Spring Preview 2024

The arrival of spring signals the end of our Spring Preview contests. Many thanks to all who entered --- and a big congratulations to our winners! Below are the books that we believe you will be talking about over the next few months.

» Click here to see the winners of this year's Spring Preview contests.

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The Familiar by Leigh Bardugo

In a shabby house, on a shabby street, in the new capital of Madrid, Luzia Cotado uses scraps of magic to get through her days of endless toil as a scullion. But when her scheming mistress discovers that the lump of a servant cowering in the kitchen is actually hiding a talent for little miracles, she demands Luzia use those gifts to improve the family's social position. What begins as simple amusement for the nobility takes a perilous turn when Luzia garners the notice of Antonio Pérez, the disgraced secretary to Spain's king. The king is desperate for any advantage in the war against England's heretic queen --- and Pérez will stop at nothing to regain his favor. As Luzia's notoriety grows, so does the danger that her Jewish blood will doom her to the Inquisition's wrath.

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Maggie O'Farrell, author of The Distance Between Us

On a cold February afternoon, Stella catches sight of a man she hasn't seen for many years but instantly recognizes. Or thinks she does. At the same moment on the other side of the globe, in the middle of a crowd of Chinese New Year revellers, Jake realizes that things are becoming dangerous. They know nothing of one another's existence, but both Stella and Jake flee their lives: Jake in search of a place so remote it doesn't appear on any map, and Stella for a destination in Scotland, the significance of which only her sister, Nina, will understand.

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Casey Sherman, author of A Murder in Hollywood: The Untold Story of Tinseltown's Most Shocking Crime

Hollywood starlet Lana Turner seemed to have it all --- a thriving film career, a beautiful daughter, and the kind of fame and fortune that most people could only dream of. But when the famous femme fatale began dating mobster Johnny Stompanato, her personal life became violent and unpredictable. Lana's teenage daughter, Cheryl, watched her beloved mother's life deteriorate as Stompanato's intense jealousy took over. Eventually, the physical and emotional abuse became too much to bear, and Lana attempted to break it off with Johnny --- with disastrous consequences. The details of what happened that fateful night remain foggy, but it ended in a series of frantic phone calls and Stompanato dead on Lana's bedroom floor, with Cheryl claiming to have plunged a knife into his abdomen in an attempt to protect her mother.

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Leslie Jamison, author of Splinters: Another Kind of Love Story

Leslie Jamison has become one of our most beloved contemporary voices, a scribe of the real, the true, the complex. In her first memoir, Jamison turns her unrivaled powers of perception on some of the most intimate relationships of her life: her consuming love for her young daughter, a ruptured marriage once swollen with hope, and the shaping legacy of her own parents’ complicated bond. In examining what it means for a woman to be many things at once --- a mother, an artist, a teacher, a lover --- Jamison places the magical and the mundane side by side in surprising ways. The result is a work of nonfiction like no other, an almost impossibly deep reckoning with the muchness of life and art, and a book that grieves the departure of one love even as it celebrates the arrival of another.

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B. A. Paris, author of The Guest

Iris and Gabriel have just arrived home from a make-or-break holiday. But a shock awaits them. One of their closest friends, Laure, is in their house. The atmosphere quickly becomes tense as she oversteps again and again: sleeping in their bed, wearing Iris' clothes, even rearranging the furniture. Laure has walked out on her husband --- and their good friend --- Pierre over his confession of an affair and a secret child. Iris and Gabriel want to be supportive of their friends, but as Laure's mood becomes increasingly unpredictable, her presence takes its toll. Iris and Gabriel's only respite comes in the form of a couple new to town. But with them comes their gardener, who has a checkered past. Soon, secrets from all their pasts will unravel, some more dangerous than they could have known.

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