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In this newsletter, you will find books releasing the weeks of April 13th and April 20th 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 review of YESTERYEAR, which is April’s “Good Morning America” Book Club selection, #1 Indie Next pick, Top LibraryReads Pick --- and an upcoming Bookreporter.com Bets On title. In Caro Claire Burke’s much-talked-about debut novel, a traditional American woman, a “tradwife” influencer, suddenly awakens in the brutal reality of 1855.
Carol Fitzgerald's latest “Bookreporter Talks To” interview is with Allison Pataki. Her new novel, IT GIRL, is a USA Today bestseller and a Bets On selection.
Allison shares that her inspiration for the book was Evelyn Nesbit, one of the Gibson Girls of the early 20th century, who became America's first self-made female celebrity and “It Girl,” rising from poverty in Pittsburgh to Broadway stardom.
The story takes place during a transformative period following the Gilded Age with new technology like electricity, automobiles and cameras, and the birth of Broadway as the “Great White Way.” It examines the exploitation of young women in early celebrity culture while exploring themes of survival, agency and female empowerment.
Our latest Spring Reading prize book is MIDNIGHT, AT THE WAR by Devi S. Laskar, a novel about a reporter chasing the biggest story of her career as she contends with a tense newsroom, a dangerous global conflict, and all the problems she’s running away from at home.
The contest is now up, so be sure to enter for your chance to win one of five copies of the book. The deadline for your entries is TOMORROW, Wednesday, April 15th at noon ET.
Be sure to check out our review of the book from Sarah Rachel Egelman, who says, “Laskar’s prose is timeless and understated. So much happens in this short novel, but it doesn’t really feel action-packed.... Both broadly political and personally intimate, MIDNIGHT, AT THE WAR is a complex, brave and powerful novel that will not be forgotten any time soon.”
Our last Spring Reading contest will go live on Wednesday, April 15th at noon ET. The prize book will be THE LOST SUMMER by Wendy Corsi Staub. In this shocking novel of psychological suspense, a girl’s vanishing draws a detective into the crimes and mysteries of her own past. Be sure to submit your entries by Thursday, April 16th at noon ET.
Next month's “Bookaccino Live” book preview event will take place on Wednesday, May 13th at 2pm ET. The focus will be on books releasing between May 12th and June 2nd, in addition to some titles from the first half of July, that we think will appeal to you.
P.S. For those of you who shop online, if you use the store links that appear on our site for shopping, Bookreporter.com gets a small affiliate fee on your purchases from Amazon, Barnes & Noble and IndieBound. As you read our reviews and features, we would appreciate your considering this as you buy!
This Week's Bonus News:
Our Review of YESTERYEAR by Caro Claire Burke
April’s “Good Morning America” Book Club Pick
and an Upcoming Bookreporter.com Bets On Title
YESTERYEAR by Caro Claire Burke (Psychological Thriller)
Audiobook available, read by Rebecca Lowman
Natalie Heller Mills lives a traditional lifestyle. Her charming farmhouse is rustic, her husband a handsome cowboy, her six children each more delightful than the last. So what if there are nannies and producers behind the scenes, her kitchen hiding industrial-grade fridges and ovens, her husband the heir to a political dynasty? What Natalie’s eight million followers don’t know won’t hurt them. But then one morning, Natalie wakes up in a life that isn’t hers. Her kitchen is warmed by a sputtering fire rather than electricity, her children are dirty and strange, and her soft-handed husband is suddenly a competent farmer. Has she become the unwitting star of a ruthless reality show? Could it really be time travel? When Natalie suffers a brutal injury in the woods, she realizes two things: This is not her beautiful life, and she must escape by any means possible. Reviewed by Rebecca Munro.
- Click here to read more about the book.
- Click here for the discussion guide on ReadingGroupGuides.com.
- Click here to see why the book is this month's “Good Morning America” Book Club pick.
Click here to read our review.
YESTERYEAR will be a Bookreporter.com Bets On pick.
Don't miss Carol's commentary in Friday's Weekly Update newsletter.
Upcoming Virtual Book and Author Events
Here is an upcoming virtual event that you may be interested in attending. Click on the link for more info.
Wednesday, April 15th at 7pm ET: “Friends & Fiction”: Join “Friends & Fiction” for a conversation with Tana French about her latest novel, THE KEEPER, which is the final installment in her million-copy-bestselling trilogy featuring retired Chicago detective Cal Hooper.
On Sale the Week of April 13th in Hardcover
April 14th
CAT ON A HOT TIN WOOF: A Chet & Bernie Mystery by Spencer Quinn (Mystery)
Miss Kitty, a feline internet sensation, has disappeared, and Chet and Bernie have been hired to find her before her many followers realize something is wrong. Miss Kitty belongs to Bitty, a sweet teenage girl who lives with her mom. Bitty and her mother are struggling financially, but the arrival of Miss Kitty and the chance discovery of her social media appeal has changed everything. Bitty now has sponsors and a high-powered agent, and real money is flowing in. With Miss Kitty gone, the family's income is on the line. The case presents a slew of challenges for Chet and Bernie. For one thing, a potential witness is a pig named Senor Piggy, who may be in possession of an important piece of evidence. For another, it seems like a possible perp has been killed twice --- and there's evidence implicating Bernie in the crime.
Minotaur Books | 9781250331779
CHERRY BABY by Rainbow Rowell (Fiction)
Everybody knows that Cherry's husband, Tom, is in Hollywood making a movie. Almost nobody knows that he isn't coming home. Tom is the creator of Thursday, a semi-autobiographical webcomic that's become an international phenomenon. There's a character in this movie based on Cherry: “Baby.” Wide-hipped, heavy-chested, double-chinned Baby. Cherry never wanted this. No fat girl wants to see herself caricatured on the page --- let alone on the big screen. But there's no getting away from it. While her soon-to-be ex-husband is in Los Angeles, Cherry is stuck in Omaha wondering who she's supposed to be without him. One night, Cherry decides to leave all her problems at home. She ventures out to see her favorite band play her favorite album…and someone recognizes her from across the room.
William Morrow | 9780063380264
CLEO DANG WOULD RATHER BE DEAD by Mai Nguyen (Fiction/Dark Humor)
All Cleo Dang has ever wanted is to be a mother. The day she discovers she’s pregnant is the happiest of her life, especially when she learns that her best friend, Paloma, is also expecting. It’s a wonderful surprise, and together, they enjoy their pregnancies. But when they both go to the hospital in labor, something goes very, very wrong. Paloma comes home with a baby. Cleo does not. Ravaged by grief, Cleo must now navigate life after losing her baby. She alienates herself from the world, particularly her best friend, who is living the life she so desperately wanted. Forced to take leave from her demanding job as an actuary, Cleo manages to find work at a funeral home, where she meets a revolving cast of bereaved locals and discovers the power of confronting grief.
Atria Books | 9781668080863
DEAR MONICA LEWINSKY by Julia Langbein (Fiction/Humor)
Jean Dornan cannot escape the summer of 1998, when, as a college student studying abroad in France, she embarked on an inappropriate relationship with her professor. Now, decades later, when that professor contacts her out of the blue with an invitation to his retirement ceremony, Jean’s long-standing malaise becomes an emotional crisis. Desperate to understand why this relationship derailed her life so completely, she begins rereading her old diaries and is shocked to realize that her own disastrous affair occurred during the summer of the Lewinsky scandal. In a frenzy of guilt and regret, Jean finds herself praying to Monica Lewinsky for forgiveness as if she were a secular saint. To Jean’s shock, Saint Monica appears and guides Jean like the Ghost of Christmas Past back to the summer of 1998.
Doubleday | 9780385551502
DEATH TIMES SEVEN: A Daniel Pitt Novel by Anne Perry and Victoria Zackheim (Historical Mystery)
1913: Junior attorney Daniel Pitt must step in for his friend, fellow attorney Toby Kitteridge, whose parents have been brutally attacked. Toby's mother is dead, and his father is barely alive. With Toby returning to the family home in rural Ipswich, Daniel remains in London to substitute for Toby and defend Peter Ward, who is on trial for the sexual assault and murder of a young woman. Daniel is convinced that Ward is innocent, yet the evidence seems to prove otherwise. Eager to assist, his pathologist wife, Miriam fford Croft, offers her forensics expertise. But despite Miriam’s involvement, Daniel finds himself distracted by his desire to help Toby. And when the evidence points to Toby’s father as the killer of Toby’s mother, Daniel faces two of the greatest challenges of his young career: proving the innocence of both Peter Ward and Reverend Kitteridge.
Ballantine Books | 9780593982518
EXTRA SAUCE: The Good, the Bad, and the Onions by Zahra Tangorra (Memoir)
At 22, Zahra Tangorra was trying on adulthood and attempting to find herself when a harrowing, near-death experience stopped her in her tracks. It felt like a twisted version of a second chance. Who am I? She asked herself. What do I love? The answers started coming to her. Stuffed shells and giant meatballs at J&J’s, the Italian red sauce joint of her Long Island childhood. Her mother's chocolate mousse pie and her father's sweet and savory pea soup. The people, places and experiences that made her her, the relationships both loving and fraught --- they were all, for better and sometimes worse, inextricably bound up with food. Told with both uproarious humor and tremendous insight, EXTRA SAUCE is for anyone who yearns to embrace their whole self, who loves with abandon, and who eats with gusto.
The Dial Press | 9780593733370
FAMESICK: A Memoir by Lena Dunham (Memoir)
For the last decade, being the owner and operator of Lena Dunham’s body has felt “like towing a wrecked car across town at midnight.” It’s not easy dragging a wrecked car anywhere, much less to the set of the hit show that you --- as a 25-year-old --- are writing, directing, producing and starring in. But Dunham does it --- even if it means interminable hospital stays, vomiting in the bathroom when she’s meant to be meeting Oprah, or terrifying those closest to her --- because she can no longer tell the difference between fighting to do what she loves and being a servant to her own ambition. All the while, she is holding out for a love that can withstand her personal and public challenges and, more than anything, yearning to feel like herself again --- if only she could remember who that self was.
Random House | 9780593129326
GO GENTLE by Maria Semple (Fiction)
A Stoic philosopher and divorcée, Adora Hazzard lives a contented life on New York City’s Upper West Side. Having discovered that the secret to happiness is to desire only what you have, she’s applied this insight to blissful effect: relishing her teenage daughter, the freedom of being solo, and her job as a moral tutor for the twin boys of an old-money family. She’s even assembled a “coven” --- like-minded women who live on the same floor in the legendary Ansonia --- and is making active efforts to grow its membership. Adora’s carefully curated life is humming along brilliantly until a chance meeting with a handsome stranger. Soon, her ordered world is upended by black-market art deals, secret rendezvous and international intrigue…and her past lands like a bomb in her present.
G.P. Putnam's Sons | 9798217176632
HOPE RISES by David Baldacci (Thriller)
Walter Nash is on the road to revenge after becoming an informant for the FBI against a global criminal operation headed up by Victoria Steers. Steers has ripped everything Nash held dear away from him. With long, rigorous training under his belt, the gentle and sensitive Nash has transformed into a physically imposing man with lethal skills. And now he has only one goal left in life: taking down Victoria Steers. In order to succeed, Nash is going to need to cross enemy lines and work the job from the inside. But he must rely on every ounce of his hard-earned skills to prove himself an ally to Steers if he’s ever going to get close enough to decimate her criminal empire. Still, Nash finds himself oddly drawn to Steers in ways that he never could’ve imagined. And what he ultimately discovers will turn all he believed upside down, forcing him to do something truly unfathomable.
Grand Central Publishing | 9781538758021
I CHOOSE ME: Chasing Joy, Finding Purpose & Embracing Reinvention by Jennie Garth (Memoir)
Jennie Garth is best known for playing the iconic role of Kelly Taylor in the hit television series “Beverly Hills, 90210.” Now in her 50s, she invites readers into the real story of growing up on screen, facing Hollywood’s impossible beauty standards, and losing --- and finding --- herself through heartbreak, loss and the challenge of motherhood. She shares the raw truths of the moments that broke her open and shows the resilience it takes to walk through grief and begin again. Jennie writes with warmth and candor about learning to quiet the voice that says “not enough,” rediscovering her strength after loss, and daring to take up space, speak her truth and want more. She opens up about the unglamorous, deeply human moments, and finally letting go of the need for perfection and other people’s approval.
Park Row | 9780778305637
THE INSOMNIACS by Allison Winn Scotch (Mystery)
Huddled in an all-night diner over coffee and pancakes, a lonely middle-aged mom, an injured baseball pro, an elusive retiree and a young waitress examine the thoughts that plague them in the middle of the night. Within a few restless months, the group of strangers have become a fragile family. And when one of them goes missing in the dead of night, they’re thrust into a propulsive mystery. Though ill-prepared and unequipped for the job, they begin to piece together the clues left behind. In chasing down answers, they uncover a reason for their friend’s disappearance and are forced to wrestle with the question of how well you can really know anyone --- and once you do, how much you are willing to risk to save them...and, in doing so, save yourself.
Berkley | 9780593817926
INVASIVE SPECIES by Ellery Adams (Supernatural Thriller/Horror)
While the town of Coal Harbor has seen its fair share of monsters in cheating husbands and leering bosses, none are as hungry as Mrs. Smith. The mysterious resident has finally emerged from her crumbling mansion on the hill, mesmerizing the townspeople with her beauty. Her secret? Nine human sacrifices to feed her immortality. Natalie Scott is more worried about Mrs. Smith blocking her first real estate sale. She's eager to prove herself in a world where the social mores of 1980s suburbia reign. Her two best friends are facing their own demons, and Mrs. Smith and her deep, dark woods are an easy scapegoat for everyone's problems. But Natalie's 12-year-old daughter, Jill, and her Icelandic housekeeper, Una, can sense something deeper at play. Armed with library books and a whole lot of grit, Jill and Una team up to save the town once and for all.
Hanover Square Press | 9781335001535
IT WASN'T MEANT TO BE PERFECT: A Memoir by Gaelynn Lea (Memoir)
Gaelynn Lea was born with Osteogenesis Imperfecta. Her parents were loving, cash-strapped theater kids, and she grew up racing about in her first electric wheelchair, having adventures with her siblings and handing out Playbills at her parents' dinner theater shows. Transfixed by an orchestra performance in fifth grade, Gaelynn was determined to play the cello. When her shortened limbs made playing the instrument challenging, she employed a familiar tactic: adapting. What if she held a violin upright in her wheelchair, like the world's tiniest cello? That what if was the key that unlocked her lifelong music career. Lea's warm, funny, deeply felt memoir addresses love and faith, sexuality and mortality, the frustration and the joy of difference. She shows how disability inspires and enables unique and indispensable contributions to the world.
Algonquin Books | 9781643756431
JAPANESE GOTHIC by Kylie Lee Baker (Gothic Horror/Mystery)
October 2026: Lee Turner doesn’t remember how or why he killed his college roommate. All he knows is he has to flee New York and go to the one place that might offer refuge --- his father’s new home in Japan, which is hidden by sword ferns and wild ginger. October 1877: Sen is a young samurai in exile, hiding from the imperial soldiers in a house behind the sword ferns. A monster came home from war wearing her father’s face, but Sen would do anything to please him. She knows the soldiers will soon slaughter her whole family when she sees a terrible omen: a young foreign man who appears outside her window. One of these people is a ghost, and one of these stories is a lie. Something is hiding beneath the house of sword ferns, and Lee and Sen will soon wish they never unburied it.
Hanover Square Press | 9781335001559
LAST ONE OUT by Jane Harper (Mystery/Thriller)
Carralon Ridge, a once vibrant village in rural New South Wales, has become a shell of itself, its houses and buildings bought up and left to rot by the mining company operating at its borders. A decade into its slow death, the skeletal town is all but abandoned. After years of scorning those who left the Ridge behind as it fell into ruin, Ro never imagined she'd become one of them. But everything changed when she lost her son. Five years ago, Sam vanished while visiting during a break from college. He had loved Carralon Ridge and had been working on an oral history of the town to preserve its legacy before it vanished altogether. But when Ro returns to Carralon Ridge to be with her husband and daughter on the anniversary of Sam's disappearance, she begins to suspect that something important was overlooked in his case.
Flatiron Books: Pine & Cedar | 9781250291394
LEAVE YOUR MESS AT HOME by Tolani Akinola (Fiction)
Sola Longe is secretly back home in Chicago for the first time in a decade. She’s a newly single and recently disgraced influencer trying to quietly put her life back together again. The other three Longe siblings aren't doing much better. Anjola is in love with her best friend, who just got engaged to someone else; Karen, a college junior, is grappling with her sexuality and self-image; and Ola, the golden child with a baby of his own on the way, is questioning his marriage and how to raise a Black son in America. Sola’s unexpected return sets them on a crash course towards each other, and when the four siblings find themselves together again at their Nigerian immigrant parents' Thanksgiving table, a decade’s worth of secrets and a lifetime of resentments explode to the fore.
Pamela Dorman Books | 9780593834190
THE LEFT AND THE LUCKY by Willy Vlautin (Fiction)
Eddie Wilkens is a workaholic house painter. His wife has left him to her regret, and his main employee, Houston, is a loafer and scoundrel who barely shows up for work. Eddie is a thoughtful man who rarely gets angry, but he is ruled by a guilt that he has carried for nearly 20 years. Next door, a woman and her two sons move in with her frail and aging mother. The youngest boy, eight-year-old Russell, is quiet and small for his age and lives in constant terror of his increasingly lost and troubled 15-year-old brother, Curtis. As their mother struggles to keep the family together and the grandmother’s health begins to falter, they find themselves unable to protect Russell and themselves from Curtis’ cruelty, which threatens to explode in frenetic violence. Though neither knows it, Russell and Eddie will become each other’s saving grace.
Harper | 9780063346635
THE LONG RUN: Steve Prefontaine, Frank Shorter, Joan Benoit, Grete Waitz, and the Decade That Made the Marathon Cool by Martin Dugard (Sports/History)
On September 3, 1970, the New York City Marathon was run for the first time. One hundred twenty-seven runners paid a $1 entry fee. Only one woman competed. Fifty-four years later, nearly 50,000 runners finished the same race. Nearly half were women. More than three times as many runners applied, and over two million spectators watched. Today, runners from all over the world run the NYC Marathon and many others like it. Marathons are inclusive, fully global and still exploding in popularity. How did we get from there to here? As Martin Dugard explains, it was thanks to four very special runners who changed the way America --- and the world --- saw running: Frank Shorter, Steve Prefontaine, Joan Benoit Samuelson and Grete Waitz.
Dutton | 9798217178483
MIDNIGHT, AT THE WAR by Devi S. Laskar (Fiction)
Foreign correspondent Rita Das has left New York for the war-torn Middle East, a reassignment she asked for after learning she is pregnant but uncertain if the father is her husband or her lover. As she strives to shed light on the fallouts of the war, Rita finds herself embroiled in her own conflicts with her interpreter and her news editor, her sources and her colleagues. She is unable to accept the loss of her mother and deal with her guilt for not being by her side when she died. As she goes into the field to report on the war, she grapples with the physical and emotional tolls of her pregnant body and a turbulent region. When her news editor delivers urgent orders for her to return to New York, Rita is faced with a choice about how she wants to live her life as a journalist and a soon-to-be mother.
Mariner Books | 9780063289437
MURDER MINDFULLY written by Karsten Dusse, translated by Florian Duijsens (Crime Fiction/Dark Humor)
Criminal defense lawyer Björn Diemel has been given an ultimatum: repair his work-life balance, or his wife will leave him --- and take their daughter. He reluctantly starts a mindfulness course, and to his surprise, it’s a revelation. He becomes calmer, happier and more focused as he starts to understand what’s really important in life. When his worst client, brutal crime boss Dragan Sergowicz, tries to interfere with his precious family time, Björn discovers that even murder can be a mindfulness exercise to protect his peace.
Soho Crime | 9781641298186
THE PATCHWORK PLAYERS: An Elm Creek Quilts Novel by Jennifer Chiaverini (Fiction)
Julia Merchaud’s beloved historical drama, “A Patchwork Life,” revived her acting career. But her happiness turns to dismay when she learns that the hit show will have only one more season. Inspiration comes after a conversation with Summer Sullivan, one of the expert quilters who helped Julia prepare for her role. When Summer confides that Elm Creek Quilt Camp is in financial trouble, Julia concocts a brilliant plan that will help the Elm Creek Quilters and herself. Julia sets about persuading the cast and crew to join her for what she promises will be a marvelous week at a luxurious 19th-century mansion. Secretly, she hopes the bonding experience will convince them to sign on for another few seasons. But after several joyful days of quilting and camaraderie, Julia’s scheme takes an unexpected turn.
William Morrow | 9780063381803
PORCUPINES by Fran Fabriczki (Fiction/Humor)
Sonia is a Hungarian immigrant who is raising her daughter, Mila, on her own in sunny Los Angeles. Her days are a blur of not-quite-illegal business activities, dodging PTA moms, and baking birthday cakes laced with rum. Mila, meanwhile, is juggling violin and swimming lessons and navigating the treacherous social politics of school with the help of a less-than-helpful guidebook on how to be cool in the sixth grade. Sonia is sure that their bond will be enough to satisfy her daughter. But her guarded lifestyle has left Mila lonely, isolated and ready to write herself into a bigger story. When she stumbles across emails between her mother and a man she’s never met, Mila decides to take matters into her own hands and forms a plan that will implode their carefully constructed lives.
S&S/Summit Books | 9781668091913
A PRIVATE MAN by Stephanie Sy-Quia (Historical Fiction)
It’s the 1960s, and David is handsome, charismatic and sworn to celibacy. An exemplary Catholic priest, devotion to God is all he’s ever known and all he ever thinks he will. In London, Margaret is adrift, healing from the loss of her parents and the end of a recent love affair. Increasingly drawn to the church, she sets out to join the new revolutions of sex and faith, taking up a teaching position at an all-girls school in David's diocese. Decades later, Margaret is being cared for by her grandson, who has just discovered the strange truth of his family history. So begins the story of forbidden love and ardent faith, devotion and sacrifice, as the consequences of David and Margaret’s unlikely union play out across generations.
Grove Press | 9780802166906
SEE YOU ON THE OTHER SIDE by Jay McInerney (Fiction)
Russell Calloway’s best friend, Washington Lee, was the least likely monogamist of Russell’s acquaintances, but Washington somehow has become a model husband and father over the years. The celebration of Washington’s 35th wedding anniversary at the Odeon in the Spring of 2020 sparks an at once funny and moving autumnal reckoning with mortality as the specter of the COVID-19 virus spreads. In this moment of unprecedented upheaval --- frantic and fraught real-time response, piercing personal and political impact --- the Calloways find themselves and their marriage tested in ways they never could have anticipated as fatal consequences ensue.
Knopf | 9780593804797
A SOLDIER'S WIFE: My Mother, the Marvelous Mrs. Marilyn A. Underwood by Blair Underwood (Biography & Memoir)
Born in Buffalo, New York, Marilyn Ann Scales Underwood dreamed of becoming a fashion designer. Moving to New York City to study at the Traphagen School of Fashion, she became an assistant designer and eventually returned to her hometown where she began her career as the first Black female executive at Barmon Brothers Company. Independent and content with being single, she wasn’t interested in marriage until she met Lieutenant Frank Underwood. Blair Underwood honors his mother with this remarkable work, bringing into sharp focus her life as a soldier's wife, mother and successful entrepreneur, drawn from his memories, her letters, and interviews with family and friends.
Amistad | 9780063211872
THESE FAMILIAR WALLS by C. J. Dotson (Supernatural Thriller/Horror)
In 1998, desperate loneliness pushes preteen Amber to ignore the misgivings of her family, particularly her younger sister, when she befriends the troubled new kid in the neighborhood --- a boy with dead eyes, a fascination with fire, and no remorse. Their turbulent relationship is brief but creates lasting consequences. Twenty-two years later, in 2020, he resurfaces to kill Amber’s parents, and is in turn betrayed by his accomplice and killed in Amber's childhood home. After the deaths, Amber inherits the house and, in an effort to save money, moves in with her husband and two children, hoping to reclaim some sense of stability in the grief and chaos surrounding her. Instead, she finds that the familiar walls are haunted by more than just bitter memories and lockdown stress.
St. Martin's Press | 9781250336583
On Sale the Week of April 13th in Paperback
April 14th
THE ACADEMY by Elin Hilderbrand and Shelby Cunningham (Fiction)
It’s move-in day at Tiffin Academy, and America Today just ranked Tiffin the number-two boarding school in the country. It’s a 17-spot jump. Was there a typo? The dorms need to be renovated, their sports teams always come in last place, and let’s just say Tiffin students are known for being more social than academic. On the other hand, the campus is exquisite, and they do have fun with lots of parties and school dances. But just as the rarefied air of Tiffin is suffused with self-congratulation, the wheels begin to turn --- and then they fall off the bus. One by one, scandalous blind items begin to appear on phones across Tiffin’s campus, thanks to a new app called ZipZap, and nobody is safe. As the year unfolds, bonds are forged and broken, secrets are shared and exposed, and the lives of Tiffin’s students and staff are changed forever.
Back Bay Books | 9780316567886
BE READY WHEN THE LUCK HAPPENS: A Memoir by Ina Garten (Memoir)
Here, for the first time, Ina Garten presents an intimate, entertaining and inspiring account of her remarkable journey. Ina’s gift is to make everything look easy, yet all her accomplishments have been the result of hard work, audacious choices and exquisite attention to detail. In her unmistakable voice (no one tells a story like Ina), she brings her past and her process to life in a high-spirited and no-holds-barred memoir that chronicles decades of personal challenges, adventures (and misadventures) and unexpected career twists, all delivered with her signature combination of playfulness and purpose.
Crown | 9780593800027
BIG CHIEF by Jon Hickey (Fiction)
Mitch Caddo, a young law school graduate and an aspiring political fixer, is an outsider in the homeland of his Anishinaabe ancestors. But alongside his childhood friend, Tribal President Mack Beck, he runs the government of the Passage Rouge Nation and the tribe’s Golden Eagle Casino and Hotel. On the eve of Mack’s reelection, their tenuous grip on power is threatened by a nationally known activist and politician, Gloria Hawkins, and her young aide, Layla Beck, none other than Mack’s estranged sister and Mitch’s former love. In their struggle for control over Passage Rouge, the campaigns resort to bare-knuckle political gamesmanship. But when an accident claims the life of Mitch’s mentor, a power broker in the reservation’s political scene, the election slides into chaos and pits Mitch against the only family he has.
Simon & Schuster | 9781668046470
BOAT BABY: A Memoir by Vicky Nguyen (Memoir)
Starting in 1975, Vietnam’s “boat people” --- desperate families seeking freedom --- fled the Communist government and violence in their country any way they could, usually by boat across the South China Sea. Vicky Nguyen and her family were among them. Attacked at sea by pirates before reaching a refugee camp in Malaysia, Vicky’s family survived on rations and waited months until they were sponsored to go to America. But deciding to leave and start a new life in a new country is half the story. Figuring out how to be American is the other. BOAT BABY is Vicky’s memoir of growing up in America with unconventional Vietnamese parents who didn’t always know how to bridge the cultural gaps.
Simon & Schuster | 9781668025574
THE CHILDREN OF EVE: A Charlie Parker Novel by John Connolly (Supernatural Thriller)
Wyatt Riggins, the boyfriend of rising Maine artist Zetta Nadeau, has gone missing, leaving behind a cell phone containing a single-word message: RUN. Private investigator Charlie Parker is hired to find out why Riggins has fled, and from whom. Parker discovers that Riggins, an ex-soldier, has been involved in the abduction of four children from Mexico, all belonging to the cartel boss Blas Urrea --- except Urrea’s family is safe and well in Mexico, which means the abductees cannot be his children. Yet whoever they are, Urrea wants them back and has dispatched his agents to secure them, even if it means butchering everyone who stands in their way. Every child has a mother. Now Parker will face one unlike any other and learn the terrifying truth about the Children of Eve.
Atria/Emily Bestler Books | 9781668083956
COUNT MY LIES by Sophie Stava (Domestic Thriller)
Sloane Caraway is a liar. Harmless lies, mostly, to make her self-proclaimed sad little life a bit more interesting. So when Sloane sees a young girl in tears at a park one afternoon, she can’t help herself. She tells the girl’s (very attractive) dad that she’s a nurse and helps him pull a bee stinger from the girl’s foot. With this lie, and chance encounter, Sloane becomes the nanny for the wealthy and privileged Jay and Violet Lockhart. They’re the perfect New York couple, with a brownstone, a daughter in private school, and summers on Block Island. But maybe Sloane isn’t the only one lying, and all that’s picture-perfect harbors a much more dangerous truth.
Gallery/Scout Press | 9781668079355
THE DEATH OF US by Abigail Dean (Psychological Thriller)
Together, Edward and Isabel move to London. They are young and in love, occupied by friends, work and fun. But late on a spring evening when they are 30 years old, their home is invaded by a serial killer. In the wake of this violation, each tries to come to terms with a night that changed everything --- and their marriage begins to crumble. Twenty-five years later, their tormentor is caught, and Edward and Isabel reunite for his sentencing. Isabel has waited years for the man who nearly ended her life to be brought to justice. Edward has tried to think about anything else. As they prepare to deliver impact statements in the public eye, it is time to revisit their love story. Will they finally be able to confront the secrets, longings and lies that tore them apart? Or will the horror of that night be the death of them?
Penguin Books | 9780593831151
DON’T FALL IN LOVE WITH ME by Paige Toon (Romance)
Paperback Original
Grace has loved Jackson since she was 15. Spending every summer together exploring his grandfather’s chateau and the tumbling rivers of the gorgeous Ardèche region of France, they were best friends. Until he married someone else. Three years later, a newly single Jackson re-enters Grace’s life with an irresistible offer: her dream job in the very town where their story began. As memories from those idyllic summers flood back, Grace encounters another old friend, Étienne, who proposes a plan to make Jackson jealous. Their scheme begins to work just as Grace finds herself questioning if the sparks between them might not be so pretend after all. But games can be dangerous, and Étienne is harboring a secret that could shatter Grace’s heart.
G.P. Putnam's Sons | 9780593718759
HAPPY ENDING by Chloe Liese (Romantic Comedy)
Paperback Original
Thea and Alex couldn’t be more different. Thea has never cooked a day in her life. Alex is a world-class chef. Alex resents feeling stuck in his hometown. Thea resents the town for not feeling more like home. Thea and her ex are in a contentious custody battle for their dog. Alex and his ex amicably coparent their daughter. Fast forward two years, and they’re truly the best of friends. Two years ago, their exes got together immediately following their divorces, and Thea and Alex somehow found themselves spinning a spite-fueled story about being old friends and first loves. Two years later, what began as a ruse has grown into real friendship. But when their exes invite them on a two-week, “two family” beach vacation, Alex and Thea start to wonder if this story they’ve spun might have gotten away from them.
Gallery Books | 9781668205471
HOLLYWOOD PAYBACK by Jon Lindstrom (Thriller)
Paperback Original
Twenty years ago, Jake Ferguson threw his life away. Once a promising Hollywood actor, he crashed and burned the usual way: with coke, booze and pills. When that path reached its inevitable end, he made a desperate choice, and an innocent woman was killed. Before being convicted and shipped to Folsom Prison, Jake agreed to testify against his own partners-in-crime as the star witness for the prosecution. Now Jake is reentering society --- coming home to an LA he no longer recognizes and to a life that has lost all meaning. Then he meets Carla, a waitress who understands him better than he expects, and he begins to believe deliverance may be possible after all. Until one night, a murder is committed right in front of him, and Jake knows he’s been set up.
Crooked Lane Books | 9798892425094
HOLMES IS MISSING: A Holmes, Margaret & Poe Mystery by James Patterson and Brian Sitts (Mystery/Thriller)
Success has come quickly to Holmes, Marple & Poe Investigations. The New York City agency led by three detectives --- Brendan Holmes, “the brain”; Margaret Marple, “the eyes”; and Auguste Poe, the “muscle” --- with famous names and mysterious pasts is one major case away from cementing its professional reputation. But as a series of child abductions tests the PIs’ legendary skills, the cerebral Holmes’ absence leaves a gaping hole in the agency roster. Only by closing ranks and solving the mystery within can they recover all that’s been lost.
Little, Brown and Company | 9781538758908
ISABELLA NAGG AND THE POT OF BASIL by Oliver Darkshire (Fantasy/Humor)
In a tiny farm on the edge of the miserable village of East Grasby, Isabella Nagg is trying to get on with her tiny, miserable existence. Dividing her time between tolerating her feckless husband, caring for the farm’s strange animals, cooking up “scrunge,” and crooning over her treasured pot of basil, Isabella can’t help but think that there might be something more to life. When Mr. Nagg returns home with a spell book purloined from the local wizard, she thinks: What harm could a little magic do? This debut novel by beloved rare bookseller and memoirist Oliver Darkshire reimagines a heroine of Giovanni Boccaccio’s THE DECAMERON in a delightfully deranged world of talking plants, walking corpses, sentient animals and shape-shifting sorcerers.
W. W. Norton & Company | 9781324130796
THE LOST SUMMER by Wendy Corsi Staub (Psychological Thriller)
Paperback Original
Detective Sergeant Midge Kennedy and her lifelong pals, Talia and Kelly, have reunited on the 25th anniversary of the disappearance of their friend, Caroline. But as the season draws to a close in Mulberry Bay, Midge is plunged into a missing person case with unsettling ties to the past. Ordinarily, she wouldn’t suspect foul play when a 16-year-old girl is just a few hours late getting home. But her investigation yields a shocking glimpse of a familiar face, and mounting coincidences link Sarah Greene’s vanishing to Caroline’s. The clues lead to Haven Cliff, an abandoned Gilded Age estate that’s been the stuff of cursed legend for generations. It’s also Kelly’s new home. Midge suspects that the wooded grounds hold the key to Sarah’s fate and Caroline’s. But will Haven Cliff --- and Midge herself --- give up long-buried secrets?
Thomas & Mercer | 9781662523823
MATCHMAKING FOR PSYCHOPATHS by Tasha Coryell (Psychological Thriller)
When Lexie's fiancé runs off with her so-called best friend on her birthday, her carefully crafted fairy-tale life shatters. To distract herself, Lexie throws herself into her unusual job: matchmaking psychopaths (a specialty her clients are blissfully unaware of). But the loneliness is crushing. So when a gorgeous, overprotective new client named Aidan insists they're soulmates, and another intriguing client, Rebecca, seems perfect to fill the best-friend-shaped hole in her life, Lexie can't help but find the attention comforting --- despite her own professional boundaries. Then a human heart appears on Lexie's doorstep. As more threatening packages arrive and her fiancé mysteriously disappears, she must confront a terrifying question: Did she inadvertently match herself with a killer?
Berkley | 9780593640319
THE MISSING ONES by A. R. Torre (Domestic Thriller)
Paperback Original
Behind the manicured lawns and guarded gates of Crestmore Estates lies a neighborhood built on secrets. Five years ago, three residents vanished without a trace. Now, when human remains surface on the golf course, old suspicions rematerialize --- and the spotlight falls on the women left behind. Andrea Kendal knows what people think --- that her brilliant surgeon husband had something to do with his first wife’s bloody disappearance. Sara Batcher has spent years defending herself against accusations that she killed her husband. And Katie Morrow, the community’s youngest trophy wife, can’t escape the suspicious shadows cast by her husband’s ex-wife. As the investigation circles closer, the wives find themselves bound together by fear, betrayal and the ghosts of the missing.
Thomas & Mercer | 9781662534218
OVERGROWTH by Mira Grant (Science Fiction/Horror)
Since she was three years old, Anastasia Miller has been telling anyone who would listen that she's an alien disguised as a human being, and that the armada that left her on Earth is coming for her. Since she was three years old, no one has believed her. Now, with an alien signal from the stars being broadcast around the world, humanity is finally starting to realize that it's already been warned, and it may be too late. The invasion is coming, Stasia's biological family is on the way to bring her home, and very few family reunions are willing to cross the gulf of space for just one misplaced child.
Tor Nightfire | 9781250768247
PARALLEL LINES by Edward St. Aubyn (Fiction)
It’s the summer, and Sebastian is in treatment following a breakdown that has left him grappling with his fragile grip on reality and his persistent hunger to connect with the biological mother who abandoned him as a child. His therapist, Martin, is facing challenges of his own, including his adopted daughter’s tenuous relationship with her own biological mother --- a predicament that makes Sebastian’s struggle feel uncannily proximate to her own. Olivia is producing a radio series on catastrophic natural disasters, which itself seems to be running parallel to the events unfolding in her personal life, as her best friend, Lucy, faces a grave diagnosis, and her husband, Francis, pursues his mission of re-wilding the world. Over the course of the next year, their fates collide in outrageous and poignant ways, as each of their destinies is revealed in a marvelous new light.
Vintage | 9780593468746
PARENTS WEEKEND by Alex Finlay (Psychological Thriller)
In the glow of their children’s exciting first year of college at a small private school in Northern California, five families plan on a night of dinner and cocktails for the opening festivities of Parents Weekend. As the parents stay out way past their bedtimes, their kids --- five residents of Campisi Hall --- never show up at dinner. As the hours click by and another night falls with not so much as a text from the students, panic ensues. Libby, Blane, Mark, Felix and Stella --- The Five, as the podcasters, bloggers and TikTok sleuths call them --- come from five very different families. What led them out on that fateful night? Could it be the sins of their mothers and fathers that have come to cause them peril, or a threat to the friend group from within?
Minotaur Books | 9781250360748
THE RIDE: Paul Revere and the Night That Saved America by Kostya Kennedy (History)
On April 18, 1775, a Boston-based silversmith, engraver and anti-British political operative named Paul Revere set out on a borrowed horse to fulfill a dangerous but crucial mission: to alert American colonists of advancing British troops, which would seek to crush their nascent revolt. Revere had completed at least 18 previous rides across New England and other colonies, disseminating intelligence about British movements. But this ride was like no other, and its consequences in the months and years to come --- as the American Revolution morphed from isolated skirmishes to a full-fledged war --- became one of our founding legends. In THE RIDE, Kostya Kennedy presents a dramatic new narrative of the events of April 18 and 19, 1775, informed by fresh primary and secondary source research into archives, family letters and diaries, contemporary accounts, and more.
St. Martin's Griffin | 9781250341396
THE ROAD TO TENDER HEARTS by Annie Hartnett (Fiction/Dark Humor)
At 63 years old, million-dollar lottery winner PJ Halliday would be the luckiest man in Pondville, Massachusetts, if it weren’t for the tragedies of his life: the sudden death of his eldest daughter and the way his marriage fell apart after that. He probably doesn’t have much time left as he’s had three heart attacks already. But when PJ reads the obituary of his old romantic rival, he realizes that his high school sweetheart, Michelle Cobb, is finally single again. So he decides to drive across the country to the Tender Hearts Retirement Community in Arizona to win Michelle back. Before he can hit the road, tragedy strikes Pondville, leaving PJ the sudden guardian of his estranged brother’s grandchildren. This could be the second chance PJ has long hoped for --- a fresh shot at love and parenting --- but does he have the strength to do both those things again?
Ballantine Books | 9780593873465
THREE DAYS IN JUNE by Anne Tyler (Fiction)
Gail Baines is having a bad day. To start, she loses her job --- or quits, depending on whom you ask. Tomorrow her daughter, Debbie, is getting married, and she hasn’t even been invited to the spa day organized by the mother of the groom. Then, Gail’s ex-husband, Max, arrives unannounced on her doorstep, carrying a cat, without a place to stay and without even a suit. But the true crisis lands when Debbie shares with her parents a secret she has just learned about her husband to be. It will not only throw the wedding into question but also stir up Gail and Max’s past.
Vintage | 9780593689325
VANISHING WORLD written by Sayaka Murata, translated by Ginny Tapley Takemori (Speculative Fiction)
As a girl, Amane realizes with horror that her parents “copulated” in order to bring her into the world, rather than using artificial insemination, which became the norm in the mid-20th century. Amane strives to get away from what she considers an indoctrination in this strange “system” by her mother, but her infatuations with both anime characters and real people have a sexual force that is undeniable. As an adult, Amane and her husband, Saku, decide to live in a mysterious new town called Experiment City or Paradise-Eden, where all children are raised communally, and every person is considered a Mother to all children. Men are beginning to become pregnant using artificial wombs that sit outside of their bodies like balloons, and children are nameless, called only “Kodomo-chan.” Is this the new world that will purify Amane of her strangeness once and for all?
Grove Press | 9780802167521
WHILE YOU WERE SEETHING by Charlotte Stein (Romantic Comedy)
Paperback Original
Daisy Emmett has been enemies with famous romance author Caleb Miller since they were in college together. So when she agrees to maneuver him through a PR disaster of his own making, she knows it’s not going to be easy. They somehow end up trapped in the same truck, on an endless road trip from one book tour stop to another. Then, even more horrifying: people appear to be mistaking her for the woman to whom he dedicates all of his books. The love of his life, his adored beloved --- the one who doesn’t actually exist. Now they’re trapped into pretending she does and that Daisy is her, each fake kiss and phony embrace ratcheting up the tension to the point where enemies suddenly seem a lot closer to lovers than either of them would like. Or so they’re telling themselves.
St. Martin's Griffin | 9781250867995
THE WILDELINGS by Lisa Harding (Fiction)
Jessica and Linda have been best friends since the first day of school. Now 18, they have come to Wilde --- an elite university in the heart of Dublin, far away from their troubled childhoods. Jessica thrives immediately; with the faithful Linda at her side, she finds herself at the heart of a new circle of friends. But then Mark enters the picture. A philosophy student a few years older than them, he has strange and compelling ideas about self-discovery. When Linda and Mark start dating, Jessica is disturbed by the change in her friend --- and how quickly she seems to have fallen under the charismatic man’s control. It turns out that Mark’s influence is not limited to Linda alone, and Jessica soon finds out that her whole group of friends are keeping secrets for him. It will culminate in ways that will change their lives forever.
HarperVia | 9780063375642
WIND AND TRUTH: Book Five of the Stormlight Archive by Brandon Sanderson (Fantasy/Adventure)
Dalinar Kholin challenged the evil god Odium to a contest of champions with the future of Roshar on the line. But the sudden ascension of the crafty and ruthless Taravangian to take Odium’s place has thrown everything into disarray. The former assassin Szeth must cleanse his homeland of Shinovar from the dark influence of the Unmade. He is accompanied by Kaladin, who faces a new battle helping Szeth fight his own demons…and who must do the same for the insane Herald of the Almighty, Ishar. At the same time, Shallan, Renarin and Rlain work to unravel the mystery behind the Unmade Ba-Ado-Mishram and her involvement in the enslavement of the singer race and in the ancient Knights Radiant killing their spren. And Dalinar and Navani seek an edge against Odium’s champion that can be found only in the Spiritual Realm, where memory and possibility combine in chaos.
Tor Books | 9781250319210
On Sale the Week of April 20th in Hardcover
April 20th
THE MOTHER-DAUGHTER BOOK CLUB by Susan Patterson and James Patterson (Fiction)
Between their busy lives and their far-flung residences, the Mother-Daughter Book Club --- four longtime college friends and their five daughters --- more often discuss the books on their nightstands via 2am texts than in-person meetings. And maybe it’s just as well, after what happened at their last get-together. So it’s an emotional reunion when they finally gather again, this time on the spectacular shores of Italy’s Lake Como. Sightseeing excursions, reminiscing fueled by “Como-politans,” and a hint of vacation romance all build toward the book club’s trademark “Night of Secrets.” These friends, and sometime rivals, are close readers --- of novels, memoirs, and each other. But as the years and the distance cast shadows and doubt, confidences and sympathies turn into surprising revelations.
Little, Brown and Company | 9780316580595
April 21st
BUMBLEBEE SEASON by Eileen Garvin (Fiction)
Beekeeper Jake Stevenson’s fledgling honey farm has been inundated with orders. But he can’t seem to hire anyone, and there’s no way he can handle the approaching harvest all by himself, no matter how adept he’s become at maneuvering among the beehives in his wheelchair. Meanwhile, Flaco López, a young migrant from Mexico, is lost on Mount Hood when he stumbles upon Jake’s beehives in a high alpine meadow. As Flaco takes refuge on Jake’s farm, they begin to form a tentative friendship. And the two soon cross paths with Abigail Plue, a scientist who’s on Mount Hood studying a threatened native bumblebee. Then a local rabble rouser begins to rally support to build a commercial hunting camp that would destroy Mount Hood’s pristine wilderness. Jake, Abigail and Flaco must come together to protect everything they hold dear.
Dutton | 9798217044900
THE CARETAKER by Marcus Kliewer (Supernatural Thriller/Horror)
EXCITING OPPORTUNITY: Caretaker urgently needed. Three days of work. Competitive pay. Serious applicants ONLY. Macy Mullins can’t say why the job posting grabbed her attention. It had the pull of a fisherman’s lure, barbed hook and all --- vaguely ominous. But after an endless string of failed job interviews, she's not exactly in the position to be picky. She has rent to pay, groceries to buy, and a younger sister to provide for. Besides, it’s only three days’ work. Three days, cooped up in a stranger’s house, surrounded by Oregon Coast wilderness. What starts as a peculiar side gig soon becomes a waking nightmare. An incomprehensible evil may dwell on this property --- and Macy Mullins just might be the only thing standing between it and the rest of humanity.
Atria/Emily Bestler Books/12:01 Books | 9781982198817
THE LANGUAGE OF LIARS by S. L. Huang (Science Fiction/Space Opera)
In his training as a spy, Ro was warned: You will always be living a lie. Jumping into a Star Eater's mind in the first place requires a moment of perfect psychic connection, and he has studied all his life to comprehend their species. The only species physiologically capable of mining the element needed for lightyear-spanning space travel. The species Ro's own small civilization, with its dwindling resources and withering reach, needs to know more about. It will feel real, his elders impressed upon him. It will never be real. But Ro's certainty runs deep: he will be different. Ro will not be an imposter hiding the truth of his past, because his heart will be one of them. He will be one of them. To understand is to become. It never occurs to him that the mere act of understanding can destroy.
Tordotcom | 9781250405333
LAST NIGHT IN BROOKLYN by Xochitl Gonzalez (Fiction)
Spring, 2007. Alicia Canales Forten is in a long-distance relationship, living at home with her mother’s beliefs, and saving up for her wedding to a future doctor. But after Alicia ventures out one night in the neighborhood of Fort Greene, Brooklyn, she finds herself lured by the siren song of youth and possibility that the striving crowd of creatives holds, and she moves in. No one embodies this milieu more than La Garza, a larger-than-life, up-and-coming fashion designer whose epic house parties fuel neighborhood lore. La Garza’s life, observed by Alicia from her apartment across the street, seems to hold the allure and fearlessness that Alicia has never dared to imagine for herself. But when Alicia’s wealthy banker cousin moves to the neighborhood, she finds herself increasingly drawn into both his and La Garza’s precarious lives.
Flatiron Books | 9781250372031
LIDIE: The Further Travels and Adventures of Lidie Newton by Jane Smiley (Historical Fiction)
Christmas, 1857. America's future is precarious; civil war looms on the horizon. After her abolitionist husband is murdered in the lawless Kansas Territory, Lidie Newton returns, in mourning, to her hometown of Quincy, Illinois. But her sisters have little comfort to offer, and Lidie is haunted by the memories of her failures --- until she takes an interest in her niece, Annie. Annie becomes an actress at the local theater, and when she is offered the opportunity to perform abroad, she decides to run away. But travel is dangerous for a young unmarried woman, so Lidie, armed with her pistol and her wit, goes with her. The two women embark on a perilous journey across the Atlantic. Once they arrive in Liverpool, they vanish into new roles in the household of Annie's benefactor, Mr. Mallory Cunningham. But will either of them be content with her new lot in life?
Knopf | 9780593802298
LIVONIA CHOW MEIN by Abigail Savitch-Lew (Fiction)
In 1978, two tenements on Livonia Avenue in Brownsville burn to the ground, killing one resident and displacing dozens of others. It remains unclear who set the buildings ablaze, but the survivors are convinced the culprit is Mr. Wong. Who exactly is Mr. Wong, and what allegedly drove him to this extraordinary act of violence, is the question that consumes this novel as it plunges into four generations of Wong family history. Joining together the present and the past is community organizer Lina Rodriguez Armstrong, who also was displaced by the fire and has spent the intervening years fighting for the rights of Brownsville’s residents and organizing a Livonia Avenue community land trust.
Simon & Schuster | 9781668075234
MAD MABEL by Sally Hepworth (Domestic Thriller)
Meet Elsie Mabel Fitzpatrick: 81 years old, gloriously grumpy, fiercely independent, and never without a hot cup of tea --- or a cutting remark. She minds her own business in her quiet Melbourne suburb, until a neighbor turns up dead and the whispers start flying. Because Elsie hasn’t always been Elsie. Once upon a headline, she was Mad Mabel Waller --- Australia’s youngest convicted murderer. But was she really mad, or just misunderstood? Either way, she’s kept her secret buried for decades. Enter seven-year-old Persephone, a relentless little chatterbox who has just moved in across the road; Joan, who appears to have it in for Elsie; and a healthy dose of public interest. So Mabel does what she’s always done best --- she takes matters into her own hands.
St. Martin's Press | 9781250284549
NO WAY HOME by T.C. Boyle (Fiction)
Terrence Tully is at work when he receives news that his mother has died. A third-year medical resident in a gritty community hospital in downtown Los Angeles, he sees death daily, but the news that his mother has passed away jolts him like no other. Turn the page, and he’s heading north on I-15 through a lifeless desert to the small Nevada town where his mother had retired. Overwhelmed with grief and the burden of having to sort out the remnants of his mother’s life, he stops at a café and has a chance encounter with a pretty young local girl in a turquoise minidress. What seems to him a chance meeting like so many we all experience daily will come to upend his life and morph into a fatal obsession.
Liveright | 9781324097525
PARADOX by Douglas Preston and Aletheia Preston (Technothriller)
When a reclusive man is found dead under grisly circumstances in the Colorado wilderness, CBI Agent Frankie Cash and Eagle County Sheriff Jim Colcord, whom we met in EXTINCTION, team up again on their most enigmatic and dangerous case yet. Their investigation uncovers a trail of bizarre killings, baffling money transfers, and a fanatical secret society. And all the while, the resurrected Neanderthals, who vanished into the Colorado mountains, seem to be biding their time for something…spectacular.
Forge Books | 9781250413901
PERMANENCE by Sophie Mackintosh (Fiction/Magical Realism)
Clara and Francis are in love, but nobody knows it. For months they have been stealing away from their respective lives, leaving no trace of their relationship behind. Their time together is always excruciatingly sweet and all too short. Until one day they wake up in an apartment neither of them recognizes, with no memory of how they got there. They find themselves in a new, unnamed city, a self-contained sanctuary where adulterers live openly as couples. Here there are fountains and old town squares and perfect cafes with checkered tablecloths. Contact with the real world is impossible, and the city’s whims are mysterious. But now those stolen afternoons never have to end. How much would you sacrifice for a life you never thought possible? And how long can you stay in paradise before the cracks start to show?
Avid Reader Press/Simon & Schuster | 9781668206522
THE ROLLING STONES: The Biography by Bob Spitz (Music/Biography)
All great music is a threat. What left is there to say about The Rolling Stones? A hell of a lot, it turns out. Bob Spitz has brought his indefatigable energy and five decades of experiences in the fields and hollows of rock 'n’ roll to bear on his five-year journey to reexamine one of popular music’s greatest stories. There are myriad revisions to the conventional narrative that underscore just how in control of that narrative the band has been up to now. But, as with the Beatles and Led Zeppelin, Spitz’s greatest gift is for the big picture. He knows where the magic is, and why it is. He is as clear-eyed a connoisseur of the show business, the spectacle and the collateral damage of this whirlwind as anyone alive. But the ultimate goal is to connect with a creative force whose power shows no signs of fading, over 60 years on.
Penguin Press | 9780593489093
A ROOM IN BOMBAY: A Memoir by Manil Suri (Memoir)
Indian American author Manil Suri grew up in a large crumbling apartment in Bombay (now Mumbai), which his parents, who were Hindu, shared with three Muslim families. At age 20, Suri managed to break free from their single room and come to the US, where he finally found the freedom to embrace his sexuality and find a life partner. But the room, which still held his parents hostage, kept wrenching him back to Bombay. By now, real estate prices had risen so much that neighbors had begun conspiring to take over the room. Eventually it was only his mother, Prem, left, who had staked all her happiness on her son but was unable to escape the room’s hold on her. When a rash of mysterious incidents seemed to beset the room, Suri realized how little time he had left to convince Prem that a happier life might await beyond the four walls that both enthralled and imprisoned her.
W. W. Norton & Company | 9781324106388
SHADOW STRIKE: A Pike Logan Novel by Brad Taylor (Political Thriller/Adventure)
After its proxies are devastated and its offensive capability pummeled in the latest war in the Middle East, a rogue group of Iranian regime officials create a brazen plot to strike back at their hated enemies once and for all. They envision a series of operational dominos culminating in a devastating attack, and the first step is the assassination of the Israeli prime minister. And there’s only one assassin with the skills to pull it off: Abdul Rahman, known in the shadows as the Ghost. When a routine prison transfer is ambushed, the Ghost escapes and is given the assignment. The only Operator who can hunt him down is the man who stopped him before: Pike Logan. Pike and his team soon learn that the mission involves something bigger than just the escape of his old enemy.
William Morrow | 9780063433199
SHORT CIRCUIT written by Wolf Haas, translated by Jamie Bulloch (Literary Mystery)
Franz Escher is waiting for the electrician. His power outlet has a loose connection. To pass the time, he buries himself in a book about a Mafioso-turned-informant, Elio Russo. Elio is in jail, awaiting his imminent release into witness protection. He has betrayed so many people that he fears for his life. Unable to sleep, he lies awake at night reading a book about a man named Franz Escher, who's waiting for the electrician. His power outlet has a loose connection. So begins SHORT CIRCUIT, an inventive new take on the detective novel. Styled after one of M. C. Escher’s impossible drawings, its two stories gradually intertwine only to solve each other, culminating in one final short circuit.
HarperVia | 9780063469167
SMALL BOAT written by Vincent Delecroix, translated by Helen Stevenson (Fiction)
In November 2021, an inflatable dinghy carrying migrants from France to the UK capsized in the English Channel, causing the deaths of 27 people on board. Despite receiving numerous calls for help, the French authorities wrongly told the migrants they were in British waters and had to call the British authorities for help. By the time rescue vessels arrived on the scene, nearly three hours later, all but two of the migrants had died, the worst single loss of life ever to occur in the Channel. SMALL BOAT is a fictional first-person account of the French navy officer who took the migrants’ calls --- and her attempts to justify the indefensible. Accused of failing in her duty, she refuses to be held more responsible than others for this disaster, than the crises behind these tragedies.
Mariner Books | 9780063491694
SMALL TOWN GIRLS: A Writer's Memoir by Jayne Anne Phillips (Memoir/Essays)
Jayne Anne Phillips grew up in the small town of Buckhannon, West Virginia. The distinctly American landscape of Appalachia has been the great setting for her fiction, even as she and her boundless imagination have traveled to other times and places. In these pieces, Phillips brings us into her childhood and family, most movingly her mother. She recreates the place she calls home, its foundational truths and the densely woven ties between the women of the town. She traces her journeys across the country and her discovery of writing and reading as tools for both survival and revelation, offering insights into the fellow writers and touchstones that moved and influenced her. From the local beauty salon to the legendary Hatfield–McCoy feud, Phillips ponders her relationship with inspiration, spirituality, culture, and the troubled annals of the last American centuries.
Knopf | 9780593804933
TO THE END OF RECKONING by Joseph Moldover (Psychological Thriller/Literary Mystery)
Lukas Moore has returned to his hometown and left his burgeoning acting career behind to care for his father. Dr. Richard Moore is a psychiatrist known for being nearly as misanthropic as he is brilliant, but a recent traumatic brain injury has changed his worldview in unexpected ways. He now sees mysteries where other people see settled facts --- nowhere more so than in the disappearance of his former colleague and neighbor, Dr. Jason Grant, one year ago. The obvious conclusion was suicide. But Jason’s younger sister and Lukas’ high school girlfriend, Misty, has questioned his fate, so she asks for the Moores’ help in finding out what really happened to him. As Lukas, Richard and Misty are drawn into the puzzle, they are forced to confront the secrets behind both Jason’s disappearance and Richard’s injury.
The Mysterious Press | 9781613167588
A WOMAN'S PLACE by Danielle Steel (Historical Fiction)
In April 1912, 23-year-old Lady Victoria Oldbrooke is traveling with her beloved father from England on the maiden voyage of the Titanic. But when the ship strikes an iceberg and lifeboats are lowered with women and children first, Lord Alfred gives his place to another, and they are separated. Before he goes down with the ship, he asks his friend, Bert Banning, to promise he’ll marry his daughter and care for her. As friendship turns to deeper feelings, Bert hesitates to propose. Not only is he 40 years her senior, but her marrying an industrialist will cause Victoria to be ostracized by the aristocratic world she comes from. She marries Bert anyway and --- cruelly shunned by everyone she knows --- moves to his home in Manchester. When Bert meets a tragic end, she steps into his shoes and applies everything she has learned, in spite of opposition from all sides.
Delacorte Press | 9780593973080
On Sale the Week of April 20th in Paperback
April 21st
THE 10: A Memoir of Family and the Open Road by E.A. Hanks (Memoir)
Driving her trusty minivan, “Minnie,” E.A. Hanks retraces the route of a memorable road trip she once took with her mother, seeking to understand the complex woman who shaped her life. Along the way, as she follows her mother’s diaries and her own recollections of the route, she begins to uncover secrets --- some unexpectedly wonderful, and others darker and more violent than she ever imagined --- that bring more questions than answers. Reckoning with the past, the present, her memories and herself, Hanks brings us along a poignant journey, revealing how the stories tied to the places we come from shape the narratives of who we are.
Gallery Books | 9781982131302
THE BEWITCHING by Silvia Moreno-Garcia (Historical Fantasy/Gothic Horror)
“Back then, when I was a young woman, there were still witches”: That was how Nana Alba always began the stories she told her great-granddaughter, Minerva, who is now researching the life of Beatrice Tremblay, an obscure author of macabre tales. In the course of assembling her thesis, Minerva uncovers information that reveals that Tremblay’s most famous novel, The Vanishing, was inspired by a true story. Decades earlier, during the Great Depression, Tremblay attended the same university where Minerva is now studying and became obsessed with her beautiful and otherworldly roommate, who then disappeared under mysterious circumstances. As Minerva descends ever deeper into Tremblay’s manuscript, she begins to sense that the malign force that stalked Tremblay and the missing girl might still walk the halls of the campus.
Del Rey | 9780593874349
THE BRIGHT YEARS by Sarah Damoff (Fiction)
Ryan and Lillian Bright are deeply in love, recently married, and now parents to a baby girl, Georgette. But Lillian has a son she hasn’t told Ryan about, and Ryan has an alcohol addiction he hasn’t told Lillian about, so Georgette comes of age watching their marriage rise and fall. When a shocking blow scatters their fragile trio, Georgette tries to distance herself from reminders of her parents. Years later, Lillian’s son comes searching for his birth family, so Georgette must return to her roots, unearth her family’s history, and decide if she can open up to love for them --- or herself --- while there’s still time.
Simon & Schuster | 9781668061459
THE CONFESSIONS by Paul Bradley Carr (Technothriller)
LLIAM is the world’s most powerful supercomputer, built to make the toughest decisions for its users. But when it suddenly goes offline with no explanation, the world is thrust into chaos. Then, on every continent, mysterious envelopes arrive in the mail, exposing people’s darkest secrets and most shocking crimes. All beginning with the same chilling words: “We must confess.” With millions of people suddenly made to confront their past transgressions, CEO Kaitlan Goss must track down the only person who can help undo the resulting violent chaos: Maud Brookes, an ex-nun who taught LLIAM what it means to be human. But when Maud receives a letter herself, revealing Kaitlan’s own unforgivable sin, the two women are forced into a deadly game of deceit as the world teeters on the brink.
Atria Books | 9781668074411
DEATH AT A HIGHLAND WEDDING: A Rip Through Time Novel by Kelley Armstrong (Historical Mystery/Thriller)
After slipping 150 years into the past, modern-day homicide detective Mallory Atkinson has embraced her new life in Victorian Scotland as housemaid Catriona Mitchell and has come to love her role as assistant to undertaker Dr. Duncan Gray and Detective Hugh McCreadie. Mallory, Gray and McCreadie are on their way to the Scottish Highlands for McCreadie's younger sister's wedding. When they arrive at the Cranston estate, Gray and Mallory decide to explore the castle and the surrounding wilderness. They discover that the groom, Archie Cranston, has set up deadly traps in the woods for the endangered Scottish wildcats, and they soon come across a cat who's been caught and severely injured. When one of the guests is murdered, they must work fast to uncover the murderer before another life is lost.
Minotaur Books | 9781250321336
DON’T STOP by Bonnie Friedman (Fiction)
Paperback Original
Ina is a 41-year-old literary scholar on the cusp of professional success. With a coveted university job, a kind husband, and a book on Eugene O’Neill due in months, her life appears enviably stable. But when an impulsive kiss with a stranger shatters her self-control, Ina finds herself plunged into an erotic and emotional freefall. She tells herself it’s research --- a brief detour before returning to real life. But what begins as a flirtation becomes a reckoning with everything Ina thought she wanted: marriage, intellect, control. As she navigates the ecstatic confusion of newfound desire, she risks upending her work, her relationship, and her understanding of who she is.
Europa Editions | 9798889661740
A HISTORY OF HEARTACHE: Stories by Patrick Strickland (Fiction/Short Stories)
Paperback Original
In A HISTORY OF HEARTACHE, boys grow up fast in the blazing heat of North Texas, and men grow old before their time. A wayward son rides shotgun into a night he can't take back. A janitor at an abortion clinic can’t outrun a ghost --- or a camera. Patrick Strickland writes with clear-eyed realism and unsparing craftsmanship about common people --- fathers and sons; widowers and junkies --- poised on the knife-edge of hope. With taut sentences and a wicked sense of humor, these 14 stories chart the small mercies and big mistakes that make a life: the songs we inherit, the bottles we empty, the tools we fashion from whatever is at hand. Gritty and tender in the same breath, this debut fiction collection asks what it costs to stay, what it takes to leave, and who we become when we do.
Melville House | 9781685892357
HOT AIR by Marcy Dermansky (Fiction/Dark Humor)
Joannie hadn’t been on a date in seven years when Johnny invites Joannie and her daughter to dinner. His house is beautiful, his son is sweet, and their first kiss is, well, it’s not the best, but Joannie could convince herself it was nice enough. But when Joannie’s childhood crush, a summer-camp fling turned famous billionaire, crash-lands his hot-air balloon in Johnny’s swimming pool, Joannie dives in. Soon she finds herself alighting on a lost weekend with Johnny the bad kisser, Jonathan the billionaire, and Julia, his smart, stunning wife. Does Joannie want Jonathan? Does Julia want her husband? Or Joannie? Or Joannie’s beautiful little girl? Does Johnny want Julia? Does Jonathan want Joannie, or Julia, or maybe his much younger personal assistant, Vivian, who is tasked to fix it all?
Vintage | 9780593315361
JAMES by Percival Everett (Historical Fiction)
When Jim overhears that he is about to be sold to a man in New Orleans, separated from his wife and daughter forever, he runs away until he can formulate a plan. Meanwhile, Huck Finn has faked his own death to escape his violent father. As all readers of American literature know, thus begins the dangerous and transcendent journey by raft down the Mississippi River toward the elusive and unreliable promise of the Free States and beyond. Brimming with the electrifying humor and lacerating observations that have made Percival Everett a literary icon, this brilliant and tender novel radically illuminates Jim’s agency, intelligence and compassion as never before.
Vintage | 9780593686867
JULIE CHAN IS DEAD by Liann Zhang (Psychological Thriller)
Julie Chan finds herself thrust into the glamorous yet perilous world of her late twin sister, Chloe Van Huusen, a popular influencer. Separated at a young age, the identical twins were polar opposites and rarely spoke. When Julie discovers Chloe’s body, she doesn’t call the police. Instead, she slips into her dead sister’s meticulously curated life: luxury fashion, high-end skincare and a devoted online following who never noticed they weren’t quite the same. Now, trapped on a private island retreat with Chloe’s inner circle --- an elite clique of influencers obsessed with status and secrecy --- Julie is forced to keep up the act while being haunted by her sister’s untimely death. As events spiral out of control, Julie uncovers the sinister forces that may have led to her sister’s demise and realizes she might be the next target.
Atria Books | 9781668067901
THE MISSING HALF by Ashley Flowers, with Alex Kiester (Mystery/Thriller)
At 24, Nicole “Nic” Monroe lives alone in a dinky apartment in her hometown of Mishawaka, Indiana, she’s just gotten a DWI, and she works the same dead-end job she’s been working since high school. Everyone has felt sorry for her for the last seven years --- since the day her older sister, Kasey, vanished without a trace. The only real clue in her disappearance was Jules Connor, another young woman from the same area who disappeared in the same way, two weeks earlier. But with so little for the police to go on, both cases eventually went cold. Nic wants nothing more than to move on from her sister’s disappearance and the state in which it has left her. But then one day, Jules’ sister, Jenna Connor, walks into Nic’s life and offers her something she hasn’t felt in a long time: hope.
Bantam | 9780593727003
THE MOUNTAINS WE CALL HOME: The Book Woman's Legacy by Kim Michele Richardson (Historical Fiction)
Paperback Original
In this stand-alone and companion novel to the Book Woman of Troublesome Creek series, our heroine for the ages, legendary book woman Cussy Lovett, returns home. A powerful testament of strength, survival and the magic of the printed word, THE MOUNTAINS WE CALL HOME is wrapped into a vivid portrait of Kentucky life: examining incarceration and criminalization, exploring the effects on the poor and powerless, and tracing the societal consequences of fractured family bonds, along with nostalgic glimpses of a bustling, multifaceted Louisville, and heartwarming portraits of reading efforts in every facet of life.
Sourcebooks Landmark | 9781464239335
MUTUAL INTEREST by Olivia Wolfgang-Smith (Historical Fiction)
When Vivian Lesperance meets Oscar Schmidt, a middle manager at a soap company, at the turn of the 20th century, she finds a partner she can guide to build the life she wants --- not least because, more interested in men himself, Oscar will leave Vivian to tend to her own romances with women. But Vivian's plans require capital, so the two pair up with Squire Clancey, scion of an old American fortune. Together they found Clancey & Schmidt, a preeminent manufacturer of soap, perfume and candles. When Oscar and Squire fall in love, the trio form a new kind of partnership. Vivian reaches the pinnacle of her power, building Clancey & Schmidt into an empire of personal care products while operating behind the image of both men. But exposure threatens, and all three partners are made aware of how much they have to lose.
Bloomsbury Publishing | 9781639738403
THE PERFECT DIVORCE by Jeneva Rose (Domestic Thriller)
It's been 11 years since high-powered attorney Sarah Morgan defended her husband, Adam, against the charge of murdering his mistress. Sarah has long since moved on, starting a family with her new husband, Bob Miller, and changing careers. Her life is back to being exactly how she always wanted. Or is it? After discovering Bob engaged in a one-night stand, Sarah wastes no time filing for divorce. However, amid their ugly separation, new DNA evidence is uncovered in the case against Adam, forcing the police to reopen the investigation and putting Sarah right back in the spotlight. Everyone wants to know what really happened, most of all former Deputy Hudson, who is hell-bent on finding the truth. But when the woman Bob slept with is reported missing, he and Sarah start to fight dirty, and a high-stakes game of cat and mouse ensues.
Blackstone Publishing | 9798228646087
THE SAMURAI’S OCTOPUS by Jonelle Patrick (Historical Mystery)
Paperback Original
It’s the year 1784, and the shogun rules with an iron fist...except within the walled pleasure quarter of Yoshiwara. Inside the Great Gate, samurai law does not apply, and it’s women who pull the strings. But beneath the surface runs a deadly current of greed, deception...and murder. Takahisa Takeda will never forgive the first shogun for rewarding his ancestor’s loyalty with more honor than land. He’s the head of a venerable samurai family who barely can make ends meet, until the night he witnesses a terrible crime and seizes the opportunity to turn tragedy into gold. Birdie is just a child when she’s chosen to serve Yoshiwara’s number one courtesan and given a new name at the House of Treasures. Her only way out is to discover why the victim had to die, and hunt down a witness whose life depends on not being found.
Seventh Street Books | 9781645061151
SEALED WITH A HISS: A Mrs. Murphy Mystery by Rita Mae Brown and Sneaky Pie Brown (Mystery)
In Crozet, Virginia, restorations to the long-shuttered local segregated school are nearly complete, and it will be renamed to commemorate an important community member. To honor the former students, Mary Minor “Harry” Haristeen and her friends are hard at work planning a reunion. But the 15 acres behind the school are enticing for more than just a school reunion. One realtor soon reveals plans to buy the land and build over it --- unless the crew can find a way to stop the sale. In their search to prevent the purchase, they come across a dead body. With a little aid from Tee Tucker the corgi and Irish Wolfhound Pirate, as well as feline sleuths Mrs. Murphy and Pewter, Harry just might have a chance at solving this mystery and preventing the land purchase once and for all.
Bantam | 9780593874103
SUMMER LIGHT ON NANTUCKET by Nancy Thayer (Fiction)
With three of her kids in the throes of teenagerhood and one not too far behind them, Blythe Benedict has plenty of drama to keep her busy every single day, but no amount of that drama could change the family’s beloved annual summer trip to Nantucket. Blythe has always treasured the months spent at her island home-away-from-home. However, this summer’s getaway proves to be much more than she bargained for. Yes, there are sunny days enjoyed at the beach. But Blythe must contend with teenage angst, her ex-mother-in-law’s declining health, and a troubling secret involving her ex-husband. Meanwhile, she reconnects with her first love, her former high school sweetheart. But their second-time-around romance becomes complicated when another intriguing man enters the picture.
Ballantine Books | 9780593724057
THIS SONG IS ABOUT ME by Melissa de la Cruz (Fiction)
Paperback Original
Ryan Holding, the most famous pop star in the world, won every music award imaginable at the industry’s highest event. She exited the stage to thunderous applause…then disappeared off the face of the earth. Six years later, her social media accounts remain untouched. Her band has broken up. Her Malibu estate sits quiet. And billions of obsessed fans still ask: Whatever happened to Ryan Holding? Amid theories, suspicions and rumors, reporter Elyse James wants the truth about the girl who poured her heart into every song she wrote. As Elyse searches through the stories of Ryan’s life, a portrait of a flesh-and-blood icon begins to emerge. So do clues to a mystery that has captivated the world. Did Ryan disappear to find herself? Or did someone deliberately make Ryan disappear? The answers are the stuff of legend.
Little A | 9781662533686
WE LIVED ON THE HORIZON by Erika Swyler (Dystopian Fiction)
A walled city built to protect and preserve the people who managed to survive a series of great cataclysms, Bulwark was founded on a system where sacrifice is rewarded by the AI that runs the city. Over generations, an elite class has evolved from the descendants of those who gave up the most to found mankind’s last stronghold, called the Sainted. Saint Enita Malovis feels the end of her life and decades of work as a bio-prosthetist approaching. She is determined to preserve her legacy and decides to create a physical being, called Nix, filled with her knowledge and experience. In the midst of her project, a fellow Sainted is brutally murdered and the city AI inexplicably erases the event from its data. Soon, Enita and Nix are drawn into the growing war that could change everything between Bulwark’s hidden underclass and the programs that impose and maintain order.
Atria Books | 9781668049600
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