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In this newsletter, you will find books releasing the weeks of October 19th and October 26th 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 TWO reviews of PECK & PECK by Bonnie Garmus. The #1 New York Times bestselling author of LESSONS IN CHEMISTRY returns with an irresistible, delightful and tender story about a young man whose life turns upside down when he is hired by the most prestigious, secretive and dysfunctional poetry journal in the world.
We will share Carol Fitzgerald's “Bookreporter Talks To” interview with Bonnie Garmus in next week's newsletter.
We hosted this month’s “Bookaccino Live” book preview afternoon event last Wednesday. Carol talked about 29 books releasing between October 13th and November 5th, along with three from December and 12 from January 2027, that we wanted to get on your radar.
Next month's “Bookaccino Live” book preview afternoon event will take place on Wednesday, November 11th at 2pm ET. The focus will be on books releasing between November 10th and January 5th, in addition to some titles releasing in February 2027, that we think will appeal to you.
Carol's latest Bookreporter.com Bets On selections are AMERICAN HAGWON by Min Jin Lee and HOLLYWOOD, ENDING by John Green.
AMERICAN HAGWON by Min Jin Lee (Fiction)
Min Jin Lee's last book, PACHINKO, came out in 2017, which in many ways feels like a lifetime ago. So I assumed that whatever she wrote next would both feel and be big. I am not talking about the page count, but rather the storyline, the complexity of the characters, and the messaging that she wanted to share.
The focus in AMERICAN HAGWON is on education, which starts young. It is not just about learning, but also about achievement. Mediocrity is unacceptable. Good is unacceptable. Very good is unacceptable. There is a quest for the promised land --- that of a select group of Ivy League colleges that have been noted as the only way that success will be achieved.
What will contribute to that success? After-school programs called hagwons, which foster the kind of student to which these schools are attracted.
HOLLYWOOD, ENDING by John Green (Fiction)
Ah, Hollywood. It's all glitz and glamour on the outside. But what is it really like behind the scenes? John Green takes readers there in his latest book, HOLLYWOOD, ENDING, his first novel for adults.
Over the past decade, Green has seen cinematic adaptations of his novels that have given him insight into that world --- and he brings that knowledge to this book.
Here we are brought onto the set of an indie film being made about Andy Warhol, which is set in the days before his death. Andy Warhol Never Gets Old co-stars Juniper Castillo, who was a child actor, and Kai Laramie, who is appearing in his first movie. The title role is being played by someone whom theatergoers might not expect to see in a film like this: Marvel action hero Matthew Malone. He's “the face” of the movie, with Hollywood clout behind his name. Whether a big motion picture or a small one, he wants a hit.
For those of you who shop online, if you use the store links that appear on our site for shopping, Bookreporter.com gets a small affiliate fee on your purchases from Amazon, Barnes & Noble and Bookshop/IndieBound. As you read our reviews and features, we would appreciate your considering this as you buy!
This Week's Bonus News:
Our Reviews of PECK & PECK by Bonnie Garmus
PECK & PECK by Bonnie Garmus (Fiction/Humor)
Audiobook available, read by Seth Numrich
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. Reviewed by Pamela Kramer and Roberta O'Hara.
- Click here to read more about the book.
- Click here for the discussion guide on ReadingGroupGuides.com.
Read reviews from Pamela Kramer and Roberta O'Hara.
Don't miss Carol's “Bookreporter Talks To” interview
with Bonnie Garmus in next week's newsletter.
Upcoming Virtual Book and Author Events
Here are three upcoming virtual book and author events that you may be interested in attending. Click on the links for more info and to register.
Wednesday, October 21st at 3pm ET: Barnes & Noble: Join Barnes & Noble as they welcome Alex Hay for a live virtual discussion of his page-turning new mystery, THE MIDNIGHT GUESTS, as part of their B&N Midday Mystery Virtual Event series. Alex will be in conversation with the bestselling author of THE AMALFI CURSE, Sarah Penner.
Wednesday, October 21st at 7pm ET: “Friends & Fiction”: Join “Friends & Fiction” for a conversation with Audrey Niffenegger about LIFE OUT OF ORDER, her long-awaited follow-up to THE TIME TRAVELER'S WIFE, an exhilarating speculative story set in a dystopian future where virtual reality and real life converge.
Tuesday, October 27th at 9pm ET: Killer Author Club: Kimberly Belle, Heather Gudenkauf and Kaira Rouda will talk to Jonathan Edward Durham about his debut novel, WINTERSET HOLLOW, the perfectly twisted word-of-mouth horror phenomenon that set the internet on fire.
On Sale the Week of October 19th in Hardcover
October 19th
THE FAMILY CROSS: An Alex Cross Thriller by James Patterson (Thriller)
Alex Cross is a brilliant psychologist --- and a relentless hunter of killers for the FBI and DC Metro Police. To his beloved Nana Mama, he’s still the boy she raised. And every morning, as he straps on his service weapon, she’s reminded just how dangerous his world has become. But in Washington, DC, there are places even the police don’t go --- an unseen underworld where violence thrives and rules don’t apply. And this time, Alex is stepping straight into it. Each move pulls him deeper into the dark --- and closer to a case that could shatter the promise he made to Nana…and cost him everything he holds most dear.
Little, Brown and Company | 9780316569743
October 20th
THE BISHOP OF DURHAM ATTEMPTS TO SURRENDER THE CITY by Susanna Clarke (Historical Fantasy)
During the conquest of Northern England, the fairy host sweeps across the countryside. The city of Durham finds itself surrounded. But the encircling forces are not fairies or even other humans, but trees that trap the city within an eerie wood. Ranulf, Bishop of Durham --- a consummate politician --- understands that the survival of the Northern English people depends on his finding a way to unite the two races, human and fairy. And he's not averse to improving his own position at the same time. With these aims in view, he sets off for the New Castle in search of the new King --- the leader of the fairy host, rumored to be a mysterious human boy, no more than 14 years old, who speaks no word of any human language.
Bloomsbury Publishing | 9781639739813
CHAIN REACTION: A Reacher Novel by Lee Child and Andrew Child (Thriller)
Jack Reacher is hard to find. But General Susan Turner, based deep inside the Pentagon, has the means and the motive to track him down. She needs his help. A member of her team has been brutally murdered on covert duty. She can’t trust anyone she works with, not even her deputy. She needs someone from the outside. Someone who solves problems and disappears without a trace. Reacher heads to Summertown, Colorado. A town as remote and bizarre as it gets. One diner, one motel, five massive data centers, two giant solar farms humming away in the dust. Total population: four people. And one of them is watching him. But Reacher isn’t built to run. He’s built to finish things. General Turner knows that if they come for Reacher, they’ll regret it --- all the way to the top of the chain.
Bantam | 9798217375158
DEATH ON THE ROYAL YACHT by SJ Bennett (Historical Mystery)
1966, Caribbean Sea. The Queen is touring the islands of the West Indies aboard the Royal Yacht Britannia. Her schedule is packed with official visits, but when her new diary secretary, young Pamela Sinclair, is found dead in her cabin, the whole trip threatens to be thrown off course. Pamela’s death from an overdose of prescription pills is surrounded by details that don’t add up. It looks as though she was afraid of someone on board, and Joan McGraw --- the Queen’s loyal sidekick and assistant private secretary --- is the leading suspect. With the whole world watching, the real circumstances surrounding her death must be uncovered, and quickly.
Crooked Lane Books | 9798892427142
DOPPELGÄNGER by Sam Riviere (Fiction/Dark Humor)
At Northwick Author Development Academy, an elite incubator for the creative class, originality is both fetish and mandate. Its candidates arrive ravenous for distinction --- only to discover, after a year of carefully engineered “disorientation,” that their work has converged into something eerily uniform. When a student in the sophomore cohort, Carl Sample, announces his intention to provoke a stranger into punching him --- an act pitched as both personal exorcism and artistic experiment --- the action seems grotesque, comic and vaguely prophetic. Before Carl can enact his plan, another student is assaulted in town. This emerging crisis of coincidence binds the cohort in a tightening web of surveillance and mythmaking, as intention and event fall fatally out of sync.
Catapult | 9781646223466
HANGING AND BURNING: A King Oliver Novel by Walter Mosley (Mystery)
Joe King Oliver is the big man you call to solve the most delicate and dangerous of problems. Fresh off unraveling the mystery of his own parents’ fates, King finds himself accepting (again at his grandmother’s request) a case from Arman Babylon, a powerful Los Angeles gangster now dying from cancer. Babylon’s granddaughter, Twyla Mann, has been missing for years, and he’s desperate to find her before he passes. The search pulls King into the Babylons’ stained past and the cold case of Dalia Shorts, a torch singer who vanished without a trace and whom Arman was once suspected of killing. As King follows her trail from L.A. to New York and back, he’ll realize nothing is what it seems as he uncovers a pattern of violence that has targeted the women around Babylon for decades.
Little, Brown and Company | 9780316573207
LADIES' MAN: The Careless Heart of John F. Kennedy by Laurence Leamer (History)
John F. Kennedy was a born leader --- bold, charismatic, and able to charm with nothing more than a witty phrase and a winning smile. He also was obsessive, manipulative and haunted by complex desires for shiny, remarkable women, collecting them voraciously and carelessly, then dismissing them summarily, on his rise to the White House. But these women were perhaps the only witnesses to the real JFK --- and it’s time their stories were finally told. Bestselling biographer Laurence Leamer knew three of Kennedy’s mistresses, and LADIES’ MAN reveals JFK’s harrowing, intimate life with unprecedented access.
G.P. Putnam's Sons | 9798217048403
A MARRIED LITTLE CHRISTMAS: An Illustrated Holiday Collection by Abby Jimenez (Romantic Comedy)
A MARRIED LITTLE CHRISTMAS is a collection of three feel-good novellas --- with bonus recipes and full-page illustrations. Anna thought only the food would be a disaster at her Christmas dinner --- until her high school ex shows up, and they quickly have to hatch a fake-dating scheme to save face with their families. For Matty, the idea of sitting in a diner all day dressed as a zombie Santa after losing a bet has zero appeal. But his cute and funny server just might make him change his mind. And finally, will Lauren be able to convince her best friend that getting married after a three-day relationship is absolutely ridiculous? Or will the town called Little Christmas pull her in with its happily-ever-after magic once she meets the best man?
Forever | 9781538780046
MERCY'S CHILD by Richard Paul Evans (Historical Fiction)
In 1874, Etta Wheeler leaves her quiet upstate New York farm town behind to follow her husband into the bustling and sometimes brutal world of Gilded Age New York City. Surrounded by wealth, power and ambition, Etta struggles to find where she belongs until a chance encounter in the tenements of Hell’s Kitchen changes everything. There she meets a young girl trapped in conditions no child should endure. What began as one woman’s determination to help a single child soon draws Etta into a battle against the city’s most powerful institutions, forcing her to discover a courage she never knew she possessed.
Gallery Books | 9781668264218
MISS WOLCOTT'S GHOST by Louise Penny (Mystery)
“There’s a body in Lost Nation.” “Where?” demands Armand as he scribbles on the pad by his bed. But the line goes dead before Chief Inspector Gamache can question the caller. The head of homicide for the Sûreté du Québec has no idea where Lost Nation is, or who woke him in the small hours of the morning at his home in Three Pines. So Armand is thrust into the surrounding forests in search of the mythical Lost Nation. And a body. The unidentified dead man appears to be from an era more than a century old. Adding to the mystery, the early morning call appears to have come from Armand’s friend and neighbor, Clara Morrow. While she denies any knowledge of it, it becomes clear there is some connection between her, the Morrow family, and Lost Nation.
Minotaur Books | 9781250412607
THE PIANO TEACHER OF MONTPARNASSE by Heather Morris (Historical Fiction)
In 1942, the Nazis come for a Jewish family living in the Montparnasse area of occupied Paris. In the chaos of their arrest, 11-year-old Josephine runs to the only person she can trust: her piano teacher, Andrée Levallois, a secret French Resistance operative. Andrée takes her in as a member of the family, spreading their rations and risking everything to keep her safe. But soon the authorities close in, and both Andrée and Josie are caught in a desperate race to stay alive.
Blackstone Publishing | 9798228808522
QUEEN OF LOMBARD STREET by Lisa Kleypas (Historical Fiction)
In Victorian England, no woman --- not even a brilliant economist like Reina Martin --- is allowed to open her own bank account. Together with her mentor, the powerful banker William Farlow, Reina will build the first all-women’s bank, where women can manage their own financial security. But soon she is shocked to discover that her enigmatic butler, John Pembroke, is an undercover police detective. He’s been assigned to investigate Farlow, who’s suspected of financial crime on a scale so massive that it could destabilize the British economy. Pembroke needs Reina’s expertise for a high-stakes nighttime heist to obtain incriminating evidence. Now she faces the agonizing choice of betraying her mentor or turning her back on thousands of working-class families who stand to lose everything.
Avon | 9780063247635
REDEMPTION: Faith, Justice, and Sisterhood on Death Row by Lawrence Wright (Biography)
In the fall of 2014, Deacon Ronnie Lastovica visited a women’s prison in Gatesville, Texas, and gave communion to the women on death row. Moved by the meeting, the Deacon vowed to return weekly, but he knew he couldn’t help these women alone. He called upon the Sisters of Mary Morning Star, a group of contemplative nuns in Waco, Texas, to visit the seven condemned women with him. What follows is an incredible story of a spiritual alliance between two groups of women who, though they couldn't seem more different, are living uniquely similar lives. Lawrence Wright takes us into the death row unit, laying bare their stories.
Knopf | 9780593805084
ROYAL WITCH by Philippa Gregory (Historical Fiction)
1420. Eleanor Cobham arrives at the court of Henry V. Pretty but not highborn, she hopes for nothing more than to marry well. It is a golden age for England, its royal family’s dynasty stretching across Europe. But chaos waits in the shadows. Betrayals and shifts of power change the flourishing world Eleanor has stepped into. Working in the household of a Countess who commands her own army, Eleanor begins to see for the first time what a woman is capable of…what men’s promises are truly worth. As the safe, comfortable future she’d envisioned begins to shift, Eleanor changes with it. Now she must use her wits to survive --- and to rise. Her newfound ambition will carry her further than any woman before has dared. But if she is to rule England itself, she will need to turn to darker arts.
William Morrow | 9780063439801
SIMPLY INA: A Barefoot Contessa Cookbook by Ina Garten (Cookbook)
Through her years of experience as a home cook, Ina Garten has learned that the best food is often the simplest. With just a little thought and a few good ingredients, you can make truly impressive dishes without spending hours in the kitchen. SIMPLY INA celebrates the delicious results of streamlined cooking, sharing Ina’s expert tips and tricks for achieving the best flavor with the least amount of effort. Whether you’re feeding unexpected guests, pulling together a Tuesday night dinner after work, or hosting a dinner party and don’t want to miss all the fun cooped up in the kitchen, you’ll be happy to have these simple, satisfying and completely doable recipes to turn to.
Clarkson Potter | 9780593234174
WHALE HARBOR by Mary Beth Keane (Fiction)
1960s, Ireland. In the wake of tragedy, a father makes choices for his 11 grieving sons. The older brothers will emigrate to England for work, while the younger ones will stay behind. The second eldest, Macdara, is offered a job on a Montana cattle ranch and sets off. His spirited younger brother, Rian, begs to come along, and Mac promises to bring Rian to America as soon as he’s old enough. But then one day Mac gets a call that Rian has gone missing. His disappearance will haunt Mac and his family across decades.
Scribner | 9781668224632
On Sale the Week of October 19th in Paperback
October 20th
AVIARY by Maria Dong (Speculative Mystery/Thriller)
Nineteen-year-old undocumented immigrant Hee-Jin lies on the floor of her cramped Seoul apartment, listening for footsteps. But the knock on the door isn’t the police finally coming to deport her to North Korea. Instead, sprawled on the doorstep is a disfigured, bird-like corpse --- and it has her eyes. Her younger sister, artist Hee-Young, is meant to be on an art program in America, not dead of a strange overdose. But in Hee-Young’s pocket is a plane ticket and US passport. Seeing her chance for freedom, Hee-Jin steals her sister’s identity and takes her place, determined to uncover what really happened to her. But the deeper she dives into the program’s strange workings, the closer she gets to the monstrous secret at its heart.
Severn House | 9781448319497
BIG KISS, BYE-BYE by Claire-Louise Bennett (Fiction)
Uprooted by circumstance from city to deep countryside, a woman lives in temporary limbo, visited by memories of all she’s left behind. The most insistent are those of Xavier, who has always been certain he knows her better than anyone, better than she knows herself. Xavier, whom she still loves but no longer desires, a displacement he has been unable to accept. An unexpected letter from an old acquaintance brings back a torrent of others she’s loved or wanted. The ephemera left by their passage --- a spilled coffee, an unwanted bouquet, a mind-blowing kiss --- make up a cabinet of curiosity she inventories, trying to divine the essence of intimacy. What does it mean to connect with another person? What impels us to touch someone, to be touched by them, to stay in touch? How do we let them go?
Riverhead Books | 9798217046652
THE BOOKSHOP BELOW by Georgia Summers (Dark Fantasy)
If you want a story that will change your life, Chiron’s bookshop is where you go. For those lucky enough to grace its doors, it’s a glimpse into a world of powerful bargains and deadly ink magic. For Cassandra Fairfax, it’s a reminder of everything she lost, when Chiron kicked her out and all but shuttered the shop. Since then, she’s used her skills in less ethical ways, trading stolen books and magical readings to wealthy playboys and unscrupulous collectors. Then Chiron dies under mysterious circumstances. And if Cassandra knows anything, it’s this: the bookshop must always have an owner. But she's not the only one interested. As Cassandra tries to uncover the secrets her mentor left behind, a sinister force threatens to unravel the world of the magical bookshops entirely.
Redhook | 9780316561938
DID YOU GET THE PACKAGE? by John Harrison (Psychological Thriller/Horror)
Paperback Original
Mira and Kieran Carpenter are moving into their first home together, a run-down fixer-upper. It’s an opportunity for them to forget the betrayals of the past and restore their marriage along with this new home. But then a strange delivery is left by the front door. Neither Mira nor Kieran remember ordering it. There is no sender. No acknowledgment of its origin. Inside the package is an old wooden box. Then the messages start arriving. Anonymous texts, late-night phone calls and distorted voicemails: “Did you get the package?” Things start to go wrong. Around their new house. At work. In their personal relationships. Are they victims of some kind of horrific prank? Are they being tormented because of something they’ve done? Or are they gaslighting themselves into some kind of psychosis?
Seventh Street Books | 9781645061168
THE ELSEWHERE EXPRESS by Samantha Sotto Yambao (Fantasy/Romance)
You can’t buy a ticket for the Elsewhere Express. Appearing only to those whose lives are adrift, it’s a magical train seeming to carry very rare and special cargo: a sense of purpose, peace and belonging. Raya is one of those lost souls. She had dreamed of being a songwriter, but when her brother died, she gave up on her dream and started living his instead. One day on the subway, as her thoughts wander, she’s swept off to the Elsewhere Express. There she meets Q, an intriguing artist who, like her, has lost his place in the world. Together they find a train full of wonders. Over the course of their long, strange night on the train, they also discover that it harbors secrets --- and danger: A mysterious stranger has stowed away and brought with him a dark, malignant magic that threatens to destroy the train.
Del Rey | 9780593725047
EVERY EXIT BRINGS YOU HOME by Naeem Murr (Fiction)
As a financial crisis looms, Jamal “Jack” Shaban is trying to save his neighbors from bankruptcy. For his flight attendant colleagues, he’s an object of desire, even love, particularly for his sweetly bawdy Wisconsinite best friend, Birdy. Birdy knows nothing about Dimra, Jack’s traditional Muslim wife, with whom Jack is desperate to have a child. Nor does Dimra know about Jack’s attraction to Marcia: an angry single mom new to the building. The resulting tangle of love, desire and conflict returns Jack to the violence of 1980s Gaza, where a taboo affair nearly destroyed his life. A man of many sides --- adulterer, devoted husband, fixer, community leader, liar, and the survivor of human and cosmic cruelty in the past and the novel’s present --- Jack is a paragon of both desire and hope.
W. W. Norton & Company | 9781324134442
FROM CRADLE TO GRAVE: A Royal Spyness Mystery by Rhys Bowen (Historical Mystery)
Lady Georgiana “Georgie” Rannoch absolutely despises the strict nanny who was foisted upon her by her meddlesome sister-in-law. In search of a new nanny, Georgie travels to London to see her old friend, ZouZou, only to find her about to depart for a funeral, after the unexpected death of a young man in her social circle. It quickly becomes clear there’s more than one mysterious death around town. But when word arrives that the son of a family friend has also died tragically and unexpectedly, Georgie is certain it can’t be a coincidence. ZouZou shares Georgie’s suspicions that the deaths were not an accident and begs Georgie to solve the case. As Georgie delves deeper, she can’t help worrying that her own husband, Darcy, may be next. It seems likely there is a serial killer at work, and Darcy fits the bill to be their next victim.
Berkley | 9780593641408
THE GRACEVIEW PATIENT by Caitlin Starling (Psychological Thriller/Gothic Horror)
Margaret’s rare autoimmune condition has destroyed her life, leaving her isolated and in pain. It has no cure, but she’s making do as best she can --- until she’s offered a fully paid-for spot in an experimental medical trial at Graceview Memorial. The conditions are simple, if grueling: she will live at the hospital as a full-time patient, subjecting herself to the near-total destruction of her immune system and its subsequent regeneration. The trial will essentially kill most, but not all, of her. But as the treatment progresses and her body begins to fail, she stumbles upon something sinister living and spreading within the hospital. Unsure of what's real and what's just medication-induced delusion, Margaret struggles to find a way out as her body and mind succumb further to the darkness lurking throughout Graceview's halls.
St. Martin’s Griffin | 9781250340771
THE HIDDEN CITY: A Charles Lenox Mystery by Charles Finch (Historical Mystery)
It's 1879, and Charles Lenox is convalescing from the violent events of his last investigation. But a desperate letter from an old servant forces him to pick up the trail of a cold case: the murder of an apothecary seven years before, whose only clue is an odd emblem carved into the doorway of the building where the man was killed. When Lenox finds a similar mark at the site of another murder, he begins to piece together a hidden pattern that leads him into the corridors of Parliament, the slums of East London, and ultimately the very heart of the British upper class. At the same time, Lenox must contend with the complexities of his personal life.
Minotaur Books | 9781250767189
THE LAND OF SWEET FOREVER: Stories and Essays by Harper Lee (Short Stories & Essays)
THE LAND OF SWEET FOREVER combines Harper Lee’s early short fiction and later nonfiction in a volume that offers an unprecedented look at the development of her inimitable voice. Covering territory from the Alabama schoolyards of Lee’s youth to the luncheonettes and movie houses of midcentury Manhattan, the book invites still-vital conversations about politics, equality, travel, love, fiction, art, the American South, and what it means to lead an engaged and creative life. This collection comes with an introduction by Casey Cep, Lee’s appointed biographer, which provides illuminating background for our reading of these stories and connects them both to Lee’s life and to her two novels, TO KILL A MOCKINGBIRD and GO SET A WATCHMAN.
Harper Perennial | 9780063460539
THE LAND IN WINTER by Andrew Miller (Historical Fiction)
December 1962: Deep in the English countryside, two couples begin the day. Local doctor Eric commences his rounds in the village, while his pregnant wife, Irene, wanders the rooms of their home. Across the field in a neighboring farmhouse, Rita is also expecting. Her mind swims with a past that her husband, Bill, prefers to forget. When the two women meet, a clock starts. Affection still lingers in both homes; neither marriage is over. But when the ordinary cold of December gives way --- ushering in violent blizzards of the harshest winter in living memory --- so do the secret resentments harbored in all four lives.
Europa Editions | 9798889662143
LAST LOOKS by Cate Holahan (Psychological Thriller)
Paperback Original
Ensconced in a fabulous apartment overlooking the Eiffel Tower, Cécile Duval is anxious for a post-divorce makeover. Who is Nina Berry, an on-the-rise personal stylist in America, to say no to a career-making proposal from an older, wealthy étranger? Except Cécile has secrets. She already knows Nina. Nina was her husband’s mistress, or so she believes. And Cécile doesn’t want a glow-up. She wants revenge. Arriving in Paris with her fiancé, Jean, Nina is ready to absorb all the city has to offer and transform her new client’s closet, confidence and entire life. But she has no idea what’s coming. Neither does Cécile. Because she’s not the only one keeping secrets. As the line between predator and prey disappears, a guessing game of deadly deceptions has only just begun.
Thomas & Mercer | 9781662538278
MISSING MOLLY by Natalie Barelli (Psychological Thriller)
Paperback Original
Rachel Holloway has built a quiet life in London. She has a daughter, a partner and a steady job at the local paper. Then the paper launches a true-crime podcast, and their first case is the disappearance of 12-year-old Molly Forster, missing since her family's brutal murder 12 years ago. But Rachel knows exactly what happened to Molly. Because Rachel is Molly. She's spent years hiding from the killer who destroyed her family, and now her own podcast is about to expose her and the truth she's buried. As the story goes viral, new evidence emerges that confirms what Rachel has known all along: The wrong man was convicted. The real killer is still free. And he's coming for Rachel.
Poisoned Pen Press | 9781464247514
NYPD RED 8: THE 11:59 BOMBER by Marshall Karp (Thriller)
It's 11:59. And the city that never sleeps is afraid to get out of bed. A bomb explodes in a crowded New York subway station at exactly 11:59am. The next day, a second blast rips through a busy department store --- again at 11:59. As the bombs go off with clockwork precision, the death toll climbs and businesses shut their doors as the city hunkers down in fear. NYPD Red Detectives Kylie MacDonald and Zach Jordan face their most twisted case ever, as they race against the clock in search of one man who has vowed "to destroy New York City the way it destroyed my family."
Blackstone Publishing | 9798228671843
THE PHOEBE VARIATIONS by Jane Hamilton (Fiction)
Seventeen-year-old Phoebe was never interested in her birth family. But on the cusp of her high school graduation, her adoptive mother, Greta, insists on a visit to meet her biological parents and siblings. The encounter is a jolt, a revelation that derails Phoebe. With the help of her best friend, Luna, Phoebe runs away --- as far as their friend Patrick O’Connor’s chaotic home, where she hopes to go unnoticed among his 13 siblings. What begins as an adolescent rebellion soon spirals into a whirlwind of transformation and self-discovery. As Phoebe grapples with her shifting identity, she must navigate the tumultuous road out of girlhood and chart a new and unknown course.
Zibby Publishing | 9798991140270
THE PILGRIMAGE OF PRIMROSE HONEYCHURCH by Laura Jensen Walker (Fiction)
Paperback Original
Primrose Honeychurch doesn’t really “get” people. Books, though, make perfect sense. At 70, the sharp-tongued recluse prefers to keep company with her own routines. But when a life-altering diagnosis leaves her worried she’ll never be missed, she decides it’s finally time to do something to leave her mark. Clutching her mother’s ashes and the book of her heart, Primrose hops on a plane, bound for Hay-on-Wye, the legendary Welsh “Town of Books.” Unfortunately, her literary pilgrimage just won’t follow the plot. After an accident derails her trip, she finds herself staying a while with estranged family. But she senses a kindred spirit in the niece she’s getting to know, who uncannily understands the world much the same as Primrose herself does.
Lake Union Publishing | 9781662544637
THE PLACE WHERE THEY BURIED YOUR HEART by Christina Henry (Supernatural Thriller/Gothic Horror)
On an otherwise ordinary street in Chicago, there is a house. An abandoned house where, once upon a time, terrible things happened. The children who live on this block are told by their parents to stay away from it. But of course, children don’t listen. Jessie Campanelli dared her little brother, Paul, to go inside. But unlike all the other kids who went inside that abandoned house, Paul didn’t return. His two friends, Jake and Richie, said that the house ate Paul. Of course, adults didn’t believe that. They thought someone kidnapped Paul or otherwise hurt him. His disappearance broke Jessie’s family apart in ways that would never be repaired. Jessie kept living on the same street where the house that ate her brother sat, crouched and waiting. And darkness seemed to spread out from that house, a darkness that was alive --- alive and hungry.
Berkley | 9780593953976
THE QUEEN OF ROSES by Julia Kelly (Historical Fiction)
Paperback Original
1960: Frustrated reporter Theresa Johnson receives a phone call from a Miss Pearce who claims her obituary about one of Pasadena’s last great hoteliers is wildly inaccurate. When Theresa arrives at mysterious Rosewood House, Miss Pearce proposes that Theresa help her settle old scores by writing her biography. 1903: When Adele Pearce arrives in California, she discovers why her mother has called her there: her father has squandered his fortune, and Adele must marry a wealthy American to save the family. Adele’s only comfort is Rosewood House and the beautiful garden she creates with the help of taciturn gardener Alexander Macalister. However, as Adele’s feelings for Alex flourish, a fire ignites in the San Gabriel Mountains above Rosewood House. Meanwhile, in 1960, Miss Pearce learns that history has a terrible habit of repeating itself.
Gallery Books | 9781668032756
RACEBOOK: A Personal History of the Internet by Tochi Onyebuchi (Memoir/Essays)
When Tochi Onyebuchi realized that his acclaimed science fiction and fantasy storytelling career had been centrally preoccupied with race, it prompted him to consider his responsibilities as a Black writer in the internet age. Excavating the internet of the late 1990s and early 2000s, RACEBOOK explores how the writer and public intellectual Onyebuchi is today was formed in that crucible. Beginning with the current moment when everything, including personal identity, is a matter of dispute, and tracing his online persona in reverse chronological order back to Web 1.0’s promises of greater equality and a bright digital future, Onyebuchi deftly examines the evolution of internet culture and the ways that culture has shifted in the ensuing decades.
Roxane Gay Books | 9780802168504
SPLIT SCREEN by Lee Goldberg (Thriller)
Paperback Original
When Erin Casey, the actress who plays LASD detective Eve Ronin on TV, is gunned down after a ride-along, the intended target is obvious: the real Eve. What isn’t obvious is why. As Eve hunts the shooter, her world fractures into more deadly reflections. The new sheriff forces Eve to exploit her fame to burnish his image --- or he’ll destroy her partner, Duncan. And a reckless half-sister Eve never knew she had pulls her toward a criminal conspiracy that’s already dumped a corpse in a Topanga Canyon ravine. To save Erin, protect her half-sister and survive herself, Eve must find the killers before they strike again --- and before her enemies inside the department finish the job for them.
Thomas & Mercer | 9781662533648
SUCCUBUS: A Love Story by Kate Fox (Paranormal Romance)
Paperback Original
Tempest Dunlap loves romance novels, but she knows she’ll never have her own happily-ever-after. She is a sweatpants-wearing doula who homeschools her seven-year-old niece in suburban New Jersey. Unfortunately, she’s also a succubus: Every man she’s ever kissed has died. But Tempest is a good person who never intended to be a murderer, so she’s sworn off love forever. Then she meets Joel Tav, a gorgeous, gentle doctor who makes celibacy feel impossible. Tempest knows she can’t touch him --- or tell him his brother was the last man she dated and accidentally killed. Meanwhile, a vigilante is hunting people with dark powers, and Tempest is next. Should she keep hiding in her safe, lonely life, or should she embrace the darkness she fears and risk the ultimate forbidden romance?
St. Martin's Griffin | 9781250429360
THE TEN YEAR AFFAIR by Erin Somers (Fiction)
When Cora meets Sam at a baby group in their small town, the chemistry between them is undeniable. Both are happily married young parents with two kids, and neither sees themselves as the type to engage in an affair. But as their lives continue to intertwine, the romantic tension between them becomes all-consuming --- until their worlds unravel into two parallel timelines. In one, they pursue their feelings. In the other, they resist. As reality splits, the everyday details of Cora’s life --- her depressing marketing job, her daughter’s new fascination with the afterlife, her husband’s obsession with podcasts about the history of rope --- gain fresh perspective. The intersecting and diverging timelines blur the boundaries of reality and fantasy, questioning what might have been and what truly matters.
Simon & Schuster | 9781668081457
TOM CLANCY: EXECUTIVE POWER: A Jack Ryan Novel by Brian Andrews and Jeffrey Wilson (Thriller/Adventure)
Luanda, Angola. An American intelligence team on a routine mission is wiped out. The sole survivor: Kyle Ryan, the youngest son of President Jack Ryan. But the massacre of his colleagues is just the prelude to an even more devastating conflict --- a deadly military coup in the central African nation. The next step is a shocking escalation, the seizure of the American Embassy and the taking of numerous hostages, including the ambassador and the younger Ryan. As US forces fight insurgents street by street in the African capital city, Lieutenant Katie Ryan leads the effort to untangle the mystery behind the coup and the identity of the plotters. Is it the Chinese government? Is it a corrupt Angolan general? Or is there a darker force pulling the strings? In the White House Situation Room, President Jack Ryan and his National Intelligence Team anxiously await the answers.
G.P. Putnam’s Sons | 9780593718087
THE WOMEN OF WILD HILL by Kirsten Miller (Fiction/Magical Realism)
There are places on earth where nature’s powers gather. Girls raised there are bequeathed strange gifts. Such a place is Wild Hill. For centuries, the ghost of a witch murdered by colonists claimed the beautiful and fertile Wild Hill…until a young Scottish woman with strange gifts arrived. Sadie Duncan was allowed to stay. Five generations of Sadie’s descendants called Wild Hill home, each generation more powerful than the last. Then, in the aftermath of a terrible tragedy, the last of the Duncans abandoned their ancestral home. Now Brigid, Phoebe and Sibyl have been brought to Wild Hill to discover their family legacy. The Old One, furious at the path mankind has taken, has chosen three powerful witches to turn the tide. The Duncans will fulfill their destinies --- but only if they can set aside their grievances and come together as a family.
William Morrow Paperbacks | 9780063282865
On Sale the Week of October 26th in Hardcover
October 27th
ABANDONING A CAT: A Personal Story written by Haruki Murakami, translated by Philip Gabriel (Essay)
Originally published in The New Yorker in 2019, and now presented in a full, unabridged form, ABANDONING A CAT is a poignant, self-reflective work by Haruki Murakami. Here he writes about his father, the son of a priest who might have become a priest himself had a clerical error not sent him into the Second World War. Murakami's father wrote accomplished haiku and eventually became a teacher. As Murakami grew older, as he became an adult and then a writer, he and his father found they had little in common. They were later estranged for 20 years, only reconciling on his father's deathbed.
Knopf | 9798217208692
ADVANTAGE PLAYER: A Memoir of Blackjack, Backrooms, and Beginnings by Gina Fiore (Memoir)
From an early age, Gina Fiore wanted to win. Her desire was borne from her family’s financial instability --- countless evictions, living in a motel, learning to stave off debt collectors with a tightly rehearsed script dictated by her parents. After Gina dropped out of college, her mother taught her how to deal blackjack, and she got her first job dealing in a Las Vegas casino. It was there that she discovered some players win using skill and not luck. She wanted to learn how. ADVANTAGE PLAYER follows Gina’s journey to becoming one of the best advantage players in the world, beating casinos out of millions by playing the games they offered better than they did.
Gillian Flynn Books | 9781638933625
THE BRIGHTNESS by Chad Harbach (Fiction)
At 27, Pella’s life looks settled. She’s a recent college grad; engaged to her longtime boyfriend, Mike; and helping her friend, Owen, pull off his own destination wedding on Block Island. But over that wild wedding weekend, Pella’s past and present collide spectacularly, blowing up her plans and sending her spiraling toward an unplanned future in New York City. Meanwhile, back at Westish College, 21-year-old Irma’s involvement with a politically charged prank --- one that has roiled both the campus and the world beyond --- threatens to derail her brilliant future. As Irma and Pella cycle through possibilities and identities, both navigate the heights and depths of passion and ambition, and the incalculable wages of love and loss.
Little, Brown and Company | 9780316455695
THE CHRISTMAS HOURGLASS by Davis Bunn (Romance)
Mere days before Christmas, Thad Wright’s estranged daughter passes away --- leaving behind a baby, Laura. And when Thad discovers that time is not on his beloved wife Lia’s side either, he takes Lia’s last plea to heart: that Laura is not raised by strangers, that he gives the child a loving home. Thad’s granddaughter is a singular source of light in an otherwise dark season. His friends in Morehead City are there for him, including Akila, his coworker at the local hotel where he’s an assistant chef. She’s kind, comforting, gentle, and everything her teenage son, Juri, is not. In that boy, Thad sees the same rebellion that led his own daughter astray. Yet as Thad’s relationship with Akila deepens, he’s determined to forge a bond with the young, defiant aspiring musician.
Kensington | 9781496754295
A COURT OF SPLINTERED HARMONY: The Valkyrie Cycle, Movement I by Sarah J. Maas (Fantasy/Romance)
Deep in the heart of the continent, Koschei the Deathless is stirring. Though he's been bound to a mountain lake for millennia, the insidious threat of his return now spreads across the Fae territories, attracting powerful allies hell-bent on reclaiming what was once theirs: the human lands. The Night Court will not stand idly by while innocents are attacked. But with Prythian still piecing itself together in the wake of the devastating Hybern War, the task of uniting is proving more difficult by the day. To make matters worse, those who rule and protect the Night Court are reeling from recent betrayals and revealed truths. The rifts dividing them seem insurmountable. But to defeat Koschei's creeping shadow, they must find a way back to each other and resurrect their former alliances.
Bloomsbury Publishing | 9781639739134
DARK COUNTRY by Adam Plantinga (Thriller)
After the bloodshed in Fenton, Arizona, former Detroit cop Kurt Argento had to disappear. He reemerges in the small town of Barton, South Dakota, working under an assumed name as a church handyman. But then he meets 17-year-old Majed, a Syrian refugee trying to build a life in Barton with his single mother. Two men with hard eyes are close behind. Argento steps in, and Majed’s pursuers retreat with a thin excuse about a stolen wallet. It turns out that Majed isn’t just in trouble --- he’s a target. And the hunters are closing in. To safeguard Majed, Argento hits the road with the boy, pushing west. And along the way it becomes clear that whatever Majed knows --- or carries --- someone powerful wants it and will kill to get it.
Grand Central Publishing | 9781538778869
FIND ME NOWHERE: A Cameron Winter Mystery by Andrew Klavan (Hard-boiled Mystery)
In the wilderness bordering Afghanistan, an American soldier dies in a devastating explosion. Across the world, in a withering Pennsylvania factory town, his father is stabbed to death and left in the surrounding woods amidst colonial ruins known as Nowhere. The Recruiter wants Cameron Winter to find out why. Winter journeys into America’s aching heartland, to a small town called Kinnecombe, which is left to suffer through a triple plague of poverty, drugs and crime. His assignment is to solve a murder, and all that stands in his way is a deceptively soft-spoken gangster, a mob of local thugs, an American spy as crazy as she is beautiful, and a well-trained killer who can make himself invisible right up until the moment he puts a bullet in your brain.
The Mysterious Press | 9781613168257
FRANK CAPRA: A Life by Sam Wasson (Biography)
Frank Capra --- the director of Mr. Smith Goes to Washington, It Happened One Night and, supremely, It’s a Wonderful Life --- remains one of the great chroniclers of the American heart, how we love, lead, dream, hope and fight for our individuality. But Capra was a more complex artist than is usually reckoned and a more complicated man than anyone knows. This extraordinary book, making full use for the first time of Capra’s own archives, including deeply personal writings from his later years, has brought this seminal artist into urgent life. At the same time, it offers a dazzling portrait of both a lost America and an enduring one.
Harper | 9780063291133
THE HOLLOW: A Bosch Novel by Michael Connelly (Thriller)
When Harry Bosch was 11 years old, his mother was murdered. He became a ward of the state, housed in MacLaren Children’s Center, a notorious facility where abuse was rampant. Decades after its closure, a lawsuit has resulted in a massive settlement for former residents. But when Bosch’s half-brother, defense attorney Mickey Haller, brings him word that he is entitled to part of it, Bosch says he doesn’t want the money. He wants justice. The news awakens Bosch’s memories of a place he had hoped never to revisit, and of a boy nicknamed Chops, a fellow ward who wound up dead. Bosch is certain that Chops was killed in a hidden space under the stairs --- the kids knew it as “the hollow” --- and his murder covered up. Now he is determined to reopen the investigation and learn the truth.
Little, Brown and Company | 9780316563857
PUBLIC ACCESS AFTERWORLD by Jane Schoenbrun (Speculative Thriller/Horror)
On September 3, 1988, Dallas weatherman Ray Davino makes passing reference to Public Access Afterworld during a rambling monologue, right before he puts a gun to his head and pulls the trigger. On June 12, 2009, David Sawyer and Erin Morrison, two lonely suburban teens, gather in Erin's basement to watch TV's analog-to-digital transition. But Erin witnesses surreal broadcasts from a pirate TV network called Public Access Afterworld, and their lives are changed forever. Seventeen years later, Bethany Peters toils through the night shift at megacorp GlobalVill’s bleak Austin campus. A trans content moderator, she spends her evenings reviewing an endless stream of horrific videos. Then a young streamer begins to crop up in her feed calling out to Public Access Afterworld. But what is Public Access Afterworld?
Hogarth | 9780593978382
SAVAGE LAKE by Nick Medina (Supernatural Thriller/Horror)
The passing of her estranged father leaves Nell Marin with no choice but to take her teenage son, Oscar, back to the run-down family cabin on Torchlight Lake, where horrific memories linger. The two will fix the place up, sell it, and ensure Nell never has to return to that dreaded lake again. But when the roads --- which pass through Native land --- are barricaded by the local Tribe, the quick trip turns into weeks. Oscar, a horror movie buff, knows this is exactly how it starts. As the long summer days drag on, unsettling things begin to occur. Most disturbing of all, his mother is becoming less and less herself. As the strange events lead Oscar to uncover the secrets Nell has shielded him from, he is forced to confront a reality that is far more frightening than movie monsters.
Berkley | 9780593952177
THE SEVENTH RIBBON by Gus Krieger (Fiction/Magical Realism)
Alone in her snowbound oceanfront cottage, Caroline Ora mourns the loss of her beloved husband Forest, killed earlier that year in a violent hit-and-run. Once a celebrated poet, Caroline now spends her days drowning in grief…until an unlikely discovery changes everything. Buried deep in her attic in a dusty wooden case, Caroline finds several ancient typewriter ribbons. Spontaneously using one to write a story --- a simple “what if” wherein her anguish has loosened its grip --- Caroline wakes to find it’s miraculously come true. Moment by moment, word by word, Caroline sets about rewriting her life, resurrecting her husband through ink and memories. But as the lines between fiction and reality begin to blur, Caroline learns that every wish has its cost, and every miracle has its reckoning.
Grand Central Publishing | 9781538780824
On Sale the Week of October 26th in Paperback
October 27th
AT MIDNIGHT COMES THE CRY: A Clare Fergusson/Russ Van Alstyne Mystery by Julia Spencer-Fleming (Mystery)
It’s Christmas time in Millers Kill, and Reverend Clare Fergusson and her husband, Russ van Alstyne --- newly resigned from his position as chief of police --- plan to enjoy it with their baby boy. But when a beloved holiday parade is crashed by white supremacists, Clare and Russ find themselves sucked into a parallel world of militias, machinations and murder. They and three others --- single mom and officer Hadley Knox; novice lawyer Joy Zhào; and NYS Forest Ranger Paul Terrance --- will discover that their suspicions hang on a single twisting thread, leading to the forbidding High Peaks of the Adirondacks. As the December days shorten and the nights grow long, a disparate group of would-be heroes need to unwind a murderous plot before time runs out.
Minotaur Books | 9780312606893
THE BEST CHRISTMAS EVER by Sarah Morgan (Fiction)
Paperback Original
As the snowstorm of the century bears down on New England, reclusive author Mabel Miller is preparing to spend yet another Christmas alone with her cats. That is, until the weather intervenes and sends not one but two cars spinning into the stone wall surrounding her isolated cottage. Now she has a house full of strangers when the last thing she wanted was company for Christmas. Yet Mabel’s unexpected guests --- a family with two young children expecting Santa to drop gifts down the chimney, and two work colleagues who clearly have a history --- are determined to make the best of the situation. As her attempts to protect her privacy are thwarted by the two little ones, soon Mabel is allowing them into her library, a place that contains so many of her secrets.
Mira | 9781335015075
THE BURNING LIBRARY by Gilly Macmillan (Psychological Thriller)
On a frigid, windswept day in Scotland’s Western Hebrides, Eleanor Bruton’s body is discovered on the shore. Little did Eleanor’s family know that she was harboring a dark and all-consuming secret --- a scrap of fraying embroidery that seems worthless at first glance. For over a century, two rival organizations of women have gone to deadly lengths to secure the valuable artifact in the hopes of finding the original medieval manuscript from which it was torn. When Dr. Anya Brown garners international attention for her translation of the cryptic Folio 9, she is handpicked by Diana Cornish, a professor and high-ranking member of the Fellowship, to join the exclusive Institute of Manuscript Studies in St. Andrews. Unbeknownst to Anya, she’s been recruited at great personal danger to translate ancient texts that the Fellowship believes critical to their mission.
William Morrow Paperbacks | 9780063422933
CURSED DAUGHTERS by Oyinkan Braithwaite (Fiction)
When Ebun gives birth to her daughter, Eniiyi, on the day they bury her cousin, Monife, there is no denying the startling resemblance between the child and the dead woman. So begins the belief, fanned by the entire family, that Eniiyi is the actual reincarnation of Monife, fated to follow in her footsteps. There is also the matter of the family curse --- “No man will call your house home. And if they try, they will not have peace...” --- which has broken numerous hearts and caused three generations of abandoned Falodun women to live under the same roof. When Eniiyi falls in love, she no longer can run from her family’s history. Is she destined to live out her family's story of love and heartache? Or can she break the pattern?
Vintage | 9780385551496
DEAD AND ALIVE: Essays by Zadie Smith (Essays)
In DEAD AND ALIVE, Zadie Smith brings her unique skills as an essayist to bear on a range of subjects that have captured her attention in recent years. She takes an exhilaratingly close look at artists Toyin Ojih Odutola, Kara Walker and Celia Paul. She invites us along to the movies, to see and to think about Tár, and to New York to reflect on the spontaneous moments that connect us. She takes us on a walk down Kilburn High Road in her beloved North West London and welcomes us to mourn with her the passing of writers Joan Didion, Martin Amis, Hilary Mantel, Philip Roth and Toni Morrison. She considers changes of government on both sides of the Atlantic --- and the meaning of "the commons" in all our lives.
Penguin Books | 9780593834701
THE DEVIL IS A SOUTHPAW by Brandon Hobson (Fiction)
Milton Muleborn has envied Matthew Echota, a talented Cherokee artist, ever since they were locked up together in a dangerous juvenile detention center in the late 1980s. Until Matthew escaped, that is. A novel within a novel, we read here Milton’s dark, sometimes comic and possibly unreliable account of the story of their childhood even as, years later, he remains jealous of Matthew’s extraordinary abilities and unlikely success. Milton reveals secrets about their friendship, their families, and their nightmarish, surreal experience of imprisonment. In revisiting the past, he explores the echoing traumas of incarceration and pride.
Ecco | 9780063259645
THE DEVIL’S DAUGHTER by Danielle Steel (Fiction)
Graduating magna cum laude from MIT is the happiest day of Billie Banks’ life, although her family is not part of it. Her mother, who always supported her, died when Billie was 17. Since then, her father has been slowly drinking himself to death on the family farm in Iowa, and she and her younger sister, Mickie, have grown even more estranged. Despite Billie’s attempts to look after Mickie following their mother’s death, her sister consistently treated her with cruelty. So when Mickie invites Billie to move in with her in Los Angeles, Billie is both wary and hopeful. Taking a leap of faith, she joins her sister on the West Coast. While Mickie lands a questionable modeling job and falls in with a fast crowd, Billie begins working at a pathology lab and starts dating a warm, supportive reporter at the Los Angeles Times. But then the siblings’ difficult history once again rises to the surface.
Dell | 9780593498873
FALLING FOR A VILLAINOUS VAMPIRE by Charlotte Stein (Paranormal Romantic Comedy)
Paperback Original
Marley Maples is sure she's finally evaded her vampire mortal enemy. Halsten has stalked her across oceans of time and many, many lives. But now she's arrived at the age of 30 in Hollow Brook with no sign of him. So she’s devastated when he suddenly shows and yet again tries to make her life hell. Until her two witchy best friends suggest a spell to make him forget all about her. There’s just one issue: he forgets his whole existence with it. And all he sees when he looks at Marley is his beloved little witch, his savior, the light of his life. He goes from being a horror that haunts her nightmares to a man who loves her and will protect her at all costs. And as much as she’s skeptical, she can’t help finding his fish-out-of-water, warrior ways and his desire to defend her endearing.
St. Martin's Griffin | 9781250352378
FOX AND FURIOUS by Rita Mae Brown (Mystery)
It’s hunting season in the foothills of Virginia, and “Sister” Jane Arnold is content to spend it alongside her friends, particularly one Olivia Bradford. Olivia is a formidable figure in town --- not least because she keeps the peace between her sons, Winston and Andrew --- but when she passes away, the brothers return to their squabbling ways. Faced with contention over their inheritance, tensions escalate, and the two get into a fierce fight --- and soon after, one of them turns up dead. All eyes turn to the surviving brother. But Sister can’t fathom that he’s capable of murder, and soon suspects begin to reveal themselves left and right. The more she learns, the more Sister begins to doubt the people she’s hunted with for decades.
Bantam | 9780593874134
THE GIRL IN THE LAKE: A Holmes, Margaret & Poe Mystery by James Patterson and Brian Sitts (Mystery/Thriller)
Paperback Original
At a frozen lakeside crime scene, a corpse carries an accusatory note: “If anything happens to me, arrest Brendan Holmes.” Mysteries trail Brendan Holmes, Margaret Marple and Auguste Poe wherever they go. At a remote lodge in upstate New York, the embattled private investigators have taken refuge from the assailant who bombed their sleek city headquarters. When the discovery of a body in the lake puts the detectives back in the headlines and under suspicion, the elusive killer issues his despicable orders: stop solving crimes --- and start committing them.
Little, Brown and Company | 9780316600019
THE GREAT CONTRADICTION: The Tragic Side of the American Founding by Joseph J. Ellis (History)
On the eve of the American Revolution, half a million enslaved African Americans were embedded in the North American population. The slave trade was flourishing, even as the 13 colonies armed themselves to defend against the idea of being governed without consent. This paradox gave birth to what Joseph J. Ellis calls the “great contradiction”: How could a government that had been justified and founded on the principles articulated in the Declaration of Independence institutionalize slavery? How could it permit a tidal wave of western migration by settlers who understood the phrase “pursuit of happiness” to mean the pursuit of Indian lands? In THE GREAT CONTRADICTION, Ellis addresses the questions that lie at America’s twisted roots.
Vintage | 9780593687024
THE GUN MAN JACKSON SWAGGER by Stephen Hunter (Historical Thriller/Western)
In the frying pan of a drought-scorched 1890s Southwest, an old man shows up at the region’s only prosperous spread, the Callahan ranch, seeking work. Jack is flinty, shrewd, tough, and a natural with a gun. As an incentive to be taken on at his age, he shows the foreman an uncanny skill with one of Mr. Winchester’s latest models. He knows a sharpshooter would be valuable to Colonel Callahan and head gunman Tom Voth. But he has his own mission. Aware that a young cowboy on the ranch has died mysteriously, Jack begins to investigate. He soon realizes that the death and the source of the Callahan wealth are dangerously entwined and that many of the dark forces of the American West are at play on the ranch. Soon enough, it’s the season of the six-gun and its fastest shootist.
Atria/Emily Bestler Books | 9781668030400
THE HEART OF WINTER by Jonathan Evison (Fiction)
Abe Winter and Ruth Warneke were never meant to be together --- at least if you ask Ruth. Yet their catastrophic blind date in college evolved into a 70-year marriage and a life on a farm on Bainbridge Island with their hens and beloved Labrador, Megs. Through the years, the Winters have fallen in and out of lockstep, and from their haunting losses and guarded secrets, a dependable partnership has been forged. But when Ruth’s loose tooth turns out to be something much more malicious, the beautiful, reliable life they’ve created together comes to a crisis. As Ruth struggles with her crumbling independence, Abe must learn how to take care of her while their three living children question his ability to look after his wife. And once again, the couple has to reconfigure how to be there for each other.
Dutton | 9780593473559
JOYRIDE: A Memoir by Susan Orlean (Memoir)
JOYRIDE is a magic carpet ride through Susan Orlean’s life and career, where every day is an opportunity for discovery and every moment holds the potential for wonder. Throughout her storied career, Orlean’s curiosity draws her to explore the most ordinary and extraordinary of places, from going deep inside the head of a regular 10-year-old boy for a legendary profile (“The American Man Age Ten”) to reporting on a woman who owns 27 tigers, from capturing the routine magic of Saturday night to climbing Mt. Fuji. Orlean takes us through her process of dreaming up ideas, managing deadlines, connecting with sources, chasing every possible lead, confronting writer’s block and self-doubt, and crafting the perfect lede --- a Susan specialty.
Avid Reader Press/Simon & Schuster | 9781982135171
LINCOLN’S GHOST: Houdini's War on Spiritualism and the Dark Conspiracy Against the American Presidency by Brad Ricca (History)
During a séance in 1924, Harry Houdini --- the greatest entertainer in the world --- was cursed by a vengeful spirit, who said his days were numbered. Houdini laughed. He believed talking to the dead was impossible. By 1926, Houdini was dead. This is the untold story of the last performance of Harry Houdini, who --- inspired by his hero, Abraham Lincoln --- devotes himself full-time to a personal crusade against Spiritualism, the practice of speaking to the dead. In a spellbinding journey across Jazz Age America, haunted by the aftermath of the Great War and a deadly pandemic, Houdini encounters modern-day haunted houses, warlocks and monsters, and uncovers a shocking conspiracy that stretches all the way to the American presidency --- and to the House of Houdini itself.
St. Martin’s Griffin | 9781250338921
MAKE IT OUT ALIVE: A Quinn & Costa Thriller by Allison Brennan (Mystery/Thriller)
Three newlywed couples have disappeared from an exclusive resort in Florida, only to turn up dead soon after. It’s up to the FBI Mobile Response Team to catch a serial killer before anyone else ends up dead. And they have the perfect bait --- Detective Kara Quinn, who bears an uncanny resemblance to the targeted women. Undercover as newlyweds pretending to enjoy their honeymoon, Kara and FBI Agent Matt Costa set a flawless trap. When their plan works and they arrest the predator, Matt sends the rest of the team home. But on Monday morning, the couple doesn’t show up to work, and the MRT learns they never checked out of their hotel. As their team tries to find them, Matt and Kara learn the truth --- the killer wasn’t acting alone. He had a partner who succeeded where he failed. Kidnapped and forced into a twisted escape room, they need to find a way out.
Hanover Square Press | 9781335001801
OLD SCHOOL INDIAN by Aaron John Curtis (Fiction)
Abe Jacobs is Kanien’kehá:ka from Ahkwesáhsne --- or, as white people say, a Mohawk Indian from the Saint Regis Tribe. At 18, Abe left the reservation where he was raised and never looked back. Now at 43, he is suffering from a rare disease --- one his doctors in Miami believe will kill him. Running from his diagnosis and a marriage teetering on collapse, Abe returns to the Rez, where he’s persuaded to undergo a healing at the hands of his Great Uncle Budge. But Budge --- a wry, recovered alcoholic prone to wearing punk T-shirts --- isn’t all that convincing. And Abe’s time off the Rez has made him a thorough skeptic. To heal, Abe will undertake a revelatory journey, confronting the parts of himself he’s hidden ever since he left home and wrestling with the imprint left by his once-passionate marriage.
Tin House | 9781638934189
THE PICASSO HEIST by James Patterson and Howard Roughan (Thriller)
A $100 million painting. A previously unknown Picasso is discovered in the attic of a French villa. Everyone wants to possess it. Only one person knows how to take it. THE PICASSO HEIST is a thriller that scales astonishing heights when a newcomer to the Manhattan art world executes a grand theft.
Little, Brown and Company | 9781538758458
RACE AGAINST TERROR: Chasing an Al Qaeda Killer at the Dawn of the Forever War by Jake Tapper (True Crime)
June 2011: The case has been cold for nearly 10 years when a terrorist fleeing the Arab Spring turns himself in and confesses to killing American soldiers in Afghanistan. This brazen act sets off an unlikely chain of events that puts the entirety of the American justice system to the test. They have the killer but no evidence to prove the murders happened. Determined to deliver justice, a team led by federal prosecutors Dave Bitkower and Shreve Ariail must traverse the globe, uncovering facts across thousands of miles and tracing shocking plots of terror in order to prevent tragedy from striking again. RACE AGAINST TERROR shows a man radicalized to enact violence, courageous soldiers who risked their lives for each other, and the diverse set of men and women who work tirelessly to stay one step ahead of disaster.
Atria Books | 9781668079454
SACRAMENT by Susan Straight (Fiction)
In August 2020, a group of nurses are working in the ICU at a hospital in San Bernardino at the height of a COVID surge: Larette Embers, whose husband, Grief, is an animal control officer; Cherrise Martinez, whose husband died years ago in a car crash, and whose daughter, Raquel, has been sent to a Coachella date farm to live with her great-aunt to avoid the virus; and Marisol Manalang, born in the Philippines but based in Sacramento. As the nurses struggle with the skyrocketing number of sick patients, Cherisse's daughter goes missing. Grief's friend Johnny Frias, a California Highway Patrol officer, joins the search to find her. The resulting journey leads to new love and loss, pushing all our characters to their breaking points.
Counterpoint | 9781640098015
THE TIN MEN by Nelson DeMille and Alex DeMille (Thriller)
Army CID Special Agents Scott Brodie and Maggie Taylor team up for their toughest assignment yet as they are dispatched to Camp Hayden to investigate the death of Major Roger Ames, the chief scientist in charge of the top-secret war games being conducted between a platoon of Army Rangers and a fleet of “lethal autonomous weapons.” Brodie and Taylor must untangle the complex web of alliances, animosities and secret agendas among the men and women of the isolated facility. In a place cut off from the world and exposed to the harsh desert elements, everyone is a suspect. Brodie and Taylor must uncover layers of deception to find the hidden hand behind the murder of Major Ames, and the real purpose of the activities at Camp Hayden and its terrifying arsenal of next-generation weapons.
Simon & Schuster | 9781668062012
UPSTATE by Kim van Alkemade (Historical Fiction)
Paperback Original
Thirty-four-year-old writer Audrey Beacon is grieving alone during lockdown when a post about a bookshop for sale in upstate New York pops into her social media feed like a lifeline. Audrey impulsively cashes out her savings, loads her possessions into her dead husband’s van, and flees Manhattan for the village of Schuywich. While reviving the shop, Audrey discovers letters from the 1950s between the previous owner, magazine writer Evelyn Cabot, and a local librarian, Hazel McIntyre. It was love at first sight when the pair met at a summer camp in Maine that discreetly promises a “different vacation for professional women.” But the letters abruptly end in 2015 when they're forced to abandon the bookshop. Will Audrey find the courage to heal the wounds of the past --- including her own?
William Morrow Paperbacks | 9780063438033
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