October 6, 2026

October 6, 2026

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In this newsletter, you will find books releasing the weeks of October 5th and October 12th that we think will be of interest to Bookreporter.com readers, along with Bonus News, where we call out a contest, feature or review that we want to let you know about so you have it on your radar.

This week, we are calling attention to our Favorite Monthly Lists & Picks feature for October, which includes Indie Next, LibraryReads, the Barnes & Noble Book Club, the “Good Morning America” Book Club, Oprah's Book Club, the PBS Books Readers Club, the “Read with Jenna” Book Club, Reese's Book Club, and the Target Book Club.

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This Week's Bonus News:
Our Favorite Monthly Lists & Picks for October

Upcoming Virtual Book and Author Events

On Sale the Week of October 5th in Hardcover

October 6th

ADAM AND EVE by Jeffrey Archer (Historical Thriller)
November 11, 1918. As the guns of the First World War fall silent, two babies draw their first breath. Eve is the daughter of an Earl, and Adam is a shepherd's son. Yet, from their first meeting, they form an extraordinary bond that neither privilege nor prejudice can break. Then, on a single September night in 1940, as Hitler prepares to invade the British Isles, their actions will change his mind --- determining not just their own futures but the fate of a nation. They will show extraordinary courage. They will make unimaginable sacrifices. And the story of what they did will stay with you long after you’ve turned the last page.
HarperCollins | 9780008640385

BAD WORDS by Ríoghnach Robinson (Romance)
Parker Navarro’s debut novel was meant to define his career --- until critic Selina Chan’s blistering review made it the flop of the decade. Four years later, his new book is his shot at redemption; for Selina, reviewing him again is a professional risk she can’t refuse. When her second takedown ignites a viral feud, both their fortunes shift overnight. But as the literary world feeds on their public sparring, a quieter dialogue begins --- one that challenges everything they thought they knew about success, sincerity and each other.
St. Martin's Press | 9781250431295 

BLACKOUT: A Jake Bendel Thriller by J. Luke Bennecke (Political Techno-thriller)
When the President of the United States is assassinated in a coordinated drone strike, the country plunges into chaos. Behind the assassination stands Tracy Ciacchella, a brilliant and ruthless leader of a shadowy global cabal known only as New3. Their plan is to eliminate the president, cripple the nation's power grid, and plunge the US into darkness long enough for rival superpowers to seize the advantage. When cascading blackouts sweep across the nation and martial law looms, civil engineer Jake Bendel teams up with FBI agent Kristi Konnors to track the network orchestrating the attacks. What they uncover is far more dangerous than a cyberattack --- an international conspiracy positioned to hand America's collapse to China and Russia. Then the conspiracy becomes personal.
Jaytech Publishing | 9798990527379 

CORMAC McCARTHY: A Legacy Revisited by Tracy Daugherty (Biography)
Cormac McCarthy is hailed as one of America’s greatest novelists. In his body of work, the nation’s story is told in incomparably vivid shades of violence, greed and love. And yet, most of his personal story has been largely untold --- until now. Early in life, McCarthy chose to devote himself almost exclusively to his literary pursuits. This book movingly details what this choice cost him in his family relationships, his marriages and his friendships. Mentally and physically restless, often solitary, and yet gregarious and charming, McCarthy lived as wildly, complexly and close to the bone as any of his characters. In his novels, he reported wisdom hard-learned through harsh experience and intense observation. 
St. Martin's Press | 9781250348722 

DARK READING MATTER: The Last Thursday Next Novel by Jasper Fforde (Science Fiction & Mystery/Humor)
Ex-Literary Special Ops agent Thursday Next is embarking on her eighth and final fictional adventure, and she is well aware of the fact. The problem is, others are aware of it, too. Old foes and new are plotting a terrible revenge: to disrupt the narrative and make the last Thursday Next novel, Dark Reading Matter, not just unreadable but unpublishable. Thursday can’t let that happen, and she needs to use all her guile and narrative trickery to unmask the antagonists.
Soho Press | 9781641296687 

DEATH OF AN ORDINARY MAN by Sarah Perry (Memoir)
DEATH OF AN ORDINARY MAN opens on a charming, merry seaside scene in late August. Sarah Perry; her husband; and her father-in-law, David are at the Yarmouth carnival they’ve gone to every summer for decades. The day was fine, Perry tells us, and the shining tide was going out. The next time Sarah sees David three weeks later, watching him approach across the market, she knows instantly and with a certainty she’s never had before: David is dying. He’ll be dead in less than three months’ time from a rare and swiftly moving cancer. What follows is Perry’s intimate account of sitting at David’s bedside across the final days of his life.
Mariner Books | 9780063480568 

DIVE BAR AT THE END OF THE ROAD by Kelley Armstrong (Supernatural Thriller/Horror)
Just before midnight, a car swerves to avoid something --- or someone --- mysteriously standing in the road, only to slam into a fallen tree instead. In the pitch black, four more cars follow in a pileup no one can seem to avoid. Stumbling out of the wreckage, five strangers find themselves in a backwoods dive bar, waiting for daybreak and hoping for cell service. But as tensions rise and a storm rages on outside, the occupants of the dive bar start to notice that not everything is as it seems. Time is moving differently, and they quickly learn that going outside --- whether to assist another accident victim or to hike for help --- is a very bad idea. There’s something in the woods, something that isn't natural. Could the figure in the road have been a warning? Or something more sinister?
St. Martin's Press | 9781250360595 

DO YOU SEE WHAT I SEE? by Peter Swanson (Psychological Thriller/Mystery) 
When author Nicholas Child is dropped by his publisher, his agent sends him to spend the holidays at the Cape Cod mansion of her other client, Marco Tavares. Marco needs to finish the long-overdue follow-up to his bestselling novel, and Nicholas is going to help him. But when Nicholas arrives at Marco’s sprawling seaside estate, he finds himself in the middle of a gathering where holiday cheer is in short supply --- and every visitor seems to have a motive to kill their host. The most intriguing guest is James Beers, a writer who believes that Marco’s bestselling novel was based on one of his ideas. As Christmas Day approaches, a single boozy night culminates in two corpses, and Nicholas becomes convinced that the whole thing was a setup from the start.
William Morrow | 9780063433670 

EVERY STORY IS A LOVE STORY by Imbolo Mbue (Fiction) 
Three years ago, Wolo’s wife was killed in a tragic car accident. In the face of a loss that seemed insurmountable, Wolo has slowly rebuilt a semblance of a life. But then a letter arrives one day that threatens to upend his life once again. It is from Victoria, the woman who was behind the wheel that terrible day. Wolo’s family pastor tells him the letter is the work of the devil, and his mother expressly forbids him from making further mention of it. Wolo ponders it for days and ultimately agrees to meet with the woman who killed his wife. When he does, the compassion and deep remorse of the woman affects him in ways he had never imagined, and he begins to wonder if the long road to healing can be shared. 
Random House | 9798217154777 

FAIR ONES: A Double Novel by Lydia Millet (Fiction)
FAIR ONES follows two Brooklyn women in their 40s who are reeling from the sudden and baffling death of their friend, Claire. Fair, Mara’s account, opens in the wake of initial shock as she and Jen come to grips with the enigma of Claire’s killing. Ones, told from Jen’s point of view, picks up a year later as she and Mara wrestle with new relationships and old secrets. In this vibrant, funny-sad fiction of companionship and solitude, the narrators’ inner and outer conversations, and their ongoing entanglement with the memory of Claire, explore the ways we create and define ourselves through others. 
W. W. Norton & Company | 9781324123675

FIND ME WHERE IT ENDS by Cassandra Khaw (Dark Fantasy/Horror) 
Antigone is no stranger to death. For the women of her family, death always comes in the form of a black dog. When Antigone’s own black dog arrives, she isn’t afraid. She invites it inside, where it soon becomes a daily source of companionship and comfort. It also forces her to reflect on the life she’s led --- the parts of herself she’s hollowed out for the sake of others, and the bone-deep exhaustion that’s hounded her every step. Her Death’s arrival must be a sign, permission to finally let go. To rest. Because while mortality is inevitable, living is a choice. But a good death comes at a price.
Tor Nightfire | 9781250877895 

FORTUNE AND GLASS by John Mutter (Historical Fiction)
Berlin, 1932. Germany’s fragile democracy is fracturing, its ideals cracking like thin glass as political violence and paranoia seep into the streets. In the midst of this tension, Rudi, a young Foreign Ministry official, meets Sara, an unpredictable, morally fierce Jewish woman whose connection with him is immediate and combustible. By 1943, the Germany they knew has vanished, and Rudi works at the center of Nazi power, performing his duties by day and passing intelligence to the Allies by night --- until Sara’s unexpected return threatens to unravel the life he has carefully constructed to survive. 
Left Field Publishing | 9781966883074 

THE FOUR WIVES AND FIVE DEATHS OF RICHARD MILFORD by Nafissa Thompson-Spires (Historical Fiction)
We find ourselves in 1920s Oklahoma, just far enough out of Tulsa, just long enough after the Race Massacre of 1921. For as long as anyone can remember, the Milfords have led plentiful lives on the backs of the townspeople of Newville. Now, on the ominous brink of the Great Depression and at the height of Prohibition, Richard Milford was an infamous moonshiner and womanizer who, it seems, finally crossed the wrong person at the wrong time. He’s dead and buried with only his women to mourn him, but a question remains: Who killed him, and why? Top suspects are his four “wives”: Lally, Sophronia, Georgette and Vivianne. But as their stories burst to light, the very idea of a true story comes apart before our eyes.
Scribner | 9781501168048 

FRIENDS AND FAMILY by Natalie Baszile (Fiction)
Babs and Nora have spent a decade’s worth of morning walks sharing family secrets, local drama and advice --- everything from tips on lingerie choices to Babs’ suggestions to Nora, a white woman, on how to raise Nathan, her adopted Black son. But their worlds are turned upside down when the cops are called on their kids while they’re home alone, leading to a traumatic police encounter for Nathan. In the aftermath, Babs and Nora find themselves divided as never before, and Nathan looks for refuge with Babs and her family. Babs can see that Nathan is a young Black man without community trying to find himself. Torn between respecting Nora’s boundaries and embodying the values so important to her own family, Babs will make a choice that will shape their lives forever.
Pamela Dorman Books | 9780593492161 

THE HOUSEKEEPER by Rose Tremain (Historical Romance)
Mrs. Danowski, known as Danni, is hired as a housekeeper at Manderville Hall, Lord Grenville-Whithers’ mansion on the wild coast of Cornwall. A loyal and lonely woman troubled by childhood memories of alienation, Danni dreams of finding love. Those dreams are fulfilled when Daphne du Maurier arrives at Manderville Hall for lunch with Grenville-Whithers. Succumbing to her secret sexual desire for women, Daphne begins a love affair with Danni. But, of course, such a love cannot last --- and both Danni and Daphne must deal with the aftermath of their passion. While Danni struggles to find a new place in the world, Daphne reconfigures the experience into her most famous work, REBECCA, with surprising results.
Harper | 9780063509474

HUNGERED by Amanda Rizkalla (Fiction)
Sofia’s mother promises that soon she’ll have her own bedroom to decorate. Soon, too, she’ll be able to see her friends, go back to school, and eat the colorful, tempting cakes in the grocery store’s display case. For now, though, 12-year-old Sofia lives with her mother and younger brother in their car. For now, Sofia’s days are a blur of freeways and strip malls as her mother searches for a safe place to park for the night. For now, Sofia tries to carve out a space and an identity for herself while grappling with her family’s disintegration.
Henry Holt and Co. | 9781250496508

LIFE OUT OF ORDER by Audrey Niffenegger (Fiction/Magical Realism)
Alba DeTamble has never lived a life in order. Born with the same rare Chrono-Displacement Disorder as her father, Henry, she slips unpredictably through decades, haunted by the secrets of a future she can witness but cannot change. As Alba strives to maintain a normal life with Zach, her safe, supportive anchor, she forms a tight-knit community of artists and activists who fight to take care of each other in an increasingly unstable world. LIFE OUT OF ORDER takes readers from the riot-torn streets of a dystopian Chicago to a digital museum for forgotten memories and lost artifacts. Curating this ever-expanding museum is Isadora, Alba’s mysterious stepsister and an unsettling presence in their family --- whose fate may be intertwined with Alba’s in more dangerous ways than she knows.
Hanover Square Press | 9781335003225 

MURDER ON 34th STREET by Mariah Fredericks (Historical Mystery)
New York, 1932. Grace Verlander is the secret beating heart of Macy’s. She’s the go-to person for keeping everything running smoothly behind the scenes at the famous, bustling store. Three days before the Macy’s annual Thanksgiving Day Parade, Grace arrives at work to find a note from the store Santa Claus in her locker: someone has sent him a death threat. Grace promises to look into it and speaks to the store detective about the parade’s security, confident that they’ve found a solution that will keep everyone safe. But on the day of the parade, despite all their precautions, a dead body is found on one of the floats. Using her wits and deep knowledge of the ways of the place, Grace is determined to find the killer and seek justice.
Minotaur Books | 9781250367549 

THE NAMES OF THE NEW WORLD by Kawai Strong Washburn (Fiction)
A ferocious superstorm strikes Minneapolis, leveling large swaths of the city in a matter of minutes. In the storm’s wake, three people forge an unlikely bond that will shape their lives for the next 25 years: Naomi, a disillusioned lawyer by day and amateur MMA fighter by night; Amaré, an up-by-the-bootstraps investment banker; and Raheem, a diesel mechanic struggling to save his business. When Naomi realizes that energy companies are responsible for the climate-induced superstorm, she initiates a bitter legal battle, one that culminates in her ascension to a political office in D.C. Yet her rise puts at risk a burgeoning romance with Amaré, whose own ambitions test Naomi’s ethical limits, while Raheem’s fate as a blue-collar business owner becomes dependent on the couple’s growing power.
Farrar, Straus and Giroux | 9780374619701 

THE OCCIDENTAL BOOK OF THE DEAD by T. Geronimo Johnson (Fiction)
After growing up in one of Atlanta’s poorest housing projects, George Washington Jonson enlists in the U.S. Army and finds some relief serving abroad. When events lead him back home, he joins the police force. It’s 1992, and Jonson is patrolling the streets he grew up on alongside his new partner, a shady legacy cop and self-described “redneck” who takes Jonson under his wing. After a decade on the job, Jonson has fashioned a new life in an affluent suburb with his white wife and stepson, though he is still policing his old neighborhood and is now tasked with training hot-headed rookie recruits. One night on patrol, a split-second confrontation with a white teenager takes a violent turn. That single gunshot sets into motion a series of escalating lies.
William Morrow | 9780063330542 

ONE HELLUVA RIDE by Michael Douglas (Memoir)
Beginning with his fractured childhood and a complex relationship with his superstar father, Kirk Douglas, Michael Douglas finally gives the full and uncensored account of a remarkable life. ONE HELLUVA RIDE reveals incredible behind-the-scenes stories featuring a Who’s Who of Hollywood, with an unflinching honesty about his sometimes bad-boy life. As Douglas' fame grew, so did his personal struggles. He recounts the full, unfiltered story of his turbulent first marriage; infidelity and affairs with some of the most beautiful actresses in Hollywood; his own serious struggle with alcohol, drugs and rehab; the heartbreaking fight to save his son from an addiction that sent him to prison; and his against-all-odds battle with stage IV cancer.
Grand Central Publishing | 9781538782224 

OTHER WORLDS THAN THESE: A Talisman Novel written by Stephen King and Peter Straub, illustrated by Gabriel Rodriguez (Supernatural Thriller/Dark Fantasy)
This is Stephen King and Peter Straub’s long-awaited finale to the Talisman Trilogy and a wrapping up of the fate of the worlds in King’s iconic Dark Tower epic. OTHER WORLDS THAN THESE is the story of Jack Sawyer, whom readers first met in THE TALISMAN when he was 12, crossing America and “the territories” to save his mother’s life, and met again in BLACK HOUSE, where Jack faces a child killer and the Crimson King (among other evils). This time, Jack must stop a rampaging gang of infected teenagers from America-side, and the forces of the mysterious Gullet at the edge of Mid-World, before it destroys our world and all worlds. Jack is older now; his Ka-tet (echoing the world of Roland) is fraying; and his task is nearly impossible.
Scribner | 9781668233092 

THE PARIS FILES by Eva Jurczyk (Psychological Thriller/Mystery)
Genie St. Onge and Jacob Ford’s connection is instantaneous and consuming. They agree to meet again in Paris, and they begin plotting their future together. In the dreamy apartment they're renting in the 11th arrondissement, they become intoxicated by each other. Until Jacob disappears. Genie knows Jacob would never leave her by choice. When phone calls to hospitals turn up nothing, she grows convinced that someone must have taken him. Under the scrutiny of the French police, however, Genie’s story doesn’t quite hold up --- and it sounds like Jacob might not be all he seems, either. Through police interviews with Genie and nearby residents of the 11th arrondissement, the truth remains elusive.
Pamela Dorman Books | 9798217060641

PARTITA by Barbara Kingsolver (Fiction)
Livia Cable has made her peace with her marriage and modest livelihood in the farm country where she grew up, until a shocking phone call from an old lover shakes her to the core. Decades earlier, this man knew her as Livia Bohusz, a music conservatory student estranged from her home and family, uncertain of anything except her passion for music and promise as an extraordinary pianist. His request to see her again stirs up ghosts she’s kept at bay for a lifetime. Shifting between past and present, Livia’s decision to meet or reject the reunion means confronting step by step, in memories framed as musical dances, the experiences of childhood loss, abandonment, self-immolating passion, and perilous attachment to a man who broke her belief in love and ruptured the course of her life.
Harper | 9780063577541 

PETRIFIED DREAMS: A Hap and Leonard Novel by Joe R. Lansdale (Mystery/Humor)
Hap Collins and Leonard Pine have called the detecting business quits, but when a prop plane holding the bodies of several kidnapped women crashes into their favorite watering hole, the boys know they’re in for one last effort. With the help of a victim’s sister, they learn that a network of men has stolen vulnerable young women on behalf of a horrifying, charismatic villain known as The Artist, a sculptor of living things, including his own body, and protected by the elite of the South. But the Artist refuses to be found, and every lead brings Hap and Leonard into the crosshairs of something even more dangerous. Finding The Artist is a long shot, and getting out alive is even less likely.
Little, Brown and Company | 9780316609623 

THE PHANTOM: The Untold Story of the American Marine the Nazis Could Not Kill by Bob Drury and Tom Clavin (History)
Major Pierre “Pete” Ortiz was a Manhattan-born and Paris-educated polymath fluent in five languages. An adventuresome French Foreign Legion veteran specifically recruited by “Wild” Bill Donovan’s Office of Strategic Services (the precursor to both the CIA and U.S. Special Forces) upon his enlistment in the Marines, Ortiz was the officer “Wild Bill” instinctively knew he needed and could rely on to complete a string of clandestine missions. While recuperating from gunshot wounds received during a behind-the-lines excursion into enemy-held North Africa, Ortiz delivered his After-Action Report directly to Donovan in Washington. After reading it, “Wild Bill” scrawled across the top of the report: “Please re-employ this man as soon as possible.” Ortiz’s handlers heeded Donovan’s request.
St. Martin's Press | 9781250285850 

RAVEN by Lyndsay Faye (Gothic/Historical Thriller)
After an itinerant childhood spent first with her mother’s traveling theater troupe and then being passed around from relative to relative, Raven Helen Allan is relieved to finally settle down with Aunt Berenice in her Baltimore townhouse. But when the household is threatened with financial ruin, she must set out to earn her own living. Taking a job as a paid companion, Raven arrives at the crumbling Moldavia Manor. Her charge is a delicate young invalid named Lenore Legrand, who haunts the Gothic structure like a phantom. Living with them is Lenore’s devoted older cousin, Trevanion, who shares Raven’s interest in the occult and devotes his days to searching ancient texts for an Elixir of Life that might cure his cousin. Raven finds herself inexorably drawn to both cousins, as well as to the secrets hidden in the shadows of Moldavia Manor.
The Mysterious Press | 9781613168004 

THE RIVER RUNS BLACK: A North Country Novel by Tessa Wegert (Mystery/Thriller)
After the recent death of a teenager by overdose, a record drug seizure along the Canadian border is a game changer for New York State’s criminal investigation team. The detectives are relieved that the haul will never make it to the idyllic small-town streets of Alexandria Bay. But drugs are still circulating, and the lab results confirm it: the cocaine that killed the teenager and the cocaine from the bust are not the same. Investigator Tim Wellington and his team seem to be chasing a network of ghosts who use the North Country as their criminal playground. How long will it be until another Thousand Islands youth becomes not just a victim, but a target?
Severn House | 9781448315086 

THE RUSH: California Gold, the Civil War, and the Making of the Modern World by Nathaniel Philbrick (History)
In January 1848, a carpenter spotted flecks of gold in a shallow stream at Sutter’s Mill in California, triggering the greatest voluntary migration in U.S. history, as hundreds of thousands raced west in pursuit of sudden wealth, reinvention and power. In THE RUSH, Nathaniel Philbrick transforms the Gold Rush from a tale of sudden riches into the origin story of America’s modern contradictions --- capital consolidated at dizzying speed, democracy in thrall to private power, xenophobia weaponized in the name of liberty --- and a stubborn belief in the American experiment that refuses to die. This is the story of a nation tearing at the seams and a republic tested by its own ideals.
Viking | 9780525562238 

THE SCARLET BALL by Nghi Vo (Historical Fantasy)
Judith Ban, a former convent girl, courtesan and failed thief, is on the lookout for her next identity. But she’s unprepared for the secrets of New York’s legendary Four Hundred, or for the women who build their power at the city’s heart through blood-soaked, gold-etched rituals of demonic marriage. In exchange for enough wealth to outrun her past, Judith strikes a deal with the matriarch of the powerful Howard family: she will stand in for the missing Howard granddaughter, who was poised to make her debut when she disappeared. With Miss Iphigenia Marshall’s face stitched over her own, Judith is white, rich, and about to risk body and soul in the deadly games that determine which girls will find a match --- and which will be devoured. 
Tor Books | 9781250904966 

A SERVING OF HOPE written by Hisashi Kashiwai, translated by Jesse Kirkwood (Mystery) 
Down a Kyoto alleyway, near Higashi Honganji Temple, the Kamogawa Diner attracts lost souls. The father-daughter “food detective” duo of Chef Nagare and Detective Koishi help their clientele who seek meaning in their lives by helping them access lost memories through the food of their past. From the onigiri gifted alongside cherished promises to the ginger pork that became a memory of unrequited love, the not-too-sour chilled noodles from grandma's house, and the macaroni gratin shared by a father and young son for the last time, there is no dish or memory too complex for father and daughter.
G.P. Putnam's Sons | 9798217045372 

SLEEPERS IN THE SNOW by Joanne Harris (Psychological/Supernatural Thriller)
Out on the moor, in the snow, a house stands beneath a pylon. It is a house full of memories and old things. And, in the dark, when the pylon sings in the wind, it is a house full of ghosts and fading memories. The house, Kirkhill, has a new occupant who is fresh from a bitter divorce and looking for a new start. The moor is the perfect place for that. But as the nights start to draw in and the weather takes a turn, so does the house. The cozy isolation becomes menacing, animals begin acting strangely, and it seems someone could be watching the house. And the diaries of the previous owners begin to reveal a terrible tragedy that befell Kirkhill --- and its new occupant may not be able to escape it.
Pegasus Crime | 9798897102020 

THIS SHATTERED TEMPEST: A Hurricane Wars Novel by Thea Guanzon (Fantasy/Romance)
Throughout their political marriage, Alaric and Talasyn struggled to resist the undeniable pull between them, even as rising tensions forced them on opposite sides of a looming war. Hand in hand, they vanquished the cataclysmic threat of the Moonless Dark --- and started to hope for a future together. That hope is shattered when a devastating attack sets off a chain of events that tears them apart once more. Now, as two rival nations prepare for a final, decisive clash, the Master of the Shadowforged Legion and the last Lightweaver fight to find their way back to each other. But the odds are stacked against them, and time is running out.
Harper Voyager | 9780063277359

A WALL IS ALSO A ROAD by Annalee Newitz (Science Fiction/Adventure)
Gardenpath is a graduate student. They also happen to be an amoeba --- a slime mold, to be exact --- from an ancient civilization that dwells in the space between the stars. And when they turn their many eyes to researching a remote spot on one spiral arm of the galaxy, they stumble upon a discovery that will change everything they thought they knew: a mysterious planet teeming with unexpected life, language and culture. One of these alien animals is a creature named Murtis, who lives in a city she calls Pompeii and works in a brothel known as “the lupanar.” Before they met, Gardenpath expected to finish their research, present their discovery, and return home to become an acclaimed scientist. But now they're beginning to wonder if there’s more to life than academic achievement.
Tor Books | 9781250228031 

WHAT HAPPENS AT NIGHTFALL by Lauren Willig (Paranormal Gothic Romance)
Recently laid off and searching for purpose, Jess reluctantly joins her best friend on a supposedly fun nighttime cemetery tour. Separated from her group by accident, she discovers a bunch of terrified boys and a strange, ancient key. Both lead to Green-Wood Cemetery’s surprisingly handsome resident arborist, Adam Chervinsky. Still dealing with the loss of their mother, Adam’s children are acting strangely. A haunting is afoot, and Jess seems to know more than she’s letting on. Sparks fly between Jess and Adam --- and the unquiet spirits of Green-Wood rise from their century-long slumber. As Jess and Adam delve deeper into the cemetery’s haunted history, they uncover a Gilded Age curse, a ghostly socialite, and a demonic pact that stretches across generations.
William Morrow | 9780063306172

WHERE THE ROAD ENDS: A Jonathan Stride Novel by Brian Freeman (Mystery/Thriller)
Jonathan Stride's partner, Maggie Bei, is driving home after midnight when a call comes in: shots fired at the home of a Duluth judge. Moments later, she finds Gordon and Tracy Hartwick murdered in their bed. But someone is hiding in the judge's house, and as Maggie lays chase, she's forced to make a split-second decision that leaves the intruder dead. When Stride arrives at the scene, he has to give Maggie devastating news. The intruder had no gun. He wasn't the killer. She shot an innocent man. With Maggie facing a firestorm over her actions, Stride must discover who really killed Gordon and Tracy Hartwick --- and what secrets they were hiding that put them in the gunsights of a murderer.
Blackstone Publishing | 9798228368439 

WILL AND ATTENTION: A Memoir by Meghan O’Gieblyn (Memoir)
After leaving evangelical Christianity in her early 20s, kicking an addiction, and building a life as a writer, Meghan O’Gieblyn was admired by her friends for having a strong will. Then, in her late 30s, she began secretly attending Catholic mass and meeting with a priest to discuss conversion. After 11 years of sobriety, she began drinking again. Both returns --- to organized religion and to alcohol --- felt to her like a regression, a personal defeat. Knowledge and determination had proven useless when it came to her most vexing personal battles. In WILL AND ATTENTION, O’Gieblyn captures those perplexing days.
Doubleday | 9780385551571 

THE WITCH by Freida McFadden (Psychological Thriller)
When Julia Barlow loses her job and her apartment, she has nowhere left to go but Pemberton, her family's sprawling 17th-century estate in rural Massachusetts. Officially, she's there to check in on her aging grandmother. Unofficially, she's hoping the old house will give her a place to disappear. Instead, Pemberton begins to unravel her. Every night, the grandfather clock stops at exactly 3:41am. The lights flicker without warning. And a disembodied voice cries for help outside Julia's bedroom door. As Julia digs into the house's dark history, she uncovers the story of a woman executed for witchcraft in 1692 --- and realizes the past may not be finished with Pemberton yet. 
Poisoned Pen Press | 9781464249648 

On Sale the Week of October 5th in Paperback

October 6th

59 MINUTES by Holly Seddon (Psychological Thriller)
Carrie is on her way home from work on an ordinary evening, looking forward to seeing her family, when her phone blares: SEVERE ALERT. NUCLEAR MISSILE THREAT TO SOUTH ENGLAND. 59 MINUTES UNTIL IMPACT. SEEK IMMEDIATE SHELTER. THIS IS NOT A TEST. When Frankie and her fiancé get the terrifying alert, they are on their way to a country retreat. Frankie is blissfully and newly pregnant, but her joy is shattered by the realization that there may be no world to bring her baby into. Mrs. Dabb is already spiraling because her 13-year-old daughter is missing. Panicked, she is on a mission to track her down. Then she hears sirens wailing across the moor. Three women, three families, one last chance to be together before the end. All they have is 59 minutes.
Atria/Emily Bestler Books | 9781668087701

BEDLAM: An Alexander Gregory Thriller by LJ Ross (Psychological Thriller)
First Publication in the US
Fresh from solving a high-profile case in Paris, elite forensic psychologist and criminal profiler Dr. Alexander Gregory is pulled into another nightmare. The FBI is on the brink of losing its biggest trial yet: the wife of a notorious criminal --- their star witness --- has been committed to a private psychiatric hospital and declared unfit to testify. Without her, their case collapses. Buchanan Hospital is locked down tight, and its formidable staff are as secretive and unpredictable as the patients they treat. With no one left to trust, the FBI has no choice but to turn to Gregory. Now he must enter the hospital and untangle a web of manipulation and murder before the clock runs out. But inside these walls, nothing is what it seems --- and once he uncovers the truth, he may not walk away unchanged.
Poisoned Pen Press | 9781464273933

BONE VALLEY: A True Story of Injustice and Redemption in the Heart of Florida by Gilbert King (True Crime)
In 1987, Leo Schofield was arrested and charged with the murder of his wife, Michelle. Always insistent on his innocence, he was poorly served by his legal defense: the investigation was sloppy, the case was flimsy, and numerous pieces of evidence were ignored. He was sentenced to life in prison. Over 30 years later, Gilbert King is tipped off to Leo’s case and is astonished by what he finds: layers of corruption, flawed evidence and deep-seated errors. He can’t shake the story and starts to get to know Leo and his family. Leo shows an incomprehensible amount of grace and love about his situation, which spurs Gilbert even more to tell his story.
Flatiron Books | 9781250368539

BOOM TOWN by Nic Stone (Thriller)
When Damaris “Charm” Wilburn, a new daytime dancer, is missing for her shift at Boom Town, former headliner Michah “Lyriq” Johanssen suspects something more than a “no call, no show.” As Lyriq’s former headline partner and lover --- Felice “Lucky” Carothers --- also vanished under similar circumstances, Lyriq decides she’s going to find them. Delving deeper into Charm and Lucky’s disappearances, Lyriq uncovers a tangled web of deceit, privilege and power. The line between friend and foe blurs, forcing Lyriq to confront the question: Is finding these women worth the threat to her own life?
Simon & Schuster | 9781668056288

THE BOYS IN THE LIGHT: An Extraordinary World War II Story of Survival, Faith, and Brotherhood by Nina Willner (History)
THE BOYS IN THE LIGHT follows the parallel journeys of Company D and Eddie Willner, the author’s father, as they are caught up on two sides of World War II. At 16, Eddie Willner was among the millions of European Jews rounded up by Hitler’s Nazis. He was forced into slave labor alongside his father and his best friend, Mike, and spent the next three years of his life surviving the death camps. Meanwhile, in the United States, boys only a few years older than Eddie were joining the army and heading toward their own precarious futures. A company of 3rd Armored Division tankers, led by 23-year-old Elmer Hovland, quickly became battle-hardened and weary, constantly questioning whether the war was worth it. They got their answer when two emaciated boys stepped out of the woods with their tattooed arms raised.
Dutton | 9780593471296

COZY LITTLE CHRISTMAS by RaeAnne Thayne (Romance)
Paperback Original
Hannah has built a full life for herself in the warmth of her close-knit town, with her family, her work and her music. And when her dear friend, Morgan, desperately needs her help, Hannah temporarily steps in to care for Morgan’s children. That’s what friends do --- especially at the holidays. But she never expected to run into Wes Kenner. Moving back home is the last thing that K9 law enforcement officer Wes Kenner ever wanted. It’s where he fell in love with Hannah --- and where an accident changed his mother’s life forever. But when his grandfather needs a helping hand, he can’t say no. It’s the perfect opportunity for him and his beloved K9, Kodiak, to recover. Still, seeing Hannah again fills him with regret --- and hope.
Mira | 9781335013217

DARKER DAYS by Thomas Olde Heuvelt (Supernatural Thriller/Horror)
In Lock Haven, a quiet little town in Washington State, Bird Street is a special place. The residents of this pretty cul-de-sac on the edge of the woods are all successful, healthy and happy. But come November, the Darker Days descend, bringing accidents, bad luck, conflict and illness. It is in November when a stranger appears to collect on a longstanding debt. A price must be paid for the good fortune the Bird Street community enjoys the rest of the year. A sacrifice must be made. So it has been for more than a century. To assuage their guilt, the residents of Bird Street choose carefully who will be sent into the woods. Usually, it is an elderly or terminally ill individual who wishes to enter the void with dignity. But this year, things don’t go according to plan, and events take a terrifying turn.
Harper Perennial | 9780063472525

THE DEVIL’S BIBLE: A Cotton Malone Novel by Steve Berry (Thriller)
Former Justice Department operative Cotton Malone is called to Sweden when the younger sister of King Wilhelm I is kidnapped. The ransom demand? Hand over an 800-year-old book, the Codex Gigas --- the largest illuminated medieval manuscript in the world. Claimed as war loot from Bohemia in 1648, it’s been kept in Stockholm for nearly 400 years. Along the way, it also acquired another more mysterious moniker: The Devil’s Bible. Now the Czech Republic wants the codex back, and Sweden has agreed to return it, but forces are at work to stop that deal from happening. The likely instigator? Russia. Which is also at the top of the list for possible kidnappers. It’s up to Cotton and Cassiopeia Vitt to locate the king’s sister, secure the codex and thwart the Russians. Yet nothing is as it seems.
Grand Central Publishing | 9781538770627

THE GIRL IN THE GREEN DRESS: A Mystery Featuring Zelda Fitzgerald by Mariah Fredericks (Historical Mystery)
New York, 1920. Although she’s newly married to the hottest writer in America, Zelda Fitzgerald is at loose ends while Scott works on his next novel, THE BEAUTIFUL AND THE DAMNED. Meanwhile, Atlanta journalist Morris Markey has arrived in New York and is lost in every way possible. Recently returned from the war and without connections, he hovers at the edge of the city’s revels, unable to hear the secrets that might give him his first big story. When notorious man-about-town Joseph Elwell is found shot through the head, the fortunes of the two southerners collide when they realize they were both among the last to see him alive. Zelda encountered Elwell at the scandalous Midnight Frolic revue on the night of his death, and Markey saw him just hours before with a ravishing mystery woman dressed in green. Markey has his story. Zelda has her next adventure. 
Minotaur Books | 9781250367532

THE HAUNTING OF PAYNES HOLLOW by Kelley Armstrong (Supernatural Thriller/Horror)
When Samantha Payne’s grandfather dies, she figures she won’t even get a mention in the will. After all, she hasn’t seen him in 14 years, not since her father took his own life after being accused of murdering a child at their lakefront cottage. Her grandfather always insisted that her father was innocent, despite Sam having caught him burying the child’s body. But when she does attend the reading of the will at the behest of her aunt, she discovers that her grandfather left her the very valuable lakefront property where the family cottage sits. There’s one catch: Sam needs to stay in the cottage for a month. To finally face the fact that she was wrong and her father was innocent, in her grandfather's words. When her aunt goes missing a couple of days into their stay, Sam begins to question everything again.
St. Martin’s Griffin | 9781250360588

HEAR THE DEAD by Ann Dávila Cardinal (Mystery/Thriller)
Paperback Original
For more than 40 years, Elena Altieri has been hiding from the tragedies of her New York City punk rock youth. Tragedies that left her best friend, Sin, dead, and other women in their orbit missing. Now, the past is catching up with her in more ways than one. Not only is she hearing strange noises under the hum of her tinnitus, but the photographs she took of a recently deceased musician are going viral. When Elena begins to hear the screams of a woman ringing in her ears, she becomes convinced that she's somehow hearing Sin's murder. What she'll uncover not only will force her to reckon with her own fractured memories, but might prove that Sin and other innocent women from their youth were the victims of an unspeakable crime that only she can solve. 
Sourcebooks Landmark | 9781464245862

THE LADY ON ESPLANADE: A Royal Street Novel by Karen White (Mystery)
Nola Trenholm is eager to launch a new murder-house-flipping business with contractor, closet psychic and part-time nemesis Beau Ryan. After a near-death ghostly encounter and the return of Beau’s missing sister, they are confident that the ghost of his mother can finally rest. Nola believes the shotgun house on famed Esplanade Avenue is a prime fixer-upper for her first project. It may have been the site of a woman’s murder and the disappearance of an entire family, but the house will be perfect for new-to-town Cooper Ravenel --- who happens to have caused Nola’s first heartbreak. In addition to the elusive spirit of an angry young woman who accompanied Cooper to New Orleans, the house on Esplanade has its own ghosts, including one that is becoming increasingly dangerous as he tries to hide his dark secrets.
Berkley | 9780593549513

LIFE, AND DEATH, AND GIANTS by Ron Rindo (Fiction/Magical Realism)
Gabriel Fisher was born an orphan, weighing 18 pounds and measuring 27 inches long. No one in Lakota, Wisconsin, knows what to make of him. He walks at eight months, communicates with animals, and seems to possess extraordinary athletic talent. But when the older brother who has been caring for him dies, Gabriel is taken in by his devout Amish grandparents who disapprove of all the attention and hide him away from the English world. But it’s hard to hide forever when you’re nearly eight feet tall. At 17, Gabriel is spotted working in a hay field by the local football coach. What happens next transforms not only Gabriel’s life but the lives of everyone he meets.
St. Martin’s Griffin | 9781250455918

THE MEMORY OF BORROWED BOOKS by Meg Anderson (Fiction/Magical Realism)
Paperback Original
In the coastal town of Foxhollow Bay, librarian Claire Ashford keeps her life as meticulously ordered as the centuries-old library she calls home. But when the town announces plans to shut it down, her sanctuary --- and the life she's built within its walls --- begins to crumble. One night, while wandering the stacks after hours, Claire discovers a door that shouldn't exist. And behind it lies a secret room filled with books no one else can see. Each book pulls her into the memories of those who have passed through the library's doors --- moments half-lived and stories left unfinished. Buried within these pages is a message the library has been trying to share, urging Claire to uncover the path to saving it. With the demolition looming, Claire must piece together what the library is trying to show her. 
Sourcebooks Landmark | 9781464278372

MOTHERS written by Brenda Lozano, translated by Heather Cleary (Fiction)
When the kidnapping of a little girl shocks the Mexican capital, the lives of two very different women become forever intertwined. Gloria Felipe lives a comfortable upper-class life with her husband and five children. Nuria Valencia comes from a working-class background and has been desperately trying to get pregnant in order to save her marriage. After traditional methods produce no results, she subjects herself to horrific fertility treatments designed and administered by men, and ultimately tries to adopt but is rejected on the basis that a woman in her early 30s is too old to adopt a baby. Failed time and again by the system and about to lose hope, she is presented with an opportunity that seems almost too good to be true.
Catapult | 9781646223589

MY BELOVED: A Mitford Novel by Jan Karon (Fiction)
When Father Tim’s wife, Cynthia, asks what he wants for Christmas, he pens the answer in a love letter that bares his most private feelings. Then the letter goes missing and circulates among his astonished neighbors. So much for private. Can a letter change a life? Ask Helene, the piano teacher who has avoided her feelings for a lifetime. Ask Hope, the village bookseller who desperately needs something that’s impossibly out of reach. Or, if you’d like to know how a brush with death can be the portal to a happy marriage, Cynthia will tell you all about it. In MY BELOVED, Harley gets an important letter of his own; a broken heart teaches the Old Mayor, Esther Cunningham, a lesson that’s been a long time coming; and thanks to Lace and Dooley, readers get what they’ve been waiting for: Sadie.
G.P. Putnam’s Sons | 9798217047192

NEXT OF KIN: A Memoir by Gabrielle Hamilton (Memoir)
Gabrielle Hamilton took pride in her unsentimental, idiosyncratic family. She grew up to find enormous success, first as a chef and then as the author of award-winning, bestselling books. But her family ties frayed in ways both seismic and mundane until eventually she was estranged from them all. In the wake of one brother’s sudden death and another’s suicide, Hamilton was compelled to examine the sprawling, complicated root system underlying her losses. She began investigating her family’s devout independence and individualism with a nearly forensic rigor, soon discovering a sobering warning in their long-held self-satisfaction. By the time she was called to care for her declining mother, Hamilton had realized a certain freedom, one made possible only through a careful psychological autopsy of her family.
Random House Trade Paperbacks | 9780399590115

PALAVER by Bryan Washington (Fiction)
In Tokyo, the son works as an English tutor and drinks his nights away with friends at a gay bar. He’s entangled in a sexual relationship with a married man, and while he has built a chosen family in Japan, he is estranged from his mother in Houston, whose preference for the son’s oft-troubled homophobic brother, Chris, pushed him to leave home. Then, in the weeks leading up to Christmas, 10 years since they last saw each other, the mother arrives uninvited on his doorstep. With only the son’s cat, Taro, to mediate, the two of them bristle at each other immediately. The mother, wrestling with memories of her youth in Jamaica and her own complicated brother, works to reconcile her good intentions with her missteps. The son struggles to forgive. But as life steers them in unexpected directions, they begin to see each other more clearly.
Picador | 9781250448248

REVENGE PREY: A Lucas Davenport Novel by John Sandford (Mystery/Thriller)
A former high-ranking Russian intelligence officer who defected to the U.S. after providing critical information about Russian spies in U.S. government service, Leonard Summers and his wife and son have spent the past year holed up in a CIA facility near Washington. After the CIA makes a deal with the U.S. Marshal Service’s Witness Protection Program (WPP), Leonard’s family is transported to Minneapolis. The plan is to hide them in a wooded Minneapolis suburb that resembles their former home and dacha near Moscow. The Summers are received at their destination by Lucas Davenport and fellow marshal Shelly White. Unbeknownst to them, the WPP group has been tracked by a Russian hit team. As shots are fired and enemies dodged, Lucas must move quickly to uncover where the leak is coming from before the hit team can strike again.
G.P. Putnam’s Sons | 9780593852088

SHADOW TICKET by Thomas Pynchon (Historical Fiction)
Milwaukee, 1932. The Great Depression is going full blast, the repeal of Prohibition is just around the corner, Al Capone is in the federal pen, and the private investigation business shifts from labor-management relations to the more domestic kind. Hicks McTaggart, a onetime strikebreaker turned private eye, thinks he’s found job security until he gets sent out on what should be a routine case: locating and bringing back the heiress of a Wisconsin cheese fortune who’s taken a mind to go wandering. Before he knows it, he’s been shanghaied onto a transoceanic liner, eventually ending up in Hungary. By the time Hicks catches up with the runaway heiress, he will find himself entangled with Nazis, Soviet agents, British counterspies, swing musicians, practitioners of the paranormal, outlaw motorcyclists, and the troubles that come with each of them.
Penguin Books | 9780593298039

WHEN YOU TELL by Steena Holmes (Psychological Thriller)
Paperback Original
Bree Wagner has spent her life behind the scenes --- as a ghostwriter, an aunt, and a woman scarred by tragedy. When her former best friend Miranda, now the wildly popular lifestyle influencer Randi F. Alexander, begs for help with her next book, Bree reluctantly agrees. It’s a chance to reconnect after 18 years of silence following a devastating accident in Amsterdam. But just as Bree steps back into Randi’s world, a viral misstep sends the influencer’s career into a tailspin. While Bree tries to steer clear of the spotlight and the toxic whirlwind of cancel culture, old secrets begin to surface --- ones that make her question everything she thought she knew about Miranda and their shared past.
Oceanview Publishing | 9781608096541

WILL THERE EVER BE ANOTHER YOU by Patricia Lockwood (Fiction/Humor)
Amid a global pandemic, one young woman is trying to keep the pieces together --- of her family, stunned by a devastating loss, and of her mind, left mangled and misfiring from a mystifying disease. She’s afraid of her own floorboards, and “WHAT IS LOVE? BABY DON’T HURT ME” plays over and over in her ears. She hates her friends, or more accurately, she doesn’t know who they are. Has the illness stolen her old mind and given her a new one? Does it mean she’ll get to start over from scratch, a chance afforded to very few people? The very weave of herself seems to have loosened: time and memories pass straight through her body. “I’m sorry not to respond to your email,” she writes, “but I live completely in the present now."
Riverhead Books | 9780593718568

On Sale the Week of October 12th in Hardcover

October 13th

BARK HUMBUG: An Andy Carpenter Mystery by David Rosenfelt (Mystery)
This time, reluctant lawyer Andy Carpenter is serious about retiring. But when the local newspaper asks him to participate in their Christmas spread of local celebrities and their dogs, he brings Tara along for the ride. When the photographer comes to take pictures of Andy and the dogs, he instead opens the door to Sharon Lowery, who devised the newspaper story just to get his attention and beg him for help. Her brother, Jon, is wanted for murder and is on the run. However, if Andy agrees to hear Jon out, he'll turn himself in with the hope that Andy will represent him and reunite him with his dog. Andy decides to help Jon and slowly uncovers a web of conspiracies. Determined to keep him out of jail, Andy gathers the crew to investigate. 
Minotaur Books | 9781250427830 

THE BOOKSHOP: A History of Bookselling from the Dawn of Print to the Twenty-First Century by Andrew Pettegree (History)
Whether it’s a local indie bookshop, an online mega-retailer or a chain bookstore, the place we buy books is an essential part of our reading lives. Bookstores connect books to potential buyers and convert idle browsers into committed readers. Yet, as historian Andrew Pettegree reveals, it took more than five centuries after Gutenberg for bookstores as we know them to emerge. THE BOOKSHOP tells a sweeping history of the bookstore. It celebrates the ingenuity of booksellers, from the smugglers who carried contraband books across borders, to the innovators who created the global distribution networks that define books and bookselling today. 
Basic Books | 9781541607279 

D: HEAVY WATER by Neal Stephenson (Historical Thriller)
Europe, 1934. British journalist Owen Crisp-Upjohn is dispatched to Moscow, where his assignments quickly escalate from cultural reporting to international espionage. Before long, Owen finds himself pulled into the orbit of the enigmatic Earl of Suffolk, a maverick aristocrat, and Aurora, a curiously compelling woman with a shadowy past rooted in Soviet intelligence. Their mission soon becomes to secure the earth’s only supply of deuterium --- “heavy water” --- before it falls into Nazi hands. Over time, Owen evolves from a detached observer into a man forced to confront profound questions of honor, love and moral responsibility as loyalties are tested and allegiances shift in an ever-tightening web of science, intrigue and deceit.
William Morrow | 9780062839732 

A DATE WITH SANTA by Debbie Macomber (Romance)
When her sister needs her help, single career woman Sage Madison volunteers to care for her five-year-old nephew, Ricky. Determined to give Ricky a memorable Christmas, she enlists help from her assistant and close friend, Erica, and her colleague, Ethan, who agrees to dress up as Santa --- if Sage and Ricky join him in holiday fun to get in the spirit. As Sage navigates the challenges of caring for her nephew and the prospect of romance with Ethan, she begins to discover the true magic of the season. Ethan’s bond with Ricky and his kindness toward Sage bring unexpected joy and new adventures. But when her old life threatens to interfere with the festivities, Sage must decide what she truly wants before the season’s magic slips away.
Ballantine Books | 9798217091706 

THE END OF EVERYTHING by M. John Harrison (Post-Apocalyptic Fiction) 
Phillip Tennent makes his living at the tideline, collecting artifacts that wash up from the Channel. It's been years since the crisis changed everything, but its exact nature remains obscure. Government barely functions, the seas are full of new creatures, an entire continent has been mislaid. It feels like the end. Now Phillip has fished out of the water an object he can't keep. A creature that keeps changing. An artifact he must take inland before it destroys everything he thinks he knows.
Riverhead Books | 9798217438655 

ETHEL KENNEDY: The Extraordinary Life and Bold Legacy by Kerry Kennedy (Biography)
When her husband, Robert F. Kennedy, was killed in 1968, Ethel Skakel Kennedy --- then pregnant with their 11th child --- drew national attention for her grace, dignity and resolute commitment to furthering his work in human rights, even in her grief. But as her daughter, Kerry, witnessed, Ethel was so much more than a dutiful wife and keeper of Robert's legacy of service. She was courageous, curious, compassionate, boisterous and witty, always guided by faith and an instinct for speaking truth to power. In ETHEL KENNEDY, Kerry delves into her own memories, her family's recollections, and her mother's private papers.
HarperOne | 9780063454958 

THE GAME by Peter King (Sports)
For 40 years, Peter King’s unmatched access, curiosity and passion have made him synonymous with the National Football League. He broke countless stories, giving us the human side of the sport and influencing countless reporters. Players trusted him; coaches and owners revealed information to him. He gathered it all into notebooks and columns that kept fans riveted. Now, in THE GAME, King has brought all his knowledge and insight together in one place to tell the story of the modern NFL as no one else could. Moving from the mid-1980s, when the league went head-to-head with baseball in popularity, to the present, when it dominates every other entertainment in America, King narrates the NFL’s explosive rise from the inside.
W. W. Norton & Company | 9781324123637 

HOME FOR THE HOMICIDES: A Holly & Mark Mystery by Elle Cosimano and Hannah Morrissey (Romantic Comedy/Mystery)
Welcome to Christmas, a town so cozy and charming it could be the backdrop of a Hallmark movie. So when a tourist is found stabbed to death by an icicle ornament in the middle of the town nativity scene, the local police are out of their depth. Special Agents Holly Frost and Mark Shepherd are on thin ice after screwing up on the job. This assignment is their one shot at redemption, if they can put aside their bitter rivalry. And of course, it's not only their careers on the line, it's their hearts, too. Regrets of their holiday party hookup last year haunt them like ghosts of Christmas past, so they both want to wrap up this rom-com gone wrong as quickly as possible. But with just 12 days until the town's annual Jingle Bell Jubilee festival, the countdown to catch a killer --- without killing each other --- is on.
Minotaur Books | 9781250413352

I NEVER KNEW YOU AT ALL by Christine Pride and Jo Piazza (Fiction) 
When Simone Hartwell’s college ex and first love, Kwame, resurfaces in her life, her carefully constructed domestic bliss threatens to crumble under the weight of old feelings and new dramas. Kwame, who built the journalism career Simone once dreamed of, is investigating a decades-old mystery of a young Black man who disappeared from The Tate School --- the same elite prep school that her husband’s family has attended for generations. When he discovers a startling connection to the Hartwells, it sets everyone on a collision course that will unearth long-held secrets, test loyalties, and force a major reckoning between the past and the future.
Atria Books | 9781668033258 

LOOK WHAT THE CAT DRAGGED IN by Jason Rekulak (Supernatural Thriller)
Meet Penny Padgett, a 27-year-old cartoonist in Philadelphia who agrees to pet-sit a very peculiar cat named Godfrey in her home. At first, he’s a warm and affectionate companion who follows Penny all around the house and insists on sleeping by her side every night. But soon strange things are happening: Penny is haunted by disturbing and violent nightmares. There’s a terrible insect infestation in her basement. Her cute cartoon illustrations turn dark and surreal, as if influenced by some invisible hand. And her health starts failing, as if her mind and body are under attack by a sinister, malevolent force. Penny may be a cat person, but she’s starting to think Godfrey is no ordinary cat.
Flatiron Books | 9781250895875 

LUNA, PHOENIX, QUEEN by Julie Orringer (Fiction)
Dava and Barr Pennington are professors at a Midwestern university. Dava is unhappy in their marriage and secretly in love with a colleague. Spurred by their complicated liaison, she spends her nights working on a novel about two women who run a domestic violence shelter. But the writing becomes increasingly difficult as her memory begins to fail. Tests reveal that she’s suffering from early-onset Alzheimer’s. After a precipitous decline, Dava moves to a memory-care facility. Soon afterward, Barr discovers her hidden manuscript and extrapolates her affair from the relationship described in the novel’s pages. Over the next two years, he rewrites the novel and publishes it as his own. But persistent feelings of guilt lead him to confess his theft to an unlikely party, who leads others to the truth.
Knopf | 9798217207886 

MUSIC AGAINST THE NIGHT by Yiyun Li (Historical Fiction)
In Dublin, as the 18th century nears its end, a young musical virtuoso comes of age. John Field is preternaturally gifted, and his family has visions of him becoming the next Mozart. His talent eventually takes him to Russia, where he becomes a famous pianist and composes dreamy, languorous melodies that enchant the night air. John calls them nocturnes, but the prodigy who immortalizes them is Chopin. Oceans away in Pondicherry, in French India, Adelaide Percheron is raised by her imperious, enterprising grandmother. Her cousins give her the name Percherette, an impish reminder that she is not one of the crowd. Without a connection to aristocracy or the luxury of riches, only marriage seems to offer prosperity --- until she sets her sights on a pianoforte.
Farrar, Straus and Giroux | 9780374613051 

MYSTERY PLAY by Elizabeth Kostova (Historical/Supernatural Thriller)
After his beloved mother passes away suddenly, Jay Turner returns to their Boston home to clear out her possessions and finds an unusual item: a partially burned scrap of newspaper bearing the name “Gael Brogan.” Soon after, a deliveryman leaves behind a package containing a small antique volume bound in leather --- and two bloody footprints. As a young scholar, his mother had been given the medieval book --- one of a set commissioned by Vlad Țepeș, otherwise known as Dracula, just before his death in 1477. She had always warned Jay of the dangers associated with it and had donated it to a museum before she died. Yet here it is, back in his possession. Jay sets out to learn more about Gael Brogan, a prominent 19th-century actor, and uncovers the frightening story of a young actress who fell under Brogan's sway long ago.
Ballantine Books | 9781524799649 

ODETTE RISING by Julianne Edwards (Historical Fiction)
It’s 1896 in Sèvres, France. From her bedroom window, Odette Huré watches a funeral procession carry her father’s coffin away. She is 21, and she has not left the house for 10 years. Odette looks on as her life passes, reading and soothing herself with food. But with the sudden death of her father, the walls she has built around herself begin to crumble. Forced into the world, she discovers to her horror that she is responsible for her father’s considerable fortune and his celebrated stockings factory --- renowned for its exquisite designs that adorn the slender ankles of Parisian femmes célèbres. Now Odette must try and navigate the world she has hidden from for so long. In doing so, she will unearth secrets left behind by her father and the shocking truth of her own identity.
Pamela Dorman Books | 9780593995518 

OFF THE RESERVATION by Stephen Graham Jones (Horror)
Five years have passed since the massacre on the Blackfeet reservation in THE ONLY GOOD INDIANS. Nathan Yellow Tail, one of the survivors of the revenge murders, finds himself in the hospital after a terrible accident that should’ve killed him and that nearly killed his best friend, Sebby. Nate’s life is out of balance, so when he is given the chance to reset his life, and maybe save Sebby in the process, he steps up again. This time it’s into a camper van that is almost as run down as his broken body, filled with three older Blackfeet, to find the bones of the lone Blackfeet boy who died at the Carlisle Indian Industrial School --- where many Indigenous children were abused --- and repatriate this boy home. The problem is, when they get the bones, something terrible has escaped with them.
S&S/Saga Press | 9781668225127 

PASSENGERS by Alexander Maksik (Dystopian Fiction)
Ivan is a solitary man in his 70s, set in his ways and haunted by the failures of his past. His daughter, Nina, is in the twilight of her 20s and has long kept a distance from her sentimental father. But when Ivan proposes a trip to Europe in hopes that it will bring them closer together, Nina reluctantly agrees. They meet at LAX, where their departure is delayed. And delayed again. And again. As the hours drag on, their sharp, caustic and wide-ranging conversation reveals a lifetime of misunderstandings, unhealed wounds and stubborn love. Soon more flights are canceled, security tightens, airport staff grow evasive, and it becomes clear to Ivan and Nina that something is wrong. At last, the surreal starts to overtake the mundane, and their need to escape --- and to protect each other --- turns increasingly urgent.
Europa Editions | 9798889661955 

PECK & PECK by Bonnie Garmus (Fiction/Humor) 
It’s 1982, New York City. Crime is on the rise, muggings are in the streets, and Batter Gray, a recent college graduate, is worried about his future. While his friends have real jobs, he’s folding T-shirts at the Gap. As for love? No. Not unless you count Sallie Mae, the student loan tyrant he hears from all the time. But when Batter gets a dream job at Peck & Peck, the most prestigious poetry quarterly in the world, his life moves into the literary fast lane. Soon Batter is knee-deep in the secret war between the two Editors in Chief, the famous Peck brothers --- twins and enemies --- as well as being privy to the private affairs of their 39 editors, whose professed mission is the same: Find originality. Reward creativity. Burn the rest. And by burn, they mean incinerate.
Scribner | 9781668251065 

SAMANTHA: THE NEXT CHAPTER by Fiona Davis (Historical Fiction)
In honor of the 40th anniversary of the iconic American Girl brand, Fiona Davis was asked to write the first American Girl novel for adults. It’s 1920, and 25-year-old Samantha Parkington is working hard to educate women in New York about suffrage and encourage them to vote in their first presidential election that fall. But when Samantha’s large inheritance, including her childhood Mount Bedford home, is stolen in a shocking scheme, she goes from socialite to shop girl overnight and experiences a very different side of New York City living in a boarding house. Searching for clues regarding the theft of her inheritance, Samantha infiltrates the business of a notorious criminal in New York City. Determined as ever, she will do whatever it takes to find answers and save her family’s legacy.
American Girl Publishing | 9781683372653 

SOLACE HOUSE by Will Maclean (Psychological Thriller/Horror)
For Alex Lane’s wealthy university friends, the summer break stretches out before them. But for Alex, broke as usual, going home is not an option. So when the university offers him an unusual summer job clearing out a dilapidated Victorian mansion, Solace House, he jumps at the chance. Alex joins an unlikely crew of students and is particularly drawn to mercurial, red-headed Ella. As the students begin sorting through piles of old newspapers and magazines, dusty antiques and esoteric junk, Alex and Ella become enthralled by the elaborate and eerie journals of the house’s former owner, Edwin Flayne. As the students gradually uncover the house’s secrets, the rift between those who want to delve further and those who believe they’ve already gone too far grows ever wider.
Grove Press | 9780802168689 

SOMETHING IS KILLING THE CHILDREN: Hope Is a Knife by James Tynion IV and Kiersten White (Supernatural Horror/Dark Fantasy) 
As a Black Mask, Erica Slaughter has a very straightforward job: find the monster, kill the monster, then do it all again. But when she arrives in Badwater, Idaho, nothing is simple. She can’t determine whether the horrific killer of a 12-year-old was a bear, a person, or something much worse. Complicating matters is the charismatic doomsday preacher who is quickly leading the small town to the verge of hysteria. If Erica wants to save the surviving children, she has to figure out which kid’s fears might have summoned a monster --- and fast. Erica must get to the truth before the Order and the town come to the same conclusion: to stop the monster, you have to kill the girl.
Crown | 9780593799383 

THE SPIRITS by Bonnie Jo Campbell (Fiction) 
It is the night before Christmas in a small town in Michigan, and a young woman is haunted by her father’s death. She has been silently penitent for nine years, but her guilt and grief have estranged her from her community and her family. She has taken refuge in the natural world of the plants and trees she tends, but on this anniversary of the tragedy, the supernatural landscape is rattling its chains. When a surprise guest appears at the (dreaded) Christmas Eve dinner, the family begins to open up and reveal dangerous secrets and crimes nobody is willing to face. Within this darkest chaos, a sliver of light appears, showing a way to reclaim communion and even a sense of humor.
W. W. Norton & Company | 9781324130901 

THE STORY BAKER written by Carsten Henn, translated by Melody Shaw (Fiction)
Though she only just started her temporary job at the village bakery, former ballet dancer Sofie already wants to quit from day one. Her career abruptly ended after an injury threatened any and all chances of success, and losing her most beloved passion has thrown her life off track. Yet there’s something about the rhythms of the bakery that captivates her. Fascinated, Sofie watches old Italian baker Giacomo at work and discovers that baking bread is almost like a dance. To her own surprise, she comes to see the little bakery as far more than just a place of work: it slowly transforms into a reprieve. It is here that she discovers the wisdom of a simple man, the joy of small things, and the courage to embrace change.
Hanover Square Press | 9781335000996 

THIS IS WHAT HAPPENS WHEN WOMEN READ by Julianna Glasse (Memoir)
At the peak of her fame, Julianna Glasse seemed to have everything she wanted: a successful career as a Christian pop singer and author, a high-profile marriage, and a respected place in the evangelical community that had shaped her understanding of herself and the world. But beneath the surface, questions she could no longer ignore began to challenge everything she had spent decades learning, teaching and defending. The books she started to read opened doors she could not shut. The certainties she had inherited over her lifetime no longer felt certain. She came to see how fear had shaped so many of her choices, and how freedom often begins with a question. In this deeply personal memoir, Julianna writes of her very public and painful split from both the church and her husband.
Spiegel & Grau | 9781966302346

THE THRICE-BOUND FOOL by Christopher Buehlman (Fantasy/Adventure)
Professional thief and inveterate trickster Kinch Na Shannack has always enjoyed a good book. But now his life, and the future of all of Manreach, depends on deciphering a very bad book indeed. It’s a stolen, sentient tome that tries to kill him every time he opens it --- and often when it’s closed. Galva, veteran of the goblin wars and death’s sworn handmaiden, has vowed to protect Kinch while he mines the book for its dark magic and even darker secrets. She does so not for Kinch’s sake, but because the book is the key to stopping the shadowy tyrants out to kill the queen she serves --- and loves. The ruthless, all-seeing Taker’s Guild dogs their every step, and thief and knight must flee the known world entirely if they hope to succeed. But trouble finds Kinch wherever he goes.
Tor Books | 9781250621214 

TRUTH TO POWER: A Luke Cage Marvel Crime Novel by S. A. Cosby (Thriller)
With advanced cybernetics showing up in the possession of low-level criminals, Luke Cage is hired to investigate a factory manufacturing medical devices in rural Virginia. Leaving Jessica Jones during a delicate moment in their relationship, he makes plans to travel south but is devastated to learn that a cousin who scoped out the plant for him has been found dead. The police report states it was an accident. But Luke has long known that official words are just that: words. Fueled by guilt and vengeance, Luke arrives in Virginia and promises his aunt that he will get to the bottom of things. But danger lurks in every living room, barroom and country road of Majestic, and the local sheriff’s barely concealed prejudices are ready to boil to the surface.
Hyperion Avenue | 9781368095372 

THE TULIP POPLARS by Silas House (Historical Fiction)
Amos and Tom fall in love while working in the tobacco fields during the hot summers of the early 1900s, yet Tom cannot shake his strict religious upbringing nor the responsibilities of his family’s farm. His longtime friend, Maeve, also pines for a man she can’t have, lest she endanger his already tenuous life in a town and world shaped by racial lines. How do you live a life that feels untrue, and at what point do you risk everything?
Algonquin Books | 9781643756974 

UNSPEAKABLE THINGS by Elizabeth Hand (Historical Thriller/Gothic Romance)
It's the 1920s, and the English countryside is quiet --- which suits Olivia and Tamsin. Their relationship is complicated. Unruly, working-class Tamsin was brought to Kerrith Manor to be tutored at Olivia's side, but the two quickly have found something more than friendship --- a bone-deep recognition that ignites an endless passion. But an unexpected visitor and an unexplained death disrupt their idyll, sending both women on the run. They find harbor at Ledges, the dazzling estate of ruthlessly wealthy and mysterious Rex de Voil --- and a favorite hangout for the bohemian “bright young things” eager to cut loose far from London’s prying eyes. Olivia and Tamsin revel in their newfound freedom…until they learn that nothing in Rex’s world is without cost.
Little, Brown and Company | 9780316579056 

On Sale the Week of October 12th in Paperback

October 13th

AFTER THAT, THE DARK: A Cameron Winter Mystery by Andrew Klavan (Hard-boiled Mystery)
After working up the courage to contact Gwendolyn Lord, Cameron Winter finds himself immersed in a heaven-sent passion. When Gwendolyn tells him about a true-life “locked-room mystery,” Winter is compelled to investigate. In Tulsa, Oklahoma, Owen McKay suddenly went mad and killed his wife and child. Locked in a cell and monitored on video, he was discovered dead from a projectile fired into his head. Then another mysterious death, just like McKay's, takes place in Connecticut, and both murders seem linked to a sinister billionaire who once clashed with Winter's old mentor, the Recruiter. Winter's past and present are coming together in a dangerous conspiracy. And though Winter desperately wants to escape his career as an assassin, he will do anything --- and kill anyone --- to protect Gwendolyn.
The Mysterious Press | 9781613168431

ALL THE LITTLE HOUSES by May Cobb (Domestic Thriller)
It's the mid-1980s in the tiny town of Longview, Texas. Nellie Anderson, the beautiful daughter of the Anderson family dynasty, has burst onto the scene. She always gets what she wants. What she can't get for herself… well, that's what her mother is for. Because Charleigh Anderson --- blond, beautiful and ruthlessly cunning --- remembers all too well having to claw her way to the top. When she was coming of age on the poor side of East Texas, she was a loser and an outcast, humiliated and shunned by the in-crowd, whose approval she'd so desperately thirsted for. When a prairie-kissed family moves to town --- all trad wife, woodworking dad, wholesome daughter vibes --- Charleigh's entire self-made social empire threatens to crumble. Who will be left standing when the dust settles?
Sourcebooks Landmark | 9798256500139

AS WE FALL THROUGH TIME by Claire North (Science Fiction/Romance)
Paperback Original
When Cal meets a soldier of the French Revolution, he knows his lover is destined to die. But what's the point of being a time traveler if you can’t make a few small tweaks to the course of history? A little paradox here, an alteration there --- nothing Cal can’t fix, to save the man he loves. When Fadimatu walks into a museum in 2018, she stumbles upon her own mummified corpse, setting her on the path to a betrayal that already has killed her, and a murder that has not yet come to pass. And when a sudden rupture in the fabric of history rips through the lives that Cal and Fadimatu have built, breaking both past and future, they must reckon with death foretold, love forsaken, and a secret that will shatter time itself.
Orbit | 9780316586467

THE BLUFF by Wade Rouse (Fiction/Humor)
Paperback Original
The Chapmans do Christmas the way they do everything: impeccably, expensively, and with the unshakable belief that good lighting can conceal bad blood. Their annual Christmas card may look picture-perfect, but behind the polite smiles there’s a storm brewing. This year, at their grand lakefront cottage on Mackinac Island, a snowstorm traps generations of Chapmans --- and their schemes --- under one roof. As the snow piles up, so do the grievances. Chris and Kat’s children --- fiercely liberal Leah and conservative golden-boy Chip --- are locked in a battle of wits; Chris’ vaguely corrupt brother, Cormac, and his calculating trophy wife are stirring the pot; and Kat’s mother is holding onto a secret that could upend the entire game. 
Mira | 9780778306221

BOG QUEEN by Anna North (Mystery)
When Agnes arrives in the peat bogs of Northern England to study an anthropological marvel --- an Iron Age body --- she isn't expecting the controversy. Peat-cutters are looking to profit from the bog, activists are demanding it be preserved, scientists are clamoring for the next discovery. And then there is the moss itself: a repository of artifacts, with its own dark stories to tell. Flashing between post-Brexit England and the druidic order of Celtic Europe, BOG QUEEN brims with ancient wisdom as it connects across time two gifted, farsighted young women learning to harness their strengths in a landscape more mysterious than either can imagine.
Bloomsbury Publishing | 9798260200377

DETOUR by Jeff Rake and Rob Hart (Science Fiction/Thriller)
When Ryan Crane, a cop, spots a gunman emerging from an unmarked van, he leaps into action and unknowingly saves John Ward, a billionaire with presidential aspirations, from an assassination attempt. As thanks for Ryan’s quick thinking, Ward offers him the chance of a lifetime: to join a group of lucky civilians chosen to accompany three veteran astronauts on the first manned mission to Saturn’s moon Titan. As the ship is circling Titan, it is rocked by an unexplained series of explosions. The crew works together to get back on course, and they return to Earth as heroes. When the fanfare dies down, Ryan and his fellow astronauts notice that things are different. Some changes are good, but others are more disconcerting. Before the group can connect, mysterious figures start tailing them, and their communications are scrambled.
Random House Worlds | 9780593871393

FUTURE BOY: Back to the Future and My Journey Through the Space-Time Continuum by Michael J. Fox and Nelle Fortenberry (Memoir)
In early 1985, Michael J. Fox’s days were already dedicated to rehearsing and taping the hit sitcom “Family Ties,” but then the chance of a lifetime came his way. Soon, he committed his nights to a new time-travel adventure film being directed by Robert Zemeckis and produced by Steven Spielberg --- Back to the Future. Fox’s nightly commute from a soundstage at Paramount to the back lot at Universal Studios, from one dream job to another, would become his own space-time continuum. In FUTURE BOY, Fox tells the remarkable story of playing two landmark roles at the same time. Using new interviews with the cast and crew of both projects, the result is a vividly drawn and eye-opening story of creative achievement by a beloved icon.
Flatiron Books | 9781250866790

GOOD GUYS by Mindy Misener (Fiction)
Paperback Original
Georgie and Jo are sisters, but they aren’t close. The situation seems worse once Jo goes off to college, making it obvious that she’s happy about leaving Curtisville and Georgie and their disabled father behind. Then, Gary Clemmons dies in the Iraq War. Gary --- the son of their pastor, the hero of their hometown, and the brother of Georgie’s secret girlfriend --- was famous for being a good guy. But Georgie stumbles on a dark secret about Gary, and once Jo finds out, things begin to spiral out of control. The fallout will change both sisters' lives forever.
Melville House | 9781685892654

THE HITCHHIKERS by Chevy Stevens (Psychological Thriller)
It’s the summer of 1976, and Alice and Tom set out on the remote Canadian highways in their new RV, hoping to heal their broken hearts after a devastating tragedy. They’ve planned the trip perfectly and taken care of every detail. Then they meet two young hitchhikers down on their luck and offer them a ride. But Simon and Jenny aren’t what they seem. They’ve left a trail of blood, destruction and madness behind them. Now Alice and Tom are trapped, prisoners in a deadly game, with nowhere to turn. As the tension builds, the lines blur, and the question becomes: In whose heart does evil truly lie? What secrets are Jenny and Simon hiding? And who will live another day? 
St. Martin’s Griffin | 9781250133670

IT GIRL: The Life and Legacy of Jane Birkin by Marisa Meltzer (Biography)
Jane Birkin was synonymous with chic. Her effortless style and artistic legacy have been immortalized through her music and film career. And, of course, she was the inspiration behind one of the world’s most coveted bags, the Hermès Birkin. But who was the real woman behind the it girl? Now, Marisa Meltzer sheds new light on Birkin’s enigmatic life and explores her profound influence on generations in a rigorously reported biography unlike any other. IT GIRL paints a vivid portrait of Birkin and her profound legacy, from her early years in 1960s London to her rise as a beloved celebrity in France, detailing personal challenges, her relationships with creative powerhouses, and the duality of her public and private selves.
Atria Books | 9781668060292

IT’S BEGINNING TO LOOK A LOT LIKE MURDER by Ally Carter (Romantic Comedy/Mystery)
Paperback Original
Ella Chambers didn’t kill Liam Montgomery. If she had, she certainly wouldn’t have done it outside his family’s mansion during the Christmas party of the year. But now Liam is missing, and Ella is the only person who knows he’s still alive. So it’s up to her to prove it. Liam Montgomery didn’t want to die. But, it turns out, when you’re the sole heir to a billionaire, someone might want you dead. Luckily for Liam, being dead works for him. Now he’s on the hunt for a killer. Unfortunately, Ella is on the hunt for him. She’ll have to prove he’s still alive to clear her name, but that’s easier said than done in a quaint mountain town where everyone knows your story, but no one knows the truth. As the storm of the century blows in, every step will bring these two childhood rivals closer to a killer --- and each other.
Avon | 9780063387041

LOVE YOU TO DEATH by Jenna Levine (Paranormal Romantic Comedy)
Paperback Original
Lucy McKenzie’s life has always been a disaster. So it should come as no surprise when one day she is hit by an inconveniently timed bus --- and dies. Unfortunately for the handsome grim reaper who shows up to take her to the afterlife, Lucy is not about to go quietly. Daniel is tired of his job collecting souls. While working for the Agency beats the heck out of going to Hell, he’s been doing this for literal ages. The drudgery has him yearning for more. Touched by Lucy’s plea for more time on earth, he convinces the Agency to make a deal: Lucy can have six more weeks of life if Daniel can observe her and report back on humanity. But as Lucy and Daniel navigate the chaos of life and afterlife together, they discover that a second chance at living might be their real chance at love.
Berkley | 9780593819937

MERRY SPOOKY LOVE: A Melody Bittersweet Novel by Josie Silver (Romantic Comedy/Paranormal Mystery)
Paperback Original
When Lucy Libertine, the namesake of the charming old-school department store Libertines, unexpectedly dies, the store goes to her deceased sister's three children: businessmen twins Francis and Tom, and their younger sister, Fleur. Despite Fleur and the local community protesting, the twins are excited to sell up. They hold all the cards as the majority shareholders --- that is, until Lucy Libertine herself decides to even the playing field, haunting the twins out of house and home (and department store). While the twins call in Melody Bittersweet's ghost-hunting ex to defend them, Lucy goes to Melody to represent Fleur and the deceased Libertine family. Melody is all too happy to take another job, save a beloved local store, and maybe knock her ex down a paranormal peg or two.
Dell | 9780593983041

MINOR BLACK FIGURES by Brandon Taylor (Fiction)
New York simmers with heat and unrest as Wyeth, a painter, finds himself at an impasse in his own work. After attending a dubious show put on by a collective of careerist artists, he retreats to a bar in the West Village where he meets Keating, a former seminarian. Over the long summer, as the two get to know each other, they talk and argue about God, sex and art. Meanwhile, at his job working for an art restorer, Wyeth begins to investigate the life and career of a forgotten, minor Black artist. His search yields potential answers to questions that Wyeth is only now beginning to ask about what it means to be a Black artist making Black art amid the mess and beauty of life itself.
Riverhead Books | 9780593332375

MOTHER MAY I by Harry Hunsicker (Thriller)
Paperback Original
When former CIA operative Meg Dalton finds a shocking clue that suggests her long-missing daughter might still be alive, she’s forced into a desperate, high-stakes search for the truth. Fifteen years after little Ivy vanished without a trace at a Texas fair, Meg has built a career as a covert “operator” --- a soldier-for-hire who takes on dangerous black ops missions for the government. But during a botched assignment in Los Angeles, Meg encounters a woman wearing her daughter’s distinctive butterfly necklace, and everything she believes unravels. As Meg defies her handlers and goes rogue to chase the lead, she’s thrust into a deadly conspiracy linking global espionage, human trafficking and her own past sins.
Oceanview Publishing | 9781608096626

A MURDER IN PARIS by Matthew Blake (Psychological Thriller)
Olivia Finn is a memory expert at Charing Cross Hospital in London. One night, she receives an urgent call from the police at the Hotel Lutetia on Paris’s famous Left Bank. Olivia’s French grandmother, Josephine Benoit, has appeared at the Lutetia in a distressed state claiming she once committed a murder in the hotel at the end of the Second World War. Traveling to Paris, Olivia finds her grandmother confused. But Josephine insists it is a recovered memory from the past. More disturbingly, hotel records show that a woman did die in that room of the Lutetia in 1945. Could her story really be true? As people start dying in the present day, Olivia is plunged into a race against time to uncover the truth about Josephine and what really happened all those years ago.
Harper Perennial | 9780063314207

NEAR FLESH: Stories by Katherine Dunn (Fiction/Short Stories)
A woman invests in a series of sex robots to get her off and comes to terms with the limitations --- and real threat --- of automated companionship. A knowing young student pursues an affair with an older man, the poet in residence at the university where she studies writing, and weighs the benefits and costs of their arrangement. A mother moves to a farm with her family and must come to terms with the violence simmering beneath her skin. NEAR FLESH is the first and only collection of short fiction by Katherine Dunn, the author of the bestselling novel GEEK LOVE. These 19 stories are attuned to the spit and grit of tough living. They pulse with yearning for a more prosperous life, for sexual satisfaction, to escape abusive husbands and the disappointments of convention.
Picador | 9781250448231

ONE OF THEM by Kitty Zeldis (Historical Fiction)
Anne Bishop seems like a typical Vassar sophomore --- one of a popular group of privileged WASP friends. None of the girls in her circle has any idea that she’s Jewish, or that her real first name is Miriam. Pretending to be a Gentile has made life easier. As Anne, she no longer suffers the snubs, snide remarks and daily restrictions Jews face. But her secret life is threatened when she becomes fascinated by a girl not in her crowd. Delia Goldhush is sophisticated, stylish, brilliant and unashamedly Jewish. Knowing that her growing closeness with Delia would be social suicide if it were discovered, Anne keeps their friendship quiet. Delia seems to understand --- until a cruelty on Anne’s part drives them apart and sends them scattering to other corners of the world, alone and together. 
Harper Perennial | 9780063352858

THIS IS THE ONLY KINGDOM by Jaquira Díaz (Fiction)
When Maricarmen meets Rey el Cantante, the beloved small-time Robin Hood and local musician on the rise, she begins to envision a life beyond the tight-knit community of el Caserío, Puerto Rico. But breaking free proves more difficult than she imagined, and she soon finds herself struggling to make a home for herself; Rey; his young brother, Tito; and, eventually, their daughter, Nena. Until one fateful day changes everything. Fifteen years later, Maricarmen and Nena find themselves in the middle of a murder investigation as the community that once rallied to support Rey turns against them. Now Nena, a teenager haunted by loss and betrayal and exploring her sexual identity, must learn to fight for herself and her family in a world not always welcoming.
Algonquin Books | 9781643757346

UNABRIDGED: The Thrill of (and Threat to) the Modern Dictionary by Stefan Fatsis (Linguistics/Cultural Studies)
Words are the currency of culture --- and never more than today. From selfie to doomscrolling to rizz, our hyper-connected digital world coins and spreads new words with lightning speed and locks them into mainstream consciousness with unprecedented influence. Journalist and bestselling author Stefan Fatsis embedded as a lexicographer-in-training at America’s most famous dictionary publisher, Merriam-Webster, to learn how words get into the dictionary, where they come from, who decides what they mean, and how we write and think about them. As he recounts in UNABRIDGED, he discovered the history and fascinating subculture of the dictionary and of those who curate and revere “one of the most basic features of our collective humanity.”
Grove Press | 9780802168474

THE UNVEILING by Quan Barry (Literary Horror)
Striker isn’t entirely sure she should be on this luxury Antarctic cruise. A Black film scout, her mission is to photograph potential locations for a big-budget movie about Ernest Shackleton’s doomed expedition. Along the way, she finds amusement in the behavior of both the native wildlife and the group of wealthy, mostly white tourists who have chosen to spend Christmas on the Weddell Sea. But when a kayaking excursion goes horribly wrong, Striker and a group of survivors become stranded on a remote island along the Antarctic Peninsula, a desolate setting complete with boiling geothermal vents and vicious birds. As the polar ice thaws in the unseasonable warmth, the group’s secrets, prejudices and inner demons will also emerge, including revelations from Striker’s past that could irrevocably shatter her world.
Grove Press | 9780802168481

THE WANDERING STARS by J. D. Rasch (Fantasy)
Paperback Original
The Moment, the brief joining of minds that awakened compassion across Bracat, is fading from memory. Some still remember, but many have forgotten, while others never experienced it at all. As old fears return, the Great Council of Wizards resumes its relentless search for the Golden Tree, while the ruthless Thurmore embraces forbidden powers in pursuit of his dream. Haunted by the destruction he once caused, Malzus seeks redemption as he searches for the truth behind his father's death. Elsewhere, Alitheia and Rogi, separated by distant lands yet guided by the stars, seek one another --- and the Golden Tree --- not for power, but for the peace that comes through true understanding. As Thurmore's influence spreads, two futures emerge: one built on fear, the other on compassion.
Lamina Press | 9781962247092

WORKHORSE by Caroline Palmer (Fiction/Humor)
At the turn of the millennium, Editorial Assistant Clodagh “Clo” Harmon wants nothing more than to rise through the ranks at the world’s most prestigious fashion magazine. There’s just one problem: she doesn’t have the right pedigree. Instead, Clo is a “workhorse” surrounded by beautiful, wealthy, impossibly well-connected “show horses” who get ahead without effort, including her beguiling cubicle-mate, Davis Lawrence, the daughter of a beloved but fading Broadway actress. Harry Wood, Davis’ boarding school classmate and a reporter with visions of his own media empire, might be Clo’s ally in gaming the system --- or he might be the only thing standing between Clo and her rightful place at the top.
Flatiron Books | 9781250360106

YOU LET ME IN by Lucy Clarke (Psychological Thriller)
Paperback Original
Elle Fielding is floundering. Her once-perfect marriage is falling apart, and she’s on the verge of losing her book deal --- and, by extension, the dream home she’s poured her savings into. As her finances dwindle, Elle decides to rent out her Cornish home on Airbnb. Just this once. But when she returns home after a writer’s retreat away, nothing feels right. There’s a new coldness. A shift in the atmosphere. The prickling feeling that someone is watching her every move from the shadows. Maybe it’s all in Elle’s mind? And yet every threat seems personal. As if someone has discovered the secrets that keep her awake at night. As fear and paranoia close in, Elle’s own home becomes a prison. Someone is unlocking her past --- and she’s given them the key.
Atlantic Crime | 9780802168016

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