The Woman in the Water by Charles Finch
Published by: Minotaur Books
Publication Date: February 20th, 2018
Format: Hardcover, 304 Pages
To Buy
The official patter:
"This chilling new mystery in the USA Today bestselling series by Charles Finch takes readers back to Charles Lenox’s very first case and the ruthless serial killer who would set him on the course to become one of London’s most brilliant detectives.
London, 1850: A young Charles Lenox struggles to make a name for himself as a detective…without a single case. Scotland Yard refuses to take him seriously and his friends deride him for attempting a profession at all. But when an anonymous writer sends a letter to the paper claiming to have committed the perfect crime―and promising to kill again―Lenox is convinced that this is his chance to prove himself.
The writer’s first victim is a young woman whose body is found in a naval trunk, caught up in the rushes of a small islets in the middle of the Thames. With few clues to go on, Lenox endeavors to solve the crime before another innocent life is lost. When the killer’s sights are turned toward those whom Lenox holds most dear, the stakes are raised and Lenox is trapped in a desperate game of cat and mouse.
In the tradition of Sherlock Holmes, this newest mystery in the Charles Lenox series pits the young detective against a maniacal murderer who would give Professor Moriarty a run for his money."
Oh, Charles Finch is coming relatively near me on his book tour, must try to make that!
The Tombs by Deborah Schaumberg
Published by: HarperTeen
Publication Date: February 20th, 2018
Format: Hardcover, 448 Pages
To Buy
The official patter:
"New York, 1882. A dark, forbidding city, and no place for a girl with unexplainable powers.
Sixteen-year-old Avery Kohl pines for the life she had before her mother was taken. She fears the mysterious men in crow masks who locked her mother in the Tombs asylum for being able to see what others couldn't. Avery denies the signs in herself, focusing instead on her shifts at the ironworks factory and keeping her inventor father out of trouble. Other than secondhand tales of adventure from her best friend, Khan, an ex-slave, and caring for her falcon, Seraphine, Avery spends her days struggling to survive.
Like her mother's, Avery's powers refuse to be contained. When she causes a bizarre explosion at the factory, she has no choice but to run from her lies, straight into the darkest corners of the city. Avery must embrace her abilities and learn to wield their power--or join her mother in the cavernous horrors of the Tombs. And the Tombs has secrets of its own: strange experiments are being performed on 'patients'...and no one knows why.
Deborah Schaumberg's gripping debut melds history and fantasy, taking readers on a breathless trip across a teeming turn-of-the-century New York, and asks the question: Where can you hide in a city that wants you buried?"
As I type this I have just been sucked into The Alienist so anything New York is a go for me!
The Tuscan Child by Rhys Bowen
Published by: Lake Union Publishing
Publication Date: February 20th, 2018
Format: Hardcover, 352 Pages
To Buy
The official patter:
"From New York Times bestselling author Rhys Bowen comes a haunting novel about a woman who braves her father’s hidden past to discover his secrets...
In 1944, British bomber pilot Hugo Langley parachuted from his stricken plane into the verdant fields of German-occupied Tuscany. Badly wounded, he found refuge in a ruined monastery and in the arms of Sofia Bartoli. But the love that kindled between them was shaken by an irreversible betrayal.
Nearly thirty years later, Hugo’s estranged daughter, Joanna, has returned home to the English countryside to arrange her father’s funeral. Among his personal effects is an unopened letter addressed to Sofia. In it is a startling revelation.
Still dealing with the emotional wounds of her own personal trauma, Joanna embarks on a healing journey to Tuscany to understand her father’s history—and maybe come to understand herself as well. Joanna soon discovers that some would prefer the past be left undisturbed, but she has come too far to let go of her father’s secrets now..."
Rhys Bowen going in a new direction, I'm down for that!
Death of an Honest Man by M.C. Beaton
Published by: Grand Central Publishing
Publication Date: February 20th, 2018
Format: Hardcover, 256 Pages
To Buy
The official patter:
"Nobody loves an honest man, or that was what police sergeant Hamish Macbeth tried to tell newcomer Paul English. Paul had moved to a house in Cnothan, a sour village on Hamish's beat.
He attended church in Lochdubh. He told the minister, Mr. Wellington, that his sermons were boring. He told tweedy Mrs. Wellington that she was too fat and in these days of increasing obesity it was her duty to show a good example. Angela Brody was told her detective stories were pap for the masses and it was time she wrote literature instead. He accused Hamish of having dyed his fiery red hair. He told Jessie Currie--who repeated all the last words of her twin sister--that she needed psychiatric help.
"I speak as I find," he bragged. Voices saying, "I could kill that man," could be heard from Lochdubh to Cnothan.
And someone did.
Now Hamish is faced with a bewildering array of suspects. And he's lost the services of his clumsy policeman, Charlie, who has resigned from the force after Chief Inspector Blair berated Charlie one too many times, and the policeman threw Blair into the loch. Can Hamish find the killer on his own?"
For my mom, the Hamish Macbeth acolyte.
Educated by Tara Westover
Published by: Random House
Publication Date: February 20th, 2018
Format: Hardcover, 352 Pages
To Buy
The official patter:
"An unforgettable memoir about a young girl who, kept out of school, leaves her survivalist family and goes on to earn a PhD from Cambridge University.
Tara Westover was seventeen the first time she set foot in a classroom. Born to survivalists in the mountains of Idaho, she prepared for the end of the world by stockpiling home-canned peaches and sleeping with her “head-for-the-hills” bag. In the summer she stewed herbs for her mother, a midwife and healer, and in the winter she salvaged metal in her father’s junkyard.
Her father distrusted the medical establishment, so Tara never saw a doctor or nurse. Gashes and concussions, even burns from explosions, were all treated at home with herbalism. The family was so isolated from mainstream society that there was no one to ensure the children received an education, and no one to intervene when an older brother became violent.
When another brother got himself into college and came back with news of the world beyond the mountain, Tara decided to try a new kind of life. She taught herself enough mathematics, grammar, and science to take the ACT and was admitted to Brigham Young University. There, she studied psychology, politics, philosophy, and history, learning for the first time about pivotal world events like the Holocaust and the Civil Rights Movement. Her quest for knowledge transformed her, taking her over oceans and across continents, to Harvard and to Cambridge University. Only then would she wonder if she’d traveled too far, if there was still a way home.
Educated is an account of the struggle for self-invention. It is a tale of fierce family loyalty, and of the grief that comes from severing ties with those closest to you. With the acute insight that distinguishes all great writers, Westover has crafted a universal coming-of-age story that gets to the heart of what an education is and what it offers: the perspective to see one’s life through new eyes, and the will to change it."
This sounds fascinating if just for the fact Tara has lived the exact opposite life I have.
In these days of streaming which allow for bingeing having a series that keeps you literally on the edge of your seat for ten straight weeks instead of ten straight hours is pretty remarkable, and yet that is what The Alienist did. Of course, there were times I was tempted to pick up the book by Caleb Carr to get to the bottom of the crimes taking place in New York in the late 1800s, gruesome and ritualistic murders of young male prostitutes, but at the same time I didn't want to muddy the magnificence of the adaptation by comparing it to it's source material. This show combined so many things that I love into one production, a serial killer with a creepy bent like Jack the Ripper, bringing historical fiction to the small screen, but in a way that is believable because it fits in and around actual history, women breaking out of their expected roles, not to mention the depth of the characters with their own personal secrets that inform who they've become. When each episode ended I wanted the next one right away. This show is so fabulous that I think it might be the only show I've profiled this month that has won a coveted Emmy! When they announced just a few short weeks ago that they are adapting the second book in the series, The Angel of Darkness, I couldn't have been happier. I need Dr. Kreizler, John Moore, Sara Howard, and every single supporting character I've come to love from John's grandmother played by the incomparable Grace Zabriskie to the Isaacson brothers. One can only hope that after The Angel of Darkness they find some way to keep this series going, because I don't want, I need more Dr. Kreizler and associates in my life. Perhaps we can bribe Caleb Carr to write a third and forth installment? 
You know what I find amazing? That each and every year more and more books are being adapted for the small screen. Yes, I could criticize and say that Hollywood lacks imagination, instead I will celebrate seeing some of my favorite books and some books I hope to be favorites being adapted into another medium. Last year two book adaptations took the awards season and the Emmys by storm. I of course am talking about HBO's adaptation of Big Little Lies and Hulu's adaptation and expansion of 
