Fiction Reviews

The third novel from the author of Chang and Eng and The Real McCoy is an often satiric page-turner that tracks a Long Island family crisis. Josh Goldin is a happily married TV airtime salesman with an eight-month-old son. When baby Zack is treated twice for mysterious and life-threatening symptoms, the head of a pediatric ICU, Dr. Darlene Stokes, tells Child Protective Services that she thinks Josh’s wife, Dori, suffers from Munchausen syndrome, whereby the afflicted injure their children deliberately to draw attention to themselves. The Goldins’ ensuing battle to keep Zack provides grist for public debate about issues ranging from parents’ rights to race (Dr. Stokes is black, the Goldins Jewish). Strauss takes delight in skewering a world in which everything (news coverage, legal representation, hospital beds) is for sale, sometimes digressively, always amusingly. The stereotypes are intentionally heavy-handed: Josh’s perceptions almost always register through race and class-related fear and disgust. But the heart of the story—the unraveling of Josh’s life and the steady erosion of his faith that ignorance can be a virtue and happiness a choice—is riveting. (June)

A finely detailed literary mystery set in contemporary Saudi Arabia, Ferraris’s debut centers on Nouf ash-Shrawi, a 16-year-old girl who disappeared into the desert three days before her marriage and has been found dead, several weeks pregnant. Palestinian Nayir al-Sharqi who lives in Jeddah and works occasionally for the rich Shrawi family, is asked by them to investigate Nouf’s death discreetly. Nayir, a conservative Muslim and an outsider because of his nationality, his class and his large stature, is wary of traversing the wide gulf between Saudi men’s and women’s worlds, and is encouraged by his friend Othman, an adopted son of the Shrawis, to seek out the help of Katya Hijazi, Othman’s fiancée. Katya has a Ph.D. and is employed in the women’s section of the state medical examiner’s office. As Nayir and Katya’s investigation progresses, it becomes clear that at least one of the Shrawis has something to hide. Ferraris, who has lived in Saudi Arabia, gets deep inside Nayir’s and Katya’s very different perspectives, giving a fascinating glimpse into the workings and assumptions of Saudi society. As a mystery, it’s fairly well-turned, but it’s the characters and setting that sparkle. (June)

On Christmas Eve 1967, Rosemarie McDonald walks out the door of her suburban Melbourne home, leaving her husband behind to raise their four children: Deborah, the eldest at almost 13 and default mother; Robert, the compulsive worrier; James the peacemaker even at eight; and Meredith, the perpetual baby. Decades later, the children have forged their own families, but remain trapped in their original roles and are still somehow waiting for word from Rosemarie. When James rediscovers her on a trip to London, they are all faced with confronting their betrayer, and themselves, and possible forgiveness. Published under the title Listen in Veitch’s native Australia, the novel’s omniscient narration eavesdrops on the inner lives of each family member and their different ways of coping with abandonment—not all of them healthy. What emerges is a heartfelt yet unsentimental portrait of a family undone by a mother’s desire, and its struggle to find ways to keep going and keep together. (June)

The absorbing latest from Livesey (Homework) opens multiple perspectives on the life of Dara MacLeod, a young London therapist, partly by paying subtle homage to literary figures and works. The first of four sections follows Keats scholar Sean Wyman: his girlfriend, Abigail, is Dara’s best friend, and the couple lives upstairs from Dara in the titular London house. While Dara tries to coax her boyfriend Edward to move out of the house he shares with his ex-girlfriend and daughter, Sean receives a mysterious letter implying that Abigail is having an affair, and both relationships start to fall apart. The second section, set during Dara’s childhood, is narrated by Dara’s father, who has a strange fascination with Charles Dodgson (aka Lewis Carroll) and shares Dodgson’s creepy interest in young girls. Dara’s meeting with Edward dominates part three, which mirrors the plot of Jane Eyre, and the final part, reminiscent of Great Expectations, is told mainly from Abigail’s college-era point of view. The pieces cross-reference and fit together seamlessly, with Dara’s fate being revealed by the end of part one and explained in the denouement. Livesey’s use of the classics enriches the narrative, giving Dara a larger-than-life resonance. (May)

Three generations of the Paint family struggle through 70 years of hardship and heartache on the Western plains in Todd’s ambitious fiction debut. En route from Mississippi to the Dakota Territory at the height of the Civil War, Ebenezar Paint meets and marries twice-widowed Cora, a union that produces two strapping twin boys, Eli and Ezra. Ebenezer vainly chases riches; by 15, the boys are orphans and cowboys—and involved in a risky but profitable bit of horse stealing. Ezra remains a wanderer, while Eli settles down to become a wealthy rancher. The narrative eventually follows Eli’s favorite daughter of his six children: Velma, who is brutalized by two of her three husbands, but whose estrangement from Eli causes her the most pain, and takes the story into the Depression era. Vivid and colorful in its depiction of the West’s transformation from the frontier to the modern age, this is a hardscrabble tale of proud folks who refuse to forgive mistakes or forget faults. Todd’s previous book was Desertion, a memoir of his 1969 desertion from the U.S. Army and his resettlement in Canada. He gives this epic story, which an afterword notes is based on the lives of relatives, pulpy sweep and palpable anguish. (May)

A young woman finds love and sudden maturity in this charmingly melodramatic romance from the author of The Gypsy Madonna. Tragedy strikes an upper-class English family at its Cornish manor house in 1958: Robert “Monty” Montague has vanished, leaving behind a pile of debts, a pair of shoes washed up on the beach, a drifting motorboat bearing his gold pocket watch and a note in a bottle that reads, “Forgive me.” His spoiled daughter, the impossibly beautiful 21-year-old Celestria, is forced out of her shallow complacency to discover why her father, whom everyone loved and assumed to be so happy, apparently drowned himself. She follows a trail of bank statements to a seaside Italian convent converted into a family-run hotel. There, she encounters Hamish McCloud, a surly Scotsman who loathed Monty and, after a rocky start, develops a very different feeling toward Celestria. The prose is florid and fitting for the ridiculously, deliciously escapist whirlwind romance that envelopes Celestria and Hamish as the over-the-top revelations about Monty come to light. (May)

The hereafter is happier than ever in Halpern’s debut novel. After Alex Dorenfield and her dog, Peaches, get smashed by a car, they wind up in heaven, where bubbly 29-year-old Alex is floored by how hip the digs are—especially Seventh Heaven, where Alex’s dreams (of, for instance, designer clothes, an awesome house and eating without gaining weight) come true. The icing on the cake is her reunion with a few deceased family members and meeting a dreamy prospective soul mate. Only problem? She must pass an entrance exam to stay in Seventh Heaven and not be demoted to the fourth level, where she would have to live in a condo, wear last year’s clothes and lose Peaches (all dogs stay in Seventh Heaven). So Alex gets to work on an essay to prove she led a worthwhile and fulfilling life. This simple little story is syrupy sweet throughout; readers into the heavenly have another bonbon to savor. (May)

Iggulden, coauthor of the megaseller The Dangerous Book for Boys, continues his masterful series on Genghis Khan (following Genghis: Birth of an Empire) with another vividly imagined chapter. In the debut volume, the Great Khan rises from the barren plains of central Asia to unify the scattered Mongol tribes into a nation. Here, Genghis turns to the conquest of the “bloated, wealthy” cities of the Chin, or Chinese, Kingdom. Aided by his brothers Kachiun and Khasar, Genghis strikes first against the Xi Xia Kingdom south of the Gobi Desert—a route into China that circumvents the Great Wall. The Mongols’ insatiable quest to conquer drives the narrative, but Iggulden deftly weaves several intriguing character-driven subplots into the saga, including tales of sibling rivalry between Genghis’s two eldest sons and the cupidity of a powerful and enigmatic shaman. Borrowing from history and legend, Iggulden reimagines the iconic conqueror on a more human scale—larger-than-life surely, but accessible and even sympathetic. Iggulden’s Genghis series is shaping up as a triumph of historical fiction. (Apr.)

Chronicling a journey of violence, oppression and fleeting liberation, this brutal third novel from the author of The Electric Michelangelo is a timely feminist commentary on war, gender, politics and identity. Set in a dystopian near-future northern U.K. where global warming, a fuel crisis, drug epidemics and a cruel totalitarian regime known as the Authority have savaged the land and people, the story is told by Sister, a young woman living in cramped terrace quarters. Sterilized against her will (the result of the Authority’s female sterilization policy) and forced to work in a “New Fuel” factory, Sister escapes to seek out Carhullan, a shadowy all-female commune run by the enigmatic Jackie Nixon. Carhullan is a hard-knocks utopia, in which women’s strengths and passions grow from manual labor, paramilitary training and intense, sometimes sexual, friendships. As the threat of the Authority grows, Sister rises in the ranks of the Carhullan resistance force, oblivious to the increasing similarities between the Authority and Jackie’s seductive, psychological control. Though the climax and denouement are sloppily handled, the overall effect is haunting, timely and well wrought. (Apr.)

Holland continues her Viking saga (following The Soul Thief and The Witches’ Kitchen) with an uneven but entertaining adventure tale. After their war band is defeated in a legendary clash at Hjorunga Bay, cousins Conn and Raef Corbansson, who narrowly escaped the carnage, find themselves in the frozen north of Scandinavia. As “free warriors,” they volunteer for an expedition to seize the port city of Chersonese in “the heart of the Greek Sea.” The journey is long and arduous, Chersonese is a more formidable target than expected, and as Conn and Raef discover, their new allies are treacherous. Holland’s recreation of the expedition is imaginative and creditable, and her characters—especially introspective Raef and impulsive Conn—are sharply drawn and authentic. The action ebbs and flows, the plot is occasionally opaque and the proliferation of obscure names and places can be daunting, but the novelty of Vikings out of their traditional milieu keeps the pages turning. (Apr).

In Alsace-based Sulzer’s first translated novel, set in 1966 Switzerland, self-possessed, middle-aged Erneste is the rock of the Restaurant am Berg, working the lavish Blue Room without missing a shift in 16 years. A letter posted from New York threatens to shatter the orderly cocoon he’s built around himself. Claiming to be “in a bad way from every angle,” Jakob Meier, Erneste’s one great love of 30 years ago, pleads with Erneste to track down Julius Klinger, the intellectual whom Jakob followed to America in 1936. Klinger, Jakob tells Erneste, has returned to Europe, been nominated for a Nobel prize and “lives near” Erneste; Jakob wants Erneste to ask Klinger for money, and to send it. Erneste is immediately torn between his tidy independence and intense longing. Sulzer sure-handedly layers the past on the present, gradually opening windows on both. The pieces fall together like bits of a puzzle, with a full portrait of Erneste and the truth about his relationship with Jakob coming together only at the end, powerfully. (Apr.)

In the less than sprightly latest from Fforde (Restoring Grace), newly minted interior designer Anna, 27, is renovating a run-down cottage in the Cotswold to flip for a profit. At her neighbor’s request, she takes in a homeless greyhound, and it happens that Rob Hunter, the local greyhound “rehoming officer,” is also the inspector who ensures that historical homes are properly restored. Though he initially is a thorn in her inexperienced renovator side, Anna comes to appreciate Rob’s humor, warmth and caring nature. But then Max Gordon, the architecture guest lecturer Anna’s had a crush on for years after a near-miss on getting together when she was in college, appears at her London reunion and seems poised to sweep her off her feet. The cast of country secondaries provides color and interest, and Fforde adroitly registers Anna’s subtler feelings. But the pace is slow, and the renovation details overwhelm the romance. (Apr.)

Delgado adds a few twists to the breakup lit formula in her chronicle of Erika Luna, a research scientist at a Miami pharmaceutical company who develops a pill to blunt “bad love.” Burned by her cheating husband, Erika turns to a rambunctious cadre of family and friends for support. Her out-of-the-closet father, Gilberto, and his partner, Benjamin, offer fatherly advice; her friend Lola recommends self-help books; attorney Consuelo advises “divorce without vengeance”; and Pedro Juan and Darien offer companionship. When Erika’s heartbreak over Martin and some surprises in the wake of her failed marriage threaten to engulf her, Erika puts her Ph.D. in chemistry to use: she identifies the physiological chemicals associated with romantic feelings and creates a pill to regulate them. While standard romance elements are in abundance, there are also some great scenes and funny lines. Fans will have fun easily suspending disbelief throughout. (Apr.)

Aston’s latest foray into Austendom (after Mrs. Darcy’s Daughters) follows the children of Elizabeth Bennet’s friend Mrs. Collins, who married the uninspired vicar Collins, now an uninspired bishop. Their eldest, Charlotte, has grown into rare beauty; Charlotte’s sister, and our heroine, is Eliza—Mrs. Darcy’s goddaughter. Eliza has ill-advisedly acquired a tendresse for Anthony Diggory, the son of the local squire, which is passionately returned. Sent off to London as companion for Charlotte, however, Eliza opens her eyes both to the possibilities of the larger world and her own place there, thence lessening the desirability of a Yorkshire life and of Anthony. Assisting this process is the handsome but proud banker, Bartholomew Bruton, with whom Eliza first becomes annoyed and then enamored. If she can save Charlotte from a cad and fend off Anthony, among other complications, Eliza may just find happiness. More development of Charlotte and one or two fewer complications would have helped, and some ends are simply too tidy. But the results are still utterly charming, with all the verve, humor and Austenian turns of plot one expects from Aston. (Apr.)

Dymmoch, a writer of crime and mystery novels, takes a turn in this mostly successful novel about enduring love and family secrets. Rhiann Fahey’s second husband, Mickey, a cop, was killed in a car crash, and his best cop-friend, Rory Sinter, is determined to look after Rhiann, even if she finds him creepy. Rhiann’s son, Jimmy, born during her first marriage and now a teenager, is curious about his birth father and the extended family he never met. (They cut off Rhiann after Jimmy’s dad went MIA in Vietnam.) John Devlin, their new next-door neighbor, gives Jimmy a job in his garage and offers guidance to Jimmy and support to Rhiann. As the bonds between Rhiann, John and Jimmy grow, so does Rory Sinter’s erratic behavior. Rhiann flashes back frequently to her younger years around the time she got pregnant, setting the stage for a couple of secrets to be revealed toward the novel’s end. Though the secrets aren’t exactly surprising, readers will stick with the story to see how unhinged Rory gets. (Apr.)

In this stunning follow-up to 2007’s Christine Falls, Black (pseudonym of Booker Prize–winner John Banville) spins a complex tale of murder and deception in 1950s Ireland. Pathologist Garret Quirke, surprised by a visit from a college acquaintance, Billy Hunt, is even more surprised when Billy begs Quirke not to perform an autopsy on his wife, Deirdre, whose naked body was recently retrieved from Dublin Bay. Though everything points to suicide, Quirke knows something’s amiss and begins to retrace Deirdre’s steps. Black expertly balances Quirke’s investigation with chapters detailing Deidre’s past, from her marriage to Billy to her shady business deal with Leslie White, an enigmatic Englishman who knew Deidre as Laura Swan, the proprietress of their joint venture, a beauty salon called the Silver Swan. As Quirke digs deeper, he discovers a web of lies and blackmail that threatens to envelop even his own estranged daughter, Phoebe. Laconic, stubborn Quirke makes an appealing hero as the pieces of this unsettling crime come together in a shocking conclusion. Author tour. (Mar.)

War correspondent Fesperman, the winner of the CWA’s John Creasey Memorial Dagger Award, shines the light of his insider’s knowledge into the dark corners of Jordan and Jerusalem in his gripping fifth thriller. After a career as an aid worker in some of the world’s hot spots, 55-year-old Freeman Lockhart has retired with his 37-year-old Bosnian wife, Mila, to the Aegean island of Karos. The first night in their new home they wake to find three intruders, who spirit Freeman away to a nearby location where he’s ordered to fly to Jordan to spy on a former friend and co-worker, Omar al-Baroody. When Freeman declines, his captors tell him that if he doesn’t do what they ask, they’ll tell the world his dark secret involving Mila from their days working in Africa. Freeman heads off to Amman to do their bidding. Meanwhile, in Washington, D.C., a wealthy doctor, Abbas Rahim, plots an act of terrorism that will threaten the lives of the government’s highest power brokers. Freeman may be an amateur spy, but Fesperman (The Prisoner of Guantánamo) proves once again that he’s a consummate professional. Author tour. (Mar.)

At the start of bestseller Fairstein’s nail-biting 10th legal thriller to feature alter ego Alex Cooper (after 2006’s Bad Blood), the Manhattan ADA takes a hit from a cigar at the urging of her longtime police ally, Mike Chapman—to cover the stench of a badly decomposed female body at a crime scene in an abandoned building near the Staten Island ferry. The victim later proves to be the first of a number of women in uniform targeted by the murderer, who may have military ties in his past. The trail leads to a notorious bar catering to underage drinkers, before a chance observation by a civilian shifts the inquiry dramatically. Meanwhile, Cooper is preparing to try Floyd Warren, a rapist whose first trial three decades earlier ended in a hung jury. Fairstein, whose professional résumé includes groundbreaking work in the field of sex crimes prosecution, manages to both entertain and educate, as Cooper struggles with the evidentiary challenges of the Warren rape case and with tracking a vicious serial killer. (Mar.)

At the start of this intelligent spy thriller from the pseudonymous Carr (the author of Flashback and other novels under her real name, Jenny Siler), Kat Caldwell, a gutsy U.S. Army interrogator stationed at Bagram Air Base in Afghanistan, takes charge of Jamal, a 15-year-old Moroccan boy caught in a jihadi sweep by a British Special Forces team. Having fled a degraded existence as an orphan in Morocco, the resourceful Jamal is no terrorist, Kat decides. After Jamal escapes custody, a team of American intelligence agents, working in both an official and unofficial capacity, go in search of him. Because of their earlier relationship, Kat is recruited to help locate the boy. When she realizes that something bad will happen if she finds him, she also goes on the run. Effortlessly shifting point of view and back and forth in time, Carr (An Accidental American) well deserves comparisons with the early John le Carré. (Mar.)

Swedish author Fioretos’s first novel to be translated into English is an eerie, erotic tale set in 1928 Berlin about a part-time movie projectionist turned accused killer. Sascha Knisch’s humdrum life turns scandalous after Dora Wilms, the madam who indulges him in his peculiar sexual tastes, is found dead. Sascha becomes suspect number one, and to try to prove his innocence, he digs into Dora’s mysterious past, uncovering a psychosexual plot involving one of Dora’s former confidantes and the sinister Foundation for Sexual Research. But the more Sascha learns about the plot and Dora’s possible involvement, the less makes sense to Sascha. Simultaneously, Sascha reflects on what is obliquely referred to as the “sexual question” and tries to discover his “true self.” An odd supporting cast of characters—most notably “One-legged Else”—provide comic relief in this dense and atmospheric novel. It has all the markings of a cult favorite. (Mar.)

In the second novel from Ghose (The Gin Drinkers), Mia Bhagat is a 28-year-old London-based Bengali reeling from the inexplicable suicide of her “Marxist-turned-Mystic” father. Her job as a TV reporter introduces her to Karna, an initiate of the conservative, utopian Purification Journey Brotherhood (men should “fight the female ego”) who’s also the spitting image of a figure from her late father’s painting of the Kumbh Mela, or Ganga River Festival of the Pitcher. Mia falls for him hard, but her mother arranges a marriage to a kind cosmetics entrepreneur named Vik Ray, with whom Mia moves to New Delhi. There, she enters the whirlwind of her husband’s extravagant parties and secretly waits for Karna. A subplot follows the character arc of Vik’s brilliant, beautiful and blind mother, Indi, from her childhood in Delhi to retirement in Goa. Ghose evokes the Indian settings with a wonderful tactility, and she hones in cuttingly on the sparring desires for love, independence and transcendence. Though the fractured plot’s threads weave together too neatly, Ghose, who is an anchor on CNN’s Indian affiliate, offers convincing meditations on mysticism vs. rationality and commercial wealth vs. spiritual poverty as they play out for her conflicted lead. (Mar.)

A judicious use of humor and a memorable protagonist lift Downie’s sequel to her bestselling debut, Medicus (2007). Toward the beginning of Hadrian’s reign in A.D. 118, Gaius Petreius Ruso, a doctor originally from Gaul, has attached himself to a contingent of the Roman army, the 10th Batavians, en route to the northern edge of the Roman Empire in Britannia. When Felix, a soldier, is found beheaded, the prefect of the 10th Batavians, Decianus, assigns Ruso to investigate, despite a confession to the murder by Thessalus, “retiring medic to the Tenth Batavians Bedbugs.” Decianus is concerned that the attack presages further unrest from the locals, who ascribe the killing to their antlered god, Cernunnos. Reluctantly, Ruso probes Thessalus’s motives for admitting the crime and finds that many others also had an interest in seeing Felix dead. This well-researched novel places Downie alongside such established masters of the Roman historical as Steven Saylor and Rosemary Rowe. (Mar.)

At the start of Britton’s solid third thriller to feature CIA loose cannon Ryan Kealey (after The Assassin and The American), Kealey has been wandering the world, seeking solace after his girlfriend and fellow agent, Naomi Kharmai, walked out on him four months earlier. When his CIA handler Jonathan Harper tells Kealey he’ll produce Naomi if Kealey will come back on the job, Kealey agrees. The job entails tracking down an Algerian terrorist, Amari Saifi, who’s abducted several Americans in Pakistan. When Saifi ups the ante by capturing Brynn Fitzgerald, the acting U.S. secretary of state, the assignment shifts into high gear. The exciting kidnapping scene underscores Britton’s strength—high-octane action—but the plot and characters adhere too closely to the rules and regulations of the genre. Hopefully, this obviously talented writer, who gets better with each book, will either amp up the complexity or drop Kealey and move on to new territory. (Mar.)

Julia Springer Murdoch has survived widowhood, scandals and her share of delightfully harebrained adventures in eight previous Miss Julia outings; here she tackles a town’s worth of problems. Smarmy New Jersey developer Arthur Kessler plans to tear down the old Abbotsville, N.C., courthouse and replace it with condos, but more pressing is the fact that three of Julia’s friends’ husbands have decamped or gone missing, including Richard Stroud, who may have absconded with a great deal of money. Everyone’s turning to Julia for advice except for Richard’s wife, Helen, who’s getting too cozy for comfort as she cries on the shoulder of Miss Julia’s good-natured second husband, Sam. Julia rallies her friends to convince Kessler that Abbotsville is too full of Southern eccentricities for him, but those eccentricities may be too real for the plan to work. The memorably droll Ross has a gift for elevating such everyday matters as marital strife and the hazards of middle age to high comedy, while painting her beautifully drawn characters with wit and sympathy. (Mar.)

It’s been three months since East Berliner Trudy Hulst saw her husband, Rolf, a political activist who fled to the West just ahead of the Stasi in the early 1960s. So when the Stasi summons her for interrogation, she knows what’s in store. With the help of Rolf’s friend Wolfgang, now a state policeman, Trudy escapes to West Berlin, only to find out that her husband was shot and killed while he was going over the wall. Trudy finds a room in a dingy boarding house, works as a waitress and bides her time until her young son and his grandmother can join her. But when President Kennedy comes to town, Trudy’s story so captivates a member of the presidential entourage that he takes her to America as a symbol of the Cold War’s devastation. Meanwhile, Wolfgang’s ties to the Hulsts put his career and his life in jeopardy. Though the portrayal of deprivation and suffering in East Berlin is by-the-numbers, Trudy’s struggle to adapt to the free world is refreshing, particularly her experiences in 1960s America. (Mar.)

Brandon introduces his main characters gradually in his quirky debut about a bunch of rootless drifters who form an unstable drug-distribution network in Arkansas: Swin Ruiz, who pulls his first scam before dropping out of college; Kyle Ribb, a shoplifter who stumbles on a job as a courier; and mysterious Ken Hovan (aka “Froggy” or “Frog”), who begins with bootleg tapes but graduates to run the shadowy organization. Tangential characters include a middleman, Pat Bright, who oversees Swin and Ruiz in their nebulous and phony cover jobs in a state park, and a black woman known only as “Her,” who passes packets and instructions to the couriers. As Swin and Kyle try to puzzle out how to survive in a crumbling organization, their futile attempts to create some semblance of a normal life evoke only pathos. Not evil as such, these unsympathetic people simply fall into a rut that leads inevitably to violence and death. (Mar.)

German historian Ditfurth’s fictional alter ego, Josef Stachelmann, makes an engaging protagonist in this well-crafted crime thriller, the first in a new series. Stachelmann, an academic based in Hamburg, is popular with students, but the thesis he needs to complete to get tenure has stalled amid an overwhelming mass of papers the professor calls his “mountain of shame.” He’s roused from his rut by an old classmate, Oskar Winter, now a local police commissioner, who enlists his help in solving a baffling series of crimes that have claimed over the years the life of the wife and two children of respected local businessman Maximilian Holler. Despite Holler’s sterling reputation, the probe’s discovery of some unusual real estate deals suggests he’s hiding something, perhaps connected with Holler’s Nazi father. The author sensitively handles the difficult issue of how modern Germany has dealt with its past. (Mar.)

In bestseller Robb’s slick 26th not-so-near-future crime thriller to feature Lt. Eve Dallas (after 2007’s Creation in Death), the New York City homicide cop investigates the murder of business tycoon Thomas Anders, whose strangled body is discovered tied to his bed, apparently the victim of a kinky sex encounter gone bad. Aided by her mysterious husband, Roarke, and long-time sidekick Det. Delia Peabody, Eve doggedly questions Anders’s widow, Ava, and his nephew, Benedict Forrest, number two at the victim’s corporation, Anders Worldwide. Both Ava and Benedict have alibis that put them far from the crime scene at the time of Anders’s death. While the guilty party soon becomes obvious and the gimmick used by the culprit clear to anyone familiar with Strangers on a Train, Robb’s strong, hard-nosed heroine once again generates the kind of heat that keeps fans turning the pages. (Feb.)

In Hunt’s (The Seas) overstuffed and uneven novel set in New York, circa 1943, an aging Nikola Tesla lives at the Hotel New Yorker and cares for (and chats with) pigeons while planning what could be his boldest invention yet. He forges an unlikely friendship with Louisa Dewell, a 24-year-old chambermaid at the hotel who also keeps a pigeon coop. The book alternates between Niko’s reminisces of turn-of-the century Manhattan and Louisa’s current domestic dramas; Niko revisits old grievances concerning the usurpation or dismissal of his many inventions, and Louisa gets ensnared in her zany father’s mission to travel back in time and reconnect with his dead wife via a time machine built by his lifelong friend Azor Carter. Assisting in the scheme is Louisa’s mysterious beau, Arthur Vaughn, who may or may not be from the future. Although many events are drawn from Tesla’s life, he and his peers, including Thomas Edison and John Muir, are cartoonish. Likewise, the city backdrop is drenched in rosy nostalgia (even Hell’s Kitchen is a quaint neighborhood). Each individual plot thread has potential, but the cumulative effect is dulled by an unwieldy structure. (Feb.)

In Reed and Mayer’s engrossing seventh mystery set in sixth-century Constantinople (after 2005’s Six for Gold), John, lord chamberlain to the emperor Justinian, has taken to sharing his thoughts with a young girl, whom he’s named Zoe, depicted in the mosaic on his study wall. One day John meets a woman on the street who identifies herself as Zoe and claims to be the model for the child in the mosaic. Who could have revealed his secret confessor? John wonders. When John finds this mysterious woman brutally beaten to death in a cistern, he begins a dangerous investigation that will take him into the lives of prostitutes, artisans, beggars and religious fanatics. Once again convincing historical detail and strong characterization help drive a riveting plot. Fans will be pleased to know that while the title is based on the last line of the verse on which the series is based, the authors plan to send John to Italy in an eighth volume. (Apr.)

Chief Insp. Armand Gamache and his team investigate another bizarre crime in the tiny Québec village of Three Pines in Penny’s expertly plotted third cozy (after 2007’s A Fatal Grace). As the townspeople gather in the abandoned and perhaps haunted Hadley house for a séance with a visiting psychic, Madeleine Favreau collapses, apparently dead of fright. No one has a harsh word to say about Madeleine, but Gamache knows there’s more to the case than meets the eye. Complicating his inquiry are the repercussions of Gamache having accused his popular superior at the Sûreté du Québec of heinous crimes in a previous case. Fearing there might be a mole on his team, Gamache works not only to solve the murder but to clear his name. Arthur Ellis Award–winner Penny paints a vivid picture of the French-Canadian village, its inhabitants and a determined detective who will strike many Agatha Christie fans as a 21st-century version of Hercule Poirot. (Mar.)

In McEvoy’s so-so third horse-racing mystery (after 2006’s Riders Down), failed ad man Jack Doyle, introduced in 2004’s Blind Switch, is happy to land a gig as public relations director for Monee Park, a struggling thoroughbred racetrack south of Chicago. He soon finds himself smitten with the track’s beautiful owner, Celia McCann, who’s struggling to keep Monee Park afloat and tend to her husband afflicted with Lou Gehrig’s disease. Proposed legislation that would allow the installation of video slot machines could save Monee Park, but Celia’s co-heir, scheming Irishman Niall Hanratty, is determined to make sure the deal falls through. Confronted with Niall’s goons—hired to sabotage the track and force Celia to sell the property to real estate developers—Jack realizes he’s stepped into the middle of something bigger than horse racing. McEvoy sounds the right notes, but he did a better job of capturing the flavor of the racing world in his previous two novels. (Mar.)

Sherer takes a break from his Emerson Ward series (Death Is No Bargain, etc.) with this solid stand-alone, a mystery thriller set on an island near Seattle. Jack Holm, who’s just lost his PR agency job, has a lot more to worry about after his flight attendant wife, Mary, goes missing. An overly descriptive opening slows the action, but tension builds as Jack faces life as a single father with two unruly kids, 10-year-old Tyler and 15-year-old Kelsey, who fear the worst. Meanwhile, in therapy sessions, Jack reflects on an unraveling marriage, alcoholism, soccer brawls, a car wreck and other family woes that culminate in the discovery of Mary’s battered body on a Christmas tree farm. Earthy detective Ed Mankewicz suspects Jack’s involved, though after Jack’s arrest, the evidence against him isn’t clear either to Jack, his slick lawyer or the reader. Creepy-looking strangers lurking around the local school add suspense to an unrelenting tale of personal calamity that ends on a gratifying note of hope. (Mar.)

Murder and mayhem once again rock the placid town of Alpine, Wash., in Daheim’s 20th cozy to feature newspaper publisher Emma Lord (after 2007’s The Alpine Scandal). When the two grown children of Emma’s deceased long-ago lover, Tom Cavanaugh, offer to buy her paper, the Advocate, Emma refuses. Soon after leaving for Seattle for the weekend, Emma gets a phone call from Sheriff Milo Dodge, who tells her the driving force behind the attempted takeover, Tom’s daughter’s husband, Dylan Platte, has been murdered. A suspect herself, Emma joins Milo in the search for Dylan’s killer. Not until violence strikes again, this time close to home, can Emma put the pieces together and come to terms with Tom, his family and her own painful past. An intriguing plot and the usual cast of lovable characters make this another winner. (Feb. 26)

Fans of noir master Woolrich (1903–1968) will welcome the inaugural volume in a projected series to collect all his short stories and novellas, though these 15 romance tales, which were published in magazines like College Humor and Breezy, don’t represent Woolrich at his best, as Nevins (The Sound of Detection: Ellery Queen’s Adventures in Radio) concedes in his general introduction. Still, as Nevins argues in brief prefaces to stories like “Dance It Off!” and “Gay Music,” these minor efforts anticipate themes in such later classic suspense novels as The Night Has a Thousand Eyes and The Bride Wore Black—“the obsession with dance, the bleak little apartment, the protagonist whom no conventional woman will satisfy.” This isn’t the place for newcomers to start, but specialists will be pleased to see these stories, slight as they are, back in print. (Feb.)

This amusing but insubstantial short novel explores history and the limits of free will in a more straightforward fashion than Baker’s Company series (In the Garden of Iden, etc.). Sturdy, good-natured John James, a 17th-century Caribbean buccaneer, wants to leave the piratical life and settle down as a bricklayer, but first he must deliver a letter to Clarissa Waverly, the mistress of one of his late shipmates. This seemingly routine errand sets John and Clarissa off on a journey to recover the dead man’s cache of stolen gold. They’re soon joined by Sejanus, an ex-slave who insists he’s an atheist but can’t elude the demands of African deities. Sejanus makes a nice counterpoint to John’s lower-key angst, and his story would probably be more interesting than John and Clarissa’s predictably tumultuous quest for wealth. Without imminent sequels or continuations, this short adventure is little more than a shaggy sea dog story. (Apr.)

Graham’s exquisite and bleak debut views the events of The Aeneid through the oracle Gull, a disciple of the Lady of the Dead. Taken to the Lady’s temple after being lamed in a chariot accident, Gull quickly displays her power to see the future. Her first vision—black ships fleeing a burning city—lets her recognize Aeneas when he arrives after the fall of Wilusa (the Hittite name for Troy), hoping to save those sold into slavery. Gull joins Aeneas, and they take the few remaining people of Wilusa on a glorious journey to find their scattered brethren and a site where they can found a new city. Historians will admire Graham’s deft blending of Virgil’s epic story and historical fact, most notably the creation of Egyptian princess Basetamon to take the place of magnificently anachronistic Dido. Graham’s spare style focuses on action, but fraught meaning and smoldering emotional resonance overlay her deceptively simple words. (Mar.)

Precocious twin selkies Ronan and Muriel set out for their heroic third mission (after 2007’s Maelstrom): rescuing an old friend who’s been wrongfully imprisoned. Petaybee has been invaded by troops intending to arrest the twins’ parents and others for aiding Marmion de Revers Algemeine’s evacuation of the endangered inhabitants of Kanaka. Marmion herself is languishing in the Gwinnet Incarceration Colony. Ronan and Muriel dodge the soldiers and hitch a ride with space-faring deep-sea otters to reach Versailles Station, Marmion’s home base, where they hope to beg influential Federation friends for help. Instead they wind up incarcerated with other youngsters at Gwinnet’s Camp Neverland and cruelly tortured until their special skills and friends (including Zuzu, a telepathic cat) help them survive a tsunami and volcanic eruption and complete their mission. This concluding volume of the twins’ trilogy will primarily appeal to young, animal-loving SF fans. (Mar.)

The fate of two universes hangs in the balance in this intricately plotted sequel to Bright of the Sky (2007). To sustain the constructed universe called the Entire, the alien Tarig have built the engine of Ahnenhoon, designed to turn the Rose—Earth’s universe—into a power source. Earth’s survival depends on pilot Titus Quinn’s plan to destroy the engine, but ambitious scientist Helice Maki claims Titus may instead use the mission to seek his missing daughter, Sydney, lost somewhere in the Entire. Successfully scheming her way into accompanying Titus, Helice plots to steal his nanotech weaponry and grab power from the Tarig. Titus’s only hope may be his wife, Johanna, captured 10 years ago by the Tarig, who has slowly taught herself enough about the engine to have a chance of disabling it. Tangled motivations, complex characters and intriguing world-building will keep readers on the edges of their seats. (Mar.)

This hectic tale of ancient aliens on an artificial world orbits the star-sized egos of zealous archeologist Manuel Rusk and altruistic interstellar explorer Frank Klingston. After Rusk accidentally sets off a defense system left on colony world Argo by long-gone aliens, the two must travel to the near-mythical world called Spider Star in hopes of finding someone who can turn it off before it bombs the colony into oblivion. Upon arrival, Klingston and some of the crew are captured by spiderlike aliens and rushed through the corridors of the Star in scenes resembling the disjointed action of a video game, while Rusk takes to the air in a rather improbable balloon. The premise of an artificial environment and multiple alien races has potential, but the realization is incomplete and the characterization stereotypical, so readers will respond primarily to the story’s strong and reliable pacing (though with a rather rushed denouement) and intriguing premise. (Mar.)

This graceful tale of magic, court intrigue and high drama follows Averil, duchess of Quitaine (introduced in 2007’s The Serpent and the Rose), as she keeps her promise to visit her uncle, the evil King Clodovec of Lys, and let him marry her to a noble so she can breed the kingdom’s heir. Far from her home and her commoner lover, Gereint, Averil soon discovers hidden allies and a faction that opposes the king but supports the Serpent he serves. They tempt Averil with talk of chaotic magic and anarchy, suggesting she could escape the laws governing noble marriages and wed Gereint at last. As plots and counterplots thicken, Averil finds herself besieged in a foreign land, guarding a powerful relic and torn between love and duty. Bryan achieves real suspense about which path her heroine will choose; the painful pleasure of Averil and Gereint’s longing will bring readers back as much as the cliffhanger ending. (Mar.)

Paul, a widower haunted by the ghosts of his wife and unborn son in “The Grief Frequency,” sums up Burke’s subtle approach thus: “The dead can be among the living; the living, among the dead.” In 14 dark fantasies collected here, Burke (Currency of Souls) creates characters whose angst opens them up to uncanny incidents and ghostly encounters that seem an extension of their own spiritual malaise. “Empathy” tells of a journalist so distraught over a brutal terrorist execution that his nightmares begin erupting graphically into daily reality. In “Mr. Goodnight,” a young boy’s terrifying encounter with a malignant entity leaves him distrusting even his closest loved ones. Though plot takes a backseat to mood and atmosphere in some stories, Burke shows skill at imagining expressive supernatural experiences appropriate for his well-developed characters and their agitated emotions. (Feb.)

Red werewolf Bella flees her adoptive pack of gray werewolves when the alpha male Volan tries forcibly to claim her as his mate. Her real love, beta male Devlyn, has been out of her life for years, but comes after her when she finds herself accidentally captured by humans. Bella becomes convinced that Devlyn only wants to return her to Volan, but soon realizes that Devlyn loves her as much as she loves him, and is willing to fight Volan to the death to claim her. That problem pales, however, as a pack of red werewolves takes to killing human females in a crazed quest to claim Bella for their own. Bella and Devlyn must defeat the rogue wolves before Devlyn’s final confrontation with Volan. The vulpine couple’s chemistry crackles off the page, but the real strength of the book lies in Spear’s depiction of pack power dynamics, as well as in the details of human-wolf interaction. His wolf world feels at once palpable and even plausible. (Apr.)

In Roaring ’20s New York, Dorian Black is a vampire enforcer who kills his master and leaves his two primary lieutenants to form their own factions, soon battling to win supremacy in the city. When Dorian saves human reporter Gwen Murphy from drowning and finds himself inexplicably drawn to her, she is busy investigating the mysterious deaths of mobsters, all drained of blood. When she discovers the intricate web of urban vampires, they’re soon on to her, and she’s at risk. Dorian himself gets involved with a vampire organization called Pax, dedicated to peace between vampires, but perhaps not all that it seems. Krinard’s New York and vampire factors could use more color, but Gwen is the classic intrepid girl reporter, the plot intrigues are well drawn, and the commentary on religious fanaticism is engaging. (Mar.)

Hines sidesteps the main question facing elvers—WWTD, or What would Tolkien do?—with a wink and his usual snort. His goofy elves, orcs, trolls, dwarves, humans and even an evil tree conjure laughter, not screams. Jig Dragonslayer might have a dash of hobbit in him as he reluctantly dashes into his latest adventure (after Goblin Hero): he would much rather stay home in a comfy cave, hanging out with Smudge, his fire-spider, or Relka, a most excellent cook. But alas, they’re all pressed into a human/elf war against Billa the Bloody, a monstrous orc who’ll do anything to win, even if it means killing her army and human Princess Genevieve’s troops fighting for Wendel, king of Adenkar. Luckily, Jig has a secret weapon thanks to Tymalous Shadowstar, a Forgotten God who communicates with him telepathically. Shadowstar would sacrifice himself for his little goblin priest, but Jig’s amazing courage may not make that necessary. Readers will need familiarity with earlier books in the series, but Hines’s funny bone is sharp and YA-friendly. (Mar.)

Dillon Black “Bear,” a middle-aged Lakota, submits his ranch to a reality TV makeover in Eagle’s hard to swallow latest (following Ride a Painted Pony). Monica Wilson-Black, Dillon’s ex-wife and Martha Stewart–style host of It Only Looks Expensive, convinces part-Sioux TV producer Ella Champion that Dillon and his run-down South Dakota Wolf Trail Ranch would make a great makeover project for Ella’s hot series, Who’s Our Neighbor? Dillon has his own stake: his Mystic Warriors Horse Camp needs an extreme-ish rehab for a summer program that brings horses into the lives of local at-risk Native American youth. Guest decorator Monica (who’s battling cancer), their aspiring veterinarian daughter Emily and teen son D.J. converge on the ranch. It gives Dillon opportunity to reconnect with his family and forge a new love connection with Ella. Although Eagle excels in portraying everyday Native America, the merger of Hollywood with Lakota mystique doesn’t quite come off. (Mar.)

Many memoirs both inside and outside the world of comics cover the author’s high school years. Far fewer are actually written during those years. Touchstone has started reprinting Schrag’s comics chronicling her teenage years through the mid-’90s. Each of the volumes in Schrag’s series was created in the summer of the year it chronicles. This book includes Awkward, about Schrag’s freshman year, and Definition, which concerns her sophomore year. It’s hard not to notice that the books were written and drawn by a young artist. The artwork is simple and, yes, awkward, especially in Awkward, where the characters look like punk versions of the Peanuts cast. But rather than being a drawback, the artwork is actually charming. It’s clear that Schrag is pushing herself. Even at this age, she had already attained the ability to keep the storytelling smooth and fast-paced, even if the stories she’s actually telling aren’t remarkable. The typical teenage concerns of sex, drugs, drama with friends and the importance of music are all covered. The book is comfortable because it’s so easy to relate to. (Apr.)

Can style propel well-worn subject matter into something much more substantive? Reading the first chapter of this manga brings up that question. The story of a pretty young girl named Haruna transferring to a new school starts off in a manner familiar to anyone with any experience reading fiction based on a high school setting. She doesn’t fit in with any of the established high school cliques and compares high school to a mountain populated with monkeys: both value hierarchy. What better way to illustrate the students’ hierarchy than the ever-popular idea of a high school musical? Haruna starts challenging the social system when she chooses nerdy Masaru for a role over the school’s resident lady-killer. Akira’s always attractive illustrations of teenage romance set the book apart. Scenes between Haruna and Masaru have a delicate look. There are figures in silhouette and beams of light shining through when Haruna finds herself falling for the boy she compares to a baby monkey. Despite the title, Akira never resorts to the “chibi” style. Her characters are all forceful and strong-looking. and her technical skills keep the familiar material fresh. (Mar.)

In Shanower’s latest installment of his monumental, Eisner award–winning retelling of the Trojan War, the Achaean fleet finally arrives at the shore of Troy. Before the war can begin, the story’s many vivid characters get another chance to display their natures, including Achilles impulsively pursuing glory, young Troilus yearning over Cressida, Hektor preaching reasonable compromise in an impossible situation, slippery Odysseus orating, and Helen and Paris so besotted with each other and themselves that they’ll let kingdoms drift into ruin. Shanower’s people are well drawn in more ways than one, so readers can enjoy picking out the postures and expressions of individuals in a crowd scene. Impressive as the black and white art is, some of the panels are crammed with details, just as the pages are filled with text as the characters have their say. Then, readers notice how cleverly Troilus’s lovesick funk is treated in repetitious, mostly silent panels—or how subtly the climactic appearance of an Achaean embassy to Trojan King Priam, the last chance to prevent the impending war, is managed with a mixture of closeups and long shots, open line work and encroaching shadows. On all levels, this is a brilliant work. (Jan.)

High school student Ageha Shiroi injures a young male dressmaker commissioned to build her pregnant older sister’s wedding dress in this manga about a wedding and romance. Following the accident, Ageha volunteers to help out at the boutique to finish the dress, employing her skills as a hobbyist handbag creator. Although Ageha is well characterized as a selfish teenager, 23-year-old male dressmakers Yukari and Mitsu are unrealistically cute blond and brunette manga stereotypes. Romance between Ageha and Yukari takes a backseat to the loving portrayal of Ageha’s relationship with her sister and bride-to-be Hibari. Although characters, dresses and handmade purses are well rendered, backgrounds and establishing shots are often sketchy or missing, making the first half of the book somewhat hard to follow. Ageha and Hibari have realistic character designs, but Yukari and Mitsu have unusually large eyes for young men and look almost identical to Hidaka’s characters in Tears of a Lamb, a manga CMX is publishing in English. Ageha’s deadline-related stress lends an element of suspense to an otherwise girly story; the poignant and emotional portrayal of a sibling’s wedding is an appealing story suitable for most readers, but boys might have a hard time identifying with any of the characters. (Jan.)

There’s a longstanding tradition of “science fiction” stories that actually belong to other genres and simply have freaky alien names grafted on, from space Westerns to space war stories. Space Iron Chef, though—that’s a new one. Stokoe’s wittily vulgar debut graphic novel follows former-cook–turned–space trucker Johnny Boyo as he fights off space ninjas, returns to the planet of his ex-girlfriend Citrus Watts, and finally faces a cook-off duel with a pair of alien twins who’ll stop at nothing to achieve culinary victory. The SF material is self-consciously inane, and the plot is stream-of-consciousness at best—it’s mostly an excuse for a series of nutty set pieces, like one in which Boyo tries a “high risk cooking” adventure, preparing a dish from a “hive-minded” creature that strangles its cooks if its lettuce bed is insufficiently finely shredded. The point of the book is its wall-to-wall silliness; it never quite aims for peaks of hilarity, but it’s consistently amusing. Stokoe’s line work, a sort of graffiti- and manga-inspired update on Vaughn Bodé’s old underground comix, is appropriately lighthearted and loose, but he’s as passionate about visual world building as Boyo is about flavor blending—he takes obvious glee in drawing huge, wobbly piles of fantastically detailed technology, bug-eyed monsters and goofy handshakes. (Dec.)