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THE 8th CIRCLE by Sarah Cain (Thriller)
Audiobook available, narrated by Ray Chase
A year ago, Danny Ryan lost his wife and son in a car accident. He's still reeling from the tragedy when Michael Cohen, his friend and fellow journalist, drives into the pond in front of his house with a bullet through his gut. With Michael's death ruled a murder, Danny must work to get his name crossed off the list of suspects, and that means digging into Michael's last article, an exposé of the twisted side of Philadelphia politics. But powerful people are ready to kill to protect what Michael was about to uncover. If Danny isn’t careful, he'll be next. Reviewed by Christine M. Irvin.
ALL THE BIRDS IN THE SKY by Charlie Jane Anders (Paranormal/Urban Fantasy)
Audiobook available, narrated by Alyssa Bresnahan
Childhood friends Patricia Delfine and Laurence Armstead didn't expect to see each other again, after parting ways under mysterious circumstances during middle school. After all, the development of magical powers and the invention of a two-second time machine could hardly fail to alarm one's peers and families. But now they're both adults, and the planet is falling apart around them. Little do they realize that something bigger than either of them, something begun years ago in their youth, is determined to bring them together --- to either save the world or plunge it into a new dark age. Reviewed by Sarah Rachel Egelman.
BREAKDOWN: An Alex Delaware Novel by Jonathan Kellerman (Psychological Thriller)
Audiobook available, narrated by John Rubinstein
Psychologist Dr. Alex Delaware meets actress Zelda Chase when called upon to evaluate her five-year-old son, Ovid. Years later, he is unexpectedly reunited with Zelda when she is involuntarily committed after a bizarre psychotic episode. Shortly after her release, she is discovered dead on the grounds of a palatial Bel Air estate. Alex turns to his friend, LAPD Lieutenant Milo Sturgis, for help in finding out who ended Zelda’s broken life. At the same time, he is caught up in another quest: the search for her missing son. And when other victims vanish from the same upscale neighborhood, worry turns to terror. Reviewed by Joe Hartlaub.
COCONUT COWBOY by Tim Dorsey (Mystery/Humor)
Audiobook available, narrated by Oliver Wyman
Serge A. Storms devises his wildest plan yet: finish the journey begun by his freewheeling heroes, Captain America and Billy, tragically cut short by some shotgun-wielding rednecks. Setting a course for the Florida panhandle, Captain Serge --- with Coleman literally riding shotgun --- mounts his classic motorcycle and hits the highway in search of the real America. In a state where criminal politicians are more common than gators, Serge and Coleman discover one particular speed-trap locale so aggressively inept at corruption that investigators are baffled where to start. Reviewed by Joe Hartlaub.
EVEN DOGS IN THE WILD by Ian Rankin (Mystery)
Audiobook available, narrated by James MacPherson
Detective Inspector Siobhan Clarke is investigating the death of a senior government prosecutor, David Minton, while Malcolm Fox is helping a surveillance team track a notorious Glasgow crime family. John Rebus gets a call from his old nemesis, "Big Ger" Cafferty; someone just fired a bullet through his front window, and the only man he trusts with his life is Rebus. As the cases collide, it's up to Clarke, Fox and Rebus to connect the dots and save their unlikely ally, whose past harbors a shocking secret that implicates Minton's friends in an unspeakable crime. Reviewed by Ray Palen.
THE EX by Alafair Burke (Thriller)
Audiobook available, narrated by Xe Sands
Widower Jack Harris has resisted the dating scene ever since the shooting of his wife by a 15-year-old boy three years ago. An early morning run along the Hudson River changes that when he spots a woman in last night’s party dress, enjoying a champagne picnic alone and reading his favorite novel. Eager to help Jack find love again, his best friend posts a message on a popular website after he mentions the encounter. Days later, that same beautiful stranger responds and invites Jack to meet her in person at the waterfront. That’s when his world falls apart. Reviewed by Roz Shea.
THE FORGETTING TIME by Sharon Guskin (Fiction)
Audiobook available, narrated by David Pittu and Susan Bennett
One day, the preschool office calls and says Janie needs to come in to talk about her four-year-old son, Noah. And life as she knows it stops. For Jerome Anderson, life as he knows it has stopped. A deadly diagnosis has made him realize he is approaching the end of his life. He spent his life searching for that something else. And with Noah, he thinks he's found it. Soon Noah, Janie and Anderson will find themselves knocking on the door of a mother whose son has been missing for eight years --- and when that door opens, all of their questions will be answered. Reviewed by Norah Piehl.
GIRL THROUGH GLASS by Sari Wilson (Fiction)
Audiobook available, narrated by Tavia Gilbert
In the summer of 1977, 11-year-old Mira is an aspiring ballerina whose mentor is 47-year-old Maurice DuPont. As she ascends higher in the ballet world, her relationship with Maurice intensifies, sparking unexpected desires that will upend both their lives. In the present day, Kate, a professor of dance, embarks on a risky affair with a student that threatens to obliterate her career and capsize the new life she has painstakingly created for her reinvented self. When she receives a letter from a man she has long thought dead, Kate is hurled back into the dramas of a past she thought she had left behind. Reviewed by Norah Piehl.
THE GOLDEN SON by Shilpi Somaya Gowda (Fiction)
Audiobook available, narrated by Sunil Malhotra
Anil Patel, the golden son, carries the weight of tradition and his family’s expectations when he leaves his tiny Indian village to begin a medical residency in Dallas, Texas. When his father dies, however, Anil becomes the de facto head of the Patel household and inherits the mantle of arbiter for all of the village’s disputes. Back home in India, Anil’s closest childhood friend, Leena, has trouble adapting to her demanding new husband and relatives. Though Anil and Leena struggle to come to terms with their identities thousands of miles apart, their lives eventually intersect once more --- changing them both and the people they love forever. Reviewed by Bronwyn Miller.
THE HIGH MOUNTAINS OF PORTUGAL by Yann Martel (Urban Fantasy/Magical Realism)
Audiobook available, narrated by Mark Bramhall
A young man experiences tremendous loss, and in his grief takes off on an adventure to re-discover an ancient artifact he believes will change the way we view the world. Years later, a pathologist with a fond love of mystery novels experiences a very strange mystery of his own. Fifty years after all these events have been set in motion, a senator finds that by rescuing a chimpanzee from a research facility, he reacquaints himself with a freedom he forgot he could experience. These three very different stories are all held together by the strings of love and loss. Reviewed by Amy Gwiazdowski.
THE ILLEGAL by Lawrence Hill (Fiction)
Audiobook available, narrated by Gideon Emery
All Keita has ever wanted to do is to run. Running means respect and wealth at home. His native Zantoroland turns out the fastest marathoners on earth. But after his journalist father is killed for his outspoken political views, Keita must flee to the wealthy nation of Freedom State --- a country engaged in a crackdown on all undocumented people. There, Keita becomes a part of the new underground and learns what it means to live as an illegal. As the authorities seek to arrest Keita, he strives to elude capture and ransom his sister, who has been kidnapped. Reviewed by Jana Siciliano.
THE KILLING FOREST by Sara Blaedel (Thriller)
Audiobook available, narrated by Christine Lakin
Following an extended leave, Louise Rick returns to work at the Special Search Agency, an elite unit of the National Police Department. She's assigned a case involving a 15-year-old who vanished a week earlier. When Louise realizes that the missing teenager is the son of a butcher from Hvalsoe, she seizes the opportunity to combine the search for the teen with her personal investigation of her boyfriend's long-ago death. As she moves through the small town's cramped network of deadly connections, Louise unearths toxic truths left unspoken and dangerous secrets. Reviewed by Joe Hartlaub.
MISSING PIECES by Heather Gudenkauf (Thriller)
Audiobook available, narrated by Christina Traister
Sarah Quinlan's husband, Jack, has been haunted for decades by the untimely death of his mother when he was just a teenager. The case rocked the small farm town of Penny Gate, Iowa, where Jack was raised, and for years Jack avoided returning home. But when his beloved aunt Julia is in an accident, Jack and Sarah are forced to confront the past that they have long evaded. Caught in a flurry of unanswered questions, Sarah dives deep into the puzzling rabbit hole of Jack's past. But the farther in she climbs, the harder it is for her to get out. And soon she is faced with a deadly truth she may not be prepared for. Reviewed by Kate Ayers.
NYPD RED 4 by James Patterson and Marshall Karp (Thriller)
Audiobook available, narrated by Edoardo Ballerini and Jay Snyder
Detective Zach Jordan and his partner, Kylie MacDonald, are brilliant and tireless investigators who will stop at nothing to catch a criminal. When a glitzy movie premiere is the scene of a shocking murder and high-stakes robbery, NYPD Red gets the call. Traversing the city's highs and lows, from celebrity penthouses to the depths of Manhattan's criminal underworld, Zach and Kylie have to find a cold-blooded killer before he strikes again. Reviewed by Joe Hartlaub.
PLATINUM DOLL by Anne Girard (Historical Fiction)
Audiobook available, narrated by Leslie Carroll
It's the Roaring Twenties, and 17-year-old Harlean Carpenter McGrew has run off to Beverly Hills. There, she has everything a girl could want, except an outlet for her talent. But everything changes when a dare pushes her to embrace her true ambition --- to be an actress on the silver screen. With her timeless beauty and striking shade of platinum-blond hair, Harlean becomes Jean Harlow. And as she's thrust into the limelight, Jean learns that this new world of opportunity comes with its own set of burdens. Reviewed by Alexis Burling.
THE POISON ARTIST by Jonathan Moore (Psychological Thriller/Mystery)
Audiobook available, narrated by Luke Daniels
Dr. Caleb Maddox is a San Francisco toxicologist studying the chemical effects of pain. After a bruising breakup with his girlfriend, he is drinking whiskey at the speakeasy House of Shields when a hauntingly seductive woman appears by his side. Emmeline whispers to Caleb over absinthe, gets his blood on her fingers, and then brushes his ear with her lips as she says goodbye. He must find her. As his search begins, Caleb becomes entangled in a serial murder investigation. Reviewed by Kate Ayers.
SAVING JASON by Michael Sears (Thriller)
Audiobook available, narrated by David Chandler
Jason Stafford used to be a hot Wall Street trader, went too far, and paid for it in prison. Now a financial investigator, he’s been asked to look into rumors of a hostile takeover of his firm, but he has no idea it will turn his whole life upside down. Suddenly embroiled in a grand jury investigation of Mob-related activities on Wall Street, and threatened by some very serious men, he is thrust into witness protection with his young autistic son. And then his son disappears. Stafford has no choice but to come out of hiding and risk everything to save his son, his firm, his pregnant girlfriend --- and himself. Reviewed by Joe Hartlaub.
SWEETGIRL by Travis Mulhauser (Fiction)
Audiobook available, narrated by Cassandra Morris and MacLeod Andrews
As a blizzard bears down, Percy James sets off to find her troubled mother, Carletta. Fearing she is strung out on meth and that she won’t survive the storm, Percy heads for Shelton Potter’s cabin. Searching the house, she finds the two-bit criminal and his girlfriend drugged into oblivion --- and a crying baby girl. Percy knows she must save her --- a split-second decision that is the beginning of a dangerous odyssey in which she must battle the elements and evade Shelton and a small band of desperate criminals, hell-bent on getting that baby back. Reviewed by Norah Piehl.
WHERE IT HURTS by Reed Farrel Coleman (Hard-boiled Noir Mystery)
Audiobook available, narrated by Chris Andrew Ciulla
Following the loss of his family, Gus Murphy has settled into a mindless, soulless routine that barely keeps his grief at arm’s length. But his comfortable waking trance comes to an end when ex-con Tommy Delcamino asks him for help. Four months earlier, Tommy’s son T.J.’s battered body was discovered in a wooded lot, yet the Suffolk County PD doesn’t seem interested in pursuing the killers. It’s a dangerous favor Gus has taken on as he claws his way back to take a place among the living, while searching through the sewers for a killer. Reviewed by Joe Hartlaub.
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