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This is Where it Ends by Marieke Nijkamp

January 2016

The principal of Opportunity, Alabama's high school finishes her speech, welcoming the entire student body to a new semester and encouraging them to excel and achieve. The students get up to leave the auditorium for their next class, but the doors won't open. Someone starts shooting. Told from four perspectives over the span of 54 harrowing minutes, terror reigns as one student's calculated revenge turns into the ultimate game of survival.

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My Name is Not Friday by Jon Walter

January 2016

Well-mannered Samuel and his mischievous younger brother, Joshua, are free black boys living in an orphanage during the end of the Civil War. Samuel takes the blame for Joshua's latest prank, and the consequence is worse than he could ever imagine. He's taken from the orphanage to the South, given a new name --- Friday --- and sold into slavery. What follows is a heartbreaking but hopeful account of Samuel's journey from freedom, to captivity and back again.

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Orphan X by Gregg Hurwitz

January 2016

ORPHAN X is the start of a new series for Gregg Hurwitz, and it’s fabulous. In it, Evan Smoak is a guy with a dangerous past. He was an orphan, and as a child was recruited into a deep-dark black box program called Orphan. He was the 24th recruit, hence his moniker X. He broke from the program and instead has now become a vigilante known as The Nowhere Man. But someone from his past is on to him and is out to get him.

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Dark Money: A Jack Bryant Thriller - Contest

Links to http://www.bookreporter.com/features/feature-and-contest/dark-money-a-jack-bryant-thriller.

Theodore Zeldin

Each person is an enigma. You're a puzzle not only to yourself but also to everyone else, and the great mystery of our time is how we penetrate this puzzle.

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Theodore Zeldin

The Things We Keep by Sally Hepworth

January 2016

I first discovered Sally Hepworth with her book, THE SECRETS OF MIDWIVES. I knew then that she was an author to watch. In THE THINGS WE KEEP, Sally creates a terrific multi-layered story with interesting characters. In it, Anna Forster is just 38 years old and in the early stages of Alzheimer's disease. She moves into Rosalind House, an assisted living facility, where she can be kept safe as her mind unravels. There she finds Luke, a resident who is close to her age, whose mind is unraveling with another disease. Love is an emotion that overrides the loss of memory, and Anna draws closer and closer to Luke.

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Interview: Melanie Benjamin, author of The Swans of Fifth Avenue

Jan 28, 2016

Melanie Benjamin, the New York Times bestselling author of such novels as ALICE I HAVE BEEN and THE AVIATOR’S WIFE, is back with her latest foray into historical fiction: THE SWANS OF FIFTH AVENUE, a triumphant novel about New York’s “Swans” of the 1950s --- and the scandalous, headline-making and enthralling friendship between literary legend Truman Capote and peerless socialite Babe Paley. In this interview, Benjamin talks with Bookreporter.com's co-founder, Carol Fitzgerald, about Babe Paley and the Swans, “the first Real Housewives of New York” --- from their glitz and glamour to their complicated relationship with Capote and beyond.  

John Shuster

Now people see that competitive curling of a high caliber is athletic, not just beer parties. It takes mental and physical strength.

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John Shuster

Interview: Shilpi Somaya Gowda, author of The Golden Son

Jan 28, 2016

Shilpi Somaya Gowda, the internationally bestselling author of SECRET DAUGHTER, now returns with her highly anticipated sophomore effort, THE GOLDEN SON. It’s the lovely, complicated story of Anil Patel, who makes the difficult decision to leave behind his Indian village to pursue a medical career in the U.S. --- only to be called back after the sudden death of his father to fulfill his duty-bound role as village arbiter. In this interview, Gowda talks to The Book Report Network's Bronwyn Miller about why she is and always has been so fascinated by the Indian tradition of a panchayat, and how that kind of justice system plays out on a personal and communal level. She also discusses why she is drawn to stories dealing with cross-cultural issues, how volunteering at an orphanage changed her life, and what she’d like readers to take away from THE GOLDEN SON.

Interview: Anne Girard, author of Platinum Doll

Jan 28, 2016

Anne Girard is the pen name of bestselling author Diane Haeger, which was adopted to distinguish her more recent historical fiction from her earlier works. Her latest book, PLATINUM DOLL, is about Harlean Carpenter McGrew, better known as silver screen legend and “the original platinum blonde bombshell” Jean Harlow, as she and her domineering mother take Hollywood by storm. In this interview with Bookreporter.com’s Alexis Burling, Girard talks about what inspired her to write Harlow’s story and how she researches each of her books (including a trip to the city in which it’s set!). She also shares some fascinating details about the starlet’s life, including bits about her troubled marriage, her unquenchable free spirit, and her untimely death at only 26 years old.