Previews, Reviews, and Collection Development
Brown, Sandra. Deadline. Grand Central. Sept. 2013. 300p. ISBN 9781455501519. $28. CD: Hachette Audio. SUSPENSE War-weary journalist Dawson Scott needs the distraction of the case dropped into his lap by an FBI contact; former U.S. Marine Jeremy Wesson, son of terrorists who have been on the FBI’s Most Wanted list for decades, is missing and [...]
Baker, Nicholson. Traveling Sprinkler. Blue Rider: Penguin Group (USA). Sept. 2013. 288p. ISBN 9780399160967. $26.95. LITERARY Baker’s The Anthologist, in which Paul Chowder tries valiantly to get started on a collection of formal verse, won best-book nods from a half-dozen venues. This new novel again features the hapless Chowder, here eager to jump-start his life [...]
Chamberlain, Diane. Necessary Lies. St. Martin’s. Sept. 2013. 352p. ISBN 9781250010698. $26.99; ebk. ISBN 9781250010704. CD: Macmillan Audio. WOMEN’S FICTION Chamberlain has published nearly two dozen novels, many best sellers and one a RITA Award winner. But this work, which has the house jumping, is being billed as her breakout. A half-century ago in rural [...]
Armstrong, Kelley & others. Four Summoner’s Tales. Gallery: S. & S. Sept. 2013. 352p. ISBN 9781451696684. pap. $16; ebk. ISBN 9781451696752. SHORT STORIES/PARANORMAL Wanna get scared? Four New York Times best-selling authors help out with stories of bringing back the dead. In Kelley Armstrong’s “Suffer the Children,” a stranger promises to revive children lost to [...]
Abé, Shana. The Deepest Night. Bantam. Aug. 2013. 320p. ISBN 9780345531735. $16. FANTASY Publishing this spring, Abé’s The Sweetest Dark features a young woman in post-Victorian England who discovers her supernatural roots, thus expanding Abé’s popular “Drakon” series for adults into the YA realm. Here’s the second volume already; alert YA crossover fans and fantasy [...]
Blake, Fanny. Women of a Dangerous Age. Thomas Dunne Bks: St. Martin’s. Aug. 2013. 432p. ISBN 9781250020949. $25.99; ebk. ISBN 9781250020932. WOMEN’S FICTION Lou has walked out on a husband who no longer loves her, and after going through a string of relationships, Ali has consented to marry a man she quickly learns is not [...]
Billingham, Mark. The Dying Hours. Mysterious Pr: Grove Atlantic. Aug. 2013. 400p. ISBN 9780802121486. $25; ebk. ISBN 9780802193285. THRILLER Tom Thorne, no longer a detective but back in uniform owing to his headstrong ways, doubts that several deaths among London’s elderly are suicides, as they have been classified. As he investigates, he must go it [...]
Barlow, Toby. Babayaga. Farrar. Aug. 2013. 400p. ISBN 9780374107871. $27; ebk. ISBN 9780374709594. LITERARY Remember Sharp Teeth, a sexy, scary horror/thriller mash-up about feral dogs in Los Angeles that was written in verse? Barlow returns with something equally eye-popping: the story of callow Will, an American adman in 1959 Paris whose agency is a CIA [...]
Adler, Elizabeth. Please Don’t Tell. Minotaur: St. Martin’s. Jul. 2013. 384p. ISBN 9781250019899. $25.99; ebk. ISBN 9781250019905. WOMEN’S FICTION One stormy night on the California coast, elegant 58-year-old Fenny Dexter opens her door to a blood-soaked man claiming to have been in an accident. He departs after a cozy night (they feel a spark), and [...]
Abbott, Jeff. Downfall. Grand Central. Jul. 2013. 480p. ISBN 9781455528431. $25.99. THRILLER When a beautiful woman in a San Francisco bar asks former CIA agent Sam Capra to help her, of course he says yes. Now he’s trying to protect them both from the police and a secret group of obscenely successful men and women [...]
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