August 9, 2022

August 9, 2022

In this newsletter, you will find books releasing the weeks of August 8th and August 15th that we think will be of interest to Bookreporter.com readers, along with Bonus News, where we call out a contest, feature or review that we want to let you know about so you have it on your radar.

This week, we are calling attention to our Favorite Monthly Lists & Picks feature for August, which includes Indie Next, LibraryReads, the Barnes & Noble Book Club, Reese's Book Club, the "Read with Jenna" Today Show Book Club, the "Good Morning America" Book Club, and more.

Carol's latest “Bookreporter Talks To” interview is with Casey Sherman, whose book, HELLTOWN: The Untold Story of a Serial Killer on Cape Cod, is our latest True Crime Author Spotlight title. Casey gives readers a real 360-view of the heinous crimes committed by Tony Costa in the summer of 1969 when young women were not just murdered, they were dismembered and violated after their deaths. With the national story of the Manson murders, and the local story of Ted Kennedy and Chappaquiddick, Costa’s rampage never made widespread news, but it has a long and storied history on the Cape.

Casey shares how he came upon the idea of writing this book and his extensive research project, which included seeing some photos with images that are hard to get out of his mind. Also layered into the story are two literary legends --- Kurt Vonnegut and Norman Mailer --- each of whom competed to write about these murders, and the rivalry between them. He also talks about the film adaptation of HELLTOWN, which was signed even before the book was done. Click here to watch the video and here to listen to the podcast.

Upcoming Virtual Book and Author Events

As many book and author events are still happening online these days, we are highlighting a number of them that you may be interested in attending. Click on the links below for more info and to register.

Wednesday, August 10th at 2pm ET: "Bookaccino Live: A Lively Talk About Books": Carol Fitzgerald will present titles releasing between August 9th and September 6th, along with a few from October, that she would like to get on your radar.

Wednesday, August 10th at 6pm ET: The Poisoned Pen Bookstore: Brian Freeman will talk about his new thriller, ROBERT LUDLUM'S THE BOURNE SACRIFICE, which finds Jason Bourne tackling a global media conspiracy.

Thursday, August 11th at 7:30pm ET: The Poisoned Pen Bookstore: Amanda Jayatissa will discuss her latest novel, YOU'RE INVITED, a dangerously addictive thriller about a lavish Sri Lankan wedding celebration that not everyone will survive.

Monday, August 15th at 8pm ET: Random House: Join Random House Group and Brain Lair Books to celebrate ALL GOOD PEOPLE HERE, the propulsive debut from Ashley Flowers, the creator and host of the #1 true crime podcast “Crime Junkie.” The conversation will be moderated by Crime by the Book’s Abby Endler.

Monday, August 15th at 8pm ET: Warwick's: Warwick's will host Mary Dixie Carter as she discusses her debut novel, THE PHOTOGRAPHER (which releases in paperback this month), with Gregg Hurwitz.

Tuesday, August 16th at 3pm ET: Barnes & Noble: Join Barnes & Noble as they welcome #1 New York Times bestselling author Sandra Brown for a live virtual event to celebrate the release of OVERKILL as part of their B&N Midday Mystery Virtual Event series.

This Week's Bonus News:
Our Favorite Monthly Lists & Picks for August

On Sale the Week of August 8th in Hardcover

August 9th

AFTER THE HURRICANE by Leah Franqui (Fiction)
From the outside, Elena Vega’s life appears to be an easy one. But her 20s are aimless and lacking in connection. Something has always been amiss in her life: her father, the brilliant but deeply troubled Santiago Vega. Santiago is the shining star of his migrant family --- the one who made it out and struck it rich --- but he is a haunted man, plagued by trauma, bipolar disorder and alcoholism. He’s lost contact with Elena over the years and returned to San Juan to wrestle his demons alone. Then Hurricane Maria strikes, and Santiago vanishes. Elena crisscrosses the storm-swept island of San Juan and reaches deep into his family tree to find relatives she’s never met, each of whom seems to possess a clue about Santiago’s fate.
William Morrow | 9780063204591

BARK TO THE FUTURE: A Chet & Bernie Mystery by Spencer Quinn (Mystery)
When Chet the dog and his human partner, PI Bernie Little, are approached by a down-and-out older man with a cardboard sign at an exit ramp, Bernie is shocked to discover the man is a former teammate from his high school baseball team. Chet and Bernie take Rocket out for a good meal, and later, Bernie investigates Rocket’s past, trying to figure out what exactly went wrong. Then, Rocket goes suspiciously missing. Bernie goes back to his old high school for answers, where much that he remembers turns out not to be true --- and there are powerful and dangerous people not happy with the questions Bernie is asking. Now, Chet and Bernie are plunged into a dangerous case where the past isn’t dead and the future could be fatal.
Forge Books | 9781250843272

THE DEAL GOES DOWN by Larry Beinhart (Noir Mystery/Thriller)
Ex-private eye Tony Cassella lives in the Catskill mountains, a lonely old tough guy whose body can no longer do what it once did. But a chance encounter with a rich young woman on a train changes everything. He is hired to take care of her superrich, sexual predator husband. That job leads to others, and he joins a small start-up whose mission is to save women from abusive marriages. Provided their spouses are in the top 0.01%. It's a luxury service destined to make great profits. But an old, angry associate is determined to get his cut of Tony’s earnings, murky government agents start to tail him, and when he is sent to the Austrian alps to kill a Russian oligarch and rescue his American wife, all hell breaks loose.
Melville House | 9781612199900

DO NO HARM: A Lucas Page Novel by Robert Pobi (Thriller)
Severely wounded after being caught in an explosion, Lucas Page left the FBI behind and put his focus on rebuilding the rest of his life. But he is uniquely gifted in being able to recognize patterns that elude others, a skill that brings the FBI knocking at his door again and again. Lucas' wife, Erin, loses a friend --- a gifted plastic surgeon --- to suicide, and Lucas begins to realize how many people Erin knew who have died in the past year, in freak accidents and now suicide. Intrigued despite himself, he begins digging through obituaries and realizes that there's a pattern --- a bad one. These deaths don't make sense unless the doctors are being murdered, the target of a particularly clever killer.
Minotaur Books | 9781250793645

THE FAMILY REMAINS by Lisa Jewell (Psychological Thriller)
DCI Samuel Owusu is called to the scene of a gruesome discovery and learns the bones are connected to a cold case that left three people dead 30 years ago. Rachel Rimmer’s husband, Michael, has been found dead in his cellar. The French police need Rachel to answer questions about Michael and his past that she very much doesn’t want to answer. After fleeing London 30 years ago in the wake of a horrific tragedy, Lucy Lamb is coming home. While she settles in with her children and is just about to purchase their first-ever house, her brother takes off to find the boy from their shared past whose memory haunts their present. As they all race to discover answers to these convoluted mysteries, they will come to find that they’re connected in ways they never could have imagined.
Atria Books | 9781982178895

THE FIFTH ACT: America's End in Afghanistan by Elliot Ackerman (Memoir)
Elliot Ackerman left the American military 10 years ago, but his time in Afghanistan and Iraq with the Marines and later as a CIA paramilitary officer marked him indelibly. When the Taliban began to close in on Kabul in August 2021 and the Afghan regime began its death spiral, he found himself pulled back into the conflict. Afghan nationals who had worked closely with the American military and intelligence communities for years now faced brutal reprisal and sought frantically to flee the country with their families. With former colleagues and friends protecting the airport in Kabul, Ackerman joined an impromptu effort by a group of journalists and other veterans to arrange flights and negotiate with both Taliban and American forces to secure the safe evacuation of hundreds.
Penguin Press | 9780593492048

HEAT 2 by Michael Mann and Meg Gardiner (Thriller)
Described by Michael Mann as both a prequel and sequel to the renowned, critically acclaimed movie of the same name, HEAT 2 covers the formative years of homicide detective Vincent Hanna (Al Pacino) and elite criminals Neil McCauley (Robert De Niro), Chris Shiherlis (Val Kilmer) and Nate (Jon Voight). Ranging from the streets of L.A. to the inner sancta of rival Taiwanese crime syndicates in Paraguay to a massive drug cartel money-laundering operation just over the border in Mexico, this new story illuminates the dangerous workings of international crime organizations and the agents who pursue them as it provides a full-blooded portrait of the men and women who inhabit both worlds.
William Morrow | 9780062653314

I REMEMBER YOU by Brian Freeman (Psychological Thriller)
On the Fourth of July, Hallie Evers dies at a rooftop party in Las Vegas. Hours later, she wakes up in the hospital, disoriented but alive. Why can’t she find the doctor who revived her? Why do her memories feel both foreign and familiar? Her self-doubt spirals into crippling paranoia. Hallie knows that mental illness runs in her family. But now even Hallie’s dreams are fraught with details that seem like more than imagination --- vivid images of a city she remembers but has never visited in her life. As she embarks on a cross-country search for answers, Hallie catches glimpses of what feel like another person’s memories. It’s a dark, horrifying, tragic vision…of someone else’s murder. But is any of it real?
Thomas & Mercer | 9781542035088

KOSHERSOUL: The Faith and Food Journey of an African American Jew by Michael W. Twitty (Cooking/History)
In KOSHERSOUL, Michael W. Twitty considers the marriage of two of the most distinctive culinary cultures in the world today: the foods and traditions of the African Atlantic and the global Jewish diaspora. To Twitty, the creation of African-Jewish cooking is a conversation of migrations and a dialogue of diasporas offering a rich background for inventive recipes and the people who create them. The question that most intrigues him is not just who makes the food, but how the food makes the people. Jews of Color are not outliers, Twitty contends, but significant and meaningful cultural creators in both Black and Jewish civilizations. The book also explores how food has shaped the journeys of numerous cooks, including Twitty’s own passage to and within Judaism.
Amistad | 9780062891754

THE LAST KARANKAWAS by Kimberly Garza (Fiction)
A popular tourist destination and major shipping port, Galveston attracts millions of visitors each year. Yet of those who come to drink by the beach, few stray from the boulevards to Fish Village, the neighborhood home to individuals who for generations have powered the island. Carly Castillo has only ever known Fish Village. Her grandmother claims that they descend from the Karankawas, an extinct indigenous Texan tribe, thereby tethering them to Galveston. But as Carly ages, she begins to imagine a life elsewhere. When word spreads of a storm gathering strength offshore, building into Hurricane Ike, each Galveston resident must make a difficult decision: board up the windows and hunker down, or flee inland and abandon their hard-won homes.
Henry Holt and Co. | 9781250819857

LIFE ON THE MISSISSIPPI: An Epic American Adventure by Rinker Buck (Memoir/History)
Rinker Buck returns to chronicle his latest incredible adventure: building a wooden flatboat from the bygone era of the early 1800s and journeying down the Mississippi River to New Orleans. A modern-day Huck Finn, Buck casts off down the river on the flatboat Patience accompanied by an eccentric crew of daring shipmates. Over the course of his voyage, he steers his fragile wooden craft through narrow channels dominated by massive cargo barges, rescues his first mate gone overboard, sails blindly through fog, breaks his ribs not once but twice, and camps every night on sandbars, remote islands and steep levees. As he charts his own journey, he also delivers a richly satisfying work of history that brings to life a lost era.
Simon & Schuster | 9781501106378

LONG GONE: A Detective Annalisa Vega Novel by Joanna Schaffhausen (Mystery)
Chicago detective Annalisa Vega shattered her life, personally and professionally, when she turned in her ex-cop father for his role in a murder. Her family can’t forgive her. Her fellow officers no longer trust her. So when detective Leo Hammond turns up dead in a bizarre murder, Annalisa thinks she has nothing to lose by investigating whatever secrets he hid behind the thin blue line. Annalisa quickly zeroes in on someone who had good reason to want Hammond dead: a wealthy, fast-talking car salesman who’d gotten away with murder once and wasn’t about to let Hammond take a second shot. Moe Bocks remains the number one suspect in his girlfriend’s brutal unsolved death, and now he has a new woman in his sights --- Annalisa’s best friend.
Minotaur Books | ‎9781250264633

A MAP FOR THE MISSING by Belinda Huijuan Tang (Fiction)
Tang Yitian has been living in America for almost a decade when he receives an urgent phone call from his mother: his father has disappeared from the family’s rural village in China. Though they have been estranged for years, Yitian promises to come home. When Yitian attempts to piece together what may have happened, he struggles to navigate China’s impenetrable bureaucracy as an outsider, and his mother’s evasiveness only deepens the mystery. So he seeks out a childhood friend who may be in a position to help: Tian Hanwen. Reuniting for the first time as adults, Yitian and Hanwen embark on the search for Yitian’s father, all the while grappling with the past --- who Yitian’s father really was, and what might have been.
Penguin Press | 9780593300664

MIDNIGHT ON THE MARNE by Sarah Adlakha (Historical Fiction)
France, 1918. Nurse Marcelle Marchand has important secrets to keep. Her role as a spy has put her in extreme danger from the approaching German army. American soldier George Mountcastle feels an instant connection to the young nurse. But in times of war, love must wait. Soon, George and his best friend, Philip, are fighting for their lives during the Second Battle of the Marne, where George prevents Philip from a daring act that might have won the battle at the cost of his own life. On the run from a victorious Germany, George and Marcelle begin a new life with Philip and Marcelle’s twin sister, Rosalie, in a brutally occupied France. Years pass, and tragedy strikes, sending George on a course that could change the past and rewrite history.
Forge Books | 9781250774590

THE NEIGHBORHOOD by Matthew Betley (Thriller)
Welcome to Hidden Refuge, a normal American subdivision full of normal American suburbanites. At least that's what the citizens thought before men impersonating police officers show up on their doorsteps in the middle of the night. Once the entire community is under siege, so begins a long, dark night that will prove to be anything but ordinary. But Zack Chambers, suburban family man and programmer by trade, has his own secret. One he had dearly hoped that he’d never need to use again. The deadly ex–CIA agent and trained operative plots to take back the night, doing whatever it takes to protect his neighborhood. In the face of a small army of trained killers, he has his wits, his babysitter, his equally lethal brother and a ragtag group of neighbors willing to help.
Blackstone Publishing | 9781665064620

NEVER GO HOME by Christopher Swann (Thriller)
Orphaned at age 10 by a violent home invasion, Susannah Faulkner grew up wild but is determined to wring something decent from the world before she leaves it. Then she gets word that her brother, Ethan, needs her help and returns home to Atlanta. But in the airport, she finds her Uncle Gavin suffering a heart attack. Before he is rushed to the hospital, Gavin whispers a single word to Suzie: Peaches. She’s determined to uncover the meaning behind the cryptic message, but Ethan is also deep in trouble. An ex-soldier and ex-con named Finn appeared on his doorstep with a disturbing story: 15 years earlier, Finn served with their father in Iraq, where they stole millions in cash. Now the money is missing, and Finn wants his share --- or else.
Crooked Lane Books | 9781639100828

PATH LIT BY LIGHTNING: The Life of Jim Thorpe by David Maraniss (Sports/Biography)
Jim Thorpe rose to world fame as a mythic talent who excelled at every sport. He won gold medals in the decathlon and pentathlon at the 1912 Stockholm Olympics, was an All-American football player at the Carlisle Indian School, the star of the first class of the Pro Football Hall of Fame, and played major league baseball for John McGraw’s New York Giants. Even in a golden age of sports celebrities, he was one of a kind. But despite his colossal skills, Thorpe’s life was a struggle against the odds. For all his travails, though, Thorpe did not succumb. The man survived, complications and all, and so did the myth.
Simon & Schuster | 9781476748412

THE RULE OF THREE by E. G. Scott (Domestic Thriller)
Once a week, three women get together for book club in Kingsland, a private, gated community full of neighbors looking to do their business away from prying eyes. On the same night, their husbands meet up to play poker, where much more is being planned than anyone could guess. But on this particular night, something goes terribly wrong. When all three men end up dead or hospitalized, and the entire town is being questioned, no one seems to be able to answer the only question that really needs asking: What the hell happened?
Dutton | 9780593185445

SISTER FRIENDS FOREVER by Kimberla Lawson Roby (Fiction)
Serena, Michelle, Kenya and Lynette have been best friends since they were small children. And as sister friends forever, they have always been there for one another, through good times and bad. This year is a crucial turning point for each woman. Serena, still single, is questioning why love hasn’t found her yet. Michelle is engaged and ready to walk down the aisle --- until an old flame strolls back into her life. Kenya is happily married, but at the same time, her husband’s ex-wife won’t allow them or their family to live in peace. And Lynette’s divorce from her cheating husband has her nervously dating for the first time in well over a decade. During this difficult period, their friendship will be tested like never before.
Grand Central Publishing | 9781538708958

STAY AWAKE by Megan Goldin (Psychological Thriller)
Liv Reese wakes up in the back of a taxi with no idea where she is or how she got there. When she’s dropped off at the door of her brownstone, a stranger answers --- a stranger who claims to live in her apartment. Her hands are covered in scribbled messages, like graffiti on her skin: STAY AWAKE. Two years ago, Liv was thriving as a successful writer for a trendy magazine. Now, she’s lost and disoriented in a New York City that looks nothing like what she remembers. She’s horrified to see news reports of a crime scene where the victim’s blood has been used to scrawl a message across a window, similar to the message that’s inked on her hands. What did she do last night? And why does she remember nothing from the past two years?
St. Martin's Press | 9781250280664

THE WOMEN COULD FLY by Megan Giddings (Dystopian Fiction)
Josephine Thomas has heard every conceivable theory about her mother's disappearance. The most worrying charge is that she was a witch. In a world where witches are real, peculiar behavior raises suspicions, and a woman --- especially a Black woman --- can find herself on trial for witchcraft. Fourteen years have passed, and Jo is finally ready to let go of the past. Yet her future is in doubt. The State mandates that all women marry by the age of 30 --- or enroll in a registry that allows them to be monitored, effectively forfeiting their autonomy. At 28, Jo is ambivalent about marriage. When she’s offered the opportunity to honor one last request from her mother's will, Jo leaves her regular life to feel connected to her one last time.
Amistad | 9780063116993

YOU'RE INVITED by Amanda Jayatissa (Psychological Thriller)
When Amaya is invited to Kaavi’s over-the-top wedding in Sri Lanka, she is surprised and a little hurt to hear from her former best friend after so many years of radio silence. But when Amaya learns that the groom is her very own ex-boyfriend, she is consumed by a single thought: She must stop the wedding from happening, no matter the cost. But as the week of wedding celebrations begin and rumors about Amaya’s past begin to swirl, she can’t help but feel like she also has a target on her back. When Kaavi goes missing and is presumed dead, all evidence points to Amaya. However, nothing is as it seems as Amanda Jayatissa expertly unravels that each wedding guest has their own dark secret and agenda, and Amaya may not be the only one with a plan to keep the bride from getting her happily ever after.
Berkley | 9780593335123

On Sale the Week of August 8th in Paperback

August 9th

THE ALMOST LEGENDARY MORRIS SISTERS: A True Story of Family Fiction by Julie Klam (Memoir)
Ever since she was young, Julie Klam has been fascinated by the Morris sisters, cousins of her grandmother. According to family lore, early in the 20th century, the sisters’ parents decided to move the family from Eastern Europe to Los Angeles so their father could become a movie director. On the way, their pregnant mother went into labor in St. Louis, where the baby was born and where their mother died. The father left the children in an orphanage and promised to send for them when he settled in California --- a promise he never kept. The stories of these independent women intrigued Klam, but as she delved into them to learn more, she realized that the tales were almost completely untrue.
Riverhead Books | 9780735216433

THE ARCHER by Shruti Swamy (Fiction)
Vidya’s childhood is marked by the shattering absence and then the bewildering reappearance of her mother and baby brother. Longing for connection with her brilliant and increasingly troubled mother, Vidya navigates the stifling expectations of her life with a vivid imagination until one day she peeks into a classroom where girls are learning kathak, a dazzling, centuries-old dance form that requires the utmost discipline and focus. Her pursuit of artistic transcendence through kathak soon becomes the organizing principle of her life, even as she leaves home for college and falls in complicated love with her best friend. As the uncertain future looms, she ultimately must confront the tensions between romantic love, her art and the legacy of her own imperfect mother.
Algonquin Books | 9781643752549

BRONZE DRUM: A Novel of Sisters and War by Phong Nguyen (Historical Fiction)
Paperback Original
In 40 CE, in the Au Lac region of ancient Vietnam, two daughters of a Vietnamese Lord fill their days training, studying and trying to stay true to Vietnamese traditions. While Trung Trac is disciplined and wise, always excelling in her duty, Trung Nhi is fierce and free-spirited, more concerned with spending time in the gardens and with lovers. But these sisters' lives --- and the lives of their people --- are shadowed by the oppressive rule of the Han Chinese. When Trung Trac and Trung Nhi's father is executed, their world comes crashing down around them. With no men to save them against the Han's encroaching regime, they must rise and unite the women of Vietnam into an army.
Grand Central Publishing | 9781538753705

DAUGHTER OF THE MORNING STAR: A Longmire Mystery by Craig Johnson (Mystery)
When Lolo Long's niece Jaya begins receiving death threats, Tribal Police Chief Long calls on Absaroka County Sheriff Walt Longmire along with Henry Standing Bear as lethal backup. Jaya "Longshot" Long is the phenom of the Lame Deer Lady Stars High School basketball team and is following in the steps of her older sister, who disappeared a year previously, a victim of the scourge of missing Native Woman in Indian Country. Lolo hopes that having Longmire involved might draw some public attention to the girl's plight, but with this maneuver she also inadvertently places the good sheriff in a one-on-one with the deadliest adversary he has ever faced in both this world and the next.
Penguin Books | 9780593297278

EVERYBODY: A Book About Freedom by Olivia Laing (Biography & Memoir/Cultural Studies)
The body is a source of pleasure and of pain, at once hopelessly vulnerable and radiant with power. In her sixth book, Olivia Laing charts an electrifying course through the long struggle for bodily freedom, using the life of the renegade psychoanalyst Wilhelm Reich to explore gay rights and sexual liberation, feminism and the civil rights movement. Drawing on her own experiences in protest and alternative medicine, and traveling from Weimar Berlin to the prisons of McCarthy-era America, Laing grapples with some of the most significant and complicated figures of the past century --- among them Nina Simone, Christopher Isherwood, Andrea Dworkin, Sigmund Freud, Susan Sontag and Malcolm X.
W. W. Norton & Company | 9781324022022

GONE FOR GOOD by Joanna Schaffhausen (Mystery)
The Lovelorn Killer murdered seven women, ritually binding them and leaving them for dead before penning them gruesome love letters in the local papers. Then he disappeared, and there hasn’t been a trace of him in 20 years. Grace Harper, who uses her snooping skills as part of an amateur sleuth group, believes that the Lovelorn Killer is still living in the same neighborhoods in which he hunted. If she can figure out how he selected his victims, she will have the key to his identity. Detective Annalisa Vega lost someone she loved to the killer. Now she's at a murder scene with the worst kind of déjà vu: Grace Harper lies bound and dead on the floor, surrounded by clues to the biggest murder case that Chicago homicide never solved.
Minotaur Books | 9781250847614

HARLEM SHUFFLE by Colson Whitehead (Historical Fiction)
To his customers and neighbors on 125th Street, Ray Carney is an upstanding salesman of reasonably priced furniture, making a decent life for himself and his family. Few people know he descends from a line of uptown hoods and crooks, and that his façade of normalcy has more than a few cracks in it. Cracks that are getting bigger all the time. As Ray navigates this double life, he begins to see who actually pulls the strings in Harlem. Can he avoid getting killed; save his cousin, Freddie, who falls in with a crew who plan to rob the Hotel Theresa (the “Waldorf of Harlem”); and grab his share of the big score, all while maintaining his reputation as the go-to source for all your quality home furniture needs?
Anchor | 9780525567271

THE HOUSE OF ASHES by Stuart Neville (Psychological Thriller/Mystery)
Sara Keane’s husband, Damien, has uprooted them from England and moved them to his native Northern Ireland for a “fresh start” in the wake of her nervous breakdown. Sara, who knows no one in Northern Ireland, is jobless, carless and friendless. When a blood-soaked old woman beats on the door, insisting the house is hers before being bundled back to her care facility, Sara begins to understand the house has a terrible history her husband never intended for her to discover. As the two women form a bond over their shared traumas, Sara finds the strength to stand up to her abuser, and Mary --- silent for six decades --- is finally ready to tell her story.
Soho Crime | 9781641293723

MR. PERFECT ON PAPER by Jean Meltzer (Romantic Comedy)
Paperback Original
As the creator and CEO of the popular Jewish dating app J-Mate, matchmaker Dara Rabinowitz knows the formula for lasting love --- at least, for everyone else. When it comes to her own love life, she’s been idling indefinitely. Until her beloved bubbe shares Dara’s checklist for “The Perfect Jewish Husband” on national television, and charming news anchor Chris Steadfast proposes they turn Dara’s search into must-see TV. As a non-Jewish single dad, Chris doesn’t check any of Dara’s boxes. But her hunt for Mr. Perfect is the ratings boost his show desperately needs. If only Chris could ignore his own pesky attraction to Dara --- a task much easier said than done when Dara starts questioning if “perfect on paper” can compete with how hard she’s falling for Chris.
Mira | 9780778386162

THE READING LIST by Sara Nisha Adams (Fiction)
Widower Mukesh lives a quiet life after losing his beloved wife. Aleisha is a bright but anxious teenager working at the local library for the summer when she discovers a crumpled-up piece of paper in the back of TO KILL A MOCKINGBIRD. It’s a list of novels that she’s never heard of before. Intrigued, and a little bored with her slow job at the checkout desk, she impulsively decides to read every book on the list, one after the other. As each story gives up its magic, the books transport Aleisha from the painful realities she’s facing at home. When Mukesh arrives at the library, desperate to forge a connection with his bookworm granddaughter, Aleisha passes along the reading list…hoping that it will be a lifeline for him too.
William Morrow Paperbacks | 9780063025295

ROBERT E. LEE: A Life by Allen C. Guelzo (Biography)
Robert E. Lee is one of the most confounding figures in American history. Lee betrayed his nation in order to defend his home state and uphold the slave system he claimed to oppose. He was a traitor to the country he swore to serve as an Army officer, and yet he was admired even by his enemies for his composure and leadership. He considered slavery immoral, but benefited from inherited slaves and fought to defend the institution. And behind his genteel demeanor and perfectionism lurked the insecurities of a man haunted by the legacy of a father who stained the family name by declaring bankruptcy and who disappeared when Lee was just six years old. Award-winning historian Allen Guelzo captures Robert E. Lee in all his complexity.
Vintage | 9781101912225

SIERRA SIX: A Gray Man Novel by Mark Greaney (Thriller)
Before he was the Gray Man, Court Gentry was Sierra Six, the junior member of a CIA action team. In their first mission they took out a terrorist leader, at a terrible price. Years have passed. The Gray Man is on a simple mission when he sees a ghost: the long-dead terrorist, but he's remarkably energetic for a dead man. A decade of time hasn't changed the Gray Man. He isn't one to leave a job unfinished or a blood debt unpaid.
Berkley | 9780593099018

SUMMER LIGHT, AND THEN COMES THE NIGHT written by Jón Kalman Stefánsson, translated by Philip Roughton (Fiction)
In a village of only 400 inhabitants, life could seem unremarkable. Yet in this remote town, a new road to the city has change on everyone’s minds. There is the beautiful, elusive Elisabet who cuts a surprisingly svelte path at The Knitting Company. Neighbors Kristin and Kjartan who seem…normal, but for their explosive passion that bewilders even themselves (and ignites the spectacular revenge of Kjartan’s wife). And then the most successful businessman in town decides to ditch his Range Rover and glamorous wife in exchange for Latin books and stargazing.
HarperVia | 9780063136489

THIS WILL ALL BE OVER SOON: A Memoir by Cecily Strong (Memoir)
Cecily Strong had a special bond with her cousin, Owen. And so she was devastated when, in early 2020, he passed away at age 30 from the brain cancer glioblastoma. Before Strong could attempt to process her grief, another tragedy struck: the coronavirus pandemic. Following a few harrowing weeks in the virus epicenter of New York City, Strong relocated to an isolated house in the woods upstate. Here, trying to make sense of Owen’s death and the upended world, she spent much of the ensuing months writing. The result is THIS WILL ALL BE OVER SOON --- a raw, unflinching memoir about loss, love, laughter and hope.
Simon & Schuster | 9781982168353

WHAT HAPPENED TO THE BENNETTS by Lisa Scottoline (Thriller)
Jason Bennett is driving his family home after his daughter’s field hockey game when a pickup truck begins tailgating them. Suddenly two men jump from the pickup and pull guns on Jason, demanding the car. A horrific flash of violence changes his life forever. Later that awful night, Jason and his family receive a visit from the FBI. The carjackers were members of a dangerous drug-trafficking organization, and now Jason and his family are in their crosshairs. The agents advise them to enter the witness protection program, and they have no choice but to agree. The Bennetts begin to fall apart at the seams. Then Jason learns a shocking truth and realizes that he has to take matters into his own hands.
G.P. Putnam’s Sons | 9780525539759

WIDOWLAND by C. J. Carey (Alternate History/Dystopian Thriller)
Paperback Original
Thirteen years have passed since England surrendered to the Nazis and formed a Grand Alliance with Germany. It was forced to adopt many of its oppressive ideologies, one of which was the strict classification of women into hierarchical groups based on the perceived value they brought to society. Rose Ransom, a member of the privileged Geli class, works for the Ministry of Culture, rewriting the classics of English literature to ensure there are no subversive thoughts that will give women any ideas. Outbreaks of insurgency have been seen across the country, and suspicion has fallen on Widowland, the run-down slums where childless women over 50 have been banished. Rose is given the dangerous task of infiltrating Widowland to find the source of the rebellion.
Sourcebooks Landmark | 9781728248448

On Sale the Week of August 15th in Hardcover

August 15th

DIANA, WILLIAM, AND HARRY: The Heartbreaking Story of a Princess and Mother by James Patterson and Chris Mooney (Biography)
From the moments William and Harry are born into the House of Windsor, they become their young mother’s whole world. Diana is faced with a seemingly impossible challenge: one son destined to be King of England and another determined to find his own way. She teaches them to honor royal tradition, even while daring to break it. “Sometimes I’d like a time machine…” Diana says as William and Harry grow up, never imagining they’d have less than a lifetime together. Even after she’s gone, her sons follow their mother’s lead --- and her heart. As the years pass and William and Harry grow into adulthood and form families of their own, they carry on Diana’s name, her likeness and her incomparable spirit.
Little, Brown and Company | 9780759554221

August 16th

ALL GOOD PEOPLE HERE by Ashley Flowers (Mystery/Thriller)
Two decades ago, six-year-old January Jacobs was discovered in a ditch hours after her family awoke to find her gone. Her killer was never brought to justice. Margot Davies, her next-door neighbor, is now a big-city journalist, but she’s always been haunted by the feeling that she could've suffered the same fate as January. When Margot returns home to help care for her uncle after he's diagnosed with early-onset dementia, she feels like she’s walked into a time capsule. Then news breaks about five-year-old Natalie Clark from the next town over, who’s gone missing under circumstances eerily similar to January’s. With all the old feelings rushing back, Margot vows to find Natalie and solve January’s murder once and for all. But the police, Natalie’s family and the townspeople all seem to be hiding something.
Bantam | 9780593496473

AMY & LAN by Sadie Jones (Fiction)
Amy Connell and Lan Honey are having the best childhood ever. They live on a 78-acre farm in the South West of England, with sisters and brothers, other kids, chickens, goats, three dogs and even a calf, called Gabriella Christmas. “Honeys in the Farmhouse, Connells in the Cowhouse, Hodges in the Carthouse…” The three sets of parents are best friends who came to Frith from the city, and are learning, year after year, how to farm the land. Free and unsupervised, Amy and Lan play with axes and climb on haystacks, but there is grownup danger at Frith they don't see. It's Gail, Lan's mother, and Adam, Amy's father, who should be more careful. They should learn what kids know: never to play with fire.
Harper | 9780063240902

THE BLAME GAME by Sandie Jones (Psychological Thriller)
As a psychologist specializing in domestic abuse, Naomi has found it hard to avoid becoming overly invested in her clients’ lives. But after helping Jacob make the decision to leave his wife, Naomi worries that she’s taken things too far. Then Jacob goes missing, and her files on him vanish. But as the police start asking questions about Jacob, Naomi’s own dark past emerges. And as the truth comes to light, it seems that it’s not just her clients who are in danger.
Minotaur Books | 9781250836908

THE CHALLENGE by Danielle Steel (Fiction)
Fishtail, Montana, is home to Anne and Pitt Pollock, who own the successful Pollock ranch. The sprawling foothills of the Beartooth Mountains surround the town, overlooking the Pollocks’ property and the nearby ranch belonging to Bill and Pattie Brown. The two couples have known each other since childhood. Their sons, Peter Pollock and Matt Brown, are also the best of friends. When they and two other local kids meet new girl Juliet Marshall, the five of them are soon inseparable. But one afternoon, their latest adventure takes a dangerous turn when they find themselves trapped on Granite Peak. In the aftermath of this fateful event, devastating secrets are revealed, new love appears on the horizon, and families are forced to reconsider what they once held dear.
Delacorte Press | 9781984821614

ELIZABETH FINCH by Julian Barnes (Fiction)
Julian Barnes’ novel of platonic unrequited love springs into being around the singular character of the stoic, exacting Professor Elizabeth Finch. Neil, the narrator, takes her class “Culture and Civilisation,” taught not for undergraduates but for adults of all ages. We are drawn into his intellectual crush on this private, withholding yet commanding woman. While other personal relationships and even his family drift from Neil’s grasp, Elizabeth’s application of her material to the matter of daily living remains important to him, even after her death, in a way that nothing else does.
Knopf | 9780593535431

FIRESTORM: A Garrett Kohl Novel by Taylor Moore (Thriller/Adventure)
Special Agent Garrett Kohl has just taken down a dangerous and deadly cartel boss when he finds trouble brewing back on his family’s homestead. A powerful energy consortium, Talon Corporation, has started an aggressive mining operation that threatens to destroy Garrett’s land, his family’s way of life, and everything they hold dear. To achieve its goals, Talon is flouting the law, bribing public officials, and meeting anyone who challenges it with physical violence. When the Kohls themselves are attacked by Talon guards, Garrett goes on the offensive, embarking on an investigation that he hopes will rid the Texas High Plains of the intruders once and for all.
William Morrow | 9780063066557

A HISTORY OF PRESENT ILLNESS by Anna DeForest (Fiction)
A young woman puts on a white coat for her first day as a student doctor. So begins A HISTORY OF PRESENT ILLNESS, which follows our unnamed narrator through cadaver dissection, surgical rotation, difficult births, sudden deaths and a budding relationship with a seminarian. In the troubled world of the hospital, where the language of blood tests and organ systems so often hides the heart of the matter, she works her way from one bed to another --- from a man dying of substance use and tuberculosis, to a child in pain crisis, to a young woman, fading from confusion to aphasia to death. The long hours and heartrending work begin to blur the lines between her new life as a physician and the lifelong traumas she has fled.
Little, Brown and Company | 9780316381062

THE HOUSEKEEPER by Joy Fielding (Domestic Thriller)
Jodi Bishop is a top-notch real estate agent. Her husband, Harrison, is a middling writer who resents his wife’s success. Jodi’s father, Vic, is a very controlling man. His wife, Audrey, was herself no shrinking violet. But things changed when Audrey developed Parkinson’s 10 years ago, and now Jodi starts interviewing housekeepers to help care for her parents. She settles on Elyse Woodley, an energetic and attractive widow who seems perfect for the job. Jodi is pleased to have an ally, someone she can talk to and occasionally even confide in. Until Elyse shuts Jodi out. And Audrey’s condition worsens --- rapidly. Who is this woman suddenly wearing her mother’s jewelry? What is she after? And how far will she go to get it?
Ballantine Books | 9780593158920

IN THE PINES by Kendra Elliot (Mystery/Thriller)
A national treasure hunt with a $2 million prize has driven obsessed fortune seekers to overrun the small town of Eagle’s Nest, Oregon. The hunt’s cryptic clues and the lure of wealth have exposed the desperate side of human greed. Police chief Truman Daly craves peace in his town but has a murder on his hands instead. Now the big prize isn’t the only thing hiding in the pines. So is a killer. When a young boy walks into the local café and claims his mother and baby sister have been missing for weeks, FBI special agent Mercy Kilpatrick investigates and exposes a disturbing twist in his story. Deep family secrets and lies that started 60 years ago have burst into the present, bringing with them deadly consequences.
Montlake | 9781542029711

THE LAST HOUSEWIFE by Ashley Winstead (Psychological Thriller)
While in college in upstate New York, Shay Evans and her best friends met a captivating man who seduced them with a web of lies about the way the world works. By senior year, Shay and her friend, Laurel, were the only ones who managed to escape. But when she hears the horrifying news of Laurel's death eight years later --- delivered by her favorite true-crime podcast crusader --- she begins to suspect that the past she thought she buried is still very much alive. Recruiting the help of the podcast host, Shay goes back to the place she vowed never to return to in search of answers. As she follows the threads of her friend's life, she's pulled into a dark, seductive world, where wealth and privilege shield brutal philosophies that feel all too familiar.
Sourcebooks Landmark | 9781728229911

LINE OF DARKNESS: A Colleen Hayes Mystery by Max Tomlinson (Mystery)
When a German businesswoman in 1979 San Francisco hires ex-con PI Colleen Hayes to find a missing relative, supposedly in town to visit, she thinks it’s a simple job. But she soon discovers that the “nephew” is linked to an international vigilante group hunting down ex-Nazis. Then the body of a mysterious woman turns up on San Francisco’s Municipal Railway, mirroring a murder committed the week before in Buenos Aires where the “nephew” had just been. Colleen’s search uncovers a World War II banknote and the 1942 SS ID of a German officer long thought dead. When Colleen fails to heed warnings to stop her investigation, her pregnant daughter is attacked.
Oceanview Publishing | 9781608094523

OVERKILL by Sandra Brown (Thriller)
Former Super Bowl MVP quarterback Zach Bridger’s ex-wife, Rebecca Pratt, has been placed on life support after a violent assault. Four years later, her attacker, Eban --- the scion of a wealthy family in Atlanta --- gets an early release from prison. State prosecutor Kate Lennon is determined to bring him to justice. Rebecca’s parents have kept her alive all these years, but if she were to die, Eban could be retried on a new charge: murder. It isn’t lost on Zach that in order for Eban to be charged with Rebecca’s murder, Zach must actually be the one to kill her. Eban, realizing the jeopardy he’s in, plots to make certain that neither Zach nor Kate lives to see the death of Rebecca --- and the end of his freedom.
Grand Central Publishing | 9781538752012

RAISING LAZARUS: Hope, Justice, and the Future of America's Overdose Crisis by Beth Macy (Business & Economics/Pharmaceutical & Biotechnology)
Nearly a decade into the second wave of America's overdose crisis, pharmaceutical companies have yet to answer for the harms they created. As pending court battles against opioid makers, distributors and retailers drag on, addiction rates have soared to record-breaking levels during the COVID pandemic. Meanwhile, there is scant consensus between law enforcement and medical leaders, nor an understanding of how to truly scale the programs that are out there, working at the ragged edge of capacity and actually saving lives. In RAISING LAZARUS, Beth Macy takes us into the country’s hardest hit places to witness the devastating personal costs that one-third of America's families are now being forced to shoulder.
Little, Brown and Company | 9780316430227

RUN TIME by Catherine Ryan Howard (Psychological Thriller)
Feeling her stardom fading, struggling soap actress Adele Rafferty is ready to give up on her dreams when she gets a last-minute offer to play the lead in an upcoming horror film, Final Draft. Could this be her big break? Will she have redemption for what happened the last time she was on a film set? Adele doesn’t think twice before signing on the dotted line. Adele quickly makes her way to the set, deep into the isolated and wintry woods of West Cork, Ireland, miles away from civilization and cell service. When real life on the set starts to somehow mirror the sinister events portrayed in the script, Adele fears the real horror lies off the page. Isolated and unsure who in the crew she can trust, is there anywhere or any time left to run?
Blackstone Publishing | 9781982694685

STORIES FROM THE TENANTS DOWNSTAIRS by Sidik Fofana (Fiction/Short Stories)
Each short story in Sidik Fofana’s electrifying collection follows a tenant in the Banneker Homes, a low-income high-rise in Harlem where gentrification weighs on everyone’s mind. There's Swan, whose excitement about his friend’s release from prison jeopardizes the life he’s been trying to lead. Mimi hustles to raise the child she had with Swan, waitressing at Roscoe’s and doing hair on the side. And Quanneisha B. Miles, a former gymnast with a good education, wishes she could leave Banneker for good but can’t seem to escape the building’s gravitational pull. We root for these characters and more as they weave in and out of each other’s lives, endeavoring to escape from their pasts and blaze new paths forward for themselves and the people they love.
Scribner | 9781982145811

TOUCH by Olaf Olafsson (Fiction)
When the pandemic hits, Kristofer is forced to shutter his successful restaurant in Reykjavik, sending him into a spiral of uncertainty, even as his memory seems to be failing. But an uncanny bolt from the blue --- a message from Miko Nakamura, a woman whom he had known in the ’60s when they were students in London --- both inspires and rattles him, as he is drawn inexorably back into a love story that has marked him for life. Even as the pandemic upends his world, Kristofer finds himself pulled toward an answer to the mystery of Miko’s sudden departure decades before, compelling him to travel to London and Japan as the virus threatens to shut everything down.
Ecco | 9780063226982

On Sale the Week of August 15th in Paperback

August 16th

THE ACTUAL STAR by Monica Byrne (Speculative/Science Fiction)
THE ACTUAL STAR takes readers on a journey over two millennia and six continents. Braided together are the stories of a pair of teenage twins who ascend the throne of a Maya kingdom; a young American woman on a trip of self-discovery in Belize; and two dangerous charismatics vying for the leadership of a new religion and racing toward a confrontation that will determine the fate of the few humans left on Earth after massive climate change. In each era, a reincarnated trinity of souls navigates the entanglements of tradition and progress, sister and stranger, and love and hate --- until all of their age-old questions about the nature of existence converge deep underground, where only in complete darkness can they truly see.
Harper Voyager | 9780063002906

THE BOOK OF DELIGHTS: Essays by Ross Gay (Essays)
In THE BOOK OF DELIGHTS, award-winning poet Ross Gay offers up a genre-defying volume of lyric essays written over one tumultuous year. His first nonfiction book is a record of the small joys we often overlook in our busy lives. Among Gay’s funny, poetic, philosophical delights: a friend’s unabashed use of air quotes, cradling a tomato seedling aboard an airplane, the silent nod of acknowledgment between the only two Black people in a room. But Gay never dismisses the complexities, even the terrors, of living in America as a Black man, the ecological and psychic violence of our consumer culture, or the loss of those he loves. More than anything else, though, Gay celebrates the beauty of the natural world --- his garden, the flowers peeking out of the sidewalk, the hypnotic movements of a praying mantis.
Algonquin Books | 9781643753287

THE DEEPEST BLACK by Randall Silvis (Mystery)
Paperback Original
Acclaimed author Randall Silvis is looking for a story --- any story to follow up the series of gripping mystery novels that catapulted him to success. And then, out of nowhere, a story appears. A mysterious stranger named Thomas Kennaday tips Silvis off about a series of murders in a small Pennsylvania town, sending Silvis off on a tentative investigation in hopes of finding material for his next novel. What Silvis discovers is much more than a typical small-town murder case, and it soon becomes clear that Kennaday, who seems to have disappeared into thin air, is somehow pulling the strings of the investigation from behind the scenes.
Poisoned Pen Press | 9781728223612

FRIENDS LIKE THESE by Kimberly McCreight (Psychological Thriller)
Six college friends have reunited for a glamorous weekend in the Catskills, a decade after a fatal accident that nearly destroyed them. Keith, once the ringleader of the group, is spiraling into addiction and stands at the edge of losing it all. This weekend is the last chance to save him. But Keith is not the only one who needs saving. By dawn on Sunday morning, a car has been found deep in the woods --- one of the friends is dead, another is missing. When a local detective turns up to investigate, it’s clear the group is hiding something ominous. Haunted by her sister’s murder years ago, Detective Julia Scutt has her own share of problems. But she is a skilled detective and knows a rehearsed story when she hears one. It is up to Julia to untangle a decade-long web of friendship, lies and betrayals to discover the truth.
Harper Paperbacks | 9780063061576

HEATWAVE by Victor Jestin (Fiction)
Seventeen-year-old Leo is sitting in an empty playground at night, listening to the sound of partying and pop music filtering in from the beach, when he sees another, more popular boy strangle himself with the ropes of the swings. Then, in a panic, Leo drags him to the beach and buries him. Over the next 24 hours, Leo wanders around the campsite like a sleepwalker, haunted by guilt and fear, and distracted by his desire for a girl named Luce. Meanwhile, the teenage summer rituals continue all around him --- the fighting and flirting, the smell of salt and sunscreen, the tinny announcements from the loudspeaker, and above all, the crushing, relentless heat.
Scribner | 9781982143497

THE HUMAN ZOO by Sabina Murray (Fiction)
Filipino-American Christina “Ting” Klein has just traveled from New York to Manila, both to escape her imminent divorce, and to begin research for a biography of Timicheg, an indigenous Filipino brought to America at the start of the 20th century to be exhibited as part of a "human zoo." It has been one year since Procopio “Copo” Gumboc swept the elections in an upset and took power as president. Arriving unannounced at her aging aunt’s aristocratic home, Ting quickly falls into upper-class Manila life. To make her way, she must balance the aristocratic traditions of her extended family, seemingly at odds with both situation and circumstance, as well as temper her stance towards a regime her loved ones are struggling to survive.
Grove Press | 9780802157515

LOVE IN THE TIME OF SERIAL KILLERS by Alicia Thompson (Romantic Comedy)
Paperback Original
PhD candidate Phoebe Walsh has always been obsessed with true crime. She's even analyzing the genre in her dissertation --- if she can manage to finish writing it. It's hard to find the time while she spends the summer in Florida, cleaning out her childhood home, dealing with her obnoxiously good-natured younger brother, and grappling with the complicated feelings of mourning a father she hadn't had a relationship with for years. It doesn't help that she's low-key convinced that her new neighbor, Sam Dennings, is a serial killer. It's not long before Phoebe realizes that Sam might be something much scarier --- a genuinely nice guy who can pierce her armor to reach her vulnerable heart.
Berkley | 9780593438657

THE MANHATTAN GIRLS: A Novel of Dorothy Parker and Her Friends by Gill Paul (Historical Fiction)
Paperback Original
New York City, 1921: The war is over, fashions are daring and bootleg liquor is abundant. Here four extraordinary women form a bridge group that grows into a firm friendship. Dorothy Parker: renowned wit, member of the Algonquin Round Table, and more fragile than she seems. Jane Grant: first female reporter for the New York Times, and determined to launch a new magazine she calls The New Yorker. Winifred Lenihan: beautiful and talented Broadway actress, a casting-couch target. And Peggy Leach: magazine assistant by day, brilliant novelist by night. Their romances flourish and falter, while their goals sometimes seem impossible to reach. But their biggest challenge is keeping their dear friend Dottie safe from herself.
William Morrow Paperbacks | 9780063161757

MY NAME IS JOE LaVOIE by W.A. Winter (Mystery)
Paperback Original
On Thanksgiving Day, 1991, the tattered remnants of the notorious LaVoie crime family gather for a melancholy reunion. Sister Ronnie, a faded beauty who’s outlived three husbands and countless lovers, is the host. Her guests include eldest brother Eugene, the family’s detested Judas; Adriana, the flamboyant widow of youngest brother Michael, who was presumed killed in Vietnam; and Joe, the sole survivor of a fraternal trio of pint-sized desperadoes who terrorized the Upper Midwest during the summer of 1953. Crippled by a police bullet during the climactic shootout, Joe has spent the past 38 years in a wheelchair. Now, dying, he’s desperate to know --- yet terrified to learn --- the awful truth behind his family’s demise.
Seventh Street Books | 9781645060536

THE NAMELESS ONES by John Connolly (Supernatural Thriller)
In Amsterdam, four bodies, violently butchered, are discovered in a canal house, the remains of friends and confidantes of the assassin known only as Louis. The men responsible for the murders are Serbian war criminals. They believe they can escape retribution by retreating to their homeland. They are wrong. For Louis has come to Europe to hunt them down: five killers to be found and punished before they can vanish into thin air. There is just one problem. The sixth.
Atria/Emily Bestler Books | 9781982176983

PALM BEACH by Mary Adkins (Fiction)
Rebecca and her husband, Mickey, typify struggling, 30-something New Yorkers --- he’s an actor, and she’s a freelance journalist. But after the arrival of their baby son, the couple decides to relocate to Palm Beach, where Mickey has been offered a sweet deal managing the household of a multimillionaire Democratic donor. Once there, he quickly doubles his salary by going to work for venture capitalist Cecil Stone. Rebecca, a writer whose beat is economic inequality, is initially horrified: she pillories men like Stone, a ruthless businessman famous for crushing local newspapers. So no one is more surprised than her when she accepts a job working for Cecil’s wife as a ghostwriter. As she and Mickey are pulled deeper into this topsy-turvy household, they become increasingly dependent on their problematic benefactors.
Harper Paperbacks | 9780063011380

THE PHOTOGRAPHER by Mary Dixie Carter (Psychological Thriller)
As a photographer, Delta Dawn observes the seemingly perfect lives of New York City’s elite: snapping photos of their children’s birthday parties, transforming images of stiff hugs and tearstained faces into visions of pure joy, and creating moments these parents long for. But when Delta is hired for Natalie Straub’s 11th birthday, she finds herself wishing she wasn’t behind the lens but a part of the scene --- in the Straub family’s gorgeous home and elegant life. That’s when Delta puts her plan in place, by babysitting for Natalie; befriending her mother, Amelia; finding chances to listen to her father, Fritz. Soon she’s bathing in the master bathtub and eyeing the beautifully finished garden apartment in their townhouse. It seems she can never get close enough, until she discovers that photos aren’t all she can manipulate.
Minotaur Books | 9781250790354

ROOM AND BOARD by Miriam Parker (Fiction)
Paperback Original
Gillian thought she had everything she ever wanted. As a successful publicist running her own Manhattan firm, she finally made herself at home among the elite who eluded her throughout her youth. That is, until her career implodes, leaving her jobless, friendless and with a googleable reputation that follows her everywhere. So, when she receives an offer to become a “dorm mom” at Glen Ellen Academy, the prestigious Sonoma boarding school she attended two decades earlier on scholarship, she leaps at the opportunity for a change of scene. However, just as she begins to feel comfortable, a scandal surfaces on campus that threatens to derail everything. Now Gillian must figure out how to save her job, her students, her friends and her new romance before it’s too late.
Dutton | 9781524744502

THE SHIMMERING STATE by Meredith Westgate (Dystopian Fiction)
Lucien moves to Los Angeles to be with his grandmother as she undergoes an experimental memory treatment for Alzheimer’s using a new drug, Memoroxin. An emerging photographer, he’s also running from the sudden death of his mother. Sophie has just landed the lead in the upcoming performance of La Sylphide with the Los Angeles Ballet. She still waitresses during her off-hours at the Chateau Marmont, witnessing the recreational use of Memoroxin --- or Mem --- among the Hollywood elite. When Lucien and Sophie meet at the Center, they have no memory of how they got there --- or why they feel so inexplicably drawn to one another. Is it attraction, or something they cannot remember from “before”?
Atria Books | 9781982156725

TWO TRUTHS AND A LIE: A Murder, a Private Investigator, and Her Search for Justice by Ellen McGarrahan (True Crime/Memoir)
Ellen McGarrahan was a young journalist for The Miami Herald in 1990 when she witnessed the botched execution of convicted killer Jesse Tafero. When evidence later emerged casting doubt on Tafero’s guilt, McGarrahan found herself haunted by his fiery death. Had she witnessed the execution of an innocent man? Decades later, McGarrahan, now a successful private investigator, is still gripped by the mystery and infamy of the Tafero case, and decides she must investigate it herself. Her quest will take her around the world and deep into the harrowing heart of obsession. As questions of guilt and innocence become more complex, McGarrahan discovers she is not alone in her need for closure. For whenever a human life is taken by violence, the reckoning is long and difficult for all.
Random House Trade Paperbacks | 9780812988055

WITH LOVE FROM WISH & CO. by Minnie Darke (Romance)
Paperback Original
Marnie Fairchild is the brains and talent behind Wish & Co., a boutique store that offers a bespoke gift-buying service to wealthy clients with complicated lives. Brian Charlesworth is Marnie’s most prized customer, and today she’s wrapping the perfect anniversary gift for his wife, Suzanne…and a birthday present for his mistress, Leona. For years, Marnie has had her heart set on moving Wish & Co. to the historic shopfront once owned by her grandfather. When the chance to bid for the property unexpectedly arises, a distracted Marnie makes an uncharacteristic mistake. Soon Brian is in a fight to rescue his marriage, and Marnie is scrabbling to keep her dreams alive. The last thing she needs is to fall for Brian and Suzanne’s gorgeous son, Luke.
Dell | 9780593357194

THE YEAR’S BEST FANTASY: Volume One edited by Paula Guran (Fantasy/Short Stories)
Paperback Original
This superbly curated collection explores myth and fable, dark and light --- a heroic creature facing a dangerous demon; an earthly love facing the mossy decay of death. With tales of living ball gowns and timid monsters, of modern witches and multidimensional magic, these 24 stories will transport you from fantastical realms that push the limits of imagination to alternative realities mirroring much of our own. Discover bewitchment and wonder, the surreal and the chimerical, in a fantasy anthology representing a diverse array of accomplished talent from around the world…and perhaps beyond.
Pyr | 9781645060482

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