Monday, August 26, 2019

Tuesday Tomorrow

Galaxy's Edge: Black Spire by Delilah S. Dawson
Published by: Del Rey
Publication Date: August 27th, 2019
Format: Hardcover, 400 Pages
To Buy

The official patter:
"Walk the ancient streets, meet the colorful characters, and uncover the secret history of Star Wars: Galaxy’s Edge, the new expansion to the Disney Parks experience!

After devastating losses at the hands of the First Order, General Leia Organa has dispatched her agents across the galaxy in search of allies, sanctuary, and firepower - and her top spy, Vi Moradi, may have just found all three, on a secluded world at the galaxy’s edge.

A planet of lush forests, precarious mountains, and towering, petrified trees, Batuu is on the furthest possible frontier of the galactic map, the last settled world before the mysterious expanse of Wild Space. The rogues, smugglers, and adventurers who eke out a living on the largest settlement on the planet, Black Spire Outpost, are here to avoid prying eyes and unnecessary complications. Vi, a Resistance spy on the run from the First Order, is hardly a welcome guest. And when a shuttle full of stormtroopers lands in her wake, determined to root her out, she has no idea where to find help.

To survive, Vi will have to seek out the good-hearted heroes hiding in a world that redefines scum and villainy. With the help of a traitorous trooper and her acerbic droid, she begins to gather a colorful band of outcasts and misfits, and embarks on a mission to spark the fire of resistance on Batuu - before the First Order snuffs it out entirely."

I would literally give anything to get to go to Galaxy's Edge! I mean, to actually be IN the Star Wars universe? Dream. Come. True.

A Better Man by Louise Penny
Published by: Minotaur Books
Publication Date: August 27th, 2019
Format: Hardcover, 448 Pages
To Buy

The official patter:
"Catastrophic spring flooding, blistering attacks in the media, and a mysterious disappearance greet Chief Inspector Armand Gamache as he returns to the Sûreté du Québec in the latest novel by #1 New York Times bestselling author Louise Penny.

It’s Gamache’s first day back as head of the homicide department, a job he temporarily shares with his previous second-in-command, Jean-Guy Beauvoir. Flood waters are rising across the province. In the middle of the turmoil a father approaches Gamache, pleading for help in finding his daughter.

As crisis piles upon crisis, Gamache tries to hold off the encroaching chaos, and realizes the search for Vivienne Godin should be abandoned. But with a daughter of his own, he finds himself developing a profound, and perhaps unwise, empathy for her distraught father.

Increasingly hounded by the question, how would you feel..., he resumes the search.

As the rivers rise, and the social media onslaught against Gamache becomes crueler, a body is discovered. And in the tumult, mistakes are made.

In the next novel in this “constantly surprising series that deepens and darkens as it evolves” (New York Times Book Review), Gamache must face a horrific possibility, and a burning question.

What would you do if your child’s killer walked free?"

Sounds a little too close to reality...

Wonton Terror by Vivien Chien
Published by: St. Martin's Paperbacks
Publication Date: August 27th, 2019
Format: Paperback, 320 Pages
To Buy

The official patter:
"In the fourth in Vivien Chien's Noodle Shop delicious mystery series, Ho-Lee Noodle House is ready to take the Cleveland night market by storm - until a brand-new food venue literally explodes onto the scene.

Lana Lee is all smiles when the first evening of Cleveland’s Asian Night Market kicks off the summer. The weekly festival is always good for business, packed with locals and tourists, and this year, some stiff new food-truck competition. Wonton on Wheels, run by old friends of Lana’s parents, promises to have customers lining up for their delicately wrapped delights - until the truck blows up at evening’s end.

Lana’s boyfriend, Detective Adam Trudeau, had been planning a birthday getaway for the two of them but, lo and behold, Lana must assume the role of amateur sleuth yet again. With one proprietor of Wonton on Wheels dead, it’s beginning to look more like murder and less like an unfortunate accident. And as they begin to unwrap layers of disturbing secrets, Lana’s own family erupts into new drama. Will Lana be able to solve this crime - or has she jumped from the wok right into the fire?"

Food truck cozy to celebrate the start of fall and a new school year, AKA, the time of year I relied on food trucks as an undergrad.

The Girl Who Lived Twice by David Lagercrantz
Published by: Knopf
Publication Date: August 27th, 2019
Format: Hardcover, 368 Pages
To Buy

The official patter:
"The sixth Lisbeth Salander story - the crime-fiction phenomenon that has sold more than 90 million copies worldwide.

Lisbeth Salander - the fierce, unstoppable girl with the dragon tattoo - has disappeared. She's sold her apartment in Stockholm. She's gone silent electronically. She's told no one where she is. And no one is aware that at long last she's got her primal enemy, her twin sister, Camilla, squarely in her sights.

Mikael Blomkvist is trying to reach Lisbeth. He needs her help unraveling the identity of a man who lived and died on the streets in Stockholm - a man who does not exist in any official records and whose garbled last words hinted at possible damaging knowledge of people in the highest echelons of government and industry. In his pocket was a crumpled piece of paper with Blomkvist's phone number on it.

Once again, Salander and Blomkvist will come to each other's aid, moving in tandem toward the truths they each seek. In the end, it will be Blomkvist - in a moment of unimaginable self-sacrifice--who will make it possible for Lisbeth to face the most important battle of her life, and, finally, to put her past to rest."

I just recently saw the film adapted from the first of Lagercrantz's books on Lisbeth and it's made me interested in checking out the rest of the books he's written for this series, though I still think he should have followed the original outlines and not done his own thing. 

Beneath the Attic by V.C. Andrews
Published by: Gallery Books
Publication Date: August 27th, 2019
Format: Paperback, 368 Pages
To Buy

The official patter:
"Forbidden passions have shaped and haunted the Dollanganger family since their first novel - Flowers in the Attic - debuted forty years ago. Now discover how twisted the family roots truly are, and witness the clan’s origins as a result of one wild and complicated relationship. In this evocative and thrilling tale from New York Times bestselling author V.C. Andrews, see Corrine Dixon as a young girl and discover the fascinating family history of the Dollanganger clan.

Two generations before Corinne Foxworth locked her children in an attic, her grandmother, a gorgeous young girl named Corrine Dixon, is swept away by the charms of rich, sophisticated, and handsome Garland Foxworth. After discovering that she’s pregnant, Garland does what appears to be the honorable thing and marries her in a huge ceremony on the luxurious Foxworth Hall grounds. Both families fervently overlook the pregnancy, happy for a suitable resolution.

Now the mistress of a labyrinthine estate, Corrine discovers that nothing is what is seems. Garland is not the man once captivated by her charms, and she’s increasingly troubled by his infatuation with memories of his departed mother.

Can Corrine survive this strange new life? Or is her fate already sealed?

Explore the origins of the legendary Dollanganger family in this page-turning, gripping gothic thriller."

If anyone else is suffering from V.C. Andrews withdrawal after the final Lifetime movie adaptation aired on Saturday here's your cure!

Dead Voices by Katherine Arden
Published by: G.P. Putnam's Sons Books for Young Readers
Publication Date: August 27th, 2019
Format: Hardcover, 256 Pages
To Buy

The official patter:
"Bestselling author Katherine Arden returns with another creepy, spine-tingling adventure in this follow-up to the critically acclaimed Small Spaces.

Having survived sinister scarecrows and the malevolent smiling man in Small Spaces, newly minted best friends Ollie, Coco, and Brian are ready to spend a relaxing winter break skiing together with their parents at Mount Hemlock Resort. But when a snowstorm sets in, causing the power to flicker out and the cold to creep closer and closer, the three are forced to settle for hot chocolate and board games by the fire.

Ollie, Coco, and Brian are determined to make the best of being snowed in, but odd things keep happening. Coco is convinced she has seen a ghost, and Ollie is having nightmares about frostbitten girls pleading for help. Then Mr. Voland, a mysterious ghost hunter, arrives in the midst of the storm to investigate the hauntings at Hemlock Lodge. Ollie, Coco, and Brian want to trust him, but Ollie's watch, which once saved them from the smiling man, has a new cautionary message: BEWARE.

With Mr. Voland's help, Ollie, Coco, and Brian reach out to the dead voices at Mount Hemlock. Maybe the ghosts need their help - or maybe not all ghosts can or should be trusted.

Dead Voices is a terrifying follow-up to Small Spaces with thrills and chills galore and the captive foreboding of a classic ghost story."

It's like The Shining for kids! 

Best Friends by Shannon Hale and LeUyen Pham
Published by: First Second
Publication Date: August 27th, 2019
Format: Paperback, 256 Pages
To Buy

The official patter:
"Bestselling creators of Real Friends Shannon Hale and LeUyen Pham are back with a true story about popularity, first crushes, and finding your own path in the graphic novel, Best Friends.

Follow your heart. Find your people.

Sixth grade is supposed to be perfect. Shannon’s got a sure spot in the in-crowd called The Group, and her best friend is their leader, Jen, the most popular girl in school.

But the rules are always changing, and Shannon has to scramble to keep up. She never knows which TV shows are cool, what songs to listen to, and who she’s allowed to talk to. Who makes these rules, anyway? And does Shannon have to follow them?"

A must read for those who love Shannon Hale and those who have yet to discover her!
 A Bride's Story, Volume 11 by Kaoru Mori
Published by: Yen Press
Publication Date: August 27th, 2019
Format: Hardcover, 192 Pages
To Buy

The official patter:
"Having reached his destination in Ankara, Smith is not only reunited with his old friend, but also Talas, the woman he briefly stayed with on his journey. An agreement was made, and now Smith must travel back to Amir and Karluk with his new companions and newly acquired camera. However, the roads back are perilous as war approaches..."

To me, it's never really the start of fall until a new installment of this magnificent manga is released. 

Bottle Grove by Daniel Handler
Published by: Bloomsbury Publishing
Publication Date: August 27th, 2019
Format: Hardcover, 240 Pages
To Buy

The official patter:
"A razor-sharp tale of two couples, two marriages, a bar, and a San Francisco start-up from a best-selling, award-winning novelist.

This is a story about two marriages. Or is it? It begins with a wedding, held in the small San Francisco forest of Bottle Grove - bestowed by a wealthy patron for the public good, back when people did such things. Here is a cross section of lives, a stretch of urban green where ritzy guests, lustful teenagers, drunken revelers, and forest creatures all wait for the sun to go down. The girl in the corner slugging vodka from a cough-syrup bottle is Padgett - she's keeping something secreted in the woods. The couple at the altar are the Nickels - the bride is emphatic about changing her name, as there is plenty about her old life she is ready to forget.

Set in San Francisco as the tech-boom is exploding, Bottle Grove is a sexy, skewering dark comedy about two unions - one forged of love and the other of greed - and about the forces that can drive couples together, into dependence, and then into sinister, even supernatural realms. Add one ominous shape-shifter to the mix, and you get a delightful and strange spectacle: a story of scheming and yearning and foibles and love and what we end up doing for it - and everyone has a secret. Looming over it all is the income disparity between San Francisco's tech community and...everyone else."

San Francisco and a shape-shifter? Did someone read my dream book combination?

Monday, August 19, 2019

Tuesday Tomorrow

Finding Lady Enderly by Joanna Davidson Politano
Published by: Revell
Publication Date: August 20th, 2019
Format: Paperback, 400 Pages
To Buy

The official patter:
"Raina Bretton is a rag woman in London's east end when a handsome stranger appears in a dank alley and offers her a glittering smile and a chance for adventure. Rothburne Abbey has a unique position for her, one that will take her away from her hardscrabble life and give her a chance to be a lady. Things she could only dream of might be coming true. But some dreams turn out to be nightmares.

Though Raina has traded squalor for silk and satin, something about the abbey is deeply unsettling. As she wrestles with her true identity, the ruin, decay, and secrets she finds at the heart of the old mansion tear at her confidence and threaten to reveal her for who she really is. Only one man stands between her and the danger that lurks within - and only if he decides to keep her biggest secret hidden."

This sounds like a more Gothic version of Fingersmith and I'm sold! 

The Zepplin Deception by Colleen Gleason
Published by: Avid Press
Publication Date: August 20th, 2019
Format: Hardcover, 318 Pages
To Buy

The official patter:
"Mina Holmes and Evaline Stoker return in their final - and most exciting - adventure together.

It’s a cold, blustery day in January of 1890 when Mina Holmes receives an invitation to Evaline Stoker’s wedding. The two young women - partners and occasionally friends - haven’t spoken for nearly two months, since the events at the Carnelian Crow.

Shocked, Mina is still looking at the invitation when constables from Scotland Yard begin pounding on her front door. They’ve arrived to arrest her for the murder of a man she’s never even heard of.

Meanwhile, Evaline has her hands full with wedding plans (boring) and an overbearing sister who wants to manage her every move - including a dizzying array of social activities. In the midst of all this, she receives an invitation to visit Lady Isabella Cosgrove-Pitt, a most villainous woman.

With Pix in jail, Mina being hunted by Scotland Yard, and Evaline dining with the murderous Lady Isabella what more can possibly go wrong?

Plenty. And when the mysterious black zeppelin appears once again in the night sky, things are about to get even more dangerous for Miss Stoker and Miss Holmes."

Their final adventure has FINALLY arrived. Though if I were you I'd go over to Colleen's website to order it...

The Warlow Experiment by Alix Nathan
Published by: Doubleday
Publication Date: August 20th, 2019
Format: Hardcover, 272 Pages
To Buy

The official patter:
"An utterly transporting and original historical novel about an eighteenth-century experiment in personal isolation that yields unexpected - and deeply, shatteringly human - results.

Herbert Powyss lives in an estate in the Welsh Marches, with enough time and income to pursue a gentleman's fashionable investigations and experiments in botany. But he longs to make his mark in the field of science - something consequential enough to present to the Royal Society in London. He hits on a radical experiment in isolation: For seven years a subject will inhabit three rooms in the basement of the manor house, fitted out with rugs, books, paintings, and even a chamber organ. Meals will arrive thrice daily via a dumbwaiter. The solitude will be totally unrelieved by any social contact whatsoever; the subject will keep a diary of his daily thoughts and actions. The pay: fifty pounds per annum, for life.

Only one man is desperate to apply for the job: John Warlow, a semi-literate laborer with a wife and six children to provide for. The experiment, a classic Enlightenment exercise gone more than a little mad, will have unforeseen consequences for all included."

Don't you just NEED to know the consequences? I know I do! 

A Shadowed Livery by Charlie Garratt
Published by: Sapere Books
Publication Date: August 20th, 2019
Format: Kindle, 261 Pages
To Buy

The official patter:
"The first book in a page-turning historical mystery series! Perfect for fans of Agatha Christie, Dorothy L. Sayers, Philip Kerr and Andrew Taylor.

War is on the horizon...

Warwickshire, England, 1938.

While Hitler and Chamberlain are preparing to sign the Munich agreement, the murderer of a Jewish shopkeeper is being hanged in Birmingham.

After witnessing the execution, Inspector James Given, who brought the killer to justice, is surprised to find he has been taken off the investigation to pursue something completely different.

Grovestock House, owned by the wealthy Barleigh family has witnessed a triple death.

With the terrible events neatly written off as a murder and a double suicide, Given is supposed to tidy up a few loose ends with the help of local constable, John Sawyer.

But Given is sure there is more to the case than meets the eye.

What dark secrets were the Barleigh family hiding? Could there be another killer involved?

And how will Given react when he is forced to confront the ghosts of his past...?

A Shadowed Livery is an intriguing historical mystery - a traditional British investigation set in England immediately before the Second World War."

A time of change, a true event, and perfect for fans of Agatha Christie? Perfect summer read in my book.

The Paper Bark Tree Mystery by Ovidia Yu
Published by: Constable
Publication Date: August 20th, 2019
Format: Paperback, 336 Pages
To Buy

The official patter:
"Su Lin is doing her dream job: assistant at Singapore's brand new detective agency. Until Bald Bernie decides a 'local girl' can't be trusted with private investigations, and replaces her with a new secretary - pretty, privileged, and white. So Su Lin's not the only person finding it hard to mourn Bernie after he's found dead in the filing room. And when her best friend's dad is accused, she gets up to some sleuthing work of her own in a bid to clear his name.

Su Lin finds out that Bernie may have been working undercover, trading stolen diamonds for explosives from enemy troops. Was he really the upright English citizen he claimed to be?

Meanwhile, a famous assassin commits his worst crime yet, and disappears into thin air. Rumours spread that he may be dangerously close to home.

Beneath the stifling, cloudless Singaporean summer, earthquakes of chaos and political unrest are breaking out. When a tragic loss shakes Su Lin's personal world to its core, she becomes determined to find the truth. But in dark, hate-filled times, truth has a price - and Su Lin must decide how much she's willing to pay for it."

I hope you love a different kind of detective story as much as I do! 

Turning Darkness into Light by Marie Brennan
Published by: Tor Books
Publication Date: August 20th, 2019
Format: Hardcover, 416 Pages
To Buy

The official patter:
"Marie Brennan's Turning Darkness Into Light is a delightful fantasy of manners, the heir to the award-winning Natural History of Dragons series, a perfect stepping stone into an alternate Victorian-esque fantasy landscape.

As the renowned granddaughter of Isabella Camherst (Lady Trent, of the riveting and daring Draconic adventure memoirs) Audrey Camherst has always known she, too, would want to make her scholarly mark upon a chosen field of study.

When Lord Gleinheigh recruits Audrey to decipher a series of ancient tablets holding the secrets of the ancient Draconean civilization, she has no idea that her research will plunge her into an intricate conspiracy, one meant to incite rebellion and invoke war. Alongside dearest childhood friend and fellow archeologist Kudshayn, Audrey must find proof of the conspiracy before it’s too late."

Anyone else as over the moon as I am that we have more dragon tales by Marie Brennan?

Snow, Glass, Apples by Neil Gaiman and Colleen Doran
Published by: Dark Horse Books
Publication Date: August 20th, 2019
Format: Hardcover, 64 Pages
To Buy

The official patter:

"A chilling fantasy retelling of the Snow White fairy tale by New York Times bestselling creators Neil Gaiman and Colleen Doran!

A not-so-evil queen is terrified of her monstrous stepdaughter and determined to repel this creature and save her kingdom from a world where happy endings aren't so happily ever after.

From the Hugo, Bram Stoker, Locus, World Fantasy, Nebula award-winning, and New York Times bestselling writer Neil Gaiman (American Gods) comes this graphic novel adaptation by Colleen Doran (Troll Bridge)!"

That Erté-esque cover is TO DIE FOR!

Tidelands by Philippa Gregory
Published by: Atria Books
Publication Date: August 20th, 2019
Format: Hardcover, 464 Pages
To Buy

The official patter:
"The #1 New York Times bestselling author and “one of the great storytellers of our time” (San Francisco Book Review) turns from the glamour of the royal courts to tell the story of an ordinary woman, Alinor, who cannot bear to conform to the life that lies before her.

Midsummer’s Eve, 1648, England is in the grip of a civil war between renegade king and rebellious parliament. The struggle reaches every corner of the kingdom, even the remote tidelands - the marshy landscape of the south coast.

Alinor, a descendant of wisewomen, trapped in poverty and superstition, waits in the graveyard under the full moon for a ghost who will declare her free from her abusive husband. Instead, she meets James, a young man on the run, and shows him the secret ways across the treacherous marsh, not knowing that she is leading disaster into the heart of her life.

Suspected of possessing dark secrets in superstitious times, Alinor’s ambition and determination mark her out from her neighbors. This is the time of witch mania, and Alinor, a woman without a husband, skilled with herbs, suddenly enriched, arouses envy in her rivals and fear among the villagers, who are ready to take lethal action into their own hands.

It is dangerous for a woman to be different."

I love nothing more that Philippa Gregory and her cunning women! 

The Deaths and Afterlife of Aleister Crowley by Ian Thornton
Published by: Unbound
Publication Date: August 20th, 2019
Format: Kindle, 400 Pages
To Buy

The official patter:
"Aleister Crowley, also known as the Great Beast, is one of the most reviled men in history. Satanist, cult leader, debauched novelist and poet, his legacy has been harshly contested for decades.

Crowley supposedly died in 1947, but in Ian Thornton's new novel, set in the present day, the Great Beast is alive and well and living in Shangri-la. Now over 130 years old, thanks to the magical air of his mystical location, he looks back on his life and decides it is time to set the record straight.

For Crowley was not the evil man he is often portrayed as. This was just a cover to hide his real mission, to save the twentieth century from destroying itself and to set humanity on the road to freedom and liberty.

The Death and Afterlife of Aleister Crowley is an epic novel that will make you see this notorious figure in a completely new light, as he encounters an impressive cast of real-life characters including Timothy Leary, The Beatles, Princess Margaret, Orson Welles and Alfred Hitchcock."

If you don't know who Aleister Crowley is, where have you been? You must immediately catch up my reading this book and watching Strange Angel.

Monday, August 12, 2019

Tuesday Tomorrow

The Swallows by Lisa Lutz
Published by: Ballantine Books
Publication Date: August 13th, 2019
Format: Hardcover, 416 Pages
To Buy

The official patter:
"A teacher at a New England prep school ignites a gender war - with deadly consequences - in this dark and provocative novel by the bestselling author of The Passenger.

When Alexandra Witt joins the faculty at Stonebridge Academy, she’s hoping to put a painful past behind her. Then one of her creative writing assignments generates some disturbing responses from students. Before long, Alex is immersed in an investigation of the students atop the school’s social hierarchy - and their connection to something called the Darkroom. She soon inspires the girls who’ve started to question the school’s “boys will be boys” attitude and incites a resistance. But just as the movement is gaining momentum, Alex attracts the attention of an unknown enemy who knows a little too much about her - and what brought her to Stonebridge in the first place.

Meanwhile, Gemma, a defiant senior, has been plotting her attack for years, waiting for the right moment. Shy loner Norman hates his role in the Darkroom, but can’t find the courage to fight back until he makes an unlikely alliance. And then there’s Finn Ford, an English teacher with a shady reputation, who keeps one eye on his literary ambitions and one on Ms. Witt. As the school’s secrets begin to trickle out, a boys-versus-girls skirmish turns into an all-out war, with deeply personal - and potentially fatal - consequences for everyone involved.

Lisa Lutz’s blistering, timely tale of revenge and disruption shows us what can happen when silence wins out over decency for too long - and why the scariest threat of all might be the idea that sooner or later, girls will be girls."

Lisa Lutz is literally a favorite author of mine and to have my birthday share a birthday with her new book is beyond exciting. 

Pride, Prejudice, and Poison by Elizabeth Blake
Published by: Crooked Lane Books
Publication Date: August 13th, 2019
Format: Hardcover, 336 Pages
To Buy

The official patter:
"Perfect for fans of Laura Levine and Stephanie Barron, Elizabeth Blake’s Jane Austen Society mystery debut is a mirthfully morbid merger of manners and murder.

In this Austen-tatious debut, antiquarian bookstore proprietor Erin Coleridge uses her sense and sensibility to deduce who killed the president of the local Jane Austen Society.

Erin Coleridge’s used bookstore in Kirkbymoorside, North Yorkshire, England is a meeting place for the villagers and, in particular, for the local Jane Austen Society. At the Society’s monthly meeting, matters come to a head between the old guard and its young turks. After the meeting breaks for tea, persuasion gives way to murder - with extreme prejudice - when president Sylvia Pemberthy falls dead to the floor. Poisoned? Presumably…but by whom? And was Sylvia the only target?

Handsome - but shy - Detective Inspector Peter Hadley and charismatic Sergeant Rashid Jarral arrive at the scene. The long suspect list includes Sylvia’s lover Kurt Becker and his tightly wound wife Suzanne. Or, perhaps, the killer was Sylvia’s own cuckolded husband, Jerome. Among the many Society members who may have had her in their sights is dashing Jonathan Alder, who was heard having a royal battle of words with the late president the night before.

Then, when Jonathan Alder narrowly avoids becoming the next victim, Farnsworth (the town’s “cat lady”) persuades a seriously time-crunched Erin to help DI Hadley. But the killer is more devious than anyone imagines."

Any book that starts with killing a pompous member of the Jane Austen Society gets two thumbs up from me.

And Then They Were Doomed by Elizabeth Kane Buzzelli
Published by: Crooked Lane Books
Publication Date: August 13th, 2019
Format: Hardcover, 276 Pages
To Buy

The official patter:
"Zoe Zola is one of ten invitees to an Agatha Christie symposium. Tempers flare...and then there are nine. Can Jenny Weston save Zoe from murder on the Upper Peninsula?

Little Person author Zoe Zola believes that one of the unluckiest things in life is to receive an invitation - in the form of a letter edged in black - to an Agatha Christie symposium at an old Upper Peninsula hunting lodge. Her reluctance dissipates when she learns that the organizer is named Emily Brent - the name of a character poisoned by cyanide in Christie’s And Then There Were None.

As a dreary rain soaks the U.P., Zoe and nine other Christie scholars - each of whom bears a vague resemblance to one of the classic mystery novel’s characters - arrive at the lodge. At the opening night dinner, arguments flare over the experts’ discordant theories about Christie. Next morning, the guests find one particularly odious man has gone - whereabouts and reasons unknown. Such a coincidental resemblance to a work of fiction is surely impossible; therefore, it appears to be possible.

As the guests disappear, one by one, Zoe resolves to beat a hasty retreat - but her car won't start. She calls her friend, amateur sleuth/little librarian Jenny Weston, but Jenny will have to wait out a storm off Lake Superior before she can come to the rescue. If Zoe’s to stay alive to greet Jenny when she eventually arrives, she’ll have to draw on everything she knows about Agatha Christie’s devilish plots in Elizabeth Kane Buzzelli’s fourth tantalizing Little Library mystery."

How did I not know about this cozy series? Seriously, HOW!?! 

The Case of Miss Elliott by Baroness Orczy
Published by: Pushkin Vertigo
Publication Date: August 13th, 2019
Format: Paperback, 224 Pages
To Buy

The official patter:
"A classic collection of mysteries from the Golden Age of British crime writing, by the author of The Scarlet Pimpernel.

Mysteries! There is no such thing as a mystery in connection with any crime, provided intelligence is brought to bear upon its investigation.

So says a rather down-at-heel elderly gentleman to young Polly Burton of the Evening Observer, in the corner of the ABC teashop on Norfolk Street one afternoon. Once she has forgiven him for distracting her from her newspaper and luncheon, Miss Burton discovers that her interlocutor is as brilliantly gifted as he is eccentric - able to solve mysteries that have made headlines and baffled the finest minds of the police without once leaving his seat in the teahouse.

The Old Man in the Corner is a classic collection of mysteries featuring the Teahouse Detective - a contemporary of Sherlock Holmes, with a brilliant mind and waspish temperament to match that of Conan Doyle's creation."

I am IN LOVE with these Baroness Orczy re-issues from the Golden Age of detective fiction!

Death Comes to Dartmoor by Vivian Conroy
Published by: Crooked Lane Books
Publication Date: August 13th, 2019
Format: Hardcover, 320 Pages
To Buy

The official patter:
"The mist-shrouded moors of Devon proffer a trove of delights for two vacationing zoologists - but also conceal a hoard of dark secrets reaching down to the fathomless depths of the ocean.

Miss Merula Merriweather barely saved her uncle from the gallows after he was wrongly accused of murder - and now, she’s left the bustle of Victorian London to recuperate in the fresh air of Dartmoor with her fellow zoologist, Lord Raven Royston. The trip offers a unique treat, as they’ll be staying with a friend of Raven’s, who owns a collection of rare zoological specimens - including a kraken, a sea monster of myth and legend.

But all is not right in the land of tors, heaths, and mist. Their host’s maid has vanished without a trace, and the townspeople hold him responsible, claiming that his specimens are alive and roam the moors at night, bringing death to anyone who crosses their path. Merula and Raven are skeptical - but the accusations become more ominous when they find several specimen jars empty.

As the two hunt for clues across a desolate and beautiful landscape, a stranger appears bearing a shadowy secret from Merula’s past. Could there be a connection between her family history, the missing girl, and a fearsome monster that could be on the loose? The race is on to find the truth."

A fearsome monster on the loose in Dartmoor? My Sherlockian heart beats for joy! 

The Doll Factory by Elizabeth Macneal
Published by: Atria/Emily Bestler Books
Publication Date: August 13th, 2019
Format: Hardcover, 368 Pages
To Buy

The official patter:
"The #1 International Bestseller.

Obsession is an art.

In this “sharp, scary, gorgeously evocative tale of love, art, and obsession” (Paula Hawkins, bestselling author of The Girl on the Train), a beautiful young woman aspires to be an artist, while a man’s dark obsession may destroy her world forever.

In 1850s London, the Great Exhibition is being erected in Hyde Park and, among the crowd watching the dazzling spectacle, two people meet by happenstance. For Iris, an arrestingly attractive aspiring artist, it is a brief and forgettable moment but for Silas, a curiosity collector enchanted by all things strange and beautiful, the meeting marks a new beginning.

When Iris is asked to model for Pre-Raphaelite artist Louis Frost, she agrees on the condition that he will also teach her to paint. Suddenly, her world begins to expand beyond her wildest dreams - but she has no idea that evil is waiting in the shadows. Silas has only thought of one thing since that chance meeting, and his obsession is darkening by the day."

The Great Exhibition, the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood, what other of my obsessions does this book hold? You must read to find out!

Petra's Ghost by C.S. O'Cinneide
Published by: Dundurns
Publication Date: August 13th, 2019
Format: Paperback, 288 Pages
To Buy

The official patter:
"A man's pilgrimage becomes something from his darkest nightmares when secrets arise and ghosts haunt his path.

A woman has vanished on the Camino de Santiago, the ancient five-hundred-mile pilgrimage that crosses northern Spain. Daniel, an Irish expat, walks the lonely trail carrying his wife, Petra’s, ashes, along with the damning secret of how she really died.

When he teams up to walk with sporty California girl Ginny, she seems like the perfect antidote for his grieving heart. But a nightmare figure begins to stalk them, and his mind starts to unravel from the horror of things he cannot explain.

Unexpected twists and turns echo the path of the ancient trail they walk upon. The lines start to blur between reality and madness, between truth and the lies we tell ourselves."

YAS! Just so much yas! It's a book that you read the description and instantly want to drop all other books to read. 

A Keeper by Graham Norton
Published by: Atria Books
Publication Date: August 13th, 2019
Format: Hardcover, 320 Pages
To Buy

The official patter:
"When Elizabeth Keane returns to Ireland after her mother’s death, she’s focused only on saying goodbye to that dark and dismal part of her life. Her childhood home is packed solid with useless junk, her mother’s presence already fading. But within this mess, she discovers a small stash of letters - and ultimately, the truth.

Forty years earlier, a young woman stumbles from a remote stone house, the night quiet except for the constant wind that encircles her as she hurries deeper into the darkness away from the cliffs and the sea. She has no sense of where she is going, only that she must keep on.

A Keeper confirms Graham Norton’s status as a fresh and evocative literary voice, and illustrates his clear-eyed understanding of human nature and its darkest flaws."

A love Graham SO MUCH! What I wouldn't give for a US signing tour, just saying...

The Night is Short, Walk on Girl by Tomihiko Morimi
Published by: Yen On
Publication Date: August 13th, 2019
Format: Hardcover, 272 Pages
To Buy

The official patter:
"A college student spends an evening out, unwittingly attracting the attention of various men whose paths she crosses. One in particular, an upperclassman who has been nursing a crush on her for some time, has chosen this night to make his true feelings known.

Will the two come together, or will this girl just keep on walking...?"

That cover is just too cute for words! 

Voyages in the Underworld of Orpheus Black by Marcus Sedgwick
Published by: Walker Books US
Publication Date: August 13th, 2019
Format: Hardcover, 320 Pages
To Buy

The official patter:
"Harry Black is lost between the world of war and the land of myth in this illustrated novel that transports the tale of Orpheus to World War II–era London.

Brothers Marcus and Julian Sedgwick team up to pen this haunting tale of another pair of brothers, caught between life and death in World War II. Harry Black, a conscientious objector, artist, and firefighter battling the blazes of German bombing in London in 1944, wakes in the hospital to news that his soldier brother, Ellis, has been killed. In the delirium of his wounded state, Harry’s mind begins to blur the distinctions between the reality of war-torn London, the fiction of his unpublished sci-fi novel, and the myth of Orpheus and Eurydice. Driven by visions of Ellis still alive and a sense of poetic inevitability, Harry sets off on a search for his brother that will lead him deep into the city’s Underworld. With otherworldly paintings by Alexis Deacon depicting Harry’s surreal descent further into the depths of hell, this eerily beautiful blend of prose, verse, and illustration delves into love, loyalty, and the unbreakable bonds of brotherhood as it builds to a fierce indictment of mechanized warfare."

I couldn't think of a better pairing than WWII and Orpheus, it just seems so right. 

Monday, August 5, 2019

Tuesday Tomorrow

The Turn of the Key by Ruth Ware
Published by: Gallery/Scout Press
Publication Date: August 6th, 2019
Format: Hardcover, 352 Pages
To Buy

The official patter:
"When she stumbles across the ad, she’s looking for something else completely. But it seems like too good an opportunity to miss - a live-in nannying post, with a staggeringly generous salary. And when Rowan Caine arrives at Heatherbrae House, she is smitten - by the luxurious “smart” home fitted out with all modern conveniences, by the beautiful Scottish Highlands, and by this picture-perfect family.

What she doesn’t know is that she’s stepping into a nightmare - one that will end with a child dead and herself in prison awaiting trial for murder.

Writing to her lawyer from prison, she struggles to explain the unravelling events that led to her incarceration. It wasn’t just the constant surveillance from the cameras installed around the house, or the malfunctioning technology that woke the household with booming music, or turned the lights off at the worst possible time. It wasn’t just the girls, who turned out to be a far cry from the immaculately behaved model children she met at her interview. It wasn’t even the way she was left alone for weeks at a time, with no adults around apart from the enigmatic handyman, Jack Grant.

It was everything.

She knows she’s made mistakes. She admits that she lied to obtain the post, and that her behavior toward the children wasn’t always ideal. She’s not innocent, by any means. But, she maintains, she’s not guilty - at least not of murder. Which means someone else is.

Full of spellbinding menace and told in Ruth Ware’s signature suspenseful style, The Turn of the Key is an unputdownable thriller from the Agatha Christie of our time."

Reinterpretations of The Turn of the Screw fascinate me, mainly because that story has so much wasted potential. So while I'm wary of Ware I'm still highly anticipating this book. 

Wild Fire by Ann Cleeves
Published by: Minotaur Books
Publication Date: August 6th, 2019
Format: Paperback, 432 Pages
To Buy

The official patter:
"The betrayal of those closest burns most of all...

Hoping for a fresh start, an English family moves to the remote Shetland islands, eager to give their autistic son a better life.

But when a young nanny's body is found hanging in the barn beside their home, rumors of her affair with the husband spread like wildfire. As suspicion and resentment of the family blazes in the community, Detective Inspector Jimmy Perez is called in to investigate. He knows it will mean his boss, Willow Reeves, returning to run the investigation, and confronting their complex relationship.

With families fracturing and long-hidden lies emerging, Jimmy faces the most disturbing case of his career."

Brace yourselves, not many more stories set in Shetland...

The Third Mrs. Durst by Ann Aguirre
Published by: Midnight Ink
Publication Date: August 6th, 2019
Format: Hardcover, 312 Pages
To Buy

The official patter:
"Some people just need killing.

Marlena Altizer Durst lives in her husband's shadow. He controls her every move - what she wears, the food she eats, and the friends she's allowed to make. If she disobeys, there are...consequences. And he has all the power.

To outsiders, it seems that she leads a fairy-tale life. But nobody ever wonders if Cinderella was happy after she married the prince. Marlena has traded freedom and safety for luxurious imprisonment, and most days, that seems like a bad bargain. Death may be the only exit she's allowed. Just like his first wife. And his second. Unless she flips the script.

Some people just need killing."

Ann Aguirre writing in a new suspenseful genre? YAS! 

Love and Death Among the Cheetahs by Rhys Bowen
Published by: Berkley
Publication Date: August 6th, 2019
Format: Hardcover, 304 Pages
To Buy

The official patter:
"Georgie and Darcy are finally on their honeymoon in Kenya's Happy Valley, but murder crashes the party in this all-new installment in the New York Times bestselling series.

I was so excited when Darcy announced out of the blue that we were flying to Kenya for our extended honeymoon. Now that we are here, I suspect he has actually been sent to fulfill another secret mission. I am trying very hard not to pick a fight about it, because after all, we are in paradise! Darcy finally confides that there have been robberies in London and Paris. It seems the thief was a member of the aristocracy and may have fled to Kenya. Since we are staying in the Happy Valley - the center of upper-class English life - we are well positioned to hunt for clues and ferret out possible suspects.

Now that I am a sophisticated married woman, I am doing my best to sound like one. But crikey! These aristocrats are a thoroughly loathsome sort enjoying a completely decadent lifestyle filled with wild parties and rampant infidelity. And one of the leading lights in the community, Lord Cheriton, has the nerve to make a play for me. While I am on my honeymoon! Of course, I put an end to that right off.

When he is found bloodied and lifeless along a lonely stretch of road, it appears he fell victim to a lion. But it seems that the Happy Valley community wants to close the case a bit too quickly. Darcy and I soon discover that there is much more than a simple robbery and an animal attack to contend with here in Kenya. Nearly everyone has a motive to want Lord Cheriton dead and some will go to great lengths to silence anyone who asks too many questions. The hunt is on! I just hope I can survive my honeymoon long enough to catch a killer...."

If I could only have books set in one location forevermore, it would be Kenya's Happy Valley.

Singapore Sapphire by A.M. Stuart
Published by: Berkley
Publication Date: August 6th, 2019
Format: Paperback, 384 Pages
To Buy

The official patter:
"Early twentieth-century Singapore is a place where a person can disappear, and Harriet Gordon hopes to make a new life for herself there, leaving her tragic memories behind her - but murder gets in the way.

Singapore, 1910 - Desperate for a fresh start, Harriet Gordon finds herself living with her brother, a reverend and headmaster of a school for boys, in Singapore at the height of colonial rule. Hoping to gain some financial independence, she advertises her services as a personal secretary. It is unfortunate that she should discover her first client, Sir Oswald Newbold - explorer, mine magnate and president of the exclusive Explorers and Geographers Club - dead with a knife in his throat.

When Inspector Robert Curran is put on the case, he realizes that he has an unusual witness in Harriet. Harriet's keen eye for detail and strong sense of duty interests him, as does her distrust of the police and her traumatic past, which she is at pains to keep secret from the gossips of Singapore society.

When another body is dragged from the canal, Harriet feels compelled to help with the case. She and Curran are soon drawn into a murderous web of treachery and deceit and find themselves face-to-face with a ruthless cabal that has no qualms about killing again to protect its secrets."

A country under colonial rule? A murder? This is the book for me. 

House of Salt and Sorrows by Erin A. Craig
Published by: Delacorte Press
Publication Date: August 6th, 2019
Format: Hardcover, 416 Pages
To Buy

The official patter:
"Get swept away in Erin A. Craig's mesmerizing House of Salt and Sorrows. As one by one her beautiful sisters mysteriously die on their isolated island estate, Annaleigh must unravel the curse that haunts her family. Be careful who you dance with....

In a manor by the sea, twelve sisters are cursed.

Annaleigh lives a sheltered life at Highmoor with her sisters and their father and stepmother. Once there were twelve, but loneliness fills the grand halls now that four of the girls' lives have been cut short. Each death was more tragic than the last - the plague, a plummeting fall, a drowning, a slippery plunge - and there are whispers throughout the surrounding villages that the family is cursed by the gods.

Disturbed by a series of ghostly visions, Annaleigh becomes increasingly suspicious that her sister's deaths were no accidents. The girls have been sneaking out every night to attend glittering balls, dancing until dawn in silk gowns and shimmering slippers, and Annaleigh isn't sure whether to try to stop them or to join their forbidden trysts. Because who - or what - are they really dancing with?

When Annaleigh's involvement with a mysterious stranger who has secrets of his own intensifies, it's a race to unravel the darkness that has fallen over her family - before it claims her next. House of Salt and Sorrows is a spellbinding novel filled with magic and the rustle of gossamer skirts down long, dark hallways. Get ready to be swept away."

A dark and disturbing take on The Twelve Dancing Princesses.

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