murder case --- or sacrificing either of their bedrooms. But when the focus of the investigation widens to include Finlay’s ex-husband, Steven, Finlay and Vero are left with little choice but to get closer to Mrs. Haggerty and uncover her secrets…before the police start digging up theirs. But who will solve the mystery first?
Minotaur Books | 9781250337344

FIRSTBORN GIRLS: A Memoir by Bernice L. McFadden (Memoir)
On her second birthday in 1967, Bernice McFadden died in a car crash near Detroit, only to be resuscitated after her mother pulled her from the flaming wreckage. FIRSTBORN GIRLS traces her remarkable life from that moment up to the publication of her first novel, SUGAR. Growing up in 1980s Brooklyn, Bernice finds solace in books, summer trips to Barbados and boarding school to escape her alcoholic father. Discovering the works of Alice Walker and Toni Morrison, she finally sees herself and her loved ones reflected in their stories of “messy, beautiful, joyful Black people.” Interwoven with Bernice's personal journey is her family's history, beginning with her four-times enslaved great-grandmother, Louisa Vicey Wilson. Her descendants survived Reconstruction and Jim Crow, joined the Great Migration, and mourned Dr. King’s assassination during the Civil Rights Movement.
Dutton | 9780593184974

GALWAY'S EDGE: A Jack Taylor Mystery by Ken Bruen (Mystery/Thriller)
Edge, a shadow organization made up of the most powerful figures in Galway society, exists to rid the city of criminals and abusers who have evaded the law. Long wary of the organization, the Vatican is not pleased when rumors start swirling that one of the Catholic Church’s own priests has joined its ranks. An envoy to the Archdiocese shows up at private detective Jack Taylor’s door, asking him to go speak to a priest named Kevin Whelan and dissuade him from any involvement with Edge. Jack accepts the mission, but the next day Father Whelan is found dead. As more Edge members are murdered, the Vatican grows alarmed that someone even worse will take their place. It’s up to Jack Taylor to nail the culprit before Edge is dissolved completely and Galway is thrown into chaos.
Mysterious Press | 9781613166000

THE GIRL FROM GREENWICH STREET: A Novel of Hamilton, Burr, and America's First Murder Trial by Lauren Willig (Historical Mystery/Legal Thriller)
Just before Christmas 1799, Elma Sands slips out of her Quaker cousin’s boarding house --- and doesn’t come home. Her body is eventually found in the Manhattan Well. Handbills circulate around the city accusing a carpenter named Levi Weeks of seducing and murdering Elma. But privately, quietly, Levi’s wealthy brother calls in a special favor. Aaron Burr’s legal practice can’t finance both his expensive tastes and his ambition to win the 1800 New York elections. To defend Levi Weeks is a double win: a hefty fee plus a chance to grab headlines. Alexander Hamilton has his own political aspirations; he isn’t going to let Burr monopolize the public’s attention. If Burr is defending Levi Weeks, then Hamilton will too. As the trial and the election draw near, Burr and Hamilton race against time to save a man’s life --- and destroy each other.
William Morrow | 9780063306110

HANG ON ST. CHRISTOPHER: A Sean Duffy Novel by Adrian McKinty
(Mystery/Thriller)
It's July 1992, and the Troubles in Northern Ireland are still grinding on after 25 apocalyptic years. Detective Inspector Sean Duffy got his family safely over the water to Scotland, to "Shortbread Land." Duffy is a part-timer now, only returning to Belfast six days a month to get his pension. It's an easy gig, if he can keep his head down. But then a murder case falls into his lap while his protege is on holiday in Spain. A carjacking gone wrong and the death of a solitary, middle-aged painter. But something is not right, and as Duffy probes, he discovers that the painter was an IRA assassin. So the question becomes: Who hit the hitman, and why? This is Duffy's most violent and dangerous case yet, and the whole future of the burgeoning "peace process" may depend upon it.
Blackstone Publishing | 9798212905022

A HARVEST OF HEARTS by Andrea Eames (Fantasy/Romance)
Everyone in Foss Butcher’s village knows what happens when the magic-workers come. They harvest human hearts to use in their spells. But Foss never expected that anyone would want hers. So when a sorcerer snags a piece of Foss’ heart without meaning to, she is furious. She stomps toward the grand City to keep his enchanted House and demands that he fixes her before she keels over and dies. But the sorcerer, Sylvester, is not what she expected. Petulant, idle and new to his powers, Sylvester has no clue how to undo the heart-taking, or how to do much of anything. Foss’ only friend is a talking cat, and even the House’s walls themselves have moods. As Foss searches for a cure, she accidentally uncovers that there is much more to the heart-taking --- and to the magic-workers themselves --- than she ever could have imagined.
Erewhon Books | 9781645661887

I LEAVE IT UP TO YOU by Jinwoo Chong (Fiction)
A coma can change a man, but the world Jack Jr. awakens to is one he barely recognizes. His advertising job is history, his Manhattan apartment is gone, and the love of his life has left him behind. He’s been asleep for two years; with no one to turn to, he realizes it’s been 10 years since he last saw his family. Lost and disoriented, he makes a reluctant homecoming back to the bustling Korean American enclave of Fort Lee, New Jersey; back into the waiting arms of his parents, who are operating under the illusion that he never left; and back to Joja, their ever-struggling sushi restaurant that he was set to inherit before he ran away from it all. There is value in the joyous rhythms of this once-abandoned life. But second chances are an even messier business than running a restaurant, and the lure of a self-determined path might prove too hard to resist.
Ballantine Books | 9780593727058

KILLS WELL WITH OTHERS by Deanna Raybourn (Thriller)
After more than a year of laying low, Billie, Helen, Mary Alice and Natalie are called back into action. When they receive a summons from the head of the elite assassin organization known as the Museum, they are ready to tackle the greatest challenge of their careers. Someone on the inside has compiled a list of important kills committed by Museum agents, connected to a single, shadowy figure, an Eastern European gangster with an iron fist, some serious criminal ambition, and a tendency to kill first and ask questions later. This new nemesis is murdering agents who got in the way of their power-hungry plans, and the aging quartet of killers is next. Together the foursome embark on a wild ride across the globe on the double mission of rooting out the Museum’s mole and hunting down the gangster who seems to know their next move before they make it.
Berkley | 9780593638514

THE LAST MANAGER: How Earl Weaver Tricked, Tormented, and Reinvented Baseball by John W. Miller (Sports/Biography)
Long before the Moneyball Era, the Earl of Baltimore reigned over baseball. History’s feistiest and most colorful manager, Earl Weaver transformed the sport by collecting and analyzing data in visionary ways, ultimately winning more games than anybody else during his time running the Orioles from 1968 to 1982. Beyond being a great baseball mind, Weaver was a rare baseball character. Major League Baseball is show business, and Weaver understood how much of his job was entertainment. THE LAST MANAGER uncovers the story of Weaver’s St. Louis childhood with a mobster uncle, his years of minor-league heartbreak, and his unlikely road to becoming a big-league manager, while tracing the evolution of the game from the old-time baseball of cross-country trains and “desk contracts” to the modern era of free agency, video analysis and powerful player agents.
Avid Reader Press/Simon & Schuster | 9781668030929

NO LESS STRANGE OR WONDERFUL: Essays in Curiosity by A. Kendra Greene (Essays)
In 26 sparkling essays, illuminated through both text and image, celebrated author and artist A. Kendra Greene is trying to make sense of the things that matter most in life: love, connection, death, grief, the universe, meaning, nothingness and everythingness. Through a series of encounters with strangers, children and animals, the wild merges with the domestic; the everyday meets the sublime. Each essay returns readers to our smallest moments and our largest ones in a book that makes us realize --- through its exuberant language, playful curation and delightful associative leapfrogging --- that they are, in fact, one and the same.
Tin House Books | 9781963108088

ONE GOOD THING by Georgia Hunter (Historical Fiction)
1940, Emilia-Romagna. Lili and Esti have been best friends since meeting at the University of Ferrara. There is a war being fought across borders, and in Italy, Mussolini’s Racial Laws have deemed Lili and Esti descendants of an “inferior” Jewish race, but life somehow goes on --- until Germany invades northern Italy, and the friends find themselves in occupied territory. Esti convinces Lili to flee first to a villa in the countryside to help hide a group of young war orphans, then to a convent in Florence, where they pose as nuns and forge false identification papers for the Underground. When disaster strikes at the convent, a critically wounded Esti asks Lili to take a much bigger step: to go on the run with Esti’s son, Theo. Terrified to travel on her own, Lili sets out on an epic journey, doing everything she can to keep Theo safe.
Pamela Dorman Books | 9781984880932

THE PERSIANS by Sanam Mahloudji (Fiction)
Meet the Valiat family. In Iran, they were somebodies. In America, they’re nobodies. First there is Elizabeth, the regal matriarch, who remained in Tehran despite the revolution. She lives alone but is sometimes visited by Niaz, her Islamic-law-breaking granddaughter, who takes her partying with a side of purpose and yet manages to survive. Elizabeth’s daughters wound up in America: Shirin, a charismatic and flamboyantly high-flying event planner in Houston, and Seema, a dreamy idealist turned housewife languishing in the chaparral-filled hills of Los Angeles. And then there’s the other granddaughter, Bita, a disillusioned law student in New York City trying to find deeper meaning by quietly giving away her belongings. When an annual vacation in Aspen goes wildly awry and Shirin ends up in jail, the family’s upper-class veneer is cracked open.
Scribner | 9781668015797

PLAY IT FORWARD: How Women Are Changing Sports to Change the World by TOGETHXR (Sports)
PLAY IT FORWARD features 25 inspirational stories of badass women from all corners of the sports universe, curated by TOGETHXR, a sports media company founded by legends Sue Bird, Alex Morgan, Simone Manuel and Chloe Kim. From profiles of professional athletes and Olympians at the top of their game to everyday women putting in the work without a crowd, these are true tales of fierce competitors, dedicated teammates and passionate advocates who are all too accustomed to hearing the word “no.” Each story highlights an inspiring athlete or team who is defying expectations and rebelling against inequality in big and small ways.
Chronicle Books | 9781797232171

PROPAGANDA GIRLS: The Secret War of the Women in the OSS by Lisa Rogak (History)
Betty MacDonald was a 28-year-old reporter from Hawaii. Zuzka Lauwers grew up in a tiny Czechoslovakian village and knew five languages by the time she was 21. Jane Smith-Hutton was the wife of a naval attaché living in Tokyo. Marlene Dietrich, the German-American actress and singer, was one of the biggest stars of the 20th century. As members of the OSS during World War II, their task was to create a secret brand of propaganda produced with the sole aim to break the morale of Axis soldiers. Betty, Zuzka, Jane and Marlene forged letters and “official” military orders, wrote and produced entire newspapers, scripted radio broadcasts and songs, and even developed rumors for undercover spies and double agents to spread to the enemy. And outside of a small group of spies, no one knew they existed. Until now.
St. Martin's Press | 9781250275592

THE RAGPICKER KING by Cassandra Clare (Fantasy/Romance)
Kel Saren, body double to Conor, crown prince of the dazzling city of Castellane, is caught between two worlds. In order to protect his beloved prince, Kel must find the culprits responsible for a massacre at the royal palace --- and the only clues are held by the Ragpicker King, the notorious criminal who rules Castellane’s underworld. The trail Kel follows leads back to the Hill, where a dark conspiracy to destroy the royal family has taken hold --- a conspiracy headed up by the monstrous Artal Gremont, the man engaged to marry the woman Kel adores. Meanwhile, to save the life of a dying friend, Lin Caster has falsely claimed to be the Goddess Reborn. Now the terrifying leader of her people has arrived to test her powers. The price of failure is exile, and only through her alliance with the Ragpicker King can she continue to access the magic that may save her.
Del Rey | 9780525620020

RAISING HARE: A Memoir by Chloe Dalton (Memoir)
Imagine you could hold a baby hare and bottle-feed it. Imagine that it lived under your roof and lolloped around your bedroom at night, drumming on the duvet cover when it wanted your attention. Imagine that, over two years later, it still ran in from the fields when you called it, slept in your house for hours on end, and gave birth to leverets in your study. For political advisor and speechwriter Chloe Dalton, who spent lockdown deep in the English countryside, far away from her usual busy London life, this became her unexpected reality. RAISING HARE chronicles their journey together, while also taking a deep dive into the lives and nature of hares, and the way they have been viewed historically in art, literature and folklore.
Pantheon | 9780593701843

RED DOG FARM by Nathaniel Ian Miller (Fiction)
Growing up on his family’s cattle farm in western Iceland, young Orri has gained an appreciation for the beauty found in everyday things. But the outer world still beckons, so he leaves his no-nonsense Lithuanian Jewish mother and his taciturn father, Pabbi, to attend university in Reykjavík. No longer able to find joy in his way of life, Pabbi falls into a depression soon after Orri goes away to school. Feeling adrift and aimless at the end of his first semester, Orri comes home. For the first time, Pabbi allows Orri to help him run the farm. Meanwhile, Orri meets a kindred spirit on the internet: Mihan, a part-time student. Over time, their connection deepens. By year’s end, Orri must decide whether he wants to --- or should --- return to university, and what a future with Mihan would hold, if she’ll have him.
Little, Brown and Company | 9780316575140

THE RIVER HAS ROOTS by Amal El-Mohtar (Fantasy)
In the small town of Thistleford, on the edge of Faerie, dwells the mysterious Hawthorn family. There, they tend and harvest the enchanted willows and honor an ancient compact to sing to them in thanks for their magic. None more devotedly than the family’s latest daughters, Esther and Ysabel, who cherish each other as much as they cherish the ancient trees. But when Esther rejects a forceful suitor in favor of a lover from the land of Faerie, not only the sisters’ bond but also their lives will be at risk.
Tordotcom | 9781250341082

TAKING MANHATTAN: The Extraordinary Events That Created New York and Shaped America by Russell Shorto (History)
In 1664, England decided to invade the Dutch-controlled city of New Amsterdam on Manhattan Island. Charles II and his brother, the Duke of York, had dreams of empire, and their archrivals, the Dutch, were in the way. But Richard Nicolls, the military officer who led the English flotilla bent on destruction, changed his strategy once he encountered Peter Stuyvesant, New Netherland’s canny director general. TAKING MANHATTAN reveals the founding of New York to be an invention, the result of creative negotiations that would blend the multiethnic, capitalistic society of New Amsterdam with the power of the rising English empire. But the birth of what might be termed the first modern city is also a story of the brutal dispossession of Native Americans and of the roots of American slavery.
W. W. Norton & Company | 9780393881165

UNIVERSALITY by Natasha Brown (Fiction)
Late one night on a Yorkshire farm, in the midst of an illegal rave, a young man is nearly bludgeoned to death with a solid gold bar. An ambitious young journalist sets out to uncover the truth surrounding the attack, connecting the dots between an amoral banker landlord, an iconoclastic newspaper columnist, and a radical anarchist movement that has taken up residence on the farm. She solves the mystery, but her viral exposé raises more questions than it answers.
Random House | 9780593977309

THE VANISHING KIND by Alice Henderson (Thriller)
When wildlife biologist Alex Carter is tasked with locating jaguars on a vast desert preserve in New Mexico, she is ecstatic. While jaguars once roamed throughout the Southwest, they are now endangered, and Alex hopes that some of the sleek and elusive creatures have found their way to the protected sanctuary. Meanwhile, an archaeological team is excavating the gravesite of a 16th-century Spanish conquistador on a neighboring piece of land. While learning about their discoveries, Alex encounters a dangerous group of anti-immigrant vigilantes roaming the area, threatening the team and demanding they leave. And when the militants learn of Alex’s mission, they become bent on stopping her. And then there are the strange holes that keep appearing on the preserve. Who is digging them, and what are they looking for?
William Morrow | 9780063223059

WE PRETTY PIECES OF FLESH by Colwill Brown (Fiction)
“Ask anyone non-Northern, they’ll only know Donny as punchline of a joke or place they changed trains once ont way to London.” But Doncaster is also the home of Rach, Shaz and Kel, bezzies since childhood and Donny lasses through and through. Never mind that Rach is skeptical of Shaz’s bolder plots; or that Shaz, who comes from a rougher end of town, feels left behind when the others begin plotting a course to uni; or that Kel sometimes feels split in two trying to keep the peace. The girls are inseparable, and their friendship as indestructible as they are. But as they grow up and away from one another, a long-festering secret threatens to rip the trio apart.
Henry Holt and Co. | 9781250342881

WILD DARK SHORE by Charlotte McConaghy (Fiction)
Dominic Salt and his three children are caretakers of Shearwater, a tiny island not far from Antarctica. Home to the world’s largest seed bank, Shearwater was once full of researchers, but with sea levels rising, the Salts are now its final inhabitants. Until, during the worst storm the island has ever seen, a woman mysteriously washes ashore. As they nurse Rowan back to strength, it begins to feel like she might be just what they need. Rowan starts imagining a future where she could belong to someone again. But she isn’t telling the whole truth about why she set out for Shearwater. And when she discovers sabotaged radios and a freshly dug grave, she realizes that Dominic is keeping his own secrets. As the storms on Shearwater gather force, they all must decide if they can trust each other enough to protect the precious seeds in their care before it’s too late.
Flatiron Books | 9781250827951

WOODWORKING by Emily St. James (Fiction)
Erica Skyberg is 35 years old, recently divorced --- and trans. Not that she's told anyone yet. Mitchell, South Dakota, isn't exactly bursting with other trans women. Instead, she keeps to herself, teaching by day and directing community theater by night. That is, until Abigail Hawkes enters her orbit. Abigail is 17, Mitchell High’s resident political dissident and Only Trans Girl. It’s a role she plays faultlessly, albeit a little reluctantly. She's also annoyed by the idea of spending her senior year secretly guiding her English teacher through her transition. But Abigail remembers the uncertainty --- and loneliness --- that comes with it. Besides, Erica isn’t the only one struggling to shed the weight of others’ expectations. As their unlikely friendship evolves, it comes under the scrutiny of their community.
Zando – Crooked Media Reads | 9781638931478

On Sale the Week of March 3rd in Paperback

March 1st

MR. WHISPER by Andrew Mayne (Thriller)
Paperback Original
Investigator Sloan McPherson finds a frightened vagrant suffering from amnesia living in a Florida swamp --- and then learns he disappeared from Oregon when he was a teenager. To find out how he ended up 3,000 miles from home 30 years later, Sloan enlists the help of two brilliant colleagues. FBI agent Jessica Blackwood and scientist Theo Cray have already made an alarming connection. A female classmate of the Everglades drifter disappeared at the same time, and their high school journals reveal ties to an enigmatic figure they both called Mr. Whisper. Under his influence, they did as they were told. The case is also attracting the attention of corporate security expert Brad Trasker, whose trail is leading to the dark heart of a master manipulator. Jessica, Theo, Sloan and Brad must now bring their unique skills to the table to take down a diabolical adversary.
Thomas & Mercer | 9781662522482

THE WARBLER by Sarah Beth Durst (Fiction/Magical Realism)
Paperback Original
Ten months. That’s the longest Elisa has stayed any place, constantly propelled by her fear that if she puts down roots, a family curse will turn her into a tree. But she’s grown tired of flitting from town to town and in and out of relationships. When she discovers a small town in Massachusetts where mysterious forces make it impossible for the residents to leave, she hopes she can change her fate. As Elisa learns about the town’s history, she understands more about the women in her family, who seem doomed to never get what they want. Now she believes she’s stuck, too. Is that a patch of bark on her arm? But her neighbor’s collection of pet birds sings secrets that Elisa can almost understand --- secrets she must unravel in order to be truly alive.
Lake Union Publishing | 9781662524110

March 4th

3 SHADES OF BLUE: Miles Davis, John Coltrane, Bill Evans, and the Lost Empire of Cool by James Kaplan (Music/History)
In 1959, America’s great indigenous art form, jazz, reached the height of its power and popularity. James Kaplan’s 3 SHADES OF BLUE captures how that golden era came to be, and its pinnacle with the recording of Kind of Blue. It’s a book about music, business, race, heroin, the cities that gave jazz its home, and the Black geniuses behind its rise. It’s an astonishing meditation on creativity and the strange environments where it can flourish most. It’s a book about the great forebears and founders of a lost era, and the disrupters who would take the music down truly new paths. And it’s about why the world of jazz most people know is a museum to this never-replicated period. But above all, 3 SHADES OF BLUE is a book about three very different men --- the greatness and varied fortunes of Miles Davis, John Coltrane and Bill Evans.
Penguin Books | 9780525561026

THE AMERICAN DAUGHTERS by Maurice Carlos Ruffin (Historical Fiction)
Ady, a curious, sharp-witted girl, and her fierce mother, Sanite, are inseparable. Enslaved to a businessman in the French Quarter of New Orleans, the pair spend their days dreaming of a loving future and reminiscing about their family’s rebellious and storied history. When mother and daughter are separated, Ady is left hopeless and directionless until she stumbles into the Mockingbird Inn and meets Lenore, a free Black woman with whom she becomes fast friends. Lenore invites Ady to join a clandestine society of spies called the Daughters. With the courage instilled in her by Sanite --- and with help from these strong women --- Ady learns how to put herself first. So begins her journey toward liberation and imagining a new future.
One World | 9780593729410

ANITA DE MONTE LAUGHS LAST by Xochitl Gonzalez (Fiction)
1985. Anita de Monte, a rising star in the art world, is found dead in New York City. But by 1998, Anita’s name has been all but forgotten --- certainly by the time Raquel, a third-year art history student, is preparing her final thesis. On College Hill, surrounded by privileged students whose futures are already paved out for them, Raquel feels like an outsider. Students of color, like her, are the minority there, and the pressure to work twice as hard for the same opportunities is no secret. But when Raquel becomes romantically involved with a well-connected older art student, she finds herself unexpectedly rising up the social ranks. As she attempts to straddle both worlds, she stumbles upon Anita’s story, raising questions about the dynamics of her own relationship, which eerily mirrors that of the forgotten artist.
Flatiron Books | 9781250786241

THE BIRD HOTEL by Joyce Maynard (Fiction/Magical Realism)
After a childhood filled with heartbreak, Irene, a talented artist, finds herself in a small Central American village where she checks into a beautiful but decaying lakefront hotel called La Llorona at the base of a volcano. THE BIRD HOTEL tells the story of this young American who, after suffering tragedy, restores and runs La Llorona. Along the way, we meet a rich assortment of characters who live in the village or come to stay at the hotel. While the world that Joyce Maynard brings to life on the page is rendered from her imagination, it’s one informed by the more than 20 years of which she has spent a significant amount of her time in a small Mayan indigenous village in Guatemala.
Arcade | 9781648210761

THE BOXCAR LIBRARIAN by Brianna Labuskes (Historical Fiction)
Paperback Original
When Works Progress Administration editor Millie Lang finds herself on the wrong end of a potential political scandal, she’s shipped off to Montana to work on the state’s American Guide Series --- travel books intended to put the nation’s destitute writers to work. Millie arrives to an eclectic staff claiming their missed deadlines are due to sabotage, possibly from the state’s powerful Copper Kings who don’t want their long and bloody history with union organizers aired for the rest of the country to read. More than a decade earlier, Alice Monroe created the Boxcar Library in order to deliver books to isolated mining towns. She thought she found the perfect librarian to staff the train car in Colette Durand. Now, no one in Missoula will tell Millie why both Alice and Colette went out on the inaugural journey of the Boxcar Library, but only Alice returned.
William Morrow Paperbacks | 9780063376304

BURN BOOK: A Tech Love Story by Kara Swisher (Business & Economics/Memoir)
While covering the explosion of the digital sector in the early 1990s, Kara Swisher developed a long track record of digging up and reporting the facts about this new world order. Swisher has interviewed everyone who matters in tech over three decades, right when they presided over an explosion of world-changing innovation that has both helped and hurt our world. Steve Jobs, Jeff Bezos, Elon Musk, Bill Gates, Sheryl Sandberg, Bob Iger, Larry Page and Sergey Brin, Meg Whitman, Peter Thiel, Sam Altman and Mark Zuckerberg are just a few whom Swisher made sweat --- figuratively and, in Zuckerberg’s case, literally. Despite the damage she chronicles, Swisher remains optimistic about tech’s potential to help solve problems and not just create them.
Simon & Schuster | 9781982163907

CLEAR by Carys Davies (Historical Fiction)
John, an impoverished Scottish minister, has accepted a job evicting the lone remaining occupant of an island north of Scotland --- Ivar, who has been living alone for decades, with only the animals and the sea for company. Though his wife, Mary, has serious misgivings about the errand, he decides to go anyway, setting in motion a chain of events that neither he nor Mary could have predicted. Shortly after John reaches the island, he falls down a cliff and is found, unconscious and badly injured, by Ivar, who takes him home and tends to his wounds. The two men do not speak a common language, but as John builds a dictionary of Ivar’s world, they learn to communicate. And as Ivar sees himself for the first time in decades reflected through the eyes of another person, they build a fragile, unusual connection.
Scribner | 9781668030677

DARLING GIRLS by Sally Hepworth (Domestic Thriller)
For as long as they can remember, Jessica, Norah and Alicia have been told how lucky they are. As young girls they were rescued from family tragedies and raised by a loving foster mother, Miss Fairchild, on an idyllic farming estate and given an elusive second chance at a happy family life. But their childhood wasn’t the fairy tale everyone thinks it was. Miss Fairchild had rules. Miss Fairchild could be unpredictable. And Miss Fairchild was never, ever to be crossed. In a moment of desperation, the three broke away from Miss Fairchild and thought they were free. Even though they never saw her again, she was always somewhere in the shadows of their minds. When a body is discovered under the home they grew up in, the foster sisters find themselves thrust into the spotlight as key witnesses. Or are they prime suspects?
St. Martin’s Griffin | 9781250371706

DRAGONS OF ETERNITY: Dragonlance Destinies, Volume 3 by Margaret Weis and Tracy Hickman (Fantasy/Adventure)
When Destina Rosethorn and her companions were transported to a time centuries before their birth --- to the days of the Third Dragon War --- the Graygem of Gargath brought chaos to the battlefield and changed the course of history. Upon returning to the Inn of the Last Home, where their journey began, Destina’s party discovered a world completely changed. The forces of evil now hold sway over their land. The River of Time is rising, flowing inexorably toward the present day. Destina and her friends must make one last, desperate attempt to restore time’s river to its proper channel. If they do not succeed, the altered past will sweep over the present until no trace of their old world remains.
Random House Worlds | 9781984819444

FINDING SOPHIE by Imran Mahmood (Domestic Thriller)
For the last 17 years, Harry and Zara King’s lives have revolved around their only daughter, Sophie. One day, Sophie leaves the house and doesn’t come home. Six weeks later, the police are no closer to finding her than when they started. Harry and Zara have questioned everyone who has ever had any connection to Sophie, to no avail. Except there’s one house on their block --- number 210, across the street --- whose occupant refuses to break his silence. As the question mark over number 210 devolves into obsession, Harry and Zara are forced to examine their own lives. They realize they have grown apart, suffering in separate spheres of grief. And as they try to find their way back to each other, they must face the truth about their daughter: who she was, how she changed and why she disappeared.
Bantam | 9780593723609

THE FURY by Alex Michaelides (Psychological Thriller)
Lana Farrar is a reclusive ex–movie star and one of the most famous women in the world. Every year, she invites her closest friends to escape the English weather and spend Easter on her idyllic private Greek island. I tell you this because you may think you know this story. You probably read about it at the time --- it caused a real stir in the tabloids, if you remember. It had all the necessary ingredients for a press sensation: a celebrity; a private island cut off by the wind…and a murder. We found ourselves trapped there overnight. Our old friendships concealed hatred and a desire for revenge. What followed was a game of cat and mouse. The night ended in violence and death, as one of us was found murdered. But who am I? My name is Elliot Chase, and I’m going to tell you a story unlike any you’ve ever heard.
Celadon Books | 9781250758996

A GIRL WITHIN A GIRL WITHIN A GIRL by Nanda Reddy (Fiction)
Paperback Original
On an ordinary day in an upscale Atlanta suburb, Maya is making breakfast for her two sons, when her husband drops a red-and-blue-striped envelope on the counter and asks a devastating question: Who is Sunny? Maya is sent reeling back to her childhood in Guyana --- a time when Sunny was her only name. Unbeknownst to her husband, Maya is not who she claims to be. The letter, from her long-lost sister Roshi, now threatens to expose her true identity and shatter the seemingly perfect existence Maya worked so hard to build. As she frantically weighs the impact of the truth on her future, Maya relives the details of her childhood journey to America from Guyana --- and the traumatic events that forced her to leave her past behind.
Zibby Publishing | 9798989532513

A GREAT COUNTRY by Shilpi Somaya Gowda (Fiction)
Pacific Hills, California: Gated communities, ocean views, well-tended lawns, serene pools, and now the new home of the Shah family. For the Shah parents, who came to America 20 years earlier with little more than an education and their new marriage, this move represents the culmination of years of hard work and dreaming. For their children, born and raised in America, success is not so simple. For the most part, these differences among the five members of the Shah family are minor irritants. But one Saturday night, the 12-year-old son is arrested. The fallout from that event will shake each family member’s perception of themselves as individuals, as community members and as Americans, and will lead each to consider: How do we define success? At what cost comes ambition? And what is our role and responsibility in the cultural mosaic of modern America?
Mariner Books | 9780063324350

THE HATERS by Robyn Harding (Psychological Thriller)
Camryn Lane is living her dream. After years of struggle and rejection, her first novel finally has been published. Her editor is happy, and her loved ones are proud and excited for her. She’s on top of the world --- until she receives a disturbing message from an anonymous reader. Rattled by the accusations she finds there, Camryn vows to put the missive out of her mind. But the disturbing allegations spread, and soon her book is flooded with bad reviews. Camryn is relentlessly trolled online, accused of the unthinkable. It’s clear that someone is trying to ruin her --- personally and professionally. But why? As the online harassment creeps into Camryn’s personal life, she vows to find out who’s behind it. And when the abuse turns deadly, it will take everything Camryn has to unmask the enemy so intent on destroying her.
Grand Central Publishing | 9781538766118

THE HAZELBOURNE LADIES MOTORCYCLE AND FLYING CLUB by Helen Simonson (Historical Fiction)
It is the summer of 1919. Now that all the men have returned from the front, Constance Haverhill has been asked to give up her cottage and her job at the estate she helped run during the war. She is sent as a lady’s companion to an old family friend who is convalescing at a seaside hotel. Despite having only weeks to find a permanent home, Constance is swept up in the social whirl of Hazelbourne-on-Sea after rescuing the local baronet’s daughter, Poppy, from a social faux pas. Poppy runs a ladies’ motorcycle club, to which she plans to add flying lessons. She and her friends enthusiastically welcome Constance into their circle. As the country prepares to celebrate its hard-won peace, Constance and the women of the club are forced to confront the fact that the freedoms they gained during the war are being revoked.
Dial Press Trade Paperback | 9781984801333

HELD by Anne Michaels (Historical Fiction)
1917. On a battlefield near the River Escaut, John lies in the aftermath of a blast, unable to move or feel his legs. Struggling to focus his thoughts, he is lost to memory as the snow falls --- a chance encounter in a pub by a railway, a hot bath with his lover on a winter night. 1920. John has returned from war to North Yorkshire, near a different river. He is alive but still not whole. Reunited with Helena, an artist, he reopens his photography business and tries to keep on living. But the past erupts insistently into the present, as ghosts begin to surface in his pictures: ghosts with messages he cannot understand. So begins a narrative that spans four generations of connections and consequences that ignite and reignite as the century unfolds.
Vintage | 9780593470848

THE HOUSEKEEPER by Joy Fielding (Domestic Thriller)
Jodi Bishop is a top-notch real estate agent. Her husband, Harrison, is a middling writer who resents his wife’s success. Jodi’s father, Vic, is a very controlling man. His wife, Audrey, was herself no shrinking violet. But things changed when Audrey developed Parkinson’s 10 years ago, and now Jodi starts interviewing housekeepers to help care for her parents. She settles on Elyse Woodley, an energetic and attractive widow who seems perfect for the job. Jodi is pleased to have an ally, someone she can talk to and occasionally even confide in. Until Elyse shuts Jodi out. And Audrey’s condition worsens --- rapidly. Who is this woman suddenly wearing her mother’s jewelry? What is she after? And how far will she go to get it?
Ballantine Books | 9780593158944

INDIAN BURIAL GROUND by Nick Medina (Supernatural Thriller/Horror)
All Noemi Broussard wanted was a fresh start. With a new boyfriend who actually treats her right and a plan to move from the reservation she grew up on --- just like her beloved Uncle Louie before her --- things are finally looking up for Noemi. Until the news of her boyfriend’s apparent suicide brings her world crumbling down. But the facts about Roddy’s death just don’t add up, and Noemi isn’t the only one who suspects that something menacing might be lurking within their tribal lands. After over a decade away, Uncle Louie has returned to the reservation, bringing with him a past full of secrets, horror and what might be the key to determining Roddy’s true cause of death. Together, Noemi and Louie set out to find answers. But as they get closer to the truth, Noemi begins to wonder if it might be best for some secrets to remain buried.
Berkley | 9780593546895

THE LAST DAYS OF KIRA MULLAN by Nicci French (Psychological Thriller)
Paperback Original
After suffering a psychotic break that ruined friendships, stalled her fledgling restaurant and forced her to move out of her comfortable flat, Nancy North will do anything to get back to normal. She and her partner, Felix, move into a new flat for a fresh start. Nancy is taking her pills, seeing her therapist and avoiding unnecessary stress. But on the first day in the new flat, she hears them again --- the mysterious voices that triggered her first episode. It could be just the unfamiliar sounds of water in the pipes, or the screaming baby across the hall, but deep down she knows something more sinister is going on. Her fears are confirmed when the young woman in the downstairs flat, Kira, is found dead. Felix, her neighbors and even the police insist it’s a tragic suicide, but the pieces aren’t adding up for Nancy. Can she trust her own instincts, or is it all in her head?
William Morrow Paperbacks | 9780063298378

LEAVING by Roxana Robinson (Fiction)
Sarah and Warren’s college love story ended in a single moment. Decades later, when a chance meeting brings them together, a passion ignites. Since they parted in college, each has married, raised a family and made a career. When they meet again, Sarah is divorced and living outside New York, while Warren is still married and living in Boston. Seeing Warren sparks an awakening in Sarah, who feels emotionally alive for the first time in decades. Still, she hesitates to reclaim a chance at love after her painful divorce and years of framing her life around her children and her work. Warren has no such reservations: he wants to leave his marriage but can’t predict how his wife and daughter will react. As their affair intensifies, Sarah and Warren must confront the moral responsibilities of their love for their families and each other.
W. W. Norton & Company | 9781324105121

MONA OF THE MANOR: A Tales of the City Novel by Armistead Maupin (Fiction)
When Mona Ramsey married Lord Teddy Roughton to secure his visa --- allowing him to remain in San Francisco to fulfill his wildest dreams --- she never imagined that by age 48, she would be the sole owner of Easley House, Teddy’s grand, romantic country manor in the UK. She also didn't imagine that she’d need to open the manor’s doors to paying guests to afford the electric bill and repair the leaking roof. Yet somehow, she and her young friend, Wilfred --- whom guests assume is serving as Easley’s charming-but-clumsy butler --- and the loopy old gardener, Mr. Hargis, are making it work. This delicate equilibrium is upended when Americans Rhonda and Ernie Blaylock arrive for a weekend vacation at Easley, and Wilfred stumbles onto their terrible secret.
Harper Perennial | 9780062973603

A MURDER IN ZION: A National Park Mystery by Nicole Maggi (Mystery/Thriller)
Paperback Original
Grief-stricken over her mother’s death and bruised by her failure on her most recent case, Special Agent Emmeline Helliwell with the National Park Service returns to her Utah hometown to heal and regroup. She’s determined to turn in her badge and take over her mother’s bakery for a much quieter life…until the body of a childhood friend turns up in The Narrows of Zion National Park. The case is too personal for Emme to turn down, but the seemingly simple investigation turns treacherous as clues that connect to her previous case grow too glaring to ignore. When bodies start to pile up, Emme must track down the killer before they take more lives, venturing deep into Zion National Park to uncover the sordid secrets hiding beneath its stunning beauty.
Oceanview Publishing | 9781608096381

THE MURDER OF MR. MA by John Shen Yen Nee and S. J. Rozan (Historical Mystery)
London, 1924. When shy academic Lao She meets larger-than-life Judge Dee Ren Jie, his quiet life abruptly turns from books and lectures to daring chases and narrow escapes. Dee has come to London to investigate the murder of a man he’d known during World War I when serving with the Chinese Labour Corps. No sooner has Dee interviewed the grieving widow than another dead body turns up. Then another. All stabbed to death with a butterfly sword. Will Dee and Lao be able to connect the threads of the murders --- or are they next in line as victims?
Soho Crime | 9781641296748

THE MUSEUM OF LOST QUILTS: An Elm Creek Quilts Novel by Jennifer Chiaverini (Fiction)
Summer Sullivan, the youngest founding member of Elm Creek Quilts, has spent the last two years pursuing a master’s degree in history at the University of Chicago. Her unexpected return home to the celebrated quilter’s retreat is met with delight but also concern from her mother, Gwen; her best friend, Sarah; master quilter Sylvia; and her other colleagues. Stymied by writer’s block, Summer hasn’t finished her thesis, and she can’t graduate until she does. She finds welcome distraction in organizing an exhibit of antique quilts as a fundraiser to renovate Union Hall, the 1863 Greek Revival headquarters of the Waterford Historical Society. But Summer’s research uncovers startling facts about Waterford’s past, prompting unsettling questions about racism, economic injustice and political corruption within their community, past and present.
William Morrow Paperbacks | 9780063080805

PIGLET by Lottie Hazell (Fiction)
An up-and-coming cookbook editor at a London publishing house, Piglet has lovely, loyal friends and a handsome fiancé, Kit. One of the many things Kit loves about Piglet is the delicious, unfathomably elaborate meals she’s always cooking. But when Kit confesses a horrible betrayal two weeks before they’re set to be married, Piglet finds herself suddenly…hungry. The couple decides to move forward with the wedding as planned, but as it nears and Piglet balances family expectations, pressure at work and her quest to make the perfect cake, she finds herself increasingly unsettled, behaving in ways even she can’t explain. By the day of her wedding, Piglet is undone but is also ready to look beyond the lies we sometimes tell ourselves to get by.
Holt Paperbacks | 9781250289810

THE SUNLIT MAN: A Cosmere Novel by Brandon Sanderson (Fantasy/Adventure)
Running. Putting distance between himself and the relentless Night Brigade has been Nomad’s strategy for years. Staying one or two steps ahead of his pursuers by skipping through the Cosmere from one world to the next. But now, his powers too depleted to escape, Nomad finds himself trapped on Canticle, a planet that will kill anyone who doesn’t keep moving. Fleeing the fires of a sunrise that melts the very stones, he is instantly caught up in the struggle between a heartless tyrant and the brave rebels who defy him. Failure means a quick death, incinerated by the sun…or a lifetime as a mindless slave. Tormented by the consequences of his past, Nomad must fight not only for his survival but for his very soul.
Tor Books | 9781250899729

THE UNWORTHY written by Agustina Bazterrica, translated by Sarah Moses (Dystopian/Literary Horror)
Paperback Original
From her cell in a mysterious convent, a woman writes the story of her life in whatever she can find --- discarded ink, dirt, even her own blood. A lower member of the Sacred Sisterhood, deemed an unworthy, she dreams of ascending to the ranks of the Enlightened at the center of the convent and of pleasing the foreboding Superior Sister. Outside, the world is plagued by catastrophe --- cities are submerged underwater, electricity and the internet are nonexistent, and bands of survivors fight and forage in a cruel, barren landscape. Inside, the narrator is controlled and punished, but safe. But when a stranger makes her way past the convent walls, joining the ranks of the unworthy, she forces the narrator to consider her long-buried past --- and what she may be overlooking about the Enlightened.
Scribner | 9781668051887

THE UPTOWN LOCAL: Joy, Death, and Joan Didion: A Memoir by Cory Leadbeater (Memoir)
As an aspiring novelist in his early 20s, Cory Leadbeater was presented with an opportunity to work for a well-known writer whose identity was kept confidential. Since the tumultuous days of childhood, Cory had sought refuge from the rougher parts of life in the pages of books. Suddenly, he found himself the personal assistant to a titan of literature: Joan Didion. In the nine years that followed, Cory shared Joan’s rarefied world, transformed not only by her blazing intellect but also by her generous friendship and mentorship. But secretly, Cory was spiraling. He reeled from the death of a close friend. He spent his weekends at a federal prison visiting his father, who was serving time for fraud. He struggled day after day to write the novel that would validate him as a real writer. And meanwhile, the forces of addiction and depression loomed large.
Ecco | 9780063371583

WARD D by Freida McFadden (Psychological Thriller)
First Publication by Poisoned Pen Press
Ward D is the hospital's mental health unit, and as a medical student, Amy is required to gain experience on the floor. But little do her colleagues know that it may force her to confront a past she has fought hard to forget. The night starts. The countdown begins. As the hours tick by, Amy grows increasingly convinced that something terrible is happening within the ward's tightly secured walls. When patients and staff start to vanish without a trace, it becomes clear that everyone on the unit is in grave danger. Amy never wanted to spend the night on Ward D. Now she might not make it out alive.
Poisoned Pen Press | 9781464227271

THE WHARTON PLOT by Mariah Fredericks (Historical Mystery)
New York City, 1911. Finding herself at a crossroads with both her marriage and her writing, Edith Wharton makes the decision to leave America, her publisher and her loveless marriage. And then, dashing novelist David Graham Phillips --- a writer with often notorious ideas about society and women’s place in it --- is shot to death outside the Princeton Club. Edith herself met the man only once, when the two formed a mutual distaste over tea in the Palm Court of the Belmont hotel. When Phillips is killed, Edith's life takes another turn. His sister is convinced Graham was killed by someone determined to stop the publication of his next book, which promised to uncover secrets that powerful people rather would have stayed hidden. Though unconvinced, Edith is curious. What kind of book could push someone to kill?
Minotaur Books | 9781250371355

WIZARD OF MOST WICKED WAYS by Charlie N. Holmberg (Historical Fantasy)
Paperback Original
Whimbrel House is changing. Merritt and Hulda are raising a family. Owein has signed a marriage contract with the magically compatible Lady Cora, a heavyweight of British nobility who’s an ocean away. And the lovely shape-shifting druid Fallon makes a distractingly fetching friend for Owein. But another change is in the air. The greatest wizard of the millennium, Silas Hogwood, is back --- after five years dead. New body, same foul scent, and driven by madness and revenge. Fearing he isn’t strong enough to fend off Silas, Owein seeks Cora’s help and influence in England. Queen Victoria dispatches her League of Magicians, including her personal necromancer, to aid in Owein’s defense. As magic, both good and evil, converges on Blaugdone Island, Owein realizes how harrowing the forces against them are.
47North | 9781662516825

YOU KILLED ME FIRST by John Marrs (Psychological Thriller)
Paperback Original
It’s November 5th, and a woman awakens to a nightmare. Bound and gagged, she lies trapped in the heart of a towering bonfire. As the smoke thickens, panic sets in; she’s moments away from being engulfed in flames. How did it come to this? Rewind 11 months. Margot, a faded TV star, and her long-suffering friend, Anna, watch as glamorous Liv and her flawless family move into their street. The three women soon fabricate the perfect pretense of friendship, but each harbors her own deadly secret --- and newcomer Liv senses something is terribly wrong beneath the polished exteriors. As cracks widen in the veneer of perfection and lies escalate out of control, tension ignites. Bonfire Night is approaching, and someone is set to burn. But who will it be?
Thomas & Mercer | 9781662506499

On Sale the Week of March 10th in Hardcover

March 11th

33 PLACE BRUGMANN by Alice Austen (Historical Fiction)
On the eve of the Nazi occupation, in the heart of Brussels, life for the residents of 33 Place Brugmann is about to change forever. Charlotte Sauvin knows all the details of the building and its people --- including the distinct knock of her dear friend, Julian Raphaël. Then the Raphaëls disappear, leaving everything behind but their priceless art collection, which has simply vanished. All else that’s familiar fractures when whispers of German occupation become reality, and the lives of the residents grow increasingly intertwined. Charlotte’s godmother, Masha, deepens her risky affair with a wartime compatriot of Colonel Warlemont --- a man far more calculating than his neighbors believe. When a Nazi functionary with an interest in the Raphaëls moves into the building, knowing who can and cannot be trusted becomes a matter of life and death.
Grove Press | 9780802164087

ACCIDENTS HAPPEN AND OTHER STORIES by F.H. Batacan (Crime Fiction/Short Stories)
In ACCIDENTS HAPPEN, F.H. Batacan explores the darkest corners of human experience, depicting with pitch-black humor the systems of class and politics that her characters are trapped in and the moments of violence that can shatter their lives. In particular, Batacan shines an unsparing light on the epidemic of violence against women in the Philippines. When a wealthy politician’s 12-year-old son disappears, the family’s driver witnesses the aftermath. A field investigator for the World Health Organization travels the globe giving presentations about a biomedical enzyme that will lead to the extinction of the human race. And Father Augusto Saenz, the Jesuit priest and forensic anthropologist from SMALLER AND SMALLER CIRCLES, returns to investigate the murder of a woman whose secretive life holds the key to her death.
Soho Crime | 9781641295116

ALL THE OTHER MOTHERS HATE ME by Sarah Harman (Domestic Thriller/Mystery)
Florence Grimes is a 31-year-old party girl who always takes the easy way out. Single, broke and unfulfilled after the humiliating end to her girl band career, she has only one reason to get out of bed each day: her 10-year-old son, Dylan. But then Alfie Risby, her son’s bully and the heir to a vast frozen food empire, mysteriously vanishes during a class trip, and Dylan becomes the prime suspect. Florence, for once, is faced with a task she can’t quit: She has to find Alfie and clear her son’s name, or risk losing Dylan forever. The only problem? Florence has no useful skills, let alone investigative ones, and all the other school moms hate her. Oh, and Florence has a reason to suspect that Dylan might not be as innocent as she’d like to believe.
G.P. Putnam's Sons | 9780593851463

THE ANTIDOTE by Karen Russell (Historical Fiction)
THE ANTIDOTE opens on Black Sunday, as a historic dust storm ravages the fictional town of Uz, Nebraska. But Uz is already collapsing --- not just under the weight of the Great Depression and the Dust Bowl drought but beneath its own violent histories. Karen Russell’s novel follows a "Prairie Witch,” whose body serves as a bank vault for people's memories and secrets; a Polish wheat farmer who learns how quickly a hoarded blessing can become a curse; his orphan niece, a basketball star and witch’s apprentice in furious flight from her grief; a voluble scarecrow; and a New Deal photographer whose time-traveling camera threatens to reveal both the town’s secrets and its fate.
Knopf | 9780593802250

THE CALIFORNIANS by Brian Castleberry (Fiction)
It’s 2024, and Tobey Harlan steals from the wall of his father’s house three paintings by the venerated and controversial artist Di Stiegl. Tobey has just lost everything he owns to a Northern California wildfire, and if he can sell the paintings (albeit in a shady way to a notorious tech bro), he can start life anew in a place no one will ever find him. A hundred years before, German-Jewish immigrant Klaus Aaronsohn inveigles his way into a film studio in Astoria, Queens. He will restyle himself Klaus von Stiegl, a mysterious aristocratic German film director, and end his career directing “Brackett,” a radical, notorious ’60s-era detective show. Weaving between Tobey and Klaus is the story of Diane “Di” Stiegl, Klaus’ granddaughter, raised in Palm Springs, who claws out a career as an artist in gritty 1980s NYC.
Mariner Books | 9780063213333

CARE AND FEEDING: A Memoir by Laurie Woolever (Memoir)
In CARE AND FEEDING, Laurie Woolever traces her path from a small-town childhood to working at revered restaurants and food publications, alternately bolstered and overshadowed by two of the most powerful men in the business. But there’s more to the story than the two bold-faced names on her resume: Mario Batali and Anthony Bourdain. Behind the scenes, Laurie’s life is frequently chaotic, an often pleasurable buffet of bad decisions at which she frequently overstays her welcome. As the food world careens toward an overdue reckoning and Laurie’s mentors face their own high-profile descents, she is confronted with the questions of where she belongs and how to hold on to the parts of her life’s work that she truly values: care and feeding.
Ecco | 9780063327603

GALAPHILE: The First Druids of Shannara by Terry Brooks (Fantasy)
One of the most iconic structures in the Four Lands is Paranor, the fortress home of the Druid Order. Legend holds that it was erected by an Elven leader known as Galaphile Joss. But who was this Galaphile, and how and why did he choose to establish this center of magic and learning? Within these pages we meet the real Galaphile, following him from a friendless teenage orphan stranded in the Human world to a powerful adult and master mage, studying under the infamous recluse, Cogline. Throughout it all, Galaphile’s goal is a noble one: to bring order to a chaotic world, and to make life better for those trying to survive it. To this end, he commences building the citadel that one day will be known as Paranor with the aid of the King of the Silver River. But there is one other who seeks dominion over the Four Lands --- and for far less virtuous ends.
Del Rey | 9780593129807

GIRL ANONYMOUS by Christina Dodd (Romantic Suspense)
As a child, Maarja Daire saw her mother ignite an explosion that killed vengeful mob boss Benoit Arundel --- and herself --- to save Maarja’s life. Maarja has been on the run ever since…fleeing from intimacy, from love, from consequences. Now an adult, Maarja hides in plain sight as a fine arts mover, transporting priceless belongings. Work for a new client brings her to the mansion where the fateful blast from her childhood occurred. There she meets Dante, the ruthless, scarred and brooding Arundel family boss. He watches her with dark intent. But does he remember her? Will he use her to take revenge for his father’s death? A chance turn of events earns her his trust, when she courageously leaps into flames to rescue his mother. And what happens between them in the darkness sets their worlds on fire, as Maarja recklessly abandons her lifelong caution and self-imposed isolation.
Canary Street Press | 9781335463524

GIRL FALLING by Hayley Scrivenor (Mystery/Thriller)
Torn between her girlfriend, Magdu, and her best friend, Daphne, Finn is looking forward to a day of rock climbing and bonding for the three women on the soaring cliffs near their Australian town. But nothing goes as she planned, and in a horrific accident, Magdu falls to her death. Rocked by grief, Finn tries to pinpoint where it all went wrong. Did Magdu die because of Finn’s friendship with overbearing Daphne, who has never wanted Finn to change or leave her? Can Finn trace it all the way back to the tragic childhood loss of her sister? What about Magdu’s family, who never would have accepted their relationship? When the police suspect foul play in Magdu’s death, Finn begins to search for the shocking truth about her relationships and what has been in front of her all along.
Flatiron Books | 9781250362179

GODDESS COMPLEX by Sanjena Sathian (Fiction)
Sanjana Satyananda is trying to recover her life. It’s been a year since she walked out on her husband, a struggling actor named Killian, at a commune in India, after a disagreement about whether to have children. Now, Sanjana is struggling to resurrect her busted anthropology dissertation and crashing at her annoyingly perfect sister’s while her well-adjusted peers obsess over marriages, mortgages and motherhood. Sanjana needs to move forward --- and finalize her divorce ASAP. There’s just one problem: Killian is missing. As Sanjana tries to track him down, she’s bombarded with unnerving calls from women seeking her advice on pregnancy and fertility. Soon, Sanjana comes face to face with what her life might have been if she’d chosen parenthood. And the road not taken turns out to be wilder, stranger and more tempting than she imagined.
Penguin Press | 9780593489772

HOMESTAND: Small Town Baseball and the Fight for the Soul of America by Will Bardenwerper (Sports/Memoir)
Batavia, New York --- between Rochester and Buffalo --- hosted its first professional baseball game in 1897. Despite decades of deindustrialization and evaporating middle-class jobs, the Batavia Muckdogs endured. When Major League Baseball cravenly shut them down in 2020 --- along with 41 other minor league teams --- the town fought back, reviving the Muckdogs as a summer league team comprised of college players. As MLB considers further cuts and private equity buys up what remains, the mom-and-pop operations once prevalent in baseball are endangered. But for now, the sights and sounds of local baseball live on in Batavia. Will Bardenwerper's HOMESTAND exposes the beating heart of small town America, friends and neighbors coming together as the crack of the bat echoes in the summer twilight.
Doubleday | 9780385549653

HOW TO LOVE BETTER: The Path to Deeper Connection Through Growth, Kindness, and Compassion by Yung Pueblo (Love & Relationships/Personal Growth)
Love enters our lives in many forms: friends, family, intimate partners. But all of these relationships are deeply influenced by the love we have for ourselves. If we see our relationships as opportunities to be fully present in our healing and growth, then we can transform and meet one another with compassion instead of judgment. In HOW TO LOVE BETTER, Yung Pueblo examines all aspects of relationships --- from the rose-colored early days when you may be hesitant to show your full self, to the challenges that can arise without clear communication, to dealing with heartbreak and healing as you close a chapter of your life. Ego and attachment can become barriers in a relationship, so the more self-aware you become, the more you can support both your partner and yourself.
Harmony | 9780593582275

THE HUMAN SCALE by Lawrence Wright (Thriller)
Tony Malik, a half-Irish, half-Arab FBI agent based in New York, specializes in tracking money from drug and arms deals. His life takes a dramatic turn when a long-term relationship ends and his job hangs in the balance. Amid personal turmoil, Malik becomes intrigued by his Palestinian father's past. He decides to visit his ancestral homeland for his niece's wedding, accepting a seemingly simple FBI assignment along the way. Upon arrival in Gaza, Malik's world is upended when the Israeli police chief is murdered. Initially a suspect, Malik's investigative prowess soon earns him a place in the Israeli investigation. At the heart of the story is Malik's complex relationship with Yossi, the hardline anti-Arab Israeli police officer leading the case.
Knopf | 9780593537831

THE JACKAL'S MISTRESS by Chris Bohjalian (Historical Thriller)
Virginia, 1864. Libby Steadman’s husband has been away for so long that she can barely conjure his voice in her dreams. While she longs for him in the night, fearing him dead in a Union prison camp, her days are spent running a gristmill with her teenage niece, a hired hand and his wife. It’s an uneasy life in the Shenandoah Valley, and Libby awakens every morning expecting to see her land a battlefield. And then she finds a gravely injured Union officer left for dead in a neighbor’s house. Captain Jonathan Weybridge of the Vermont Brigade is her enemy --- but he’s also a human being, and Libby must make a terrible decision: Does she leave him to die alone? Or does she risk treason and try to nurse him back to health? And if she succeeds, does she try to secretly bring him across Union lines, where she might negotiate a trade for news of her own husband?
Doubleday | 9780385547642

JANE AND DAN AT THE END OF THE WORLD by Colleen Oakley (Fiction/Humor)
Jane is a mother of two who feels unneeded by her teenagers, and her writing career has screeched to an unsuccessful halt. Her one published novel sold under 500 copies. And she’s pretty sure that her husband, Dan, is cheating on her. When the couple goes to the renowned upscale restaurant La Fin du Monde to celebrate their 19th anniversary, Jane thinks it’s as good a place as any to tell Dan she wants a divorce. But before they even get to the second course, an underground climate activist group bursts into the dining room. Nearly everything the disorganized and bumbling activists say and do is right out of the pages of Jane’s failed book. Even Dan admits it’s eerily familiar. Which means they’re the only ones who know what’s going to happen next. And they’re the only ones who can stop it.
Berkley | 9780593200827

KATE & FRIDA: A Novel of Friendship, Food, and Books by Kim Fay (Fiction)
Twentysomething Frida Rodriguez arrives in Paris in 1991, relishing the city’s butter-soaked cuisine and seeking her future as a war correspondent. But then she writes to a bookshop in Seattle and receives more than just the book she requests. A friendship begins that will redefine the person she wants to become. Seattle bookseller Kate Fair is transformed by Frida’s free spirit, spurred to believe in herself as a writer, kiss her handsome coworker, and find beauty even in loss. Through the most tumultuous years of their young lives --- personally and globally --- Kate and Frida sustain and nourish each other as they learn the necessity of embracing joy, especially through our darkest hours.
G.P. Putnam's Sons | 9780593852385

LIQUID: A Love Story by Mariam Rahmani (Fiction)
The unnamed Iranian-Indian American narrator of LIQUID has always believed herself to be the smartest person in the room. And from an early age, she and her best friend --- a poet-turned-marketer named Adam --- have turned their noses up at other peoples’ riches. But two years after earning a PhD from UCLA, the narrator is no closer to the middle-class comfort promised to her by the prestige of her fancy, scholarship-funded education and the successes of her immigrant parents. After Adam jokingly suggests that she just "marry rich," our protagonist makes a spreadsheet and outlines a goal: 100 dates with people of all genders and a marriage proposal in hand by the official start of the fall semester. Only a tragedy in Tehran and an overdue familial reckoning can alter the narrator’s increasingly manic trajectory and force her to confront the contradictions of her life in Los Angeles.
Algonquin Books | 9781643756509

THE MAN NOBODY KILLED: Life, Death, and Art in Michael Stewart's New York by Elon Green (True Crime)
At 25 years old, Michael Stewart was a young Black aspiring artist, deejay and model, looking to make a name for himself in the vibrant downtown art scene of the early 1980s New York City. On September 15, 1983, he was brutally beaten by New York City Transit Authority police for allegedly tagging a 14th Street subway station wall. Witnesses reported officers beating him with billy clubs and choking him with a nightstick. Stewart arrived at Bellevue Hospital hog-tied with no heartbeat and died after 13 days in a coma. This was, at that point, the most widely noticed act of police brutality in the city's history. THE MAN NOBODY KILLED recounts the cultural impact of Michael Stewart’s life and death.
Celadon Books | 9781250898227

ROSE OF JERICHO by Alex Grecian (Historical Fantasy/Supernatural Horror)
Something wicked is going on in the village of Ascension. A mother wasting away from cancer is suddenly up and about. A boy trampled by a milk cart walks away from the accident. A hanged man can still speak, broken neck and all. The dead are not dying. When Rabbit and Sadie Grace accompany their friend, Rose, to Ascension to help take care of her ailing cousin, they immediately notice that their new house, Bethany Hall, is occupied by dozens of ghosts. And something is waiting for them in the attic. The villagers of Ascension are unwelcoming and wary of their weird visitors. As the three women attempt to find out what’s happening in the town, they must be careful not to be found out. But a much larger --- and more dangerous --- force is galloping straight for them.
Tor Nightfire | 9781250874719

SILENT AS THE GRAVE: A Molly Murphy Mystery by Rhys Bowen and Clare Broyles (Historical Mystery)
With a newborn and two children, Molly Murphy Sullivan is tackling motherhood. Her husband, Daniel, is off to work in Washington as Easter break begins in New York. Her dear friend and writer, Ryan O’Hara, is shooting a movie and invites her and the children to visit the set. When one of the actresses is fired, Molly’s adopted daughter, Bridie, is called to replace her in the scene. It turns out she is a natural and is asked to star in the rest of the film. The movie industry is still experimenting with ways to get the best shot. But soon, their special effects start to malfunction. After a few mishaps where no one is hurt, the special effects turn deadly. With rumors of a feud between studios, Molly believes these malfunctions are sabotage. She is invited to go undercover on set to investigate the burgeoning film war.
Minotaur Books | 9781250890818

WE TELL OURSELVES STORIES: Joan Didion and the American Dream Machine by Alissa Wilkinson (Cultural Biography)
Joan Didion opened THE WHITE ALBUM (1979) with what would become one of the most iconic lines in American literature: “We tell ourselves stories in order to live.” Today, this phrase is deployed inspirationally, printed on T-shirts and posters, used as a battle cry for artists and writers. In truth, Didion was describing something much less rosy: our human tendency to manufacture delusions that might ward away our anxieties when society seems to spin off its axis. Nowhere was this collective hallucination more effectively crafted than in Hollywood. In this riveting cultural biography, New York Times film critic Alissa Wilkinson examines Joan Didion’s influence through the lens of American mythmaking.
Liveright | 9781324092612

WHITE KING by Juan Gómez-Jurado (Mystery/Thriller)
Antonia Scott has an unusually gifted forensic mind, whose ability to reconstruct crimes and solve baffling murders is legendary. She’s the lynchpin of a top-secret project, Red Queen, created to work across borders and behind the scenes to solve the most devious and dangerous crimes. But the Red Queen project is under attack on all fronts. The mysterious Mr. White has been weaving a web around Antonia for a very long time. Jon Gutierrez, Antonia’s protector and the only person she trusts, has been kidnapped. Antonia’s husband has been killed, and her remaining family is in hiding. With Jon’s life at stake, Mr. White gives her a seemingly innocuous challenge: solve three crimes and bring the perpetrators to justice. The only way to keep Jon alive is to play Mr. White’s game. But can even Antonia win a game when she can only see part of the board?
Minotaur Books | 9781250853714

THE WOMEN ON PLATFORM TWO by Laura Anthony (Fiction)
Dublin, 1969: Maura has just married Dr. Christy Davenport, and they look forward to growing their family. But as her husband’s vicious temper emerges, Maura worries that her home might never be safe for a child. Meanwhile, her close friend Bernie, a mother of three, learns the devastating news that if she conceives again, her health complications could prove fatal. Dublin, 2023: A close call makes Saoirse realize that she may never want to be a mother. Little does she know that only a few decades ago, a group of women made this option possible for her. And she’s about to meet one of them.
Gallery Books | 9781668047385

On Sale the Week of March 10th in Paperback

March 11th

2054 by Elliot Ackerman and Admiral James Stavridis (Speculative Thriller)
It is 20 years after the catastrophic war between the United States and China that brought down the old American political order. A new party has emerged in the US, and efforts to cement its grip have resulted in mounting violent resistance. The American president has control of the media, but he is beginning to lose control of the streets. Many fear he’ll stop at nothing to remain in the White House. Suddenly, he collapses in the middle of an address to the nation. After an initial flurry of misinformation, the administration reluctantly announces his death. A cover-up ensues, conspiracy theories abound, and the country descends into a new type of civil war. All signs point to a profound breakthrough in AI, of which the remote assassination of an American president is hardly the most game-changing ramification.
Penguin Books | 9780593489888

THE ANATOMY OF MAGIC by J.C. Cervantes (Fiction/Magical Realism)
Paperback Original
Lilian Estrada is part of a family of fiercely loyal and exceptional women, all bound together by an extraordinary secret. The Estrada women each possess a unique power, and Lily shines with the rare gift to manipulate memories. Yet not even her mystical abilities can shield her from a harrowing event at the hospital, one that sends her powers --- and her confidence --- spiraling out of control. Seeking solace, Lily retreats to her family's ancestral home in Mexico, only to find herself face to face with a ghost from her past --- Sam, the first love she never forgot. Nearly a decade since she last saw him, Sam is hardly the boy she once knew. As old flames spark to life, Lily must navigate the mysteries of their shared history and the depths of her own heart if she hopes to control her unpredictable magic.
Park Row | 9780778310822

BEGIN AGAIN by Helly Acton (Romantic Comedy)
Frankie McKenzie dies in a freak kebab-related accident after what she sees as yet another dud of a first date. But life isn’t over for Frankie. Instead, she is miraculously offered a second chance: Frankie can revisit key moments from her past to see if different choices will lead her to the fulfilling life she’s always dreamt of. Should she decide to languidly lounge by warm Mexican waters with sexy Raphael? Or say yes to the proposal of earnestly reliable university-sweetheart Toby? Perhaps a worry-free gilded cage with Callum is the solution! Or what about that high-powered media career she thought she wanted? Soon, Frankie will see what her life would have been if only she’d caught that one-way flight, accepted the marriage proposal, or attended the intimidating job interview.
Avon | 9780063345355

THE BLUES BROTHERS: An Epic Friendship, the Rise of Improv, and the Making of an American Film Classic by Daniel de Visé (Biography/Performing Arts)
“They’re not going to catch us,” Dan Aykroyd, as Elwood Blues, tells his brother Jake, played by John Belushi. “We’re on a mission from God.” So opens the musical action comedy The Blues Brothers, which hit theaters on June 20, 1980. Much delayed and vastly over budget, beset by mercurial and oft-drugged-out stars, the film opened to outraged reviews. However, in the 45 years since, it has been acknowledged a classic. Based on original research and dozens of interviews probing the memories of principals from director John Landis and producer Bob Weiss to Aykroyd himself, THE BLUES BROTHERS illuminates an American masterpiece while vividly portraying the creative geniuses behind modern comedy.
Grove Press | 9780802164360

CHARLIE HUSTLE: The Rise and Fall of Pete Rose, and the Last Glory Days of Baseball by Keith O'Brien (Sports/Biography)
Pete Rose is a legend. A baseball god. He compiled more hits than anyone in the history of baseball, a record he set decades ago that still stands today. He was a working-class white guy from Cincinnati who made it. He was everything that America wanted and needed him to be, the American dream personified --- until he wasn’t. In the 1980s, Pete Rose came to be at the center of one of the biggest scandals in baseball history. He kept secrets, ran with bookies, took on massive gambling debts, and was magnificently, publicly cast out for betting on baseball and lying about it. The revelations that followed ruined him, changed life in Cincinnati and forever altered the game. CHARLIE HUSTLE tells the full story of one of America’s most epic tragedies --- the rise and fall of Pete Rose.
Vintage | 9780593469392

DEVOUT: A Memoir of Doubt by Anna Gazmarian (Memoir)
In this revelatory memoir, Anna Gazmarian tells the story of how her evangelical upbringing in North Carolina failed to help her understand the mental health diagnosis she received, and the work she had to do to find proper medical treatment while also maintaining her faith. When Anna is diagnosed with bipolar disorder in 2011, she’s faced with a conundrum. While the diagnosis provides clarity about her manic and depressive episodes, she must confront the stigma that her evangelical community attaches to her condition. Over the course of 10 years, we follow Anna on her journey to reframe her understanding of mental health to expand the limits of what her religious practice can offer.
Simon & Schuster | 9781668004043

THE FELLOWSHIP OF PUZZLEMAKERS by Samuel Burr (Fiction)
Clayton Stumper might be in his 20s, but he dresses like your grandpa and fusses like your aunt. Abandoned at birth on the steps of the Fellowship of Puzzlemakers, he was raised by a group of eccentric enigmatologists and now finds himself among the last survivors of a fading institution. When the esteemed crossword compiler and main maternal presence in Clayton’s life, Pippa Allsbrook, passes away, she bestows her final puzzle on him: a promise to reveal the mystery of his parentage and prepare him for life beyond the walls of the commune. So begins Clay’s quest to uncover the secrets surrounding his birth, secrets that will change Clay --- and the Fellowship --- forever.
Vintage | 9780593470114

FLUX by Jinwoo Chong (Speculative Thriller)
Four days before Christmas, eight-year-old Bo loses his mother in a tragic accident; 28-year-old Brandon loses his job after a hostile takeover of his big-media employer; and 48-year-old Blue, a key witness in a criminal trial against an infamous now-defunct tech startup, struggles to reconnect with his family. So begins Jinwoo Chong’s dazzling, time-bending debut that blends elements of neo-noir and speculative fiction as the lives of Bo, Brandon and Blue begin to intersect, uncovering a vast network of secrets and an experimental technology that threatens to upend life itself. Intertwined with them is the saga of an iconic ’80s detective show, "Raider," whose star actor has imploded spectacularly after revelations of long-term, concealed abuse.
Melville House | 9781685891930

THE FRIENDSHIP CLUB by Robyn Carr (Fiction)
Celebrity cooking show host Marni McGuire has been married twice, widowed and divorced. Now in her mid-50s, she’s single. Happily so. She just needs to convince her pregnant daughter, Bella, of this fact. And maybe convince herself, too. Especially after Marni’s efforts to humor her determined daughter result in a series of disastrous dates that somehow prompt Marni to wonder if maybe the right man for her is still out there after all. Similarly single, Marni’s best friend and colleague is confident she’s content without a man, but both older women soon find themselves leading by example as the young intern on their show appears caught in a toxic relationship --- and Bella reveals her own marriage maybe isn’t built to withstand the stresses of the baby on the way. Suddenly, all four women find themselves at a crossroads.
Mira | 9780778305415

GHOST DOGS: On Killers and Kin by Andre Dubus III (Memoir/Essays)
During childhood summers in Louisiana, Andre Dubus III’s grandfather taught him that men’s work is hard. As an adult, whether tracking down a drug lord in Mexico as a bounty hunter or grappling with privilege while living with a rich girlfriend in New York City, Dubus worked --- at being a better worker and a better human being. GHOST DOGS is Dubus’ retelling of his own successes, failures, triumphs and pain. In his longest essay, “If I Owned a Gun,” Dubus reflects on the empowerment and shame he felt in keeping a gun and his decision, ultimately, to give it up. Elsewhere, he writes of a violent youth and of settled domesticity and fatherhood, about the omnipresent expectations and contradictions of masculinity, about the things writers remember and those they forget.
W. W. Norton & Company | 9781324105046

HEADSHOT by Rita Bullwinkel (Fiction)
An unexpected tragedy at a community pool. A family’s unrelenting expectation of victory. The desire to gain or lose control; to make time speed up or stop; to be frighteningly, undeniably good at something. Each of the eight teenage girl boxers in HEADSHOT has her own reasons for the sacrifices she has made to come to Reno, Nevada, to compete to be named the best in the country. Through a series of face-offs that are raw, ecstatic, and punctuated by flashes of humor and tenderness, prizewinning writer Rita Bullwinkel animates the competitors’ pasts and futures as they summon the emotion, imagination and force of will required to win.
Penguin Books | 9780593654125

THE HEARING TEST by Eliza Barry Callahan (Fiction)
When the narrator of THE HEARING TEST, an artist in her late 20s, awakens one morning to a deep drone in her right ear, she is diagnosed with Sudden Deafness but is offered no explanation for its cause. As the specter of total deafness looms, she keeps a record of her year --- a score of estrangement and enchantment, of luck and loneliness, of the chance occurrences to which she becomes attuned --- while living alone in a New York City studio apartment with her dog. Through a series of fleeting and often humorous encounters --- with neighbors, an ex-lover, doctors, strangers, family members, faraway friends, and with the lives and works of artists, filmmakers, musicians and philosophers --- making meaning becomes a form of consolation and curiosity, a form of survival.
Catapult | 9781646222704

THE LAST MURDER AT THE END OF THE WORLD by Stuart Turton (Dystopian Mystery/Thriller)
Outside the island, there is nothing. The world was destroyed by a fog that swept the planet, killing anyone it touched. On the island, it is idyllic. One hundred and twenty-two villagers and three scientists are living in peaceful harmony. Until, to the horror of the islanders, one of their beloved scientists is found stabbed to death. And then they learn that the murder has triggered a lowering of the security system around the island, the only thing that was keeping the fog at bay. If the murder isn't solved within 107 hours, the fog will smother the island --- and everyone on it. But the security system also has wiped everyone's memories of exactly what happened the night before, which means that someone on the island is a murderer --- and they don't even know it. And the clock is ticking.
Sourcebooks Landmark | 9781464245657

THE LIMITS by Nell Freudenberger (Fiction)
From Mo’orea, a tiny volcanic island off the coast of Tahiti, a French biologist obsessed with saving Polynesia’s imperiled coral reefs sends her 15-year-old daughter, Pia, to live with her ex-husband, Stephen, and his new wife, Kate, in New York. A schoolteacher, Kate struggles to connect with a teenager whose capacity for destruction seems exceeded only by her privilege. Meanwhile, one of her 16-year-old students is already caring for a toddler full time. Athyna’s love for her nephew, Marcus, is a burden that becomes heavier as she struggles to finish her senior year online. Just as her fear of what is waiting for her outside her Staten Island community feels insupportable, an incident at home makes her desperate to leave. When their lives collide, Pia and Athyna spiral toward parallel but inescapably different tragedies.
Vintage | 9780593448908

LION & LAMB by James Patterson and Duane Swierczynski (Thriller)
Philadelphia is in a state of shock over the fate of two hometown heroes: Eagles starting quarterback Archie Hughes and his even more famous wife, Grammy-winning singer Francine Hughes. One spouse is murdered. The other is suspect #1. Even before the case hits the courtroom, it’s the hottest ticket in town. For the defense: Cooper Lamb, private investigator to the stars. For the prosecution: Veena Lion, a sleuth so bright she has to wear shades. Between them, they know every secret in Philadelphia. Together, they prove how two wrongs can make a right. They are Lion & Lamb.
Little, Brown and Company | 9781538710760

LITTLE UNDERWORLD by Chris Harding Thornton (Noir/Historical Mystery)
Omaha, 1930. PI Jim Beely’s life wasn’t a peach to begin with. And now there’s a dead guy in his backseat. The last thing he needs to deal with is a cop --- much less the notoriously crooked Frank Tvrdik. But where a square-dealing lawman would see homicide, Frank spots opportunity. He can make the body disappear. All Jim needs to do is double-cross a politician bent on shuttering Omaha’s speakeasies, some of the few places to make an illegal, honest living in a city that’s a racket. After the double-cross goes haywire, Jim gets his bell rung in a bizarre attack. A man on his payroll turns up dead. And Jim and Frank form an unlikely alliance, digging for the reality behind patently false headlines. All the while, the death toll mounts, outmatched only by the absurdity of it all. As the clock runs down, Jim and Frank must make a choice that can’t be unmade.
Picador | 9781250371805

A MIDNIGHT PUZZLE: A Secret Staircase Novel by Gigi Pandian (Mystery)
Secret Staircase Construction is under attack, and Tempest Raj feels helpless. After former client Julian Rhodes tried to kill his wife, he blamed her "accident" on the home renovation company’s craftsmanship. Now the family business --- known for bringing magic into homes through hidden doors, floating staircases and architectural puzzle walls --- is at a breaking point. No amount of Scottish and Indian meals from her grandfather can distract Tempest from the truth: they’re being framed. When Tempest receives an urgent midnight phone call from Julian, she decides to meet him at the historic Whispering Creek Theater --- only to find his dead body, a sword through his chest. After a blade appears from thin air to claim another victim, Tempest is certain they’re dealing with a booby trap...something Secret Staircase Construction easily could build.
Minotaur Books | 9781250880222

THE MORNINGSIDE by Téa Obreht (Fiction)
After being expelled from their ancestral home in a not-so-distant future, Silvia and her mother finally settle at the Morningside, a crumbling luxury tower where Silvia’s aunt Ena serves as the superintendent. Silvia knows almost nothing about the place where she was born and spent her early years, nor does she fully understand why she and her mother had to leave. But in Ena, Silvia finds a person willing to give glimpses into the folktales of her demolished homeland. Enchanted by Ena’s stories, Silvia begins seeing the world with magical possibilities and becomes obsessed with Bezi Duras, the mysterious older woman who lives in the penthouse of the Morningside. Silvia’s mission to unravel the truth about this woman’s life, and her own haunted past, may end up costing her everything.
Random House Trade Paperbacks | 9781984855527

A MOTHER’S LOVE by Sara Blaedel (Thriller)
Paperback Original
When innkeeper Dorthe Hyllested is found murdered, the police are surprised and puzzled to discover a concealed nursery in her upstairs apartment. As far as her friends and family knew, the recently widowed Dorthe was childless. So who lived in this secret toy-strewn room? And, more importantly, where is the child now? Detective Louise Rick has just taken on a challenging new job as head of the freshly created Mobile Task Unit, which is charged with solving the most difficult cases all over Denmark. Could the mystery of Dorthe’s murder and the hidden child have something to do with the cabin in the woods behind the inn where men are often seen coming and going at all hours? Louise finds herself grasping at unlikely connections, but the twisted story she begins to uncover turns out to be darker and more dangerous than she ever imagined.
Dutton | 9780593850541

MY BIG FAT FAKE MARRIAGE by Charlotte Stein (Romantic Comedy)
Paperback Original
Connie has always distrusted nice guys. In her experience, they’re just waiting to reveal some horrible secret. And then she meets editor extraordinaire Henry Samuel Beckett, who’s so cheery that she struggles to believe he’s real. Until Beck tells her the secret underneath his sunny surface: He’s been single all his life. But in a moment of panic, he’s told everyone at his publishing house that he’s married. And when Connie, an aspiring writer herself, can’t help defending him, she ends up being the fake wife he doesn’t actually have. When they head off on a writing retreat, surrounded by people convinced this must be a ruse, both of them can't help but agree. Until they share their first kiss, their first touch, their first time in only one bed. And Connie starts to wonder if this might be real after all.
St. Martin's Griffin | 9781250867971

PARASOL AGAINST THE AXE by Helen Oyeyemi (Fiction/Magical Realism)
For reasons of her own, Hero Tojosoa accepts an invitation she was half expected to decline and finds herself in Prague on a bachelorette weekend hosted by her estranged friend, Sofie. Little does she know she has arrived in a city with a penchant for playing tricks on the unsuspecting. A book Hero has brought with her seems to be warping her mind: the text changes depending on when it’s being read and who’s doing the reading, revealing startling new stories of fictional Praguers past and present. Uninvited companions appear at bachelorette activities and at city landmarks, offering opinions, humor and even a taste of treachery. When a third woman from Hero and Sofie’s past appears unexpectedly, the tensions between the friends’ different accounts of the past reach a new level.
Riverhead Books | 9780593192375

PRIDE AND JOY by Louisa Onomé (Fiction)
Ever the dutiful Nigerian daughter, Joy Okafor has planned every aspect of her mother’s 70th birthday weekend on her own. As the Okafors slowly begin to arrive, Mama Mary goes to take a nap. But when the grandkids go to wake her, they find that she isn’t sleeping after all. Refusing to believe that her sister is gone-gone, Auntie Nancy declares that she has had a premonition that Mama Mary will rise again like Jesus Christ on Easter Sunday. Desperate to believe that they’re about to witness a miracle, the family overhauls their birthday plans to welcome the Nigerian Canadian community, effectively spreading the word that Mama Mary is coming back. But skeptical Joy is struggling with the loss of her mother and not allowing herself to mourn just yet while going through the motions of planning a funeral that her aunt refuses to allow.
Atria Books | 9781668012826

RED SIDE STORY: A Shades of Grey Novel by Jasper Fforde
(Dystopian Fantasy/Humor)
Welcome to Chromatacia, where life is strictly regulated by one’s limited color perception. Civilization has been rebuilt after an unspoken “Something that Happened” 500 years before. Society is now color vision–segregated, everything dictated by an individual’s visual ability and governed by the shadowy National Color in far-off Emerald City. Twenty-year-old Eddie Russett, a Red, is about to go on trial for a murder he didn’t commit, and he’s pretty certain to be sent on a one-way trip to the Green Room for execution by soporific color exposure. Meanwhile, he’s engaged in an illegal relationship with his co-defendant, a Green, the charismatic and unpredictable Jane Grey. Negotiating the narrow boundaries of the Rules within their society, they search for a loophole --- some truth of their world that has been hidden from its hyper-policed citizens.
Soho Press | 9781641297134

THE RESCUE by T. Jefferson Parker (Thriller)
While reporting on a Tijuana animal shelter, journalist Bettina Blazak falls in love with one of her story’s subjects --- an adorable Mexican street dog who is being treated for a mysterious gunshot wound. Bettina impulsively adopts the dog, who she names Felix after the veterinarian who saved him. In investigating Felix’s past, Bettina discovers that his life is nothing like what she assumed. For one thing, he’s not a Mexican street dog at all. A former DEA drug-sniffing dog, Felix has led a very colorful, dangerous and profitable life. With Bettina’s story going viral, some interesting people are looking for Felix, making him a target --- again. Bettina soon finds herself drawn into a deadly criminal underworld from which she and her beloved dog may not return.
Forge Books | 9781250382092

SHOOT YOUR SHOT by Lexi LaFleur Brown (Romantic Comedy)
Paperback Original
After not securing an NHL contract with the Seattle Rainiers, Jaylen “JJ” Jones decides to bid the city farewell with a final night of fun, blowing off steam with an anonymous one-night stand. But when a last-minute roster spot opens up on the Rainiers, he connects his luck to the girl he spent the night with. Superstitious Jaylen is desperate to keep her around; his career depends on it. Aspiring tattoo artist Lucy Ross isn’t so sure about the proposition to remain Jaylen’s lucky charm. But stuck in a career slump, Lucy has everything to gain. Hoping for an apprenticeship hasn’t offered much stability, and Jaylen is willing to pay any price to get Lucy to agree. So maybe sending him a routine text message before each game won’t be too hard. What starts as an agreement to trade favors quickly turns into sizzling chemistry that’s too delicious to deny.
Canary Street Press | 9781335016560

A VERY PRIVATE SCHOOL: A Memoir by Charles Spencer (Memoir)
A VERY PRIVATE SCHOOL offers a clear-eyed, firsthand account of a culture of cruelty at the school Charles Spencer attended in his youth and provides important insights into an antiquated boarding system. Drawing on the memories of many of his schoolboy contemporaries, as well as his own letters and diaries from the time, he reflects on the hopelessness and abandonment he felt at age eight, viscerally describing the intense pain of homesickness and the appalling inescapability of it all. Exploring the long-lasting impact of his experiences, Spencer presents a candid reckoning with his past and a reclamation of his childhood. And now, in a new afterword, he reflects on the aftermath of his memoir’s publication, including the outpouring of support and solidarity from fellow abuse survivors.
Gallery Books | 9781668046395

THE WHITE BOOK written by Han Kang, translated by Deborah Smith (Fiction)
While on a writer's residency, a nameless narrator wanders the twin white worlds of the blank page and snowy Warsaw. THE WHITE BOOK becomes a meditation on the color white, as well as a fictional journey inspired by an older sister who died in her mother's arms, a few hours old. The narrator grapples with the tragedy that has haunted her family, an event she colors in stark white --- breast milk, swaddling bands, the baby's rice cake-colored skin --- and, from here, visits all that glows in her memory: from a white dog to sugar cubes.
Hogarth | 9780525573074

WHY WE LOVE BASEBALL: A History in 50 Moments by Joe Posnanski
(Sports/History)
In WHY WE LOVE BASEBALL, Joe Posnanski writes of major moments that created legends, and of forgotten moments almost lost to time. It's Willie Mays’ catch, Babe Ruth’s called shot and Kirk Gibson’s limping home run; the slickest steals; the biggest bombs; and the most triumphant no-hitters. But these are also moments raw with the humanity of the game, the unheralded heroes and the mesmerizing mistakes drenched in pine tar. Every story, from the immortal to the obscure, is told from a unique perspective. Whether of a real fan who witnessed it, or the pitcher who gave up the home run, the umpire, the coach, the opposing player --- these are fresh takes on moments so powerful they almost feel like myth.
Dutton | 9780593472682

THE WILDEST SUN by Asha Lemmie (Historical Fiction)
When tragedy forces Delphine Auber, an aspiring writer on the cusp of adulthood, from her home in postwar Paris, she seizes the opportunity to embark on the journey she's long dreamed of: finding the father she has never known. But her quest --- spanning from Paris to New York’s Harlem, to Havana and Key West --- is complicated by the fact that she believes him to be famed luminary Ernest Hemingway, a man just as elusive as he is iconic. She desperately yearns for his approval, as both a daughter and a writer, convinced that he holds the key to who she's truly meant to be. But what will happen if she's wrong, or if her real story falls outside of the legend of her parentage that she’s revered all her life?
Dutton | 9780593185735

YOU DESERVE TO KNOW by Aggie Blum Thompson (Domestic Thriller)
Paperback Original
Neighbors Gwen, Aimee and Lisa share more than playdates and coffee mornings on their tranquil street in East Bethesda. They confide their deepest secrets, navigate the challenges of motherhood together, and provide a support system that seems unbreakable. But when Gwen’s husband is found murdered after one of their weekly Friday night dinners, the peaceful quiet of their cul-de-sac shatters. As the police investigate, the veneer of friendship begins to crack, revealing hidden tensions, clandestine affairs, and long-buried jealousies among the three women. With suspicions mounting and the neighborhood gripped by fear, Gwen, Aimee and Lisa must confront the chilling truth about their husbands, and the sinister undercurrents in their own friendship.
Forge Books | 9781250892034

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