Fiction Reviews: Week of 6/18/2007

Philip Roth’s 28th book is, it seems, the final novel in the Zuckerman series, which began in 1979 with The Ghostwriter. A 71-year-old Nathan Zuckerman returns to New York after more than a decade in rural New England, ostensibly to see a doctor about a prostate condition that has left him incontinent and probably impotent. But Zuckerman being Zuckerman and Roth being Roth, the plot is much more complicated than it at first appears. Within a few days of arriving in New York, Zuckerman accidentally encounters Amy Bellette, the woman who was once the muse/wife of his beloved idol, writer S.I. Lonoff; he also meets a young novelist and promptly begins fantasizing about the writer’s young and beautiful wife. There’s also a subplot about a would-be Lonoff biographer, who enrages Zuckerman with his brashness and ambition, two qualities a faithful Roth reader can’t help ascribing to the young, sycophantic Zuckerman himself. As usual, Roth’s voice is wise and full of rueful wit, but the plot is contrived (the accidental meeting with Amy, for example, is particularly unbelievable) and the tone hovers dangerously close to pathetic. In the Rothian pantheon, this one lives closer to The Dying Animal than Everyman. (Oct.)

Two misfits find common ground and a unique, surreal friendship via unspoken words in Coupland’s latest (after JPod), a fine return to form. In the two years since his wife’s (nonfatal) cancer was diagnosed, Roger Thorpe has devolved into a dejected, hard-drinking, divorced father and the oldest employee “by a fair margin” at Staples. A frustrated novelist to boot, Roger considers himself “lost,” continually haunted by dreams of missed opportunities and a long ago car accident that claimed four friends. His younger, disgruntled goth co-worker, Bethany Twain, one day discovers Roger’s diary—filled with mock re-imaginings of her thoughts and feelings—in the break room. She lays down a “supreme challenge” for them both to write diary entries to each other, but neither is allowed to acknowledge the other around the store. Through exchanged hopes and dreams, customer stories, world views and cautionary revelations (“time speeds up in a terrifying manner in your mid-thirties”), the pair become intimately acquainted before things unravel for both. Running parallel to the epistolary narrative are chapters from Roger’s novel, Glove Pond, which begins having much in common with the larger narrative it’s enclosed in. Coupland shines, the story is humorous, frenetic, focused and curiously affecting. (Oct.)

In this exuberant follow-up to Ways of Dying, the celebrated South African novelist and playwright Mda once again centers his story upon the professional mourner Toloki—this time, as he makes his way through a sad and surreal America. Set on the eve of the 2004 presidential election, the novel fixes its outsider gaze on everything from Billionaires for Bush to late-night television, viewing American cultural and political life through a near-anthropological lens. But there is much heart here, too, as Toloki is taken in by an impoverished Southern family; he befriends the son, Obed; falls in love with his melancholy, sitar-playing sister, Orpah; and learns to quilt from their mother, Ruth. Simultaneously, he learns how the quilts link Ruth’s ancestry to the slave trade and, in particular, the escape of Nicodemus and Abednego, the beloved sons of a slave called “The Abyssinian Queen.” Cross-cutting between the slave story and Toloki’s experiences, the book offers a rich and original picture of the United States on both a personal and grander historical level and is suffused with the same lyricism, vividness and dark, tragic wit that have earned the author previous recognition here and in his homeland. (Sept.)

In her stirring fourth novel, Nahai explores the struggles of an Iranian family in the tenuous decade before the Islamic revolution. Twelve-year-old Yaas narrates her family’s story, beginning before her birth at her parents’ unlikely meeting. Her mother, Bahar, lives in the Jewish slums with her less-than-respectable family—among them, “a seamstress who can’t sew,” “a cantor who can’t sing,” a Muslim convert and a ghost. Bahar’s fortuitous encounter with Omid Arbab, the son of wealthy Iranian Jews, results in a marriage that quickly disintegrates, due to class pressures and Bahar’s desire for a measure of independence. Yaas then embarks on what is, at times, an overly lyrical account of her difficult and lonely childhood. She senses that she is an unwelcome disappointment to her mother, whose behavior toward her daughter ranges from inattentive to cruel. When Omid becomes involved in a public affair with the wealthy and beautiful Niyaz and Yaas begins going deaf, the Arbab family spirals out of control. Despite a clunky subplot involving Bahar’s ghost brother and a too-easy resolution, the novel is a poignant tale of a “damaged family.” (Sept.)

The unnamed, not-entirely-reliable narrator of this novel of obsession from Watson (In a Dark Time) aims his imaginative faculties at discovering, through fiction, the truth of an incident from his adolescence in Bismarck, N.Dak. In trying to figure out why, in 1961, his best friend’s father shot a state senator and then hanged himself, the writer tries out a number of different scenarios via short fictions and simple speculation, including mental illness, romantic rivalry, a festering real estate swindle and a looming corruption scandal. The fictions-within-a-fiction are a clever conceit, but ponderous discussion of the pieces weakens it. More problematic is that the specifics of the larger tale aren’t engineered to go as far as Watson wants to take them. The book’s greatest strength, alongside its palpable sense of place, is its rich period detail—including the inescapability of cigarette smoking, in which nearly every character hungrily indulges. But even the narrator’s own mother, initially absorbed by the case, loses interest in it rather swiftly, so it should be no surprise that the relentless analysis of minutiae comes to feel like harping. (Sept.)

Setting her second novel among the glamorous couture houses of post-WWI Paris, Diliberto (I Am Madame X) delves into a Europe inching its way back to caring about fashion. Following the death of her fiancé and family, fictitious 22-year-old seamstress Isabelle Varlet leaves her provincial town in 1919 and takes a low-level job working for Gabrielle “Coco” Chanel, joining a gaggle of young women sewing until their fingers bleed to serve “Mademoiselle” in preparation for the upcoming fall collection. Dresses are depicted in magnificent detail; fellow couturiers Madeleine Vionnet and Jean Patou are vibrant and alive, and Diliberto even incorporates period fashion journalism. Still, Isabelle, on a frustrating run of bad luck, proves a bit of a snore—she’s an orphan, she falls ill and loses her job, her workroom is robbed. And her love story with poet Daniel Blank feels forced. Chanel, however, is another story: with her married lovers and fiery arrogance, Mademoiselle is the true star of the book; each moment she’s on the page is sheer pleasure, much like fine couture. (Sept.)

Television actress Thorne-Smith, who has had roles on (among other shows) Melrose Place and According to Jim, delivers a Hollywood novel about a failed movie actress who finds new life as the star of a nighttime soap called Generations. But Kate Keyes-Morgan’s life, glamorous on the outside, is still less than perfect. This put-upon heroine has issues with weight and self-worth, and an overly controlling manager/husband to please. Her problems reach a head when she learns that her husband is having an affair with Sapphire Rose, Kate’s diva-like co-star. How Kate deals with this dual betrayal forms the dramatic core of a thin story prone to the classically shallow emotional highs and lows associated with soap operas. Except for vibrant Kate, the characters—Kate’s eccentric mother, her wisecracking best friend and her nominal love interest (an agent who improbably dreams of being a novelist)—seldom move beyond their stereotypical origins. A typical Hollywood ending caps the story, but getting there is not nearly as much fun as it should be. (Sept.)

This dark first-person tale of youthful initiation by Mississippi-born Saterstrom (The Pink Institution) follows a feisty narrator from public housing in a backward Southern town to the sodden grit of university life in Glasgow. The young, unnamed narrator of these detached vignettes falls into bad company as her drug-addict mother largely disappears and her older sister introduces her to sex and booze. The narrator loses her virginity early on during a drunken bout with a football player and subsequently hangs out with half-Vietnamese friend Heather and her doped-up loser pals. It’s not clear how, but after being sent to reform school, the narrator distinguishes herself in English, which opens the door to college in “Big City,” and later, to Scottish University, where she studies religion, delves into postmodern studies and hooks up with former “heroin freak” Ian. Her mother’s death brings her home just in time for gallstones to send her to the hospital for a long stay. Through banter with night nurse Charlie (who calls her Ginger Rogers), she establishes a connection in the face of rupture and loss. Saterstrom’s coming-of-age narrative is tough and unblinking, and the moments of clarity provide immense satisfaction. (Sept.)

Khakpour builds her luminously intelligent debut around the travails of an Iranian-American family caught in the feverish and paranoid currents immediately after 9/11. Darius Adam and his wife, Laleh (who, much to Darius’s disgust, Americanizes her name to Lala), flee revolutionary Iran for the alien territory of Southern California, settling in an apartment complex with the allegorically enticing name of Eden Gardens. Son Xerxes grows up with psychological “dual citizenship”: regular American outside of Eden Gardens, but the son of bitter Darius and clueless Lala inside. Xerxes finds true paradise in watching Barbara Eden, the star of I Dream of Jeannie. For the brilliantly rendered Lala, America is not so bad—it’s a good place to ''lose your mind,” which is how Lala translates into English her forgetting her unhappy Tehran childhood. Against this background of a parody paradise, Khakpour plays out the events following 9/11, which will, grotesquely, unite the Adam family. By then Xerxes, 26, is an unemployed college grad in a New York airshaft-view apartment, as far from Eden Gardens as possible. Khakpour is an elegant writer, and she imparts a perfect sense of the ironies of being Persian in America, where the blurry collective image of the Middle East alternates between blonde genies in bottles and furrow-browed terrorists in cockpits. (Sept.)

Scots author Faber (The Crimson Petal and the White) practices a distinct and finally winning form of defamiliarization in these 16 short tales, creating characters with very low thresholds for overstimulation, so that the everyday, through their eyes, looks nightmarish or sublime. A man wakes in a pile of garbage in “The Safehouse,” strips off his fetid raincoat and then can’t understand why, as he tries to figure out what day it is, the townspeople want to help him—even after he discerns his name, an address and a phone number printed on his T-shirt. In “Serious Swimmers,” a recovering drug addict is overwhelmed with love for her son during a swim at the local pool. The homicidal wife-beater on a rampage (in “Someone to Kiss It Better”) is oddly sympathetic as his misguided coverup goes very wrong. More fantastically, legions of Western businessmen are held in ecstatic captivity by a machete-wielding Miss Soedhono (“Explaining Coconuts”), while the grotesque 1861 demise of Alchester’s richest man (in “Flesh Remains Flesh”) is freakish and deeply satisfying. Faber’s elaborately imagined stories often end at a moment of tension or ambivalence, underscoring his characters’ fragility and giving the book an uncanny coherence. (Sept.)

Hobbie, the narrator of this endearing debut novel, prefers the company of his beloved mutt, Terry, to the companionship of most humans. Hobbie, who has a blistering case of chronic acne, and Kari, his obese girlfriend of 20 years, continually aggravate their situations: Hobbie picks at and further inflames his bad skin while Kari eats in response to a shared tragedy from their youth. When the novel opens, Kari’s ensconced at a weight-loss clinic hundreds of miles from their temporary north Georgia home, and Hobbie lives like a hermit until he’s attacked by a bear. While recovering, he’s sucked into the messy world of Kari’s father, Roth, and slowly, clumsily becomes part of Roth’s family once Kari goes missing from the clinic. Crandell has an exquisite eye for small details—Kari’s letters home are written on “lined paper, the same kind we wrote love notes on”—that lend a tender feel to what could easily be overwrought. Though the novel turns on some unconvincing plot twists (particularly in the concluding section), the characters and situations are so simultaneously moving and unique that a bit of contrivance doesn’t sink this tale of misfit love. (Sept.)

This tenderly funny tale from British author Rhodes (Don’t Tell Me the Truth About Love) traces the sweetly unsentimental course of Miyuke Woodward’s annual holiday at a rustic Welsh coastal cottage. Miyuke and lover Grindl (known as “the Lesbians” in the small town where they have a decorating business) spend a month apart on separate, two-week vacations each year. This year, vacationing Miyuke spends her days as always, indulging in junk food and beer at the local pub, reading a book a day and walking across fields and along the seaside cliffs, until she discovers a rock that glows golden in the afternoon sunlight. Impulsively, she decides to paint it gold, only to be seen doing so by a pub regular, tall Mr. Hughes, who subsequently disappears from his usual spot at the bar. Confronted by two other pub regulars, short Mr. Hughes and Mr. Puw, Miyuke tells of the rock, and the three set off to find their compatriot. Rhodes’s tale features lovely touches (such as the Children from Previous Relationships, a local band that’s never played in public), and effortlessly ends an immaculately crafted story of minor perturbations and their unpredictable outcomes. (Sept.)

At the start of Edgar-winner Riordan’s entertaining seventh crime novel to feature San Antonio, Tex., PI Tres Navarre (after 2005’s Mission Road), Tres has just retired and married his longtime girlfriend Maia, who’s eight-plus–months pregnant. Tres’s wheelchair-bound older brother, Garret, has persuaded the couple to honeymoon together with him and other old friends on the Texas Gulf’s Rebel Island, where Tres and Garret spent vacations with their dysfunctional parents. When U.S. Marshal Jesse Longoria, a character from earlier books, is killed, Tres gets a chance to work out some unfinished business. As the bodies begin piling up, a lethal hurricane approaches. Fans will enjoy the update on Tres’s life as he prowls through secret passageways hunting down the ghostlike killer while the roof of the island’s old hotel begins to shred and the seas begin to rise. (Sept.)

Drawing on his experience directing Friends, Benson offers in his debut a derivative parody of behind-the-scenes Los Angeles that fails to skewer any of its easy targets. Has-been sitcom director J.T. Baker, a “passionate schmuck” in a self-imposed exile from Hollywood, is picked to helm the hit show I Love My Urban Buddies (“the biggest sitcom in eons”) after his predecessor meets an unfortunate end via an unfaithful wife, a hot tub and a nail gun. Desperate for money and health insurance to cover his son’s kidney dialysis treatment, J.T. accepts the assignment and flies to California. Upon his arrival, he clashes with Debbie, the “voluptuous” sexpot network liaison; Lance, the underqualified studio exec; and the married terrors Stephanie and Marcus Pooley, the show’s creators. J.T.’s only ally on the lot is his friend Asher Black, who helps J.T. survive Marcus’s lecherous casting sessions, puerile assistant directors, an on-set pederast and a cast of babied egoists. Benson’s flat, one-dimensional characters are hard to take seriously, and readers may have a hard time sympathizing with the long-winded J.T., especially after he anoints himself “the Sergeant at Arms of the Moral Police.” Benson’s background in the TV biz is apparent, but his roman à clef doesn’t pop. (Sept.)

Set in the same high-tech present day as Pattern Recognition, Gibson’s fine ninth novel offers startling insights into our paranoid and often fragmented, postmodern world. When a mysterious, not yet actual magazine, Node, hires former indie rocker–turned–journalist Hollis Henry to do a story on a new art form that exists only in virtual reality, Hollis finds herself investigating something considerably more dangerous. An operative named Brown, who may or may not work for the U.S. government, is tracking a young, Russian-speaking Cuban-Chinese criminal named Tito. Brown’s goal is to follow Tito to yet another operative known only as the old man. Meanwhile, a mysterious cargo container with CIA connections repeatedly appears and disappears on the worldwide Global Positioning network, never quite coming to port. At the heart of the dark goings-on is Bobby Chombo, a talented but unbalanced specialist in Global Positioning software who refuses to sleep in the same spot two nights running. Compelling characters and crisp action sequences, plus the author’s trademark metaphoric language, help make this one of Gibson’s best. 8-city author tour. (Aug.)

If Jake Landry, a tough guy with an understanding of airplane engineering and an innate grasp of corporate politics, is too good to be true, he’s still fun to watch in this sleek thriller from bestseller Finder (Killer Instinct). A junior executive at California’s Hammond Aerospace, Landry possesses a remarkably flexible intelligence, which lands him on a high-end corporate weekend at a lodge called Rivers Inlet, where the new CEO, Cheryl Tobin, discreetly asks Landry to help her identify corrupt executives. Almost immediately, the lodge is assailed by five men who at first appear to be hunters turned vicious at the sight of the weekend participants’ enormous wealth. As they interrogate the executives, however, it becomes clear that they know quite a bit about Hammond and its workings. Landry’s job, then, is to figure out their purpose as well as rescue the entire crew. Tight, fluid writing more than compensates for the occasional plot implausibility. 200,000 first printing; author tour. (Aug.)

Florida, hurricanes and crime make a potent mix, as shown in Edgar-winner King’s fifth entry in his Max Freeman PI series (The Blue Edge of Midnight, etc.). The vacation trip that Max and his cop girlfriend, Sherry Richards, take to his Everglades cabin and then to a friend’s even more remote fishing camp turns into a struggle for survival when hurricane Simone shifts course unpredictably. A trio of unscrupulous thieves scavenging in the hurricane’s wake and a pair of deadly security guards out to protect an illegal asset compound the danger. King vividly describes the hurricane’s force and the different ways people respond to it. Sherry displays her grit and Max his ingenuity in a series of desperate gambles as the story builds to an explosive climax. This is a worthy addition to a Florida subgenre that includes Carl Hiaasen’s Stormy Weather and Tim Dorsey’s Hurricane Punch. (Aug.)

British author Billingham’s taut sixth procedural to feature London policeman Tom Thorne (after Lifeless) establishes him as one of the best new hard-boiled voices. Assigned to investigate the kidnapping of 16-year-old Luke Mullen, DI Tom Thorne knows it won’t be a straightforward case when he discovers the boy’s father is ex–Det. Chief Supt. Tony Mullen. As Thorne and his new partner, DI Louise Porter, dig deeper into the kidnapping, they discover unsettling connections to an unsolved hate crime and to Grant Freestone, a wanted man with a grudge against the senior Mullen. An unexpected twist in the case turns kidnapping into murder, and Thorne and Porter are thrust into a dangerous game of cat and mouse against a criminal with disturbing ties to the police force itself. With its effortless point-of-view shifts that illuminate the unfolding stories from myriad angles, this superb suspense thriller cements Billingham’s place along with such American heavyweights as Michael Connelly and Dennis Lehane. (Aug.)

The tension between India’s centuries-old spiritual traditions and contemporary religious militancy drives this memorable, melancholy family saga by two-time Canadian Giller Prize–winner Vassanji (who won for The Book of Secrets and The In-Between World of Vikram Lall). Karsan Dargawalla is destined from boyhood to succeed his father and his father’s father as avatar of Pirbaag, a 13th-century Sufi shrine. As the novel unfolds in fits and starts, Karsan rejects his spiritual inheritance and decamps for Harvard in 1970, against his chagrined father’s wishes. The three decades of stubborn self-exile that follow represent a sorrowful generational rift between father and son that ends when Karsan returns home after his ascetic father’s death, announced at the book’s opening. Though Sufism is a Muslim tradition, Karsan’s father considered himself “neither and both” Muslim and Hindu, “and we,” says Karsan at one point, “are respected for that.” Yet Karsan finds the shrine destroyed by a mob of Hindu hard-liners, while his younger brother, Mansoor, “militantly calls himself a Muslim” and may be involved in Islamist terrorist activities. Frequent shifts in time and perspective (including flashes of the shrine’s early history) heighten Vassanji’s evocative depiction of India’s ongoing postcolonial tumult, mournfully personalized by the fate of the fractured family at the novel’s heart. (Aug.)

Life is no party for Lillian Leyb, the 22-year-old Jewish immigrant protagonist of Bloom’s outstanding fifth novel: her husband and parents were killed in a Russian pogrom, and the same violent episode separated her from her three-year-old daughter, Sophie. Arriving in New York in 1924, Lillian dreams of Sophie, and after five weeks in America, barely speaking English, she outmaneuvers a line of applicants for a seamstress job at the Goldfadn Yiddish Theatre, where she becomes the mistress of both handsome lead actor Meyer Burstein and his very connected father, Reuben. Her only friend in New York, tailor/actor/playwright Yaakov Shimmelman, gives her a thesaurus and coaches her on American culture. In a last, loving, gesture after receiving word that Sophie is living in Siberia, Yaakov secures Lillian passage out of New York to begin her quest to find Sophie. The journey—through Chicago by train, into Seattle’s African-American underworld and across the Alaskan wilderness—elevates Bloom’s novel from familiar immigrant chronicle to sweeping saga of endurance and rebirth. Encompassing prison, prostitution and poetry, Yiddish humor and Yukon settings, Bloom’s tale offers linguistic twists, startling imagery, sharp wit and a compelling vision of the past. Bloom has created an extraordinary range of characters, settings and emotions. Absolutely stunning. (Aug.)

Bernhardt’s dysfunctional Las Vegas cop, Susan Pulaski, tracks another maniacal serial killer in this circuitous and graphically violent sequel to 2005’s Dark Eye. When the grisly murders—in which the victim is branded and dismembered, and a mathematical equation left at each crime scene—hit Vegas, police chief Robert O’Bannon temporarily rehires widowed ex-police profiler Susan, against the wishes of Lt. Barry Granger, the homicide detective leading the investigation, who despises Susan. The chief’s autistic math-whiz son, Darcy, may be able to crack the killer’s baffling symbols, but O’Bannon warns Susan to keep Darcy on the sidelines. As tensions escalate between Susan and Granger, Susan remains one step behind the mastermind behind the crimes. Distracting lectures on numerology, the Kabbalah and advanced mathematics interrupt the overloaded plot, but the ghastly puzzle comes together in a breathtaking, suspenseful finale. (Aug.)

An alias of prolific bestseller Bob Meyer—whose second novel with Jennifer Crusie, Agnes and the Hitman, is due in August (Reviews, June 4)—Doherty is a bestseller in his own right with his Area 51 books, among others. This terrific follow-up to Bodyguard of Lies continues to track the Cellar, a government organization whose task is to police rogue agents in the CIA, FBI and other U.S. bureaus. Maj. Jack Gant is called in from his South Carolina island home to oversee an investigation involving the abduction of Emily Cranston, daughter of Fort Bragg Special Warfare Center commander Col. Samuel Cranston. The motive for the abduction is revenge, and the perpetrators have been highly trained in how to carry it out—by the U.S. government. As related crimes pile up, Doherty delivers top-notch action and adventure, creating a full cast of lethal operatives armed with all the latest weaponry. Excellent writing and well-drawn, appealing characters help make this another taut, crackling read from Doherty. (Aug.)

Tanenbaum’s run-of-the-mill 19th thriller to feature Manhattan district attorney Butch Karp and his wife, Marlene Ciampi, picks up where 2006’s Counterplay left off. Karp is recovering at Beth Israel Hospital, after being shot by his rival and fellow prosecutor, Rachel Rachman, who was in turn gunned down by Ciampi. Various members of the Karp family have helped thwart terrorist outrages aimed at the pope. The mastermind behind the plot against the pope, mayoral candidate and murderer Andrew Kane, is believed dead, but Karp suspects that someone at a high level in U.S. security circles fed Kane key information and remains poised to do the country further harm. Once again, Karp’s plucky daughter, Lucy, becomes involved in a plot so improbable that the author has Ciampi comparing it with the far-fetched conspiracies of The Da Vinci Code. Series fans will be pleased, but those seeking sophisticated political suspense set in a post-9/11 New York City should look elsewhere. (Aug.)

This uneven first novel, a meditation on stress and suicide among young Korean-American women, has some wonderfully telling details: where another heroine might ice her lover’s wounds with a bag of frozen peas (standard issue from the props department), Cora Moon uses frozen edamame. Fleeing grad school and a bad breakup for New York’s Koreatown, Cora, 26, arrives at her borrowed apartment to find a crowd gathered: a young woman on the roof is getting ready to jump, and the doorman says she’s the third in 15 years. From there, dual narratives look back over the suicide of Cora’s high school friend and forward through Cora’s reckoning with her own desire to jump. A little dark humor helps: buying 50 cards to write suicide notes in bulk, Cora throws in an extra: “Poor Sophie would have to deliver these... she decided she’d get her sister a gift certificate at a bookstore to show her gratitude.” Rough structural edges and sometimes awkward language make this a promising but flawed debut. (Aug.)

Two gifted sisters draw on their talents to belatedly forge a bond and find their ways in life in Allen’s easygoing debut novel. Thirty-four-year-old Claire Waverley manifests her talent in cooking; using edible flowers, Claire creates dishes that “affect the eater in curious ways.” But not all Waverley women embrace their gifts; some, including Claire’s mother, escape the family’s eccentric reputation by running away. She abandoned Claire and her sister when they were young. Consequently, Claire has remained close to home, unwilling to open up to new people or experiences. Claire’s younger sister, Sydney, however, followed in their mother’s footsteps 10 years ago and left for New York, and after a string of abusive, roustabout boyfriends, returns to Bascom, N.C., with her five-year-old daughter, Bay. As Sydney reacquaints herself with old friends and rivals, she discovers her own Waverley magic. Claire, in turn, begins to open up to her sister and in the process learns how to welcome other possibilities. Though Allen’s prose can lean toward the pedestrian and the romance subplots feel perfunctory, the blending of horticultural folklore, the supernatural and a big dollop of Southern flavor should find favor with a wide swath of readers. (Aug.)

Anne Mahroum, the protagonist of Goodman’s latest (after You Made Me Love You), has a luxurious home in northern Toronto, an art business and a good husband in Elie, a Lebanese man with a penchant for numismatics. Her six-month-old son, Evan, was born with “severe bilateral club feet.” Anne loves her Evan, but yearns for him to be normal and decides on corrective surgery. As Anne copes with complicated feelings about her child, she wonders why her mother, Jean, uprooted them from Harmony, B.C., when she was five years old, severing ties with the rest of the family. Anne vows to locate her father and introduce him to Evan after the operation, when she can present her perfect son and their normal life. Goodman’s solid writing is permeated with commentary on the societal pressures to have it all, yet the book remains mired in Anne’s thoughts as the reader waits for some form of transformation to happen. (Aug.)

Jenkins’s unsystematic debut follows Natalie Kelley, a 30-something African-American, who has been married three years to steady provider Anderson: the couple have beautiful twins and a nice home in an Ohio suburb. Natalie, admittedly preoccupied with the children, suspects her attractive, sports-loving husband is cheating on her, and confronts her fears. Her abrasive best friend from high school, Leslie Ann West, in contrast, made her hard-going way on her own as an exotic dancer before becoming successful as a marketing director, though she’s resentful she’s unmarried and dying to find a suitable sire for her future baby. Scenes of Leslie’s disastrous dates with various men and snapshots of Natalie’s extended family provide cornball levity and further drama respectively in Jenkins’s disjointed narrative, which flashes back repeatedly from the weekend of Natalie and Anderson’s reckoning. (Aug.)

This horse-centered romance by inspirational novelist Snelling (A Promise for Ellie) is tedious and not the author’s best work. As it opens, Maggie Roberts is serving time in prison for an unnamed crime; although the details aren’t spelled out until the end of the novel, most readers will put the pieces together long before. Maggie is enrolled in a new, experimental program that offers prisoners the chance to work with retired racehorses. Before she knows it, Maggie has helped rehabilitate a horse (not so subtly named Breaking Free), and she might be fast-tracked for parole, if only she can secure a job on the outside. Enter Gil Winters. Abandoned by his ex-wife, he’s heroically raising a precocious son, Eddie, who, despite suffering from spina bifida, has learned to ride. Gil would buy Eddie his own horse, but he’d need to hire a caretaker for the animal as well. Throw in that Maggie’s divorced and Gil is lonely, and the plot isn’t hard to predict. Still, the characters have a bit of depth, and the tale of faith, forgiveness and starting over may find a readership with Snelling’s many diehard fans. (Aug.)

Whitson wraps her latest inspirational novel around a troubled marriage and a “wish list” of adventures, with mixed results. Jacob “Jake” Nolan is a happy, adventuresome 20-year-old who has a list of 10 things he wants to do before he settles down (echoing Lisa Samson’s The Living End). When he’s killed in an accident, his wealthy parents, Pamela and Michael, are left with only their dying marriage, Pamela’s friends and Jacob’s unfinished list. The details of the grieving process in the narrative add authenticity, but that strength is also a weakness when the novel begins to sound a little too much like grief therapy. A Hawaiian vacation doesn’t quite fit, especially when a prayer to Jesus results in cancellations so two of the characters can swim with the dolphins. Christian fiction authors have a frustrating penchant for including their previous books as part of the story line (here, Whitson’s nonfiction title, How to Help a Grieving Friend, is used as a workshop). However, themes of forgiveness, redemption and the power of friendship are nicely woven into the story. Whitson’s Christian characters believe that everything that happens—good or evil—is part of God’s plan, and the plot takes this theology to its ultimate conclusion. (Aug.)

Likable Rachel Chavez, a recovering alcoholic who lives above the parking garage she owns in downtown L.A., displays curiosity, grit and stamina in Rudolph’s less than successful sequel to Thicker Than Blood (2005). After Rachel discovers two young Mexican children locked in a van in her garage, the action jerks from one episode to another, connected only by fragile threads. Rachel rushes the children to nearby Jefferson Hospital, where she’s told that one is dead but the other, severely dehydrated, will be admitted. When Rachel returns the next day, the hospital has no record of either child’s existence. Massive old Jefferson turns out to have almost as many secrets as it does corridors, and Rachel’s attempts to find the surviving child stir up a hornet’s nest. Rachel’s allies—blunt, caring Goldie, who runs a nighttime cleaning crew, and homeless fortuneteller Irene—are solidly drawn characters always ready with advice and more substantive assistance, but Rudolph’s unconvincing plot doesn’t give any of them room to shine. (Sept.)

Bond’s charming new Carlotta Wren mystery (after 2006’s Body Movers) has all the ingredients for a chic sleuth-a-thon, from identity theft and designer clothes to dead bodies and poker. Rich girl–turned–Neiman’s shop girl Carlotta was left at 18 to raise her 10-year-old brother, Wesley, after their parents, Randolph and Valerie, skipped town to avoid investment fraud charges. Ten years later, snarky Atlanta DA Kelvin Lucas has reopened the case. Grouchy love interest Det. Jack Terry wants information that Carlotta’s afraid to divulge. Randolph makes a mysterious call to Carlotta and also gets in touch with Peter Ashford, her attentive ex-fiancé. Wesley, an oddly likable slacker and compulsive gambler, believes in their dad’s innocence, but Carlotta’s not so sure. When a woman with Carlotta’s car and I.D. apparently kills herself, Lucas requests a fake funeral to lure her parents back. Bond keeps the pace frantic, the plot tight and the laughs light, and supplies a cliffhanger ending that’s a bargain at twice the price. (Aug.)

Akashic’s latest city-themed crime anthology successfully captures the immense diversity of the Bronx, from the mean streets of the South Bronx to affluent Riverdale, in 19 tales by authors both well known and obscure. The most imaginative entry, Joseph Wallace’s “The Big Five,” about a hunter who targets his prey in the Bronx Zoo as part of a national contest, concludes with a satisfying noir twist. Lawrence Block’s Riverdale story, “Rude Awakening,” also surprises the reader with its clever resolution of a one-night stand. Particularly inventive is Kevin Baker’s grim “The Cheers Like Waves,” set in the shadow of Yankee Stadium. Rozan, herself a contributor, has put together one of the series’ better entries, with memorable tales of betrayal and despair that reflect the borough’s varied ethnic populations and geography. (Aug.)

The entertaining 26th Father Dowling mystery (after 2006’s The Prudence of the Flesh) finds the lovable gang at St. Hilary’s poking into a decade-old crime. When Wallace Flanagan disappeared after receiving a large gift of money from his father, everyone thought he’d left his wife, Melissa, and run off with another woman. Some years later, his body is found, mangled by a cement mixer belonging to the Flanagan family business. Now people from Wally’s past are asking questions. His erstwhile lover and his father both want to know what Wally was up to between his disappearance and his death. Melissa suddenly asks Father Dowling to say a mass for his soul. Matters get even more complex when Greg Packer, a shady associate of Wally’s who had been flirting with Melissa, is killed. McInerny keeps the story moving with several twists and turns, producing another solid parish mystery for Father Dowling to solve in his usual quiet and compassionate way. (Aug.)

After disappointing efforts like Sherlock Holmes and the Crosby Murder (2002), veteran pasticher Roberts approaches the high level of such earlier novels as Sherlock Holmes and the Man from Hell (1997) in this atmospheric tale. When Holmes masterfully deciphers a series of coded messages concerning a plot in the newspaper, the master detective and his Boswell stake out a clandestine rendezvous in Regent’s Park, only to find that one of the plotters has been stabbed to death. The clues eventually lead the pair to Scotland, where the quest for a legendary cache of gold coins garners the attention of U.S. intelligence agents who suspect a link between the London murder and the recent assassination of President William McKinley. While an unsurprising conclusion and some anachronisms mar the story, Roberts remains one of today’s finer emulators of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle in his ability to combine a tight plot with an authentic Watsonian voice. (Aug.)

Lambert’s powerful third Whitney Logan novel (after 1996’s Soultown and 1991’s Dogtown) concludes the story of the troubled Los Angeles attorney. Having scrambled for years to get her career off the ground, Logan, thwarted by drink and depression, becomes the court-appointed lawyer for Tony Red Wolf, recently arrested on misdemeanor charges. Logan finds him surly and attractive, and soon has him out on bail. That evening he calls her to a meeting place where he shows her the butchered body of one of his female friends, claiming to have nothing to do with the murder. Unsure whether to believe him, Logan delves into the little-examined subculture of Native Americans living in Los Angeles while slipping ever further into her own dark world of personal demons. With its memorable characters, sharp dialogue and ever-increasing mood of uncertainty, fear and menace, the narrative builds to a startling and fantastical conclusion. Lambert was the pseudonym of Douglas Anne Munson (1948–2003), whose tragic story her literary executor describes in an afterword. Michael Connelly provides an appreciative introduction. (Aug.)

With a simple but effective plot and understated prose, this outstanding “redneck noir” successfully gives the windswept Texas plains the feel of mean city streets. Young, callow Toby McCoy appears at an isolated farmhouse, apparently just seeking work. Soon he’s plowing the fields, feeding the hogs and making eyes at Grace Halligan, the lovely older woman who owns the place. Just as the two move beyond a professional relationship, strange gunmen appear at the farm, forcing the lovers to reveal the extent of their mutual deceptions as they hit the road—with two dogs in the back of their pickup truck—in search of a double-crossing bank robber and the money he owes Grace. In the spirit of the genre, Reasoner (Texas Wind) saves the final chilling revelations for the very end, captivating the reader with other twists and turns along the way. (Aug.)

The notoriously wild Truluck (Street Level) out-wilds himself with Joe Ready, a 98-year-old cop turned PI turned vigilante, and Ready’s younger partner, Jimmy Cotton. Ready and Cotton met when Ready was already old and supposedly retired, and Cotton was a young man scarred and scared by the 1970 shootings at Kent State. The two formed a relationship around Cotton’s desire to soak up Ready’s tall tales, liquor and dope. Years later, the tables are turned and Cotton must recount Ready’s exploits to entertain the dying old man, even though he’s pretty sure Ready was never actually mixed up with Machine Gun Kelly, Meyer Lansky, tough guys in Cuba, kidnappings and Ready’s perennial nemesis, Pearlie Friedman. Turns out the tales are true, Ready’s not really retired and Cotton’s being seduced—or drafted—into Ready’s world. Truluck’s pulpy prose is spot on, and his vision and voice remain among the most original in a genre too often reduced to formula. (Aug.)

Nebula-winner Finch’s many fans as well as SF readers who have yet to encounter her work will welcome this collection of 10 short stories and a novella that showcase her unique contribution to the genre. Making excellent use of her graduate work in linguistics, Finch creates the Guild of Xenolinguists (later called lingsters), a formal organization devoted to translating the languages of other worlds. Much as Asimov did with the Three Laws of Robotics, Finch creatively examines the conflicts stemming from adherence to the guild’s strict rules. The stories span a wide range, from “First Was the Word,” a brief tale setting the stage for the development of the guild, to the moving “A World Waiting” and “A Flight of Words,” which present their protagonists with morally difficult situations—tortured prisoners, conflicting religious beliefs, abortion—that hold significant contemporary resonance. A thoughtful foreword by New Wave luminary Ian Watson and an engaging afterword by Finch (Birds) discuss the linguistic theories that underlie the fiction. (Sept.)

Sterling (Visionary in Residence: Stories), the godfather of cyberpunk, demonstrates his full range, from far future to forgotten past, in this well-stocked career-spanning collection of his finest SF pieces. His blend of uncompromising realism and irrepressible optimism shows up wherever his protagonists do, whether working for a stranded alien in Crusader-era Palestine (“The Blemmye’s Stratagem”), investigating a mock space journey inside the cavern left from a Chinese H-bomb test (“Taklamakan”) or just hanging around (literally) in 2037 Chattanooga, fixing bikes and foiling a black ops agent out to protect her senile senator boss (“Bicycle Repairman”). Sterling is both Cassandra and Scheherazade, always forced to spill the ugly truths about what’s to come in spite of our unconcern, but always willing to see if the doom can be held off for another night by one more good story. Readers who like a hard-eyed view of the future combined with a wry wink at the past, with a few inventive postmodern narrative kicks mixed in, will be greatly rewarded. (Aug.)

Hugo-winner Bova’s fourth Asteroid Wars novel (after 2004’s The Silent War) is a bewildering attempt to exploit loose ends. When crazed assassin Dorik Harbin disables the spaceship Syracuse, an ore-carrier run by Victor Zacharias, Victor is forced to jettison an escape pod containing his wife and children. Unfortunately, the Zacharias family’s desperate efforts to survive are lost among a host of other stories. While son Theo and daughter Angela battle incredible odds to make their way back to inhabited space, Victor steals another spaceship, Pleiades, and goes looking for his family and Syracuse. Various other characters, including Harbin, who becomes a repentant priest named Dorn, go on quests in other spaceships. Chapters are named for the spacecraft in which they take place, which helps orient readers, but Bova doesn’t focus enough on the technical features of these ships or the natures of those in them to bring either to life. The action remains equally muddled. (Aug.)

This stirring prequel to The Forest House, Paxson’s first collaboration with Marion Zimmer Bradley (1930–1999), is sure to please fans of the late author of The Mists of Avalon. In The Forest House, they introduced the Society of the Ravens, sons of the Druid priestesses who were raped and tortured by Britain’s Roman invaders. Now Paxson explores the events circa A.D. 60 that inspired the mythical group’s formation. Strong women surge to the forefront, most notably Druid priestess Lhiannon and her headstrong student and friend, Boudica, a Celtic princess who forgoes becoming a priestess to marry Prasutagos, High King of the Iceni. The uneasy peace with Rome shatters after Prasutagos dies, and Roman soldiers, refusing to recognize Boudica as queen, beat her and rape her daughters. Vowing vengeance, Boudica raises an army infused with the battle goddess’s magical power and strikes back at the Romans. Paxson’s bright fusion of fact and myth is a fine tribute to Bradley and the real-world triumphs and tragedy of Boudica. (Aug.)

Sanderson’s entertaining second Mistborn novel begins after most fantasy series end, when the team of brave and cunning heroes find that holding on to power is even harder than overthrowing the previous tyrant. Elend Venture, the scholarly new Lord Ruler of Luthadel, clings to power while Luthadel’s aristocrats and merchants grumble and two enemy armies—one led by Elend’s father, Lord Straff—camp outside the city gates. Fortunately, Elend can rely on help from his lover and unofficial court assassin, the young allomancer Vin, but her magical metal-using ability makes her a target. An orphan of decidedly low origins, Vin is also having trouble adapting to her position as royal consort, especially since the underclass skaa, newly freed by Elend, look to her as their protector. Meanwhile, the ancient evil known as the Deepness is rising once again. This entertaining read will especially please those who always wanted to know what happened after the good guys won. (Aug.)

Like its roguish protagonists, Lynch’s colorful sequel to 2006’s The Lies of Locke Lamora is charming, unpredictable and fast on its feet and stands surprisingly well on its own given its convoluted plot. Initially poised to rob the Sinspire, the notoriously thief-proof casino where the penalty for cheating is death, Locke and his partner, Jean, are unwillingly sidetracked into joining and then leading a pirate crew, swindling their way across the sea as they had previously done on land. The cinematic influences on Lynch’s fantasy setting are evident, the borrowing is mostly ingenious and the prose frequently enthralls, but tone and pacing suffer from odd inconsistencies. A handful of dark moments clash uncomfortably with the overall devil-may-care atmosphere. Most frustrating of all is the handling of key secondary character Ezri Delmastro, who shines too briefly as an energetic romantic interest for Jean. The ending promises at least one more installment, but fans may be unhappy if the saga strays too far from its amiable roots. (Aug.)

Combining classic heroic fantasy with a metaphysical twist, Malan (The Mirror Prince) introduces the Mercenary Brotherhood and two of its most fascinating members: Dhulyn Wolfshead, a psychically gifted former slave, and Parno Lionsmane, a rugged exiled nobleman. Their assignment seems simple: deliver Mar-eMar, a young orphan, to her distant relatives of the demi-royal Tenebro House in Imrion’s capital, Gotterang. The trip quickly turns complicated and dangerous as they encounter the deadly persecution of the Marked, supernaturally talented people whom the fanatical New Believers think are trying to wake the Sleeping God and destroy the world. Parno must confront his noble past and Dhulyn fight the limitations of her visions as they battle the elusive, terrifying Green Shadow, who’s manipulating the New Believers for his own ends. Malan’s sometimes wordy, philosophical musings weigh down the action, but she makes up for it with abundant swordplay and the protagonists’ strong, entertaining partnership. (Aug.)

Roberson adds a pulpy twist to Napoleonic-era naval adventure as the crew of a damaged English frigate finds both paradise and hell on a pair of uncharted Pacific islands. First Lt. Hieronymus Bonaventure, last seen in Paragaea (2006), serves gamely aboard the HMS Fortitude, but longs for something more exciting than harrying galleons across the South Pacific for an aging captain dreaming of padding his retirement stash. When the Fortitude is badly damaged and blown into “mare incognita,” the “unknown sea,” the crew manages to reach a tropical island where the natives are friendly and the ship can be repaired. An attack by bat-winged creatures foreshadows the danger awaiting on the forbidden island of “first volcano,” where Bonaventure leads his men when his native lover, Pelani, is kidnapped. Roberson delivers a fairly standard but well-crafted adventure story for most of the book before delving into the supernatural. The novel is a good bet for adventure fans who want more than your average Horatio Hornblower clone. (Aug.)

Carlyle’s second Neville family novel (after Never Lie to a Lady) revisits the wounded hero story line and adds a touch of mystery. Through a twist of fate, Gareth Lloyd, part owner of Neville Shipping, discovers that the title of duke of Warneham has now fallen to him. It’s a bitter inheritance for Gareth, who as a child was sentenced by the old duke to a hardscrabble life aboard ship. Reluctantly, Gareth visits his new country estate, Selsdon Court, only to discover the duke’s beautiful widow, Antonia, still in residence. Passion flares between the emotionally damaged pair as Antonia reveals her grief over the death of a young daughter, and Gareth faces anti-Jewish sentiment among the upper class (an atypical touch that works well). The author’s natural, concise writing style, attention to historical detail and fully formed characters make her world spring to life, and her plot never flags; Carlyle even finds room for a dose of mystery, as Gareth’s friend, Kemble, investigates the poisoning death of the previous duke. As usual, Carlyle doesn’t disappoint. (Aug.)

Wiggs returns to the town of Avalon, N.Y., and the shores of picturesque Willow Lake with the fourth installment of her popular Lakeshore Chronicles (after The Winter Lodge). Nina Romano, single mom and ex-mayor of Avalon, is just a bank loan away from realizing her lifelong dream: restoring the Inn at Willow Lake, a historic lodge once owned by the wealthy Bellamy family, and turning it into an elegant retreat. Then she finds that Greg Bellamy has beat her to the punch. Greg and Nina have been sparring since the night Greg decked the West Point cadet who had gotten her pregnant at age 15. Now, nearly 20 years later, Greg is the divorced dad of his own pregnant teen. Predictably, Greg is clueless when it comes to running a hotel, and the only person in town qualified to act as general manager—Nina—refuses to take the position. Wiggs’s uncomplicated stories are rich with life lessons, nod-along moments and characters with whom readers can easily relate. Delightful and wise, Wiggs’s latest shines. (Aug.)

This tiresome sci-fi thriller debut, set in postapocalyptic California, has an ingenious kickoff that unfortunately goes nowhere fast. Following the accidental release of a deadly nanotechnology (designed to fight cancer), much of the world’s population is dead; in the California Sierras, above the plague’s high-water mark (10,000 feet), Cameron Najarro, Albert Sawyers and their small group of survivors eke out a desperate living, turning to cannibalism for survival. Meanwhile, in the International Space Station Dr. Ruth Ann Goldman and her team are making progress on a vaccine. Things go bad quickly when Goldman and her team return to Earth to test a hypothesis: first, they crash land in the middle of a civil war, then they find that the military has its own plans for the vaccine. When the astronauts and mountain survivors finally meet up, Goldman is surprised to find valuable allies in Sawyers and Najarro, and the three set off with a few others to find a lost lab that may hold the key to stopping the nano menace. The timely idea may hold readers’ interest, but only so far as their patience allows; though well-written, the heroes’ lengthy journeys slow the story to a pace almost as tormenting as organ-liquefying micro-machines. (Aug.)

Back in America following a disastrous mission in Afghanistan, lone survivor Cmdr. Joe Montgomery lives in a whiskey-induced haze, consumed with guilt over the death of his men. His neighbor, navy physical therapist Penny Price, helps him heal both mentally and physically, but she has demons of her own—namely Eric Tomlinson, former business partner of her murdered father. She’s been receiving threatening phone calls she believes are tied to Tomlinson, and soon the unknown assailant makes Penny and her sister, Lia, his targets. Joe, looking for redemption, throws himself headfirst into the mystery, discovering love with Penny along the way. The latest in Melton’s Navy SEALS series (after Time to Run) features a romance that sizzles, and a subplot involving Lia’s own special SEAL works well. Unfortunately, Melton’s mystery doesn’t maintain the kind of suspense that keeps readers hunting for clues. (Aug.)

This manga adaptation of Cabot’s 2005 novel tells the story of a perfectly ordinary high school girl—who happens to be dating the reincarnation of King Arthur. Ellie Harrison moves to a new town and a new school, and soon finds herself drawn to Will Wagner, the football star. Her history professor Mr. Morton—or is that Merlin?—believes that Will is the reincarnation of England’s legendary king and Ellie is the newborn Lady of the Lake. He enlists her help to persuade Will to accept his duty and conquer evil. The rest of the Arthurian cast is here as well—Lance, Will’s best friend; Jennifer, Will’s ex-girlfriend; Morgan, the high school’s queen bee and Marco, Will’s half-brother—and they play out the classic story with a high school twist. The vivid manga style brings the novel to life, with all the characters svelte and beautifully drawn. Unfortunately, a third of the volume is spent recapping the story so far, making this feel like a later book in a series, rather than the first. The story turns are predictable to anyone familiar with Arthurian myth, and the characters one-dimensional, but this adaptation should appeal to fans of the original work. (July)

In Hornschemeier’s third major work, the clearly inked panels of a framing story show the main character, a comics artist named Paul, on a walk with his father. The touchingly honest conversation between father and son is intercut with stories that include childhood memories and Zeno’s presentation of his three paradoxes to a group of Athenian philosophers. The book’s funniest moment comes when Socrates, upon hearing the paradoxes, interrupts to say, “Man, no offense, but are you guys retarded?” and then goes on to berate Zeno for his insistence on the impossibility of change. A young luminary of experimental comics, Hornschemeier offers a brilliant narrative demonstration of the paradoxes in this graphic personal essay, in which the protagonist simultaneously connects with his past, mulls over his present and anticipates the future. The book is formally brilliant as well, with a dust jacket that peels back to reveal preparatory sketches on the hard cover of the book and stories that are each told in a different, fully realized style. Childhood memories are shown in newsprint comic color-dot style while Zeno’s story is presented as pages torn from old comics, their frayed edges laid out on the white pages of the book. (July)

Lapham’s new graphic novel doesn’t stray far from his best known work, the noir comic Stray Bullets. Daniel is a killer, a man who believes that silverfish live in his brain and tell him to commit murder. All of his scenes are spectacular examples of creating an uneasy mood. Lapham art is easy to read, but he can also pull off a style for depicting something metaphorical, such as a stream of nasty-looking fish heading toward a man’s brain. But Daniel is not the center of the story so much as a presence that hovers over the action like a storm cloud. The book spends most of its time on teenager Mia, who thinks something is strange about her stepmom Suzanne. Along with her friends, Mia finds some unsettling clues about Suzanne’s past. Story stereotypes like the distrustful stepmother and the clueless dad are too clichéd for someone like Lapham to take at face value. The book sticks close to genre conventions, enjoyable but familiar, with Lapham’s highly expressive noir art kicking it up a notch. (June)

The most striking thing about Lonergan’s black and white comic is the deliberately inexpressive, realistic but minimal art. Many wordless panels look like amateur snapshots: they record the presence of objects or people without indicating what’s going on or how an observer should feel. Even in closeups of the characters speaking, faces seldom show what’s going on inside. This style is quite appropriate for the story of a casual relationship that can’t develop into anything more. Kyle is an alienated young man, living in a borrowed apartment and starting a boring job. Erika is a rootless young woman who works in a nearby restaurant. They meet, like each other, have sex, spend time together and have minor spats, then part. Short, diarylike chapters give only glimpses of the two during their affair, but hint that a future is possible. Both feel that their lives are meaningless, so they might be ready to find meaning in caring for another person. But Kyle in particular is uneasy about becoming emotionally vulnerable by getting too close to someone else. The story’s conclusion is sad but muted, suggesting that the breakup was inevitable with people like this, resulting in a book that thoroughly succeeds in being mildly depressing. (June)

In Shiomi’s third title to come to the U.S., title character Yurara Tsukinowa is a high school student with the unique talent for seeing ghosts and for feeling their pain. Preceded by her “weird” reputation (her gift often has her bursting into tears or staring off into space), she’s shunned by her classmates—all except for the handsome and playful Mei Tendo and his best friend/arch rival, the cool, attractive Yako Hoshino. As it turns out, the two hottest guys in school share not only the same class as Yurara but also the same ghost-seeing ability. Together, the threesome form a “yin” and “yang” type of ghost busting. With Mei and Yako, Yurara discovers her inner self—a self-confident and compassionate girl who can release spirits from their suffering. As in many shojo narratives, the outer Yurara struggles with her insecurities and appears meek and helpless. Shiomi develops her characters in an entertaining and intricate manner and presents the story with clean, detailed art. For readers who like their shojo with an edge, Yurara is Land of the Blindfolded with teeth. (June)