Editorial Content for All I Want
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Reviewer (text)
From the author of A SIMPLE FAVOR comes a haunted house story. But is the house truly haunted, or does its history play tricks on new owners Ben and Emma? Read More
Teaser
When Emma’s husband, Ben, falls in love with a large Victorian mansion for sale in upstate New York, he swears to her the fixer-upper will be worth the risk. With a baby on the way, Emma would like to live in a charming, safe community --- and in a space larger than a one-bedroom New York City apartment. On impulse, she agrees to Ben’s plan and they put in an offer on the house. Sure, the mansion has a somewhat creepy backstory and is a bit dilapidated, but Emma and Ben are in this together. Aren't they? When strange things start happening, Emma begins to experience a little buyer’s remorse. What’s the real history of this house? Is its dark history repeating itself? Why does her husband suddenly seem so distant? Is she in danger? Is her baby?
Promo
When Emma’s husband, Ben, falls in love with a large Victorian mansion for sale in upstate New York, he swears to her the fixer-upper will be worth the risk. With a baby on the way, Emma would like to live in a charming, safe community --- and in a space larger than a one-bedroom New York City apartment. On impulse, she agrees to Ben’s plan and they put in an offer on the house. Sure, the mansion has a somewhat creepy backstory and is a bit dilapidated, but Emma and Ben are in this together. Aren't they? When strange things start happening, Emma begins to experience a little buyer’s remorse. What’s the real history of this house? Is its dark history repeating itself? Why does her husband suddenly seem so distant? Is she in danger? Is her baby?
About the Book
The New York Times bestselling author of A SIMPLE FAVOR brings her “sly, satirical, subversive” (L.S. Hilton, author of ULTIMA) prose to a pitch-perfect psychological suspense novel about a young couple whose disintegrating marriage and remote new home in rural, upstate New York make for a terrifying descent into the darker side of human nature.
When Emma’s husband, Ben, falls in love with a large Victorian mansion for sale in upstate New York, he swears to her the fixer-upper will be worth the risk. With a baby on the way, Emma would like to live in a charming, safe community, after all --- and in a space larger than a one-bedroom New York City apartment. On impulse, she agrees to Ben’s plan and they put in an offer on the house.
Sure, the mansion has a somewhat creepy backstory and is a bit dilapidated, but Emma and Ben are in this together. Aren’t they? When strange things start happening, Emma begins to experience a little buyer’s remorse. What’s the real history of this house? Is its dark history repeating itself? Why does her husband suddenly seem so distant? Is she in danger? Is her baby?
Combining the domestic anxiety of Liane Moriarty and the haunting twists and turns of Shirley Jackson, ALL I WANT is an intensely absorbing novel that will change the way you look at your neighbors.
Audiobook available; read by Emily Tremaine, Kevin R. Free and Madeleine Maby
Editorial Content for Yonder
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Reviewer (text)
One of the epigraphs with which Jabari Asim opens his new novel, YONDER, is a line from a Black folk song: “Got one mind for the boss to see, Got another mind for what I know is me.” Then comes an opening paragraph that both echoes this lyric and sets the book’s overriding theme: “All of us have two tongues. The first is for them… The second is for us… This tongue is rich, savory, and, if we’re not mindful, can bring us to ruin. This tongue reminds us that, despite everything, we love.” Read More
Teaser
Cato and William meet at Placid Hall, a plantation in an unspecified part of the American South. Subject to the whims of their tyrannical and eccentric captor, Cannonball Greene, they never know what harm may befall them: inhumane physical toil in the plantation’s quarry by day, a beating by night, or the sale of a loved one at any moment. The latter hurts the reserved and stubborn William, who finds himself falling for Margaret, a small but mighty woman with self-possession beyond her years. And it hurts Cato, whose first love, Iris, was sold off with no forewarning. He now finds solace in his hearty band of friends. But their relationships begin to fray when a visiting minister with a mysterious past starts to fill their heads with ideas about independence.
Promo
Cato and William meet at Placid Hall, a plantation in an unspecified part of the American South. Subject to the whims of their tyrannical and eccentric captor, Cannonball Greene, they never know what harm may befall them: inhumane physical toil in the plantation’s quarry by day, a beating by night, or the sale of a loved one at any moment. The latter hurts the reserved and stubborn William, who finds himself falling for Margaret, a small but mighty woman with self-possession beyond her years. And it hurts Cato, whose first love, Iris, was sold off with no forewarning. He now finds solace in his hearty band of friends. But their relationships begin to fray when a visiting minister with a mysterious past starts to fill their heads with ideas about independence.
About the Book
THE WATER DANCER meets THE PROPHETS in this spare, gripping and beautifully rendered novel exploring love and friendship among a group of enslaved Black strivers in the mid-19th century.
They call themselves the Stolen. Their owners call them captives. They are taught their captors’ tongues and their beliefs but they have a language and rituals all their own.
In a world that would be allegorical if it weren’t saturated in harsh truths, Cato and William meet at Placid Hall, a plantation in an unspecified part of the American South. Subject to the whims of their tyrannical and eccentric captor, Cannonball Greene, they never know what harm may befall them: inhumane physical toil in the plantation’s quarry by day, a beating by night, or the sale of a loved one at any moment. It’s that cruel practice --- the wanton destruction of love, the belief that Black people aren’t even capable of loving --- that hurts the most.
It hurts the reserved and stubborn William, who finds himself falling for Margaret, a small but mighty woman with self-possession beyond her years. And it hurts Cato, whose first love, Iris, was sold off with no forewarning. He now finds solace in his hearty band of friends, including William, who is like a brother; Margaret; Little Zander; and Milton, a gifted artist. There is also Pandora, with thick braids and long limbs, whose beauty calls to him.
Their relationships begin to fray when a visiting minister with a mysterious past starts to fill their heads with ideas about independence. He tells them that with freedom comes the right to choose the small things --- when to dine, when to begin and end work --- as well as the big things, such as whom and how to love. Do they follow the preacher and pursue the unknown? Confined in a landscape marked by deceit and uncertainty, who can they trust?
In an elegant work of monumental imagination that will reorient how we think of the legacy of America’s shameful past, Jabari Asim presents a beautiful, powerful and elegiac novel that examines intimacy and longing in the quarters while asking a vital question: What would happen if an enslaved person risked everything for love?
Audiobook available; read by Joniece Abbott-Pratt, Lamarr Gulley, JD Jackson, Adam Lazarre-White, Imani Jade Powers and Kylah Williams
Editorial Content for Antoinette's Sister
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Reviewer (text)
Diana Giovinazzo’s ANTOINETTE’S SISTER has a tough task ahead of it. The novel’s very title casts its heroine, Maria Carolina, in the shadow of her infamous sister, Marie Antoinette. The context of the book places “Charlotte,” as she was known, as the heiress apparent to her dominating mother, Empress Maria Theresa. Giovinazzo creates a compelling character in Charlotte; she thrives when portraying the intimate relationships of her friends and family, but flags when she gets to the actual history of the period. Read More
Teaser
Austria, 1767: Maria Carolina Charlotte --- the 10th daughter and one of 16 children of Empress Maria Theresa of Austria --- knows her position as a Habsburg archduchess will inevitably force her to leave her home, family and cherished sister, Antoinette, whose companionship she values over all else. But not yet. The Habsburg family is celebrating a great triumph: Charlotte’s older sister, Josepha, has been promised to King Ferdinand IV of Naples and will soon take her place as queen. Before she can journey to her new home, however, tragedy strikes. After visiting the family crypt, Josepha contracts smallpox and dies. Shocked, Charlotte is forced to face an unthinkable new reality: she now must marry Ferdinand in her sister’s stead.
Promo
Austria, 1767: Maria Carolina Charlotte --- the 10th daughter and one of 16 children of Empress Maria Theresa of Austria --- knows her position as a Habsburg archduchess will inevitably force her to leave her home, family and cherished sister, Antoinette, whose companionship she values over all else. But not yet. The Habsburg family is celebrating a great triumph: Charlotte’s older sister, Josepha, has been promised to King Ferdinand IV of Naples and will soon take her place as queen. Before she can journey to her new home, however, tragedy strikes. After visiting the family crypt, Josepha contracts smallpox and dies. Shocked, Charlotte is forced to face an unthinkable new reality: she now must marry Ferdinand in her sister’s stead.
About the Book
As Marie Antoinette took her last breath as Queen of France in Paris, another formidable monarch --- Antoinette’s dearly beloved sister, Charlotte --- was hundreds of miles away, in Naples, fighting desperately to secure her release from the revolutionaries who would take her life. Little did Charlotte know, however, that her sister’s execution would change the course of history --- and bring about the end of her own empire.
“You are the queen. You are the queen that Antoinette wanted to be.”
Austria, 1767: Maria Carolina Charlotte --- the 10th daughter and one of 16 children of Empress Maria Theresa of Austria --- knows her position as a Habsburg archduchess will inevitably force her to leave her home, family and cherished sister, Antoinette, whose companionship she values over all else. But not yet. The Habsburg family is celebrating a great triumph: Charlotte’s older sister, Josepha, has been promised to King Ferdinand IV of Naples and will soon take her place as queen. Before she can journey to her new home, however, tragedy strikes. After visiting the family crypt, Josepha contracts smallpox and dies. Shocked, Charlotte is forced to face an unthinkable new reality: she now must marry Ferdinand in her sister’s stead.
Bereft and alone, Charlotte finds that her life in Naples is more complicated than she ever could have imagined. Ferdinand is weak and feckless, and a disastrous wedding night plunges her into despair. Her husband’s regent, Tanucci, a controlling and power-hungry man, has pushed the country to the brink of ruin. Overwhelmed, she asks her brother Leopold, now the Holy Roman Emperor, to send help --- which he does in the form of John Acton, a handsome military man 20 years Charlotte’s senior who is tasked with overseeing the Navy. Now, Charlotte must gather the strength to do what her mother did before her: take control of a country.
In a time of political uprisings and royal executions and with the increasingly desperate crisis her favorite sister, Queen Marie Antoinette, is facing in France, how is a young monarch to keep hold of everything --- and everyone --- she loves? Find out in this sweeping, luxurious tale of family, court intrigue and power.
Audiobook available, read by Marisa Calin
Editorial Content for My Annihilation
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Reviewer (text)
Over the last few years, I have added a number of Japanese authors to my reading lists. I typically go out of my way to expand my bookish horizons, and I love the Japanese culture. Happily, MY ANNIHILATION is not the first book I have read by Fuminori Nakamura, who is considered to be a master of literary noir in his home country of Japan. Read More
Teaser
With MY ANNIHILATION, Fuminori Nakamura, master of literary noir, has constructed a puzzle box of a narrative in the form of a confessional diary that implicates its reader in a heinous crime. Delving relentlessly into the darkest corners of human consciousness, the novel interrogates the unspeakable thoughts all humans share that can be monstrous when brought to life, revealing with disturbing honesty the psychological motives of a killer.
Promo
With MY ANNIHILATION, Fuminori Nakamura, master of literary noir, has constructed a puzzle box of a narrative in the form of a confessional diary that implicates its reader in a heinous crime. Delving relentlessly into the darkest corners of human consciousness, the novel interrogates the unspeakable thoughts all humans share that can be monstrous when brought to life, revealing with disturbing honesty the psychological motives of a killer.
About the Book
What transforms a person into a killer? Can it be something as small as a suggestion?
Turn this page, and you may forfeit your entire life.
With MY ANNIHILATION, Fuminori Nakamura, master of literary noir, has constructed a puzzle box of a narrative in the form of a confessional diary that implicates its reader in a heinous crime.
Delving relentlessly into the darkest corners of human consciousness, MY ANNIHILATION interrogates the unspeakable thoughts all humans share that can be monstrous when brought to life, revealing with disturbing honesty the psychological motives of a killer.
Audiobook available, read by Brian Nishii