Features

End-of-the-Year Contest 2018

Congratulations to the winners of our 2018 End-of-the-Year Contest! One Grand Prize winner received all 45 of Carol Fitzgerald's Bookreporter.com Bets On picks from 2018, while nine others won a selection of five of these titles. You can see all the winners below, along with 2018's Bets On books.

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Week of January 28, 2019

Paperback releases for the week of January 28th include EVERY NOTE PLAYED by Lisa Genova, a powerful exploration of regret, forgiveness, freedom and what it means to be alive; THE DISAPPEARED, C. J. Box's 18th Joe Pickett novel that finds the Wyoming game warden contending with two lethal cases; Michael Koryta's HOW IT HAPPENED, in which an FBI investigator must uncover the secrets of his hometown to solve a double murder; THE TAKE by Christopher Reich, an international spy thriller featuring Simon Riske, who is one part James Bond, one part Jack Reacher; and BUILDING THE GREAT SOCIETY, in which LINCOLN'S BOYS author Joshua Zeitz takes us inside Lyndon Johnson's White House to show how the legendary Great Society programs were actually put into practice.

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Lisa Genova, author of Every Note Played

An accomplished concert pianist, Richard now has ALS, and his entire right arm is paralyzed. Three years ago, Karina removed their framed wedding picture from the living room wall and hung a mirror there instead. But she still hasn’t moved on. Karina is paralyzed by excuses and fear, stuck in an unfulfilling life as a piano teacher, afraid to pursue the path she abandoned as a young woman, blaming Richard and their failed marriage for all of it. When Richard becomes increasingly paralyzed and is no longer able to live on his own, Karina becomes his reluctant caretaker.

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Every Note Played by Lisa Genova

March 2018

More than two decades ago, a friend told me that his dad had ALS. I still remember his abject sadness as he described how his father was losing functionality. Then, a couple of years ago, our friend, Peter, was diagnosed. He was living in Florida at the time, and my husband and I thought we would fly down to see him in April. It was a well-laid plan, but he passed away in March, stunning both of us. Also, a couple of years ago, I read UNTIL I SAY GOOD-BYE: My Year of Living with Joy, a memoir by Susan Spencer-Wendel, who had ALS and was determined to live every day. That, too, was a Bets On selection.

All this to say that when I read Lisa Genova’s latest novel, which looks at the world of ALS, I was not coming to the subject of this book as a novice. That said, I knew that in Lisa’s hands, it would be deftly crafted and addressed. And indeed it was.

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