Adult

Angie DeRose strives to find and rescue endangered runaways. But in the wake of her mother's sudden death, she makes a life-altering discovery. Hidden among the mementos in her parents' attic is a photograph of a little girl, with a code and a handwritten message on the back: "May God forgive me." Angie has no idea what it means or how to explain other questionable items among her mother's possessions. The lies she unearths will bring her past and present together with terrifying force. And everything she cherishes will be threatened by the repercussions of one long-ago choice --- and an enemy who will kill to keep a secret hidden forever.

Amanda Baron died in a boating accident on the Ohio River in 1953. Or did she? While it was generally accepted that she had lost her life when a coal barge rammed the pleasure boat she was sharing with her lover, her body was never found. Travis Baron was an infant when his mother disappeared. After the accident and the subsequent publicity, Travis’ father scoured the house of all evidence that Amanda Baron had ever lived, and her name was never to be uttered around him. Now in high school, Travis yearns to know more about her. With the help of his best friend, Mitch Malone, Travis begins a search for the truth about the mother he never knew.

At the moment of the Emperor's death, everything changes in the palace. Mei, his former concubine, is free, and Pheasant, the heir and Mei's lover, is proclaimed as the new Emperor, heralding a new era in China. But just when Mei believes she's closer to her dream, Pheasant's chief wife, Lady Wang, turns against Mei and takes unthinkable measures to stop her. The power struggle that ensues will determine Mei's fate --- and that of China. Surrounded by enemies within the palace that she calls home, Mei continues her journey to the throne in this second book of Weina Dai Randel's acclaimed duology.

The ultrawealthy families of Chouteau Forest may look down on a woman like death investigator Angela Richman, but they also rely on her. When a horrific car crash kills a Forest teenager, Angela is among the first on the scene. Her investigation is hardly underway, though, when she suffers a series of crippling strokes. Misdiagnosed by the resident neurologist, Dr. Gravois, and mended by gauche yet brilliant neurosurgeon Dr. Jeb Travis Tritt, Angela faces a harrowing recovery. It’s a drug-addled, hallucinating Angela who learns that Dr. Gravois has been murdered…and the chief suspect is the surgeon who saved her life.

Joshua Speed, the enterprising second son of a wealthy plantation owner, has struck off on his own. But before long, he makes a surprising and crucial new acquaintance --- a freshly minted lawyer by the name of Abraham Lincoln. When an orphaned girl from a neighboring town is found murdered and suspicion falls on her aunt, Speed makes it his mission to clear her good name. Of course, he'll need the legal expertise of his unusual new friend. Together, Lincoln and Speed fight to bring justice to their small town. But as more bodies are discovered and the investigation starts to come apart at the seams, there's one question on everyone's lips: Does Lincoln have what it takes to crack his first murder case?

ICE Special Agent Dominic Verrazzano’s vigilance pays off when he uncovers a plot to launch a chemical attack in New York, but he doesn’t know what the target is or how deep the conspiracy goes. And potentially thousands of lives hang in the balance. The only woman who could have answered his questions is murdered just before she reaches him. In her last moments, she manages to send him a single clue. It will have to be enough. Her tip leads him to Syria, where he must negotiate the treacherous alleys of the casbah in the midst of civil war to track the weapon --- before it's too late. Unless it’s already too late.

Homicide sergeant Matt Sinclair recognizes the dead woman hanging from a tree as a teenage runaway named Dawn he arrested 10 years before. As Sinclair and his partner, Cathy Braddock, soon learn, many of Dawn’s clients, not to mention the local and federal officials who protect them, will go to any length to keep the police from digging too deep into her past. Then the killer goes public, and Sinclair and Braddock must race to uncover the secrets Dawn was killed to protect before the killer unleashes a major attack on a scale the city has never seen before. But in the process, Sinclair runs into secrets from his own past --- some of which could end his homicide career for good.

Ana Bacon, a young housewife, tumbles off a cruise ship into the dark and deadly waters. But did she take her secrets with her? Investigator Ryan Monahan is a numbers man. So when his company sends him the Bacon case, which could net a $10-million payout, Monahan doubts that her death is just a tragic accident. But the husband has a substantial alibi, and a number of witnesses claim to have seen Ana fall. So the official ruling seems to be substantiated. Still, the more Monahan uncovers about Ana’s life, the more he realizes how many people would kill to keep her secrets hidden. And the closer he gets to the truth, the greater the odds grow that he, too, will take a fatal fall.

THE KINGDOM OF SPEECH is a captivating, paradigm-shifting argument that speech --- not evolution --- is responsible for humanity's complex societies and achievements. From Alfred Russel Wallace, the Englishman who beat Darwin to the theory of natural selection but later renounced it, and through the controversial work of modern-day anthropologist Daniel Everett, who defies the current wisdom that language is hard-wired in humans, Tom Wolfe examines the solemn, long-faced, laugh-out-loud zig-zags of Darwinism, old and Neo, and finds it irrelevant here in the Kingdom of Speech.

Rise the dark. These were the last words written in Lauren Novak's notebook before she was murdered in a strange Florida village. They've never meant anything to the police or to her husband, investigator Markus Novak. Now the man he believes killed her is out of prison, and draws Markus to the place he's avoided for so long: the lonely road where his wife was shot to death. In Red Lodge, Montana, Sabrina Baldwin is abducted by Garland Webb, the man Markus believes killed his wife. Drawing them all together is a messianic villain who understands that you can never outpace your past. You can only rise against the future.