Hostage by Kay Hooper
Bishop/Special Crimes Unit Series Book # 14
Haven operative Luther
Brinkman has been sent into the wilderness of the Appalachian Mountains
of Tennessee to locate escaped felon Cole Jacoby, a mentally unstable
bank robber. Supposedly, Jacoby hid more than ten million dollars from
his last heist before he was captured—and rather mysteriously escaped
federal custody. And once Brinkman finds Jacoby, the agent is left
severely wounded, with no way to convey his location to Haven.
Callie
Davis, an agent with the FBI’s Special Crimes Unit, has been in the
area for some time, due to the foresight of her boss and unit chief,
Noah Bishop. But when she finds the wounded Brinkman, her rescue mission
turns into a deadly game of cat and mouse.
What neither Luther
nor Callie know is that their quarry is far more than an escaped bank
robber. And that in hunting him, they will find themselves being hunted
by him, and will discover him to be the worst monster either of them has
ever known.
For more information on Kay Hooper and her latest works visit her website.
The Death of Santini: the Story of a Father and His Son by Pat Conroy
In this
powerful and intimate memoir, the beloved bestselling author of The
Prince of Tides and his father, the inspiration for The Great Santini,
find some common ground at long last.
Pat Conroy's
father, Donald Patrick Conroy, was a towering figure in his son's life.
The Marine Corps fighter pilot was often brutal, cruel, and violent; as
Pat says, "I hated my father long before I knew there was an English
word for 'hate.'" As the oldest of seven children who were dragged from
military base to military base across the South, Pat bore witness to the
toll his father's behavior took on his siblings, and especially on his
mother, Peg. She was Pat's lifeline to a better world-that of books and
culture. But eventually, despite repeated confrontations with his
father, Pat managed to claw his way toward a life he could have only
imagined as a child.
Pat's great success as a writer has always
been intimately linked with the exploration of his family history. While
the publication of The Great Santini brought Pat much acclaim, the rift
it caused with his father brought even more attention. Their
long-simmering conflict burst into the open, fracturing an already
battered family. But as Pat tenderly chronicles here, even the oldest of
wounds can heal. In the final years of Don Conroy's life, he and his
son reached a rapprochement of sorts. Quite unexpectedly, the Santini
who had freely doled out physical abuse to his wife and children
refocused his ire on those who had turned on Pat over the years. He
defended his son's honor.
The Death of Santini is at once a
heart-wrenching account of personal and family struggle and a poignant
lesson in how the ties of blood can both strangle and offer succor. It
is an act of reckoning, an exorcism of demons, but one whose ultimate
conclusion is that love can soften even the meanest of men, lending
significance to one of the most-often quoted lines from Pat's
bestselling novel The Prince of Tides: "In families there are no crimes
beyond forgiveness."
For more information on Pat Conroy and his latest works visit his website.
Police by Jo Nesbo
Harry Hole Series Book # 10
The police urgently
need Harry Hole . . . A killer is stalking Oslo's streets. Police
officers are being slain at the scenes of crimes they once investigated
but failed to solve. The murders are brutal, the media reaction
hysterical.
But this time, Harry can't help . . . For years,
detective Harry Hole has been at the center of every major criminal
investigation in Oslo. His dedication to his job and his brilliant
insights have saved the lives of countless people.
But now, with those
he loves most facing terrible danger, Harry is not in a position to
protect anyone.
Least of all himself.
For more information on Jo Nesbo and his latest works visit his website.
Cross My Heart by James Patterson
Alex cross Series Book # 21
James Patterson
raises the stakes to their highest level, ever-when Alex Cross becomes
the obsession of a genius of menace set on proving that he is the greatest mind in the history of crime.
Detective Alex Cross is a family man at heart--nothing matters more to
him than his children, his grandmother, and his wife Bree. His love of
his family is his anchor, and gives him the strength to confront evil in
his work. One man knows this deeply, and uses Alex's strength as a
weapon against him in the most unsettling and unexpected novel of James
Patterson's career.
When the ones Cross loves are in danger, he
will do anything to protect them. If he does anything to protect them,
they will die.
CROSS MY HEART is the most powerful Alex Cross
novel ever, propelled by the ever-ingenious mind of James Patterson, the
world's #1 bestselling writer.
For more information on James Patterson and his latest works visit his website.
King and Maxwell by David Baldacci
Sean King and Michelle Maxwell Series Book # 6
David Baldacci brings
back Sean King and Michelle Maxwell-former Secret Service agents turned
private investigators, featured in the hit TNT TV series King & Maxwell-in their most surprising, personal, and dangerous case ever...KING AND MAXWELL
It
seems at first like a simple, tragic story. Tyler Wingo, a teenage boy,
learns the awful news that his father, a soldier, was killed in action
in Afghanistan. Then the extraordinary happens: Tyler receives a
communication from his father . . . after his supposed death.
Tyler
hires Sean and Michelle to solve the mystery surrounding his father.
But their investigation quickly leads to deeper, more troubling
questions. Could Tyler's father really still be alive? What was his true
mission? Could Tyler be the next target?
Sean and Michelle soon
realize that they've stumbled on to something bigger and more
treacherous than anyone could have imagined. And as their hunt for the
truth leads them relentlessly to the highest levels of power and to
uncovering the most clandestine of secrets, Sean and Michelle are
determined to help and protect Tyler--though they may pay for it with
their lives.
For more information on David Baldacci and his latest works visit his website.
Takedown Twenty by Janet Evanovich
Stephanie Plum Series Book # 20
Stephanie Plum has her sights set on catching a notorious mob boss. If she doesn’t take him down, he may take her out.
New
Jersey bounty hunter Stephanie Plum knows better than to mess with
family. But when powerful mobster Salvatore “Uncle Sunny” Sunucchi goes
on the lam in Trenton, it’s up to Stephanie to find him. Uncle Sunny is
charged with murder for running over a guy (twice), and nobody wants to
turn him in—not his poker buddies, not his bimbo girlfriend, not his two
right-hand men, Shorty and Moe. Even Trenton’s hottest cop, Joe
Morelli, has skin in the game, because—just Stephanie’s luck—the
godfather is his actual godfather. And while Morelli
understands that the law is the law, his old-world grandmother, Bella,
is doing everything she can to throw Stephanie off the trail.
It’s
not just Uncle Sunny giving Stephanie the run-around. Security
specialist Ranger needs her help to solve the bizarre death of a top
client’s mother, a woman who happened to play bingo with Stephanie’s
Grandma Mazur. Before Stephanie knows it, she’s working side by side
with Ranger and Grandma at the senior center, trying to catch a killer
on the loose—and the bingo balls are not rolling in their favor.
With
bullet holes in her car, henchmen on her tail, and a giraffe named
Kevin running wild in the streets of Trenton, Stephanie will have to up
her game for the ultimate takedown.
For more information on Janet Evanovich and her latest works visit her website.
Fiddlehead by Cherie Priest
Clockwork Century Series Book # 5
Ex-spy ‘Belle Boyd’ is
retired – more or less. Retired from spying on the Confederacy anyway.
Her short-lived marriage to a Union navy boy cast suspicion on those
Southern loyalties, so her mid-forties found her unemployed, widowed and
disgraced. Until her life-changing job offer from the staunchly Union
Pinkerton Detective Agency.
When she’s required to assist Abraham
Lincoln himself, she has to put any old loyalties firmly aside – for a
man she spied against twenty years ago.Lincoln’s friend Gideon Bardsley,
colleague and ex-slave, is targeted for assassination after the young
inventor made a breakthrough. Fiddlehead, Bardsley’s calculating engine,
has proved an extraordinary threat threatens the civilized world.
Meaning now is not the time for conflict.
Now Bardsley and
Fiddlehead are in great danger as forces conspire to keep this secret,
the war moving and the money flowing. With spies from both camps gunning
for her, can even the notorious Belle Boyd hold the war-hawks at bay?
For more information on Cherie Priest and her latest works visit her website.
Stella Bain by Anita Shreve
An epic story, set against the backdrop of World War I, from bestselling author Anita Shreve.
When
an American woman, Stella Bain, is found suffering from severe shell
shock in an exclusive garden in London, surgeon August Bridge and his
wife selflessly agree to take her in.
A gesture of goodwill turns
into something more as Bridge quickly develops a clinical interest in
his houseguest. Stella had been working as a nurse's aide near the
front, but she can't remember anything prior to four months earlier when
she was found wounded on a French battlefield.
In a narrative
that takes us from London to America and back again, Shreve has created
an engrossing and wrenching tale about love and the meaning of memory,
set against the haunting backdrop of a war that destroyed an entire
generation.
For more information on Anita Sheve and her latest works visit her website.
Spirit of Steamboat by Craig Johnson
Walt Longmire Series Book # 9.1
A holiday tale from the New York Times bestselling author of the Walt Longmire mystery series, the inspiration for A&E’s hit show Longmire
"It’s a question of what you have to do, what you have to live with if you don’t.”
Sheriff Walt Longmire is reading A Christmas Carol
in his office on December 24th when he’s interrupted by the ghost of
Christmas past: a young woman with a hairline scar across her forehead
and more than a few questions about Walt’s predecessor, Lucian Connally.
Walt doesn’t recognize the mystery woman, but she seems to know him and
claims to have something she must return to Connally. With his
daughter, Cady, and his undersheriff Vic Moretti in Philadelphia for the
holidays, Walt is at loose ends, and despite the woman’s reticence to
reveal her identity, he agrees to help her.
At the Durant Home
for Assisted Living Lucian Connally is several tumblers into his Pappy
Van Winkle’s and swears he’s never clapped eyes on the woman before.
Disappointed, she whispers "Steamboat” and begins a story that takes
them all back to Christmas Eve 1988, when three people died in a
terrible crash and a young girl had the slimmest chance of survival . . .
back to a record-breaking blizzard, to Walt’s first year as sheriff,
with a young daughter at home and a wife praying for his safety . . .
back to a whiskey-soaked World War II vet ready to fly a decommissioned
plane and risk it all to save a life.
Back to the Spirit of Steamboat.
For more information on Craig Johnson and his latest works visit his website.
Death of the Black-Haired Girl by Robert Stone
In an elite college in a once-decaying New
England city, Steven Brookman has come to a decision. A brilliant but
careless professor, he has determined that for the sake of his marriage,
and his soul, he must extract himself from his relationship with Maud
Stack, his electrifying student, whose papers are always late and too
long yet always incandescent. But Maud is a young woman whose passions
are not easily contained or curtailed, and their union will quickly
yield tragic and far-reaching consequences.
As in Robert Stone’s
most acclaimed novels, here he conjures a complex moral universe where
nothing is black and white, even if the characters—always complicated,
always compelling—wish it were. The stakes of Brookman and Maud’s
relationship prove higher than either one could have anticipated,
pitting individuals against one another and against the institutions
meant to protect them.
Death of the Black-Haired Girl is
a powerful tale of infidelity, accountability, the allure of youth, the
promise of absolution, and the notion that madness is everywhere, in
plain sight.
For more information on Robert Stone and his latest works visit this website.
The Valley of Amazement by Amy Tan
The New York
Times bestselling author and international sensation returns with her
long-awaited novel, a magnificent family saga of fate and identity that
moves from the lavish parlors of Shanghai courtesans to the fog-shrouded
mountains of a remote Chinese village.
Moving between
the dazzling world of courtesans in turn of the century Shanghai, a
remote Chinese mountain village, and the rough-hewn streets of
nineteenth-century San Francisco, Amy Tan's sweeping new novel maps the
lives of three generations of women connected by blood and history-and
the mystery of an evocative painting known as "The Valley of Amazement."
Violet
is one of the most celebrated courtesans in Shanghai, a beautiful and
intelligent woman who has honed her ability to become any man's fantasy
since her start as a "Virgin Courtesan" at the age of twelve.
Half-Chinese and half-American, she moves effortlessly between the East
and the West. But her talents belie her private struggle to understand
who she really is and her search for a home in the world. Abandoned by
her mother, Lucia, and uncertain of her father's identity, Violet's
quest to truly love and be loved will set her on a path fraught with
danger and complexity-and the loss of her own daughter.
Lucia, a
willful and wild American woman who was once herself the proprietress of
Shanghai's most exclusive courtesan house, nurses her own secret
wounds, which she first sustained when, as a teenager, she fell in love
with a Chinese painter and followed him from San Francisco to Shanghai.
Her search for penance and redemption will bring her to a startling
reunion with Flora, Violet's daughter, and will shatter all that Violet
believed she knew about her mother.
Spanning fifty years and two
continents, The Valley of Amazement is a deeply moving narrative of
family secrets, the legacy of trauma, and the profound connections
between mothers and daughters, that returns readers to the compelling
territory Amy Tan so expertly mapped in The Joy Luck Club. With her
characteristic wisdom, grace, and humor, she conjures a story of the
inheritance of love, its mysteries and senses, its illusions and truths.
For more information on Amy Tan and her latest works visit her website.
The Luminaries by Eleanor Catton
Winner of the
2013 Man Booker Prize and Canada's Governor General's Literary Award, a
breathtaking feat of storytelling where everything is connected, but
nothing is as it seems....
It is 1866, and young Walter
Moody has come to make his fortune upon the New Zealand goldfields. On
the stormy night of his arrival, he stumbles across a tense gathering of
twelve local men who have men in secret to discuss a series of
unexplained events: A wealthy man has vanished, a prostitute has tried
to end her life, and an enormous fortune has been discovered in the home
of a luckless drunk. Moody is soon drawn into the mystery: a network of
fates and fortunes that is as complex and exquisitely ornate as the
night sky.
Richly evoking a mid-nineteenth-century world of shipping, banking, and gold rush boom and bus, The Luminaries is
a brilliantly constructed, fiendishly clever ghost story and a gripping
page-turner. It is a thrilling achievement for someone still in her
midtwenties, and will confirm for critics and readers that Eleanor
Catton is one of the brightest stars in the international writing
firmament.
For more information on Eleanor Catton and her latest works visit this website.