“If they can get you asking the wrong questions, they don’t have to worry about answers.” – Thomas Pynchon, Gravity’s Rainbow
Alchemy of Secrets by Stephanie Garber
fiction / fantasy / romance / historical fiction.
It starts with a class in an old movie theater.
Folklore 517: Local Legends and Urban Myths, taught by a woman called the Professor. Most students believe the Professor’s stories are just fiction, but Holland St. James has always been convinced that magic is real. When she tracks down a local legend named the Watch Man, who can supposedly tell you when you’ll die, the world finally makes sense. Except that the Watch Man tells her she will die at midnight tomorrow unless she finds an ancient object called the Alchemical Heart.
With the clock ticking, Holland is pulled deeper into this magical world in the heart of Los Angeles―and into the path of a magnetic stranger. Everything about him feels like a bad idea, but he promises Holland that her sister sent him to protect her. As they chase clues and stories that take them closer to the Alchemical Heart, Holland realizes everyone in this intoxicating new world is lying to her, even this stranger. And if she can’t figure out whom to trust, not even the Alchemical Heart will save her.
“This book has me absolutely reeling. Alchemy is mysterious and thought-provoking. The pacing was perfect and the cast was amazing! This book is truly a gem.” – Lisa Kroger, The Indie Next List
“Stephanie Garber spins pure magic in her books and her adult debut is absolutely no exception… this time Garber is turning the Hollywood glamour up and taking us on a unique new ride that you won’t want to stop talking about.” – Tamara Fuentes, Cosmopolitan
“…dazzling… You never know what’s going to happen next and sometimes, convincingly, neither do the characters… Garber twists and turns the narrative at every corner.” – Abby McCabe, Booklist
All of Us Murderers by KJ Charles
fiction / mystery / romance / historical fiction.
When Zeb Wyckham is summoned to a wealthy relative’s remote Gothic manor, he is horrified to find all the people he least wants to see in the world: his estranged brother, his sneering cousin, and his bitter ex-lover Gideon Grey. Things couldn’t possibly get worse.
Then the master of the house announces the true purpose of the gathering: he intends to leave the vast family fortune to whoever marries his young ward, setting off a violent scramble for her hand. Zeb wants no part of his greedy family―but when he tries to leave, the way is barred. The walls of Lackaday House are high, and the gates firmly locked. As the Dartmoor mists roll in, there’s no way out. And something unnatural may be watching them from the house’s shadowy depths…
Fear and paranoia ramping ever-higher, Zeb has nowhere to turn but to the man who once held his heart. As the gaslight flickers and terror takes hold, can two warring lovers reunite, uncover the murderous mysteries of Lackaday House―and live to tell the tale?
“Wildly inventive yet grounded in the gothic literary tradition, KJ Charles’ All of Us Murderers is a twisty tour de force… All of Us Murderers balances loathsome characters, a plethora of dastardly twists, revelations calibrated to stoke readers’ bloodlust and well-earned romantic reconnection. Fans of historical romance and mystery lovers with a taste for steam will not put this book down till the last body is buried.” – Carole V. Bell, BookPage, STARRED REVIEW
“This book will appeal to readers who appreciate a focus on setting, as the mist from the English moors creeps eerily over this story laced with romance, mystery, and intrigue.” – Pamela Gardner, Booklist
“[A] solid Edwardian mystery… Twisty, atmospheric, and more than a little indebted to Agatha Christie, this satisfying whodunit with a queer twist will keep readers up all night.” – Publishers Weekly
The Art of Spending Money: Simple Choices for a Richer Life by Morgan Housel
nonfiction / finance / self help.
Most of us don’t know how to spend money. We chase things that impress others but leave us cold. Or we save endlessly, afraid to spend on what would actually make life better. We confuse admiration with envy, comfort with excess, and utility with status.
The Art of Spending Money doesn’t provide budgets, hacks, or one-size-fits-all solutions. It gives you understanding of how your relationship with money shapes your decisions—and how to reshape it so money works for you.
Morgan Housel’s work has helped millions rethink how they earn, save, and invest. Now he turns his attention to the other side of the equation: how to spend. With insight and warmth, he shows why the most valuable return on investment is peace of mind, why expectations matter more than income, and why doing well with money has less to do with spreadsheets and more to do with self-awareness.
This book isn’t about getting rich. It’s about getting the most out of what you already have—and learning to want what’s worth wanting.
“Morgan Housel offers accessible and important tips for making the most of your wealth, no matter where you find yourself in life.” – B&N Reads
“[A] deeply insightful guide to managing money focused on spending wisely… Prudent and actionable, these lessons will help readers build sensible money habits.” – Publishers Weekly
“…tackles the profound question of whether money can indeed buy happiness… Housel’s practical approach sets this book apart from traditional financial guides… enlightening and enriching… essential reading for anyone interested in not only building wealth but also living a more contented life.” – Reader Bliss
Born: A History of Childbirth by Lucy Inglis
nonfiction / history / science / health / sociology / politics.
A groundbreaking history of childbirth filled with medical, political, and social triumphs, Born is the story of how we give birth set against the female struggle to govern their ability to reproduce.
Born moves around over time and large geographical, social, and cultural distances, but returns continually to a series of themes: the experience of pregnancy, the act of childbirth, and latterly, the fight for reproductive autonomy.
Whatever their ultimate outcomes, pregnancy and the act of childbirth are at once an individual and communal event. No two births are the same, yet the history of childbirth informs us about so much more than this intimate moment in the lives of a woman and her offspring. The act of childbirth informs us as unique individuals, yet at the same moment makes us part of something much greater than ourselves.
This book is the sum of many stories that combine war, art, science, and politics with the fundamental act of human existence. It is not a book about parenting or motherhood beyond the moment of delivery and the short time afterward. Instead, this is a story of the evolving role pregnancy and childbirth have played in societies through history, of the mysticism, the practicalities, and the power struggles that have shaped nations, yet also, individual identities.
Our narrative starts out in prehistory and ends now, with the reversal of Roe v. Wade, taking in mother-and-child bone fragments of the Ice Age, the cries from the medieval birthing chair, and the calls to rally of our modern age. This is how we are Born.
“…eloquent… With birth stories from the author’s own family gracefully woven in, the result is a nuanced and tender look at an intimate yet universal human experience.” – Publishers Weekly
Enshittification: Why Everything Suddenly Got Worse and What to Do About It by Cory Doctorow ★
nonfiction / technology / sociology / business / politics.
Enshittification: it’s not just you―the internet sucks now. Here’s why, and here’s how we can disenshittify it.
We’re living through the Enshittocene, the Great Enshittening, a time in which the services that matter to us, that we rely on, are turning into giant piles of shit. It’s frustrating. Demoralizing. Even terrifying.
Enshittification identifies the problem and proposes a solution.
When Cory Doctorow coined the term enshittification, he was not just finding a funner way to say “things are getting worse.” He was making a specific diagnosis about the state of the digital world and how it is affecting all of our lives (and not for the better).
The once-glorious internet was colonized by platforms that made all-but-magical promises to their users―and, at least initially, seemed to deliver on them. But once users were locked in, the platforms turned on them to make their business customers happy. Then the platforms turned to abusing their business customers to claw back all the value for themselves. In the end, the platforms die.
Doctorow’s argument clearly resonated. Once named, it became obvious that enshittification is everywhere, so much so that the American Dialect Society named it its 2023 Word of the Year, and it was cited as an inspiration for the 2025 season of Black Mirror.
Here, now, in Enshittification the book, Doctorow moves the conversation beyond the overwhelming sense of our inevitably enshittified fate. He shows us the specific decisions that led us here, who made them, and―most important―how they can be undone.
“[A] razor-sharp yet subtly optimistic look at the soul-sucking state of the internet.” – Publishers Weekly
“A funny and enlightening read that makes a serious problem in technology and policy widely accessible.” – Margaret Heller, Library Journal, STARRED REVIEW
“Doctorow offers a masterly polemic, its scope so sweeping that it does, finally, seem to explain every pungent odor wafting from Silicon Valley… Doctorow tells it all in good humor. Somehow he believes that tech can be brought to heel, that a coalition of the fed up and fearful will usher in a new wave of trust-busting regulation, or at least nudge things in the right direction. I hope he’s right.” – Dan Piepenbring, Harper’s
“This is Doctorow in full-on angry author mode; he pulls no punches here, naming names and calling out guilty parties for the things they have done. It might be stretching things a bit to say that the book is a rallying cry for consumer rebellion, but readers will be upset, informed, and inflamed after reading this one.” – David Pitt, Booklist
Family Thai: Bringing the Flavors of Thailand Home by Arnold Myint & Kat Thompson
nonfiction / food / cooking / memoir.
The James Beard nominee and chef of the Thai restaurant International Market in Nashville, Arnold Myint, shares how to make the Thai food he grew up with in a gorgeous cookbook that’s approachable yet packs a punch of flavor.
In Family Thai, Arnold breaks down an often-intimidating cuisine into accessible building blocks for every home cook, beginning with pantry staples―what’s fish sauce? what are the differences between soy sauces?―and moving on to teaching readers essential skills like how to steam the perfect sticky rice or how to make their own noodles if they can’t find them stocked nearby.
Arnold also shares what he likes to cook at home and adaptations of Thai cuisine that have been inspired by his hometown of Nashville and his travels around the world. From there, he takes us into the vibrant and colorful world of Thai street food―including shumai, shrimp toast, curry puffs, and more―classic noodle dishes, his own original creations, and, of course, his mother’s classic recipes.
Longtime fans of International Market, who have been begging for their favorite classic recipes for years, will find them among these pages.
Arnold Myint grew up as a restaurant kid and was lucky enough to be surrounded by delicious Thai food. His parents, Thai and Burmese immigrants, first opened Nashville’s International Market & Restaurant in 1975―a rarity in Tennessee, where Asian cuisine hadn’t quite expanded beyond Americanized Chinese takeout. The Myints were determined to introduce Americans to the fiery, bold, and fragrant Thai flavors that had always brought them comfort, and it turned out that a taste of Thailand was exactly what Nashville needed.
Almost 45 years later, after attending culinary school in New York City and working with Jean-Georges Vongerichten, Arnold now owns and runs International Market, where he continues to serve the comforting, soul-feeding recipes of his mother while also jazzing things up with his own Thai-Southern flare. During the pandemic, Arnold began reaching out to an all-new audience as well through Instagram, teaching “Thai 101” basics to an ever-growing number of viewers.
When Thais greet each other, they don’t ask how are you or what’s up? Instead, they ask, Kin lao yang? or have you eaten? Feeding people is how Patti and Win Myint―and now Arnold―show their love, not just for their family but for everyone within reach. In Family Thai, Arnold shares his boldly flavorful food and welcoming, heartfelt approach with home cooks everywhere.
“…full of the thoughtfulness, the attention to detail and the complexity that Nashvillians have come to expect from Myint and family… part riotously colorful coffee table book (thanks to photos by Linda Xiao), part memoir (both his own and that of his late mother) and part cookbook… it’s both personal and universal in its appeal.” – Margaret Littman, Nashville Scene
“Each dish is infused with Myint’s humor, personality, and culinary fluency, making Thai cooking approachable while honoring its complexity… [Myint’s] book gives home cooks the confidence to explore Thai staples while reminding them that the kitchen is as much about memory and identity as it is about recipes.” – Matthew Kennedy, Resident
“[A] loving exploration of one family’s experience cooking Thai food in the United States… An ode to the way immigrants make a new food culture of their own, Family Thai combines Myint’s takes on Thai cooking — pad see eiw with pappardelle; hot dog salad with cilantro, chiles, and fish sauce — with his mother’s own popular, boundary-blurring dishes… Myint writes his recipes with the home cook top of mind. Unlike some cookbooks that can be dogmatic about using only from-scratch curry pastes, Family Thai welcomes time-saving substitutions.” – Bettina Makalintal, Eater
Higher Magic by Courtney Floyd
fiction / fantasy / mystery / romance.
First-generation graduate student Dorothe Bartleby has one last chance to pass the Magic program’s qualifying exam after freezing with anxiety during her first attempt. If she fails to demonstrate that magic in classic literature changed the world, she’ll be kicked out of the university. And now her advisor insists she reframe her entire dissertation using Digimancy. While mages have found a way to combine computers and magic, Bartleby’s fated to never make it work.
This time is no exception. Her revised working goes horribly wrong, creating a talking skull named Anne that narrates Bartleby’s inner thoughts—even the most embarrassing ones—like she’s a heroine in a Jane Austen novel. Out of her depth, she recruits James, an unfairly attractive mage candidate, to help her stop Anne’s glitches in time for her exam.
Instead, Anne leads them to a shocking and dangerous discovery: Magic students who seek disability accommodations are disappearing—quite literally. When the administration fails to act, Bartleby must learn to trust her own knowledge and skills. Otherwise, she risks losing both the missing students and her future as a mage, permanently.
“[A] spellbindingly accurate reimagining of the grad school experience… The quirky fantasy, which includes spell-eating ghosts, literary incantations, and a talking skull powered by machine-learning, will appeal to fans of trending witchy and dark-academia settings. Chosen-family lovers will also appreciate Bartleby’s supportive roommates and budding romance with a fellow student… Floyd’s debut will charm anyone who’s had to fight for their place in higher education.” – Erin Niederberger, Library Journal
“With its whimsical, dark academia setting, it has been so cozy to settle into this fall… If you ever wished you could have attended Hogwarts instead of your own alma mater, love reading a school-centered tale in the autumn months, or enjoy the idea of a magical skull reciting quotes from Austen and Dickens, I do hope you’ll check out this book.” – Kari Meutsch, Daybreak
In a Distant Valley by Shannon Bowring
fiction.
For a while, Rose Douglas believed life had given her a break. She was enjoying a steady job at the local clinic in Dalton; her two young boys, Adam and Brandon, were doing well in school; and their little family had found an easy friendship with widower Nate Theroux and his daughter, Sophie. The possibility of something deeper even hung between her and Nate—until the day Tommy Merchant, her ex and the father of her sons, showed up without warning on her doorstep. While Rose knows all too well his erratic and abusive nature, he swears he’s clean, and ready to turn over a new leaf.
Tommy isn’t the only one who’s found his way back to the town that defined him. Lost after a disastrous stint living down south with her father, Angela Muse has returned home to Dalton. There she runs into Greg Fortin, the friend who once saved her life when they were children and finally starts to believe there may be someone who understands her in a world that offers more questions than answers.
But secrets are the lifeblood of a small town, and everyone in Dalton soon finds themselves part of a chain of events hurtling towards outcomes beyond their control, where more than one future will be decided. Brimming with compassion and heart, In a Distant Valley is the remarkable conclusion to the story readers have been following since Shannon Bowring’s debut novel, The Road to Dalton.
“This is such a perfect way to wrap up the Dalton Trilogy. Shannon’s novels completely immerse me in their time and place. I have loved watching these characters develop over the course of these three books, and can’t wait to see what she does next!” – Rebecca Pimsler, The Indie Next List
“Bowring’s compassionate, unflinchingly detailed portrayals of her characters’ inner lives provide depth and nuance… A vibrant, hope-filled story of the redemptive possibilities of second chances.” – Anne Foley, Booklist
“…disarming… Bowring excels at humanizing her characters via nuanced backstories… and she teases out the joy that can come from fresh starts without flinching from the challenge of second chances. It’s a satisfying conclusion.” – Publishers Weekly
The Intruder by Freida McFadden ★
fiction / suspense / mystery.
Casey’s cabin in the wilderness is not built for a hurricane. Her roof shakes, the lights flicker, and the tree outside her front door sways ominously in the wind. But she’s a lot more worried about the girl she discovers lurking outside her kitchen window.
She’s young. She’s alone. And she’s covered in blood.
The girl won’t explain where she came from or loosen her grip on the knife in her right hand. And when Casey makes a disturbing discovery in the middle of the night, things take a turn for the worse.
The girl has a dark secret. One she’ll kill to keep. And if Casey gets too close to the truth, she may not live to see the morning.
“A grim yet gleefully gratifying tale of lost innocence and found family.” – Kirkus Reviews
“Freida McFadden’s The Intruder will not disappoint fans of her signature, twisty novels that are more fun to consume than a bag of Skittles… You can’t go wrong with a cabin in the woods, especially if you’re Freida McFadden and a master of pacing and chapter endings.” – Sarah Reida, Crime Spree Magazine
“Freida McFadden has a talent for making you doubt everything, and The Intruder is a perfect example of why she’s at the top of the psychological thriller game… a classically gothic wild ride… unsettling, addictive, and loaded with clues for you to chase.” – The Strand Magazine
John Candy: A Life in Comedy by Paul Myers
nonfiction / biography / film.
From his humble beginnings in sketch comedy with the Toronto branch of Second City, to his rise to fame in SCTV and Hollywood film classics like Planes, Trains and Automobiles, The Great Outdoors, and Uncle Buck, John Candy captivated audiences with his self-deprecating humour, emotional warmth, and gift for improvisation. Now, for the first time since Candy’s tragic death, bestselling biographer Paul Myers tells the full story of the man behind the laughs.
Drawing on extensive research and exclusive interviews with many of Candy’s closest friends and colleagues, including Dan Aykroyd, Chevy Chase, Tom Hanks, Ron Howard, Steve Martin, Catherine O’Hara, Martin Short, and many more, John Candy: A Life in Comedy celebrates the comedian’s unparalleled talent, infectious charm, and generosity of spirit. Through ups and downs, successes and failures, and struggles with anxiety and self-doubt, Candy faced the world with a big smile and a warm demeanour that earned him the love and adoration of fans around the world.
“For all its sad ending, fans of John Candy will delight in Myers’ comprehensive biography.” – Kirkus Reviews, STARRED REVIEW
“It’s easy to forget, more than 30 years later, just how shocking Candy’s death was, and this deeply moving book is a sharp reminder of what was lost: a gentle, immensely talented man who was loved—and is still loved—by virtually everyone whose life came into contact with his. This is a respectful, compassionate biography that makes the reader feel as though they’ve come to truly know the man; don’t be surprised to find readers wiping away tears by the time they’ve finished it.” – David Pitt, Booklist
“Paul Myers’ lively new book isn’t the first biography of Candy, but it feels definitive, with insights and recollections from those who knew Candy best… A less informed book might have tipped over into hagiography, but this one confronts the bedeviled shadows of a beloved figure with grace… A Life in Comedy is for anyone who knows that the most joyous heart can still be broken.” – Andi Zeisler, Salon
Last Rites by Ozzy Osbourne
nonfiction / memoir / music.
“People say to me, if you could do it all again, knowing what you know now, would you change anything? I’m like, f*** no. If I’d been clean and sober, I wouldn’t be Ozzy. If I’d done normal, sensible things, I wouldn’t be Ozzy.”
Husband. Father. Grandfather. Icon.
1948 – 2025
In 2018, at the age of sixty-nine, Ozzy Osbourne was on a triumphant farewell tour, playing to sold-out arenas and rave reviews all around the world.
Then: disaster.
In a matter of just a few weeks, he went from being hospitalized with a finger infection to having to abandon his tour – and all public life – as he faced near-total paralysis from the neck down.
Last Rites is the shocking, bitterly hilarious, never-before-told story of Ozzy’s descent into hell. Along the way, he reflects on his extraordinary life and career, including his marriage to wife Sharon, as well as his reflections on what it took for him to get back onstage for the triumphant Back to the Beginning concert, streamed around the world, where Ozzy reunited with his Black Sabbath bandmates for the final time.
Unflinching, brutally honest, but surprisingly life-affirming, Last Rites demonstrates once again why Ozzy has transcended his status as “The Godfather of Metal” and “The Prince of Darkness” to become a modern-day folk hero and national treasure.
“[A] brutally honest, yet surprisingly life-affirming memoir…” – Metal Talk
“In this revealing new memoir, music legend Ozzy Osbourne does not hold back. The icon shares his unfiltered thoughts on his monumental life and career, detailing everything from his time in Black Sabbath to his explosive marriage and life in the public eye.” – B&N Reads
“[A] brilliantly gossipy memoir… Rest in peace, Ozzy Osbourne. In Last Rites, at least, your resonant self lives on.” – Ian Winwood, The Telegraph
Mate by Ali Hazelwood
fiction / romance / fantasy.
Serena Paris is orphaned, pack-less, and one of a kind. Coming forward as the first Human-Were hybrid was supposed to heal a centuries-long rift between species. Instead, it made her a target, prey to the ruthless political machinations between Weres, Vampyres, and Humans. With her enemies closing in on her, she has only one option left—if he’ll have her.
As Alpha of the Northwest pack, Koen Alexander commands obedience. His authority is so absolute, only a fool would threaten his mate. It doesn’t matter if Serena doesn’t reciprocate his feelings, nothing will stop him from keeping her safe.
But power-hungry Vampyres and Weres are not the only threats chasing Serena. Sooner or later, her past is bound to catch up with her—and Koen might be the only thing standing between her and total annihilation…
“For readers who prefer fangs with romance instead of guts with gore, Mate is the cozy-spooky choice this October.” – Whitney Danhauer, Parade
The Nine Lives of Christopher Columbus by Matthew Restall
nonfiction / biography / history.
Christopher Columbus was born Cristoforo Colombo, in the autumn of 1451 in the Mediterranean port city of Genoa, and he died in the Spanish city of Valladolid in May 1506, as don Cristóbal Colón. More than five centuries later, we are still arguing over his life and its significance. Millions if not billions of people have learned his name. Most have some sense of what he did, that it was momentous, a great achievement, an act of primacy. But was his achievement “great” because he “discovered America” and thus made possible the hemisphere’s “great” nations? Or was it an apocalyptic catastrophe for tens of millions of Indigenous and African peoples?
In The Nine Lives of Christopher Columbus, acclaimed historian Matthew Restall, perhaps the leading scholar of the Spanish Empire, presents a new, authoritative biography of Columbus, while at the same time tracing his many afterlives down into our own time. He explores the mysteries, many of them manufactured, that color our understanding of Columbus even in the twenty-first century—mysteries surrounding Columbus’s name, nationality, place of birth, ancestry, education, religion, intellectual vision, moral fiber, sexual proclivities, and current resting place. He shows how Columbus became an iconic American hero in the nineteenth century, and how a parallel hero emerged in the form of the Italian American Columbus.
Restall takes us beyond polemic, sifting through the evidence across nations, languages, and five centuries to explore the many questions that make up what he calls “Columbiana.” He demonstrates that, far from a uniquely talented individual, Columbus was typical of the Iberian and northern Italian men of his day—a merchant mariner who became an explorer, slave-trader, and conquistador-settler. And Restall challenges the notion, deeply held to this day, that Columbus can be credited or blamed for all that happened after 1492.
Whatever one’s views of Columbus, Restall’s book is the necessary, definitive account. It dispels the myths and gives us Columbus as he was. It shows how he has been distorted in the centuries since his death—and how we might come to understand him, and his legacies, anew.
“…gets at the flesh-and-blood man behind the centuries of messaging.” – New York Times
“By examining the myths surrounding his legacy, Restall puts Columbus back into the context of his time.” – Kirk Johnson, Booklist
“An intriguing portrait of a man who, while surely no innocent, has been mythologized for centuries since his death.” – Kirkus Reviews
Shadow Ticket by Thomas Pynchon ★
fiction / historical fiction / mystery.
Milwaukee 1932, the Great Depression going full blast, repeal of Prohibition just around the corner, Al Capone in the federal pen, the private investigation business shifting from labor-management relations to the more domestic kind. Hicks McTaggart, a onetime strikebreaker turned private eye, thinks he’s found job security until he gets sent out on what should be a routine case, locating and bringing back the heiress of a Wisconsin cheese fortune who’s taken a mind to go wandering. Before he knows it, he’s been shanghaied onto a transoceanic liner, ending up eventually in Hungary where there’s no shoreline, a language from some other planet, and enough pastry to see any cop well into retirement—and of course no sign of the runaway heiress he’s supposed to be chasing.
By the time Hicks catches up with her he will find himself also entangled with Nazis, Soviet agents, British counterspies, swing musicians, practitioners of the paranormal, outlaw motorcyclists, and the troubles that come with each of them, none of which Hicks is qualified, forget about being paid, to deal with. Surrounded by history he has no grasp on and can’t see his way around in or out of, the only bright side for Hicks is it’s the dawn of the Big Band Era and as it happens he’s a pretty good dancer. Whether this will be enough to allow him somehow to Lindy-hop his way back again to Milwaukee and the normal world, which may no longer exist, is another question.
“…Pynchon at his finest. Dark as a vampire’s pocket, light-fingered as a jewel thief, Shadow Ticket capers across the page with breezy, baggy-pants assurance — and then pauses on its way down the fire escape just long enough to crack your heart open.” – David Kipen, Los Angeles Times
“…rollicking, genially silly and ultimately sweet… The endless accumulation of incident pulls you along, but sometimes you have to stop to marvel at any given sentence, much as you might at a 170-foot-tall bottle of ketchup that suddenly looms above you during a road trip… In Pynchon’s world, there’s always more than we can manage, which means there’s always more to discover. And if your findings are sometimes kind of stupid, so much the better.” – Jacob Brogan, Washington Post
“I remain addicted to Pynchon’s wordplay, his hyper-articulate strings of tea lights, even now. His mordant attacks on the moral deficiencies of the straight world are tonic circa 2025… Pynchon is a master of what Anthony Burgess called ‘the poetry of digression.’” – Dwight Garner, New York Times
“Between the novel’s sheer weirdness, its obscurity, its evocative 1930s setting and its joyously Raymond Chandler-esque dialogue – pinging back and forth between hard-boiled men and sharp-tongued broads – I enjoyed Shadow Ticket more than any other Pynchon… Pynchon’s gift has always been his ability to render America in its full strangeness: a divided people looking askew in all directions, united only by their common fantasy of there being a Real America to return to. Again and again, he reiterates the thwarted dream that there ever was such a thing… The fact that Shadow Ticket is brilliant and prescient isn’t a surprise; that it exudes so much joy and sensuousness is. To have had the career Pynchon has had, and still be so invigorated by your work, is all any novelist can ask. I hope this isn’t his last hurrah – but if it is, what a way to go out.” – Megan Nolan, The Telegraph
Sharp Force by Patricia Cornwell
fiction / mystery / suspense.
During the early hours of Christmas morning, chief medical examiner Dr. Kay Scarpetta receives a chilling call. The Phantom Slasher has struck again.
The serial killer has terrorized Northern Virginia for months. His pattern is to stalk with a sophisticated technology that enables him to invade his victims’ homes and watch their every move. They wake up to a ghost-like hologram before being murdered in their beds.
Scarpetta is summoned to Mercy Island, the site of a notorious psychiatric hospital where two people have been brutalized, one of them from Scarpetta’s past. It soon becomes apparent that she could be next…
“[Will] keep Scarpetta fans flipping pages.” – Publishers Weekly
“Come for the forensics, stay for the nonhumans.” – Kirkus Reviews
“With Cornwell’s expert pacing and psychologically nuanced and complex characters, this novel offers a reliable read for longtime fans of the forensic series, but it also includes enough backstory and detail to get newcomers up to speed.” – Emily Bowles, Library Journal
The Women of Wild Hill by Kirsten Miller
fiction / fantasy / horror.
There are places on earth where nature’s powers gather. Girls raised there are bequeathed strange gifts. A few have powers so dark that they fear to use them. Such a place is Wild Hill, on the tip of Long Island. For centuries, the ghost of a witch murdered by colonists claimed the beautiful and fertile Wild Hill… until a young Scottish woman with strange gifts arrived. Sadie Duncan was allowed to stay.
Five generations of Sadie’s descendants called Wild Hill home, each generation more powerful than the last. Then, in the aftermath of a terrible tragedy, the last of the Duncans, once prophesized to be the most powerful of their kind, abandoned their ancestral home.
One of them, Brigid Laguerre moved to California and turned her dark gift into fame and fortune. Her sister, Phoebe, settled on a ranch in Texas, where women visit in secret for her tonics and cures. Phoebe’s daughter, Sybil, has become a famous chef. Seemingly powerless, Sibyl has never been told of the Duncan bloodline.
Now Brigid, Phoebe, and Sibyl have been brought to Wild Hill to discover their family legacy. The Old One, furious at the path mankind has taken, has chosen three powerful witches to turn the tide. The Duncans will fulfill their destinies—but only if they can set aside their grievances and come together as a family.
“A master class in feminist coming-of-rage.” – Rennie Dyball, People
“…enchanting… sure to appeal to Miller’s fans and win her plenty of new ones.” – Publishers Weekly
“I adore these characters. If you’re attempting to have a realistic modern-day witch, it’s only possible if you confront their insecurities about their gift(s) head on. This does a remarkable job of that… well balanced and well delivered.” – Tabatha, All the Right Reads
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