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AMERICAN BLOOD by Ben Sanders (Thriller)
Audiobook available, narrated by George Newbern
After a botched undercover operation, ex-NYPD officer Marshall Grade is living in witness protection in Santa Fe, New Mexico. The mob wants him dead, and a contract killer known as the Dallas Man has been hired to track him down. Racked with guilt over wrongs committed during his undercover work, Marshall investigates the disappearance of a local woman named Alyce Ray. Members of a drug ring seem to hold clues to Ray's whereabouts, but hunting traffickers is no quiet task. Word of Marshall's efforts spreads, and soon the worst elements of his former life --- including the Dallas Man --- are coming for him. Reviewed by Joe Hartlaub.
BLOOD, SALT, WATER: An Alex Morrow Novel by Denise Mina (Mystery)
Audiobook available, narrated by Cathleen McCarron
A wealthy businesswoman disappears from her Glasgow home without a trace, leaving her husband and children panicked but strangely resistant to questioning. Tracing the woman's cell phone, police detective Alex Morrow discovers a call made from an unlikely location. A sleepy seaside community, Helensburgh is the last place you'd go looking for violence. But Morrow's investigation uncovers disturbing clues and a dead body in a nearby lake. When a connection to someone close to her surfaces, the case gets more personal than she could have imagined. Reviewed by Barbara Lipkien Gershenbaum.
THE COMEDIANS: Drunks, Thieves, Scoundrels, and the History of American Comedy by Kliph Nesteroff (History/Entertainment)
In THE COMEDIANS, comedy historian Kliph Nesteroff brings to life a century of American comedy with real-life characters, forgotten stars, mainstream heroes and counterculture iconoclasts. Based on over 200 original interviews and extensive archival research, Nesteroff’s groundbreaking work is a narrative exploration of the way comedians have reflected, shaped and changed American culture over the past 100 years. Reviewed by Ron Kaplan.
CROSS JUSTICE by James Patterson (Thriller)
Audiobook available, narrated by Ruben Santiago-Hudson and Jefferson Mays
When his cousin is accused of a heinous crime, Alex Cross returns to his North Carolina hometown for the first time in over three decades. As he tries to prove his cousin's innocence, Cross unearths a family secret that forces him to question everything he's ever known. Chasing a ghost he believed was long dead, Cross gets pulled into a case that has local cops needing his help: a grisly string of socialite murders. Now he's hot on the trail of both a brutal killer and the truth about his own past --- and the answers he finds might be fatal. Reviewed by Joe Hartlaub.
DASHING THROUGH THE SNOW: A Christmas Novel by Debbie Macomber (Romance)
Audiobook available, narrated by Allyson Ryan
Ashley Davison, a graduate student in California, desperately wants to spend the holidays with her family in Seattle. Dashiell Sutherland, a former army intelligence officer, has a job interview in Seattle and must arrive by December 23. Ashley and Dash reluctantly decide to share the car, but neither anticipates the wild ride ahead. Though Ashley and Dash may never reach Seattle in time for Christmas, the season is still full of surprises --- and their greatest wishes may yet come true. Reviewed by Susan Miura.
HIS RIGHT HAND: A Linda Wallheim Mystery Set in Mormon Utah by Mette Ivie Harrison (Mystery)
Audiobook available, narrated by Kirsten Potter
In Draper, Utah, a tight-knit Mormon community is thrown into upheaval when their ward’s second counselor --- one of the bishop’s right-hand men --- is found dead in an elaborately staged murder on church property. Carl Ashby was known as a devout Mormon, a pillar of the community, and a loving husband and father. Who would want him dead? Linda Wallheim, the wife of the ward’s bishop, can’t rest as long as the ward is suffering. But the entire case is turned upside down by the autopsy report, which reveals Carl was a biological female. Reviewed by Amie Taylor.
THE MISTAKE I MADE by Paula Daly (Psychological Thriller)
Audiobook available, narrated by Dawn Murphy
After the dissolution of her marriage, Roz’s business has gone under, debts are racking up, the rent is late (again), and she's struggling to provide for her nine-year-old son. At her sister’s birthday party, Roz meets Scott Elias, who makes her an offer to spend the night with him --- for money. With that kind of cash, she could clear her debts and get her life back on track. But as the situation spirals out of her control, Roz is forced to do things she never thought herself capable of. Can she ever set things right again? Reviewed by Judy Frasca.
PLAYING DAYS by Benjamin Markovits (Fiction)
In print for the first time in the United States, acclaimed novelist Benjamin Markovits’ PLAYING DAYS is a mostly autobiographical narrative concerning the author’s season playing minor league professional basketball in Germany and the love affair with another player’s estranged wife that ushers him into adulthood. Reviewed by Stuart Shiffman.
PROTECTORS 2: HEROES: Stories to Benefit PROTECT edited by Thomas Pluck (Fiction/Nonfiction Anthology)
PROTECTORS 2, edited by Thomas Pluck, is a mammoth anthology of 55 stories and almost 600 pages, with all proceeds going to PROTECT, a nonpartisan pro-child and anti-crime lobby dedicated to the protection of children from physical, sexual and emotional abuse. Contributors include Andrew Vachss, Joyce Carol Oates, David Morrell, Linda Rodriguez, Charles de Lint, Hilary Davidson, Joe R. Lansdale, Joelle Charbonneau, Reed Farrel Coleman, SJ Rozan and Alison Arngrim. Reviewed by Tom Callahan.
REACHER SAID NOTHING: Lee Child and the Making of Make Me by Andy Martin (Literary Criticism)
Fans of Lee Child know well that the muscular star of his bestselling novels, Jack Reacher, is a man of few words --- and a lot of action. In REACHER SAID NOTHING, Andy Martin shadows Child like a literary private eye in a yearlong investigation of what it takes to make fiction’s hottest hero hit the page running. The result is an up-close-and-personal look into the world and ways of an expert storyteller’s creative process as he undertakes the writing of the much-anticipated 20th Jack Reacher novel, MAKE ME. Reviewed by Joe Hartlaub.
SATURN RUN by John Sandford and Ctein (Futuristic Thriller/Adventure)
Audiobook available, narrated by Eric Conger
The year is 2066. A Caltech intern inadvertently notices an anomaly from a space telescope --- something is approaching Saturn and decelerating. Space objects don’t decelerate. Spaceships do. A flurry of top-level government meetings produces the inescapable conclusion: Whatever built that ship is at least a hundred years ahead in hard and soft technology, and whoever can get their hands on it exclusively and bring it back will have an advantage so large, no other nation can compete. The race is on, and a remarkable adventure begins. Reviewed by Pauline Finch.
SPLINTER THE SILENCE: A Tony Hill and Carol Jordan Novel by Val McDermid (Psychological Thriller/Mystery)
Audiobook available, narrated by Gerard Doyle
Is it violence if it’s virtual? The outspoken women targeted by the increasingly cruel internet trolls and bullies would probably say so. For some of them, the torrents of bile and vicious threats prove too much. They begin to silence themselves in a series of high-profile suicides. Or do they? Tony Hill isn’t convinced. But he’s the only one. Former cop Carol Jordan is too busy messing up her life to care. Until she gets an unexpected second chance. Now it’s game on, and the stakes have never been higher. Reviewed by Joe Hartlaub.
A WILD SWAN: And Other Tales written by Michael Cunningham, with illustrations by Yuko Shimizu (Fantasy/Short Stories)
Audiobook available, narrated by Billy Hough and Lili Taylor
A poisoned apple and a monkey's paw with the power to change fate; a girl whose extraordinarily long hair causes catastrophe; a man with one human arm and one swan's wing; and a house deep in the forest, constructed of gumdrops and gingerbread, vanilla frosting and boiled sugar. In A WILD SWAN, the people and the talismans of lands far, far away --- the mythic figures of our childhoods and the source of so much of our wonder --- are transformed by Michael Cunningham into stories of sublime revelation. Reviewed by Harvey Freedenberg.
YEAR OF YES: How to Dance It Out, Stand in the Sun and Be Your Own Person by Shonda Rhimes (Memoir)
Audiobook available, narrated by Shonda Rhimes
With three hit television shows and three children at home, the uber-talented Shonda Rhimes had lots of good reasons to say NO when an unexpected invitation arrived. Then Shonda’s sister laid down a challenge: just for one year, try to say YES to the unexpected invitations that come your way. She reluctantly agreed --- and the result was nothing short of transformative. In YEAR OF YES, Shonda chronicles the powerful impact saying YES had on every aspect of her life --- and how we can all change our lives with that one little word. Reviewed by Maya Gittelman.
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