Fiction Reviews

Bestseller Reynolds (The Rapture of Canaan) delivers again with this story of an embattled teenage girl growing up in a Virginia tidewater town. Kendra “Kenny” Lugo has it tough: her mother is dead, her father is in jail, and she is what others might call gender-confused (“the year before I cut off all my hair and started binding myself up”). Living with her father's girlfriend, Aunt Glo, Kenny is approaching 18 and facing the possibility of being kicked out with a sense of impending doom. When their neighbor, habitually drunk Jarvis Stanley, accidentally kills a college girl, Kenny becomes fixated on the tragedy. Meanwhile, Aunt Glo struggles with painkiller addiction while raising her own kids, 12-year-old Quincy and teenaged Tim-Tim, and her runaway daughter's seven-year-old, Daphne. Kenny makes a fascinating, cagey narrator, revealing an unexpectedly dangerous family dynamic with a matter-of-factness that belies her fear and anger, and Reynolds weds expository memories with Kenny's day-to-day so seamlessly, it looks easy. Simple prose rich with subtext, convincing dialogue and a fascinating protagonist combine to produce a heartstring-plucker that's explicit, tender, sad and hopeful. (Nov.)

In the latest installment to the rollicking Jack Absolute series (after The Blooding of Jack Absolute), Humphreys borrows from Sheridan's The Rivals to tell a highly successful adventure story with a large dose of romance. After surviving the Battle of Quebec and a long winter in the New World, Jack is ready to return to England and rejoin the 16th Light Dragoons. Aboard the slave ship Sweet Eliza, Jack befriends Red Hugh McClune, an Irish grenadier with mysterious intentions. Once in England, Jack and McClune travel to Bath, where McClune's unattached cousin, the lovely Laetitia Fitzpatrick, piques Jack's fancy. Their courtship proceeds smoothly until Jake finds himself unwittingly lured by Laetitia into a seditious conspiracy, and when Jack's superiors dispatch him to go undercover in Rome, the truth about those he thought he knew becomes tragically apparent. With his way with words and swords, Jack proves once again to be a dynamic hero—an honorable spy with a soft spot for love—and a bangup leading man for what is fast becoming a rousing, must-read series. (Nov.)

McGlynn's superlatively crafted, deeply sympathetic debut story collection traces the spiritual agonies of Christians trying to make sense of their faith within the vicissitudes of human nature. “Landslide” takes place in Southern California, concerning two best friends in a Christian college who follow divergent paths, who both seem involved in a deadly highway landslide they witness together. In “Moonland on Fire,” a divorced father of three struggles to keep the peace between his visiting teenaged son and his evangelical girlfriend amid encroaching L.A. wildfires. The last five stories move the action to Houston, Tex., and come together like five facets of one novella, centered around a 15-year-old, Rowdy Jarrett, harboring crushing guilt over his mother, Cordelia, who went blind while giving birth to him and whose health is now deteriorating. As each successive story shifts points of view among the family members, their multipronged predicament moves into more well-defined but perilous territory, amounting to an affecting family parable. (Nov.)

In this spellbinding fourth novel to be published posthumously in English (after The Rebels), Márai (1900–1989) weaves a passionate tale about a woman whose chance at love is very nearly stolen from her. Harbored peaceably at her family home in middle age with a cousin as her only companion after a lifelong disappointment in love, Esther receives a telegram from her former flame, Lajos, a masterful con artist who had declared his love for Esther, but then married her younger sister, Vilma. Lajos is locally beloved and reviled, and his dazzling return—with his two grown children by Vilma (who has since died) and a mysterious other woman and her son to whom he is indebted in tow—raises dark suspicions in Esther and her relatives. Márai's characterization of Lajos through the eyes of skeptical, still smitten Esther is deliciously portentous; the deceptions woven around these characters introduce a sharp sliver of danger into the narrative, especially as Esther's reliability is called into question. Márai is a fascinating writer readers of English will want more of. (Nov.)

Anand (The House of Lanyon) depicts colorfully the turbulent and bloody 16th century, when England, under the rule of Henry VIII and his heirs, was rife with court intrigue, religious unrest and political espionage. Jane Allerbrook, lady-in-waiting to one of Henry's least-favored wives, flees court after catching, to her dismay and peril, the romantic attention of the king. With the help of dashing adventurer Peter Carew, Jane returns to the safety of her family manor, Allerbrook. Francis, Jane's brother and guardian, is enraged that Jane has ruined her chances for a politically advantageous marriage, and bitterly marries her off to local country bumpkin Harry Hudd. Jane accepts her lot, even as she pines for Carew and chafes under the yoke of her boorish husband, but fate and duty force her to fight for her family, her land and her country. Though Anand weaves a few too many important figures and famous plots into the life of one lady of the moors (Forrest Gump comes to mind more than once), her story has plenty of satisfying action and historic detail. (Oct.)

Klinger brings the same impressive breadth of knowledge that distinguished The New Annotated Sherlock Holmes to this definitive examination of one of the classic horror novels of all time. Adopting the conceit that Stoker's narrative is based on fact, Klinger elucidates the plot and historical context for both Stoker devotees and those more familiar with Count Dracula from countless popular culture versions. Because he had privileged access to the typescript Stoker delivered to his publisher, Klinger is able to note changes between it and the first edition and comment on the reasons for them. Through close reading, Klinger raises questions about such matters as the role of lead vampire-hunter Van Helsing and whether the villainous count is actually dispatched at book's end. An introduction by Neil Gaiman, numerous illustrations, essays on topics ranging from Dracula in the movies to the academic response, and much more enhance the package. 8-city author tour. (Oct.)

In this engaging love story, Austen enthusiast Reynolds (The Pemberley Variations) brings echoes of Elizabeth and Darcy to present-day New England. Marine biologist Cassie Boulton spends summers at an insular Cape Cod academic community, studying salt marshes. Sparks fly when Calder Westing, the heir of a famous political dynasty, enters her life, but Cassie knows better than to fall for a man who can have any woman he wants. Certain her low-profile career and inner-city Chicago background disqualify her from long-term consideration, she cuts ties with Calder after just one steamy night. Cassie doesn't know that Calder harbors genuine feelings for her. With some literary maneuvering, Calder finally wins Cassie's heart, but his powerful, ruthless father is determined to split them up. Beyond a surplus of cliché and throwaway characters, lush descriptions of Cape Cod are appropriately aphrodisiacal, the couple's wit and chemistry make them worth rooting for, and Cassie's well-rendered intellectual life not only gives her depth and independence, it gives readers a welcome break from that standard of modern heroine-ism, the plucky fashion and/or media lackey. (Oct.)

An adoring friendship turns deadly in poet and translator Gander's visceral if too brief first novel. Les is the magnetic, godlike protagonist of this reflective four-part narrative: introduced at the time of his difficult birth to a teenage mother, he is put up for adoption. Years later, he is observed by Clay, a colleague on his land-surveying team in a small town in Arkansas, who finds his friend's mannerisms and dissembling so compelling that he apes Les and eventually betrays him. Les, a part-time poet and practical joker, is beloved for his eccentricities, especially by his second wife, Cora, and mistress, Sarah, whose poetic remembrances of Les after his suicide make up the novel's third section and reveal hopelessly guilt-ridden Sarah to be angry, grieving for her tender, quirky lover. Gander's passionate construction of Les reveals a character deeply conflicted, comprising enormous virtue and many flaws, though in the end the work remains piecemeal and incomplete, though nicely done. (Oct.)

Desperate to outrun the Black Death ravaging England during the sodden summer of 1348, nine disparate souls band together in this harrowing historical, which infuses a Canterbury Tales scenario with the spectral chill of an M. Night Shyamalan ghost story. Maitland (The White Room) gives each of the travelers a potentially devastating secret. How did narrator Camelot, a glib-tongued peddler of false relics and hope, really come by that hideously scarred face? What is magician Zophiel hiding inside his wagon? And just who is Narigorm, the spooky albino girl whose readings of the runes are always eerily on target? As the nine strangers slog cross-country through the pestilential landscape, their number shrinking one by one, they come to realize that what they don't know about each other might just kill them. Despite Maitland's yarn-spinning prowess, her narrative occasionally stalls because of unrelenting grimness and an increasingly predictable plot—that is, until its gasp-out-loud finale. (Oct.)

Last seen in A Necessary Evil (2006), FBI special agent Maggie O'Dell pursues a vengeful monster and his sadistic assistant who infect innocent people with the deadly Ebola virus in bestseller Kava's most terrifying psychological thriller to date. While investigating a bomb threat in suburban Elk Grove, Va., Maggie and her boss, Assistant Director Cunningham, become exposed to the virus. The pair wind up in “the Slammer,” an isolation ward within the U.S. Army Medical Research Institute of Infectious Diseases in Fort Detrick, Md. On the outside, Maggie's partner, R.J. Tully, investigates other cases of exposure to the virus, including an entire Chicago hospital. After Maggie's release, a clue Tully uncovers from his past sends him racing to save Maggie from the evil mastermind responsible for the viral threats. Full of authentic details taken from similar real-life crimes, the smart, thrill-a-minute plot builds to a cliffhanger ending that will leave fans eager for the next installment. (Oct.)

At the start of bestseller Sandford's solid second thriller to feature officer Virgil Flowers of the Minnesota Bureau of Criminal Apprehension (after Dark of the Moon), a gunman shoots Bobby Sanderson as he's walking his dog one night in Stillwater, Minn., then places a lemon in the dead man's mouth. Sanderson's killing is one in a series, and Flowers soon discovers that all the victims served together in Vietnam. When Flowers learns that Vietnamese firing squads stuck lemons in the mouths of their human targets, he pursues leads in the local immigrant community, where he hooks up with the attractive daughter of a radical professor who'd written a paper about Agent Orange. Eventually, he settles on the owner of a security company involved with the upcoming Republican National Convention as his prime suspect. While the less than credible plot builds to a highly unlikely resolution, most readers will enjoy spending time in the company of the genial Flowers. (Oct.)

Aries Burnett, the winning heroine of Smallwood's pleasant debut, has been trained as a doctor by her father, but 19th-century conventions prohibit her from getting her board certification. When her father dies, leaving her a mountain of debt and no way of supporting herself in Philadelphia, she answers an ad to be the mail-order bride to Montana rancher Jarrett McCabe. Her arrival comes as a surprise to Jarrett, whose brother Ben placed the ad without telling him. Jarrett doesn't want a wife, but he agrees to take Aries on as a cook and housekeeper. As her competence and willingness to adapt breaks down Jarrett's crusty resistance, a romance blossoms. Though predictable, the narrative has some life and a few nice tweaks—Aries's acceptance by the townsfolk as a doctor is refreshing. Also, Smallwood focuses more on Aries's development as a woman rather than strictly on the romance, which will likely win over readers who might otherwise pass on a western. (Oct.)

Spenser, the redoubtable Boston PI, struts his stuff in this 36th entry in the series, but may leave some readers wondering if his ethics will bear even casual examination. When Heidi Bradshaw hires Spenser to “support” her at her daughter's wedding on Tashtego Island in Buzzards Bay, Mass., an old nemesis of Spenser's, the Gray Man, who almost killed Spenser in Small Vices (1977), also shows up on the island. Spenser is unable to prevent the kidnapping of the bride or the deaths that attend it. Assisted by a cadre of familiar players, Spenser persists in trying to find the missing bride in spite of warnings from the Gray Man. The trademark banter and snappy dialogue may seem more forced than natural. Spenser displays his machismo in dealing with a muscle builder and his detective skills in figuring out the Gray Man's connections to the case. A troubling conclusion produces one resolution and the promise of further consequences in the next installment. (Oct.)

When Isaac Richmond, a retired army colonel, asks Chicago PI Ray Dudgeon to look into his daughter's murder, Dudgeon, who's still recovering from the injuries he sustained in Big City, Bad Blood, reluctantly agrees to take the $50,000 case in this engrossing follow-up. Joan Richmond's death looks straightforward: a deranged co-worker, Steven Zhang, shot her in her home and then committed suicide. Never one to accept the simplest answer, Dudgeon starts digging and discovers that Joan's former employer was Hawk River, a military contract company under congressional investigation. Steve's widow soon reveals her husband's ties to China, and Dudgeon realizes that Joan's murder could lead back to both the Department of Homeland Security and some ruthless military contractors. Himself a former PI, Chercover brings a crackling authenticity to Dudgeon, paying homage to the noir masters while creating a doggedly stubborn new hero all his own. (Oct.)

The line between cop and criminal becomes dangerously blurred in Billingham's excellent stand-alone thriller. Told from multiple points-of-view and full of red herrings, the story begins in the London suburbs with a gang initiation. Hoping to climb the ranks in a local gang and egged on by his friends, 17-year-old Theo Shirley fires a gun into a woman's car on a rainy night. The woman isn't killed, but her car plows into a crowded bus stop, killing Det. Sgt. Paul Hopwood. Paul's pregnant girlfriend, Det. Constable Helen Weeks, also a member of the Metropolitan Police, can't accept that his death was an accident. She retraces his footsteps and discovers unsettling connections between Paul and Frank Linnell, a powerful player in the shadowy London underworld with his own reasons for unraveling Paul's death. Best known for the Det. Insp. Tom Thorne series (Buried, etc.), Billingham does for South London what Richard Price does for Manhattan's Lower East Side in Lush Life. (Oct.)

In his disappointing third novel, Cates writes an implausible story from the viewpoint of a freed slave named Jimmy Gates. Jimmy (who later changes his name to Freeman Walker), the son of a slave and her master, receives his “freedom papers” and a copy of the Declaration of Independence (both recurring symbols) from his father before being sent away to a British boarding school. He quickly assimilates with his white classmates and teachers, but after his father drowns while crossing the Atlantic to visit, Jimmy leaves school and finds work making horse saddles. Nearing adulthood, he returns to the U.S. just as the Civil War begins. After deciding he does not want to be a soldier, he sets off for the gold mines of the American West. Unfortunately, Cates misses the grand picaresque possibilities, and the novel grows frustratingly diffuse as Jimmy becomes less an intriguing guide and more a caricature. (Oct.)

Fans of bestseller Lippman's long-running series featuring Baltimore PI Tess Monaghan (Another Thing to Fall, etc.) will be pleased to find that the 17 selections in her first short story collection are as intricate and witty as her novels. Part one, “Girls Gone Wild,” focuses on women engaged in all manner of shady enterprises, from first-time drug buyers in “The Crack Cocaine Diet” to an unassuming femme fatale with a secret in “Dear Penthouse Forum (A First Draft).” Lest readers think Lippman can only work her magic in her Maryland hometown, she devotes a section, “Other Cities, Not My Own,” to stories in settings as disparate as New Orleans during Mardi Gras (“Pony Girl”) and Dublin, Ireland, full of jilted lovers (“Honor Bar”). The book's climax is “Scratch a Woman,” a novella written for the collection and starring Heloise, the enterprising heroine of “One True Love,” an earlier entry. George Pelecanos provides an appreciative introduction. (Oct.)

To speak or not to speak is the recurring theme in Pourciau's 10 short stories. In “The Neighbor,” a character “rattles around in his house with his story trapped inside him,” while in “Among the Missing,” the narrator is such an unstoppable fount of conversation that a couple hires him to talk to them. A slight discourtesy, begun when the narrator and his wife in “Snub” avoid a couple whose company they do not enjoy, becomes a round of increasingly obsessive apologies, accusations, explanations and excuses. In the title story, a simple “What are you doing here?” haunts the narrator, who can never decide if the question was a challenge or an innocent query. Taken at once, Pourciau's stories are obsessive, repetitive and tend to blur, but individually, the better entries resonate with the questions they provoke about life, reality, memory and truth. (Oct.)

In Antosca's second novel, a campy page-turner set in contemporary backwater West Virginia, 22-year old Bram becomes obsessed with a murder after a child's bones are discovered in the woods behind his home. The ghost of the dead boy, six-year-old Adam Dovey, soon appears to Bram and urges him to help get revenge against Jacob Bunny, the introverted, kind-hearted, ex-con alcoholic who 23 years ago drowned Adam. Bram's initial reluctance gives way, and before long, Bram torches Jacob's cottage, killing him. Just about then the narrative begins to fall apart, as Bram and Adam wander through a netherworld exurbia in pursuit of dead Jacob's soul. The further they go, the campier the novel becomes, accented by half-baked riffs on the soul and journeys into strip clubs and back alleys that read like an ersatz hybrid of David Lynch and Brian Evenson. It's a demented little novel that'll appeal to readers into weirdness for weirdness's sake. (Oct.)

Roughton's beautiful, poetic translation of Laxness's novel tunes readers in to the frustrated genius of its principal character, far better than that character's own lengthy philosophical discourses do. Shortly after World War I, Steinn, a young Icelandic poet-philosopher, heads abroad to make himself “the most perfect man on earth” and perceive “glory on the visage of things.” Leaving behind his homeland and would-be sweetheart, Diljá, for Europe, Steinn proves a master of any doctrine he cares to take up, but fails to satisfy his longing for perfection. His “aesthetic soul” leads Steinn to embrace communism while abandoning his own mother, and later to join the order of the Benedictine monks at the expense of worldly intimacy. Much of Steinn's agony stems from the fact that his quest for perfection is solipsistic; even in his most pious phase, he shows utter disregard for people, including Diljá and his own family. Though he's destined to fall from the get-go, it's intriguing to see how Laxness's antihero dives into manifold ideologies, achieving essentially the same result each time. (Oct.)

Debut novelist Vanderbilt (yes, those Vanderbilts) charmingly wends her way through the memories of wealthy widow Lily Crisp. Lily's story spools from her beloved Olivetti typewriter at the family home in southern France. Lily recounts her travels and her life on an Idaho ranch with Paul, her husband, and his French mother. The house, inherited from her mother-in-law, and passed on to Lily after Paul's death, holds a mystery in the form of a longtime lodger who may or may not have something to do with a slowly teased out tragic secret that sits at the center of Lily and Paul's marriage. Meanwhile, a hunky handyman Lily retains admires more than Lily's typewritten remembrances. Things are slow to start, but about halfway in, the plot picks up and events past and present collide in surprising ways. The story may meander too much for some readers, but those who relish delightful prose and quirky adventuresses should be satisfied. (Oct.)

In the sequel to Gangsta, K'wan offers a gritty and explosive cautionary tale. Kenyatta Soladine, aka Gutter, is an Algerian immigrant and head of the Harlem Crips, recently recovered from a gunshot-induced coma to learn that his best friend has been murdered by the rival Bloods. Overcome with guilt and rage, Gutter and his gang seek revenge by killing not just those responsible, but every member of the Bloods in town, despite the protests of Gutter's wife, Sharell, his business associates and his advisers. In response, the Bloods import some serious help from Los Angeles: Major Blood, a deranged and murderous sociopath with an age-old vendetta against the Soladine family. Plenty of mayhem follows, taking in gangsters, their families and innocent bystanders on both coasts. Hard-to-ignore structural problems and predictable, clichéd plot developments will frustrate, and tacked-on prologue and epilogue will confuse. K'wan does have his eyes and ears to the street, believably detailing his characters' dialogue and reactions, but goes little further. (Oct.)

Souljah's follow-up to her bestselling novel, The Coldest Winter Ever, is another gritty coming-of-age tale, picking up the story of Midnight (a character in Coldest Winter) as he tries desperately to navigate American culture, Brooklyn streets and the dicey business of growing up. The novel begins as seven-year-old Midnight and his pregnant mother, Umma, are forced to leave their privileged life in Sudan for a hardscrabble American existence. Midnight spends his formative years in Brooklyn guiding and translating for his loyal, loving and talented mother, helping her get a factory job while encouraging her to start a clothing line. Eventually, Midnight starts working at a Chinatown fish shop, finds love, joins a dangerous hustler's basketball league and tries to disentangle his ambivalent feelings toward romance, family and personal honor. Souljah's sensitive treatment of her protagonist is honest and affecting, with some realistic moments of crisis. Unfortunately, a slack plot and slow pacing cause serious bloat, and Souljah's distinctive prose is woefully unpolished. Frustrations aside, Souljah has obvious talent and sincere motives, making her a street-lit sophomore worth watching. (Oct.)

Washington, D.C., reference librarian (and practicing witch) Jane Madison learns a lesson in love and spell casting in Klasky's lively latest (after Sorcery and the Single Girl). After quitting the snobby Washington Coven, returning heroine Jane takes a vacation from casting spells . Six months later, she discovers her powers have vanished and her witchy paraphernalia has been destroyed. In a tizzy, Jane runs to Neko, her gay feline familiar, and Melissa White, her ever-sympathetic best friend, before seeking help from David Montrose, her sexy warder/protector and “astral bodyguard.” Before long, Jane's summoned a magical servant named Ariel to help restore her magical powers, but the enchantment backfires, leading Ariel to become an obsessed arts activist and an unlikely D.C. celebrity. Further complications put Jane's cat, grandmother and love life in danger. Klasky stirs in some winning romantic angst with charming Will Becker, an architect Jane dates while still pining for David. Though predictable, Klasky's whimsical flair make this a fun entry in a series still building momentum. (Oct.)

In this debut novel, a field biologist, unsatisfied in her career and unhappy in her marriage after suffering three miscarriages, discovers Santería (the Yoruba religion brought by African slaves to the Caribbean where it mixed with Catholicism). Gabrielle Segovia lets loose while attending a conference in New Orleans and has a “reading” at Madam Laveau's House of Voodoo, where the spirit tells her that she doesn't need a doctor, the babies will come when she finds her spiritual path. Back home, Gabrielle reluctantly agrees to see a fertility specialist, but despite learning that she does have physical problems, she refuses further medical care and turns to Santería to fulfill her wish to conceive. She travels to Miami and to her Santería-practicing Puerto Rican cousins, and soon Gabrielle is ditching work and planning her “ocha,” her initiation into Santería. The author, writing under a pseudonym, is knowledgeable about her subject; she's a former scientist and a practicing santera, and does an entertaining job of contrasting science with religious beliefs. All ends happily in this lighthearted first novel that puts a contemporary Latin face on a fascinating and ancient religion. (Oct.)

In Forster's heartwarming ode to life (after Getting Some of Her Own), Petra Fields of Ellicott City, Md., learns she has an inoperable brain tumor. Only 36 years old and a single mom, she resolves to face her diagnosed four to six months of life with dignity, so when Rev. Jasper Collins tells her to make a list of people she's wronged to ask for their forgiveness, she hops to it. Most important? Telling her 18-year-old daughter, Krista, that her father is actually not dead. But after apologizing to others (like her neighbor, whose husband she slept with), Petra gets fed up with apologizing and heads off on a monumental road trip that takes her to San Francisco, where she falls in love. She meets other admirers at tourist stops, and, after a transformative visit to Martin Luther King's Tomb, Petra heads home ready to face whatever comes Although Forster doesn't break new ground with this “terminal patient becomes enlightened” tale, it's still wise and wonderful as it points out, once again, the importance of honesty and appreciating what you have while you have it. (Oct.)

Illustrator Road's overwrought debut novel chronicles the life of Carmencita Gutierrez Alonzo, a young bisexual Cuban-American punk rocker living a life of grungy hedonism in New York City, who traffics in head-scratching asides like, “The world as we knew it tried our toxicity, but in our loose pockets we often broke out a malevolent champagne.” The plot is sparse; instead, readers are hit with a barrage of vignettes of bar life, parties, drug binges and mostly ill-fated romances. Far better than the text are Road's illustrations, found on nearly every page. Displaying a cinematic eye for composition, Road adorns her novel with memorable illustrations, including a Miami sky full of gun-shaped clouds, and Carmencita and a lover embracing, a tattoo of Elizabeth Taylor visible on his arm. Less happily, the more than a dozen portraits of Carmencita reinforce the text's navel-gazing aspects. Regardless of whether Carmencita is hopelessly shallow or a wounded soul, Road's drawings deserve a better vehicle. (Oct.)

Chidley's overlong snoozer chronicles a woman's make over when her husband leaves her. After a particularly difficult day, Lizzie Buckley fires off a scathing e-mail to her sister detailing her many petty resentments of her husband, James. Unfortunately, the missive instead goes to James, who quickly announces he's leaving her. Before long, Lizzie and her twin toddlers move to the town where her best friend lives, and Lizzie realizes that she may have been depressed for a long time and lacked self-awareness in her marriage. Meanwhile, James wants a divorce and seems to have taken up with his assistant, yet Lizzie hopes to win James back. Genre standards abound: there's the ruggedly handsome possible rebound fling for Lizzie, the wacky therapist, the nasty mother-in-law and the “it was all a big misunderstanding” air-clearing. It's heavily traveled territory, and Chidley doesn't do much to distinguish herself. (Oct.)

Madeleine Clavell, the heroine of this fast-paced if narrow historical (the first in a planned series), is a former lover of Louis XIV and, unfortunately for her and her family, a Huguenot. When her family is harassed by Louis's dragoons, she goes to Versailles to exploit her past relationship with the king, but her plan backfires and soon her husband is a galley slave, her daughter is sent to a convent for Catholic re-education and she and her sons are headed to Switzerland for protection. There, with the help of a courtier and her unshakeable faith, she reunites with her husband and daughter and escapes the influence of Louis XIV without forsaking her religion. While the importance of faith and surrender to God is repeatedly used as a blunt instrument and many of the characters are thin caricatures, Parsons dramatizes nicely the historical period and its religious strife. Parsons is intent on ensuring happy endings for the Clavells, and readers of a similar worldview should enjoy following the family's travails. (Oct.)

The Culps return with a quick and formulaic installment to the Telegraph series. Tilman Wagner, new bride Catherine and adopted son in tow, arrives in town to help Catherine's brother, David, who is having trouble with his cattle ranch. Rustlers in the pay of David's neighbor are ransacking his herds, and he's got some domestic problems—his son Cam's gambling and drinking habits have him so in debt that he becomes a cattle rustler himself. With the help of old friend Butter, Tilman defeats the rustlers and saves the ranch before being called away again on another mission. The book doesn't aspire to much more than standard genre fare; it hits the requisite bases and will while away part of an afternoon. (Oct.)

In this feel-good but amateurish historical, beautiful and intelligent Ingrid yearns for a better life than the one her Swedish family has carved out on the Minnesota plains. Fed up with the farming, Ingrid demands that her family send her to St. Agnes Women's Academy in Minneapolis to become a teacher. There, she forges an attachment with Norwegian Andreas Eriksen, heir to a railroad fortune, despite their differences in upbringing and social status. But when Ingrid and Andreas are caught in a compromising position, her standing at school becomes precarious and she must choose between her education and her love. To make matters worse, Andreas's scheming stepsister, Dagmar, is determined to woo Andreas for herself. Breene captures American railroad history, paying special attention to the workers and their fight for better wages and working conditions, but underdeveloped characters and awkward dialogue detract from the novel's flow, and a number of improbable twists further diminish this spirited but inexpert narrative. (Oct.)

In Denholtz's latest slow-burning romance (after Marquis in a Minute), children's librarian and assistant dance instructor Marisol Acevedo hopes to snap up her hot, successful Latino dance partner. After meeting Dr. Alejandro “Alex” Lares in a Dover, N.J., emergency room (for her Grandma Margarita Soto's dance-related injury), Marisol is surprised to see him turn up in her class. While teaching him how to salsa in time for his cousin Pablo's upcoming wedding, it doesn't take long for Marisol to fall head over heels. Still stinging over his failed romance with Juanita, a coldhearted nurse, Alex hides his feelings. Unfortunately, their quaint courtship is largely passion free, and the tumultuous relationships of their fellow salsa classmates are far more intriguing. Suitable for YA readers and conservative romance fans, this sleepy romance never manages to catch the rhythm, much less the spirit and spice, of salsa. (Oct.)

Readers unfamiliar with the previous eight books in the Kydd series (The Admiral's Daughter, etc.) may find themselves lost at sea with the plot and setting of Stockwin's underwhelming latest addition. After the death of Cmdr. Thomas Kydd's one true love, Rosalynd, in Daughter, Kydd's depression only worsens when his ship, the HMS Teazer, is assigned to the Channel Islands, a backwater in the sea war between England and Napoleonic France. His crew's loyalty flagging, Kydd is framed for smuggling, then cashiered from royal service. After a brief stint working as a stagehand for a roving theater troupe, he is recruited to captain a privateer, duty he previously considered beneath him, while his steadfast friend and clerk, Nicholas Renzi, falls into the service of the prince of Bouillon, who is part of a plot to kidnap Napoleon and restore the Bourbon throne. Full of indecipherable sailing jargon and one-dimensional characters, Stockwin's plodding installment sinks. (Oct.)

Sebastian “Seb” Rolveden, a freelance writer who lives in a lighthouse on the Essex coast, undertakes an arduous quest after receiving a notebook belonging to his late grandfather and namesake in this convoluted mystery from British author Newman. The title refers to 19th-century Anglo-Swedish impressionist Julian Rawbeck's dark masterpiece, which Seb eventually tracks down after a long search from seedy London neighborhoods to the isle of Jersey, and eventually across to Normandy, all places associated with the enigmatic painter and his devotees, most especially Seb's grandfather. Evidence emerges implicating Sebastian senior, a bohemian painter turned preacher, in Rawbeck's violent death in a pub garret. Gallery owners, antique dealers and various other minor characters muddy the case, yet Seb perseveres to a happy if complicated outcome to his exhausting pursuit. Newman is the author, as Gerard Williams, of Dr. Mortimer and the Aldgate Mystery and other titles in the Dr. Mortimer series. (Nov.)

Officialdom casts a skeptical eye on the unorthodox crime solving of London's Peculiar Crimes Unit in Fowler's excellent sixth novel to feature senior detectives Arthur Bryant and John May (after 2007's White Corridor). While the unit's members scheme to insure their professional survival, a serial killer is targeting middle-aged women who drop dead in pubs, apparently of natural causes. Bryant puts the investigation on his team's docket after realizing that he observed one of the victims, shortly before her demise, enter the Victoria Cross, a pub that hasn't existed for almost a century. Characters who could easily have been caricatures in lesser hands assume enough depth to make them both plausible and engaging. If this is indeed the last in the series as the conclusion suggests, then the versatile author has ended on a high note. Those who appreciate Fowler's special blend of the macabre, dark humor and impossible crime puzzles will wish they haven't seen the last of Bryant and May. (Oct.)

Set in Sunrise, Mo., in 1954, Barone's engaging first novel offers some timely lessons about the corrosive effects of greed and prejudice. When a mental patient, who's convinced he's cowboy star Roy Rogers, and his fellow inmate and trusted friend, Harry, stumble on a dead man in Sunrise State Hospital's record room, they inadvertently shed unwelcome light on Sunrise's darkest secret. As people start getting murdered all around Sunrise, the town blames the hospital for the violence and demands its immediate shutdown. The hospital closure would not so coincidentally result in a financial boon for its opponents. Roy and Harry, falsely accused of the murders, must fight their own insanity in an effort to solve the mystery that's been plaguing the town and their beloved hospital for 20 years. While too many minor characters clutter the plot, readers will cheer the triumph of old-fashioned virtues in the end. (Oct.)

Tough guy PI Mike Hammer fighting terrorists in post-9/11 Manhattan? That's the improbable scenario developed by Hammer's creator, who introduced him in 1947's I, the Jury, and completed after Spillane's death in 2006 by Collins. Despite his advanced age, Hammer still carries an old army .45 and follows his own path to justice regardless of the opposition. In this last case, Hammer providentially rescues two young grad students from an assassin, discovers that they found and possess a giant human femur unearthed during a dig in the plain of Elah, where David slew Goliath, and undertakes to protect them and the bone from those who will do anything to acquire the treasure. Much of the jargon is vintage, as is the indomitable Hammer as he strives to protect the kids and prevent the Goliath bone from setting off the next big war. While not on a par with early Spillane classics, this is a fitting capstone to Hammer's career. (Oct.)

When workmen uncover skeletal remains behind a retaining wall in Thornton's well-crafted fifth mystery to feature Cochise County, Ariz., victim advocate Chloe Newcombe (after 2004's Dead for the Winter), the body turns out to be that of Wynn Wykoff, a member of the band Point of No Return, who disappeared 17 years earlier. The news of this macabre find prompts Rachel Macabee, the daughter of the band's singer, Annie Glenn, to hire Chloe's private detective friend, Brian Flynn, to look into her mother's unsolved murder, which occurred around the same time at the same location. Aided by Chloe, Flynn interviews the people originally questioned about Anna's murder, including former band members and their hangers-on. After Chloe discovers a link between Annie's and Wynn's homicides, additional lives are suddenly at risk. Appealing, nuanced characters, a simmering Southwest backdrop and an artfully unpredictable conclusion make this one a winner. (Oct.)

Art, war, love and loss all figure in Brandon's enjoyable first in a series featuring art historian Reggie Lee. Recently hired by London's National Gallery, Reggie gets the approval of the museum's director to exhibit a 1605 Caravaggio altarpiece, St. Cecilia and the Angel, along with the two copies the artist made, one of which is at the Getty, the other at the Louvre. When Antoine Rigaut, the Louvre's Italian collection administrator, refuses the loan, Reggie travels to Paris to confront Rigaut, who proves elusive and later turns up dead, an apparent suicide. Reggie eventually locates Riguat's elderly mother, a remarkable woman who holds the key to the complex history of the Louvre's copy of St. Cecilia and the Angel, which was stolen and soon after recovered in 1937. When a third copy of the painting surfaces, Reggie really has her work cut out for her. Brandon is the author of Surreal Lives: The Surrealists, 1917–1945 and other works of nonfiction. (Oct.)

In Carlson's disappointing debut, David Collier and his wife, Rebecca, give up their respective law and financial careers and move to a secluded beach house outside San Francisco, where they can pursue their respective artistic passions—writing and photography. Their dream life is shattered when a man named Bashaar shows up at the house, shoots Rebecca dead and wounds David in the leg as he flees. Determined to find Rebecca's killer, David discovers that several of Rebecca's prints are missing and realizes that her murder could be tied to her photography project, an overview of historic California mansions built in the 1930s. A visit he makes to one of the mansions Rebecca photographed uncovers a paramilitary Muslim group in training. Stereotypes about the Middle East and Islamic fundamentalism abound in a tale already burdened by an unconvincing hero and far-fetched plot twists. (Oct.)

The top-notch 12th entry in this “best of” series offers superb writing from authors both well and little known. The nature of the 20 selections again lends support to those who think the series should be more accurately titled The Best American Crime Stories. As Pelecanos notes in the introduction, “none of these stories are puzzles, locked-room mysteries, or private detective tales.” Some of the best have only an incidental connection to crime, as in the chance encounter with a robber in a hospital that triggers the decline of an elderly couple in a small New England town in Elizabeth Strout's “A Different Road.” Likewise, Joyce Carol Oates's “The Blind Man's Sighted Daughters” focuses on the sacrifices made by an adult daughter caring for her aged father. Alice Munro's chilling “Child's Play” is another standout, with its casual but depressing depiction of the brutality children are capable of. Few will dispute Pelecanos's contention that several stories in the anthology would qualify for The Best American Short Stories from the same publisher. (Oct.)

In Bain's 30th mystery based on the classic TV series Murder She Wrote (after Murder on Parade), Jessica Fletcher, Cabot Cove's crime-solving novelist, stands to inherit $1 million from the estate of her late friend, 91-year-old Tillie Mortelaine, if she can solve within a month the 1967 murder of Tillie's fiancé, Wanamaker Jones, who was shot during a New Year's eve party at Tillie's historic home in Savannah, Ga. Jessica soon settles into Mortelaine House, where she meets a number of odd tenants, including an eccentric professor at the Institute of Paranormal Relations and the younger man by some 20 years who was Tillie's second fiancé. Ferreting out who killed Wanamaker is tough work, but Jessica, as always, rises to the challenge. Ghostly assistance adds to the charm of the spunky sleuthing, though some readers may find the pacing a tad too sedate. (Oct.)

Set in New York City in 1899, the seventh Dutchman historical mystery (after 1997's The Lucifer Contract) from the pseudonymous Meyers (the husband-wife writing team of Martin and Annette Meyers) offers plenty of rich period detail, from the founding of the Automobile Club of America to the building of the new subway system, but the storytelling falls short of the standard set by, say, Caleb Carr or Daniel Stashower. John “Dutch” Tonneman, of the NYPD's two-man Commissioner's Squad, investigates a series of stabbing murders, whose victims include Delia Swann, a prostitute who was last seen alive by Esther Breslau, a photographer, who happens to be the detective's love interest. The politically progressive Breslau has begun a project to photograph streetwalkers, but it's unclear whether her encounter with the victim was mere coincidence. Those readers anticipating a whodunit may be disappointed to learn the killer's identity and motivation early on. (Oct.)

The 40 selections in this exemplary anthology from Link and Grant (the fantasy half) and Datlow (the horror half) reflect virtually every hue of the fantasy/horror palette: urban fantasy in Jeffrey Ford's “The Drowned Life” and Karen Joy Fowler's “The Last Worders”; traditional supernatural horror in Paul Walther's “Splitfoot” and Terry Dowling's “Toother”; modern folk fantasy in Elizabeth Hand's “Winter's Wife” and Eileen Gunn's “Up the Fire Road”; and cosmic terror fiction in Laird Barron's “The Forest” and Don Tumasonis's “The Swing.” A handful of stories involve child abuse and abduction, of which Lisa Tuttle's “Closet Dreams” is the most horrifying. The front matter's snapshot summaries of the past year's yield in fantasy, horror, comics, mixed media and music are a small and invaluable book unto themselves. (Oct.)

Setting the stage for the final book in the popular Pip and Flinx series, this intriguing first contact mystery ends on a cliffhanger without resolving a thing. In an otherwise unremarkable star system outside Commonwealth space, the planet Quofum seems to appear and disappear at will. A crew of xenologists sent to study the life forms that enjoy Quofum's earthlike atmosphere and alcohol-laced water oceans are shocked to discover four primitive intelligent species so unlike one another that they couldn't possibly have evolved on the same world, as well as a vast underground complex full of mysterious technology. While this novel may fill in background details for Flinx Transcendent, expected next year, it's hard to see why one needs an entire book of what is, essentially, backstory. (Oct.)

Reading Hughart's endearing historical fantasy trilogy, first published almost 20 years ago, is much like “wandering blindfolded through a myth devised by a maniac,” in the words of Master Li, the greatest and most frequently intoxicated wise man in a colorful seventh century “China that never was.” Slow, strong and good-hearted peasant Number Ten Ox initially seeks Master Li's help to cure a bizarre plague and soon becomes his sidekick. Their rollicking adventures pit them against everyone from murderers and thieves to emperors and gods. Numerous Chinese legends, filtered through Ox's simple perspective, blend seamlessly into tales both lighthearted and heartrending. Hughart's many fans will welcome this modest alternative to the 1998 omnibus published by The Stars Our Destination bookstore, which commands high prices when it can be found at all. (Oct.)

This sophomore effort from economics editor Slattery (Spaceman Blues) is a heavy-handed fable of a near-future America fallen into economic and social chaos. Marco Angelo Oliveira breaks out of prison, determined to rejoin the Slick Six, his “family” of supercriminals. He meets stiff opposition from the Aardvark, a mob boss who now runs New York City. Meanwhile, the nation has fragmented into squabbling regions, from the New Dominion of Virginia to the New Sioux of the plains; like Marco's gang, they see little reason to reunite. Complex secondary characters such as mob lawyer Jeannette Winderhoek and the less-feted members of the Slick Six somewhat balance the heavily stereotyped Marco and the Aardvark, adding vital color to this glacially slow, backstory-laden tale. (Oct.)

Slick salesman Gil and weary, neurotic Melissa purchased their tiny farm for a song, but the bargain came with a hidden price. Their formerly strong marriage, now strained from the stillbirth of their second child, snaps when preschooler Noah wanders into the forest. Each parent attempts a separate quest to retrieve the little boy from a bizarre parallel world of ghosts and monsters that lurks immediately beneath their property. Noah's determined grasp of fairy tale mechanics serves him better than Gil's recurring nightmares or Melissa's blind stumbling through secret doors, but Noah isn't a very convincing child, Gil and Melissa aren't very convincing adults, and the Undercity isn't a very convincing place. Despite interesting explorations of themes like promises and disclosure, Jasper (The Wannoshay Cycle) never manages to bring his story to life. (Oct.)

McGary (Jewels of the Madonna) brings elements of the supernatural into this smashing romantic suspense novel. After her mother's death, Rylie Powell travels to Ireland seeking the father who abandoned her. She finds Dermot O'Shea, whose name is on her birth certificate, but he seems too old to be her father. Worse, Rylie feels an instant attraction to Dermot's son, Donovan. When the police charge Dermot with arms dealing and aiding Irish terrorists, Donovan must reluctantly use his “wild sight,” which enables him to connect with ghosts of the past, to clear his father's name and solve the mysteries of his mother's disappearance and Rylie's parentage. McGary never shortchanges the sizzling romance between Rylie and Donovan as she weaves in ancient legend and recent murders, building to a dramatic, memorable conclusion. (Oct.)

The richly imagined third volume of Wilson's bestselling fantasy romance series (after 2007's Lady of Light and Shadows) draws the reader into a complex web of ancient magics and looming war surrounding a central mystery: why are the kitlings of the powerful Tairen, magical winged catlike beings, dying before they hatch? Ellysetta Baristani, a woodcarver's daughter with unexplained magical gifts, must find the solution with the aid of her recently discovered truemate, Rain Tairen Soul, the Fey king tormented by his past misdeeds. Wilson peels back layers of secrets surrounding the evil mages of Eld and their schemes to destroy the Tairen and the Fey, but the revelations never overwhelm the emotional intensity of Ellysetta and Rain's developing relationship or diminish the textured beauty of the writing. An exciting climax will leave fans hungry for more. (Oct.)

In this awkward debut romance, the supposed hero's juvenile behavior sets the stage for a frustrating read that not even a sparkling final third can mitigate. Taylor Donovan, a brilliant Chicago lawyer visiting L.A. to defend a sexual harassment case, is not happy to be assigned to help heartthrob actor Jason Andrews prep for a courtroom drama. As they begin working together, Jason predictably behaves like a spoiled teenager, but becomes increasingly enchanted with Taylor. She eventually begins to see Jason as a nice guy underneath his Hollywood attitude—with sleazy, jealous actor Scott Casey as a convenient foil—but she can't set aside her trust issues. As Jason tries to convince Taylor to stay in L.A., the book suddenly turns witty and romantic, but getting there is no fun at all. (Oct.)

Sands spins off this paranormal romance series debut from her popular Argeneau books (Bite Me If You Can, etc.) with her trademark wit and passion. On a well-deserved vacation from her fast-track job as a lawyer, Samantha Willan is looking forward to hanging out with her sisters at their family's cottage. Rogue Hunter Garrett Mortimer has been sent by the Council to search for an errant vampire who has been biting mortals. When the two cross paths in the middle of nowhere, romance intrudes on Sam's R&R and Garrett's mission. Sands maintains the heart, sass and steam of her other novels, providing plenty of plot-driving backstory, but never letting it overshadow the love and passion. With sexy immortals, strong protagonists and smart dialogue, this series launch is a winner. (Oct.)

Like some fairy tale take on the Old South, peopled with fantastic characters and lightly leavened with satire, Klein's third Lost Colony volume is a treat from start to finish. On the titular utopian island, where verdant fields are bounded by lushly blooming trees and picturesque mountains that initially obscure the dark past of the humans living there, spoiled princess Birdy isn't sure where to turn with her problems. The loving flashbacks she has of her recently murdered grandfather are challenged by eruptions of truth about his violently racist character, while her stuckup mother appears smitten by the appearance of an old flame, the oleaginous Reverend Swagger. Meanwhile, Birdy, a spoiled and tempestuous tyke, continues to mistreat her one true friend, the ex-slave Louis. Klein's mixture of the real (shades of antebellum Southern racism) and the fantastic (magical rock sprites who inhabit the island and work in mysterious ways), combined with his wondrously bright visuals, make for a heady and occasionally even educational mixture. (Oct.)

The plot to the concluding volume of Lemire's trilogy of graphic novels about the residents of a quiet Canadian farming region is as low-key as they come: a nurse makes her rounds of her patients and learns that one of them has died; a few characters' secrets are revealed; and we see flashbacks to the 1917 tragedy whose consequences still hover over the community like the black crow that always seems to be flying overhead. Even more than the first two, this volume is about quietness and regret—more pages include silent panels than don't, and a crude superhero comic that an 11-year-old character draws is bluntly about his longing for familial connection. Things unspoken between family members, in fact, count for so much here that Lemire clarifies his plot by devoting a page to a family tree near the end of the book. But the power of Lemire's hushed, deliberately paced storytelling is in his black-and-white linework: raw, scratchy and sometimes minimalist, it conveys a lot with a handful of ragged lines. On one bravura page, a nun and a group of terrified children wade through a snowstorm into the distance; by its final panel, all we can see is a few tiny scribbles. (Sept.)

The longest of this series of short stories deals with a strange woman who leads a man into a series of lengthy corridors beneath his house. The work is eerie, strange and at its best when wordless. The plots don't always make sense, aiming more for a dreamlike quality: one moment, the man and woman lost in the corridors are strangers, the next they're lovers comforting each other after a tsunami. The other stories have more pull: a woman wearing a helmet that lets her see TV struggles with the reception aerial, and a girl traveling a barren landscape finds and rides a gigantic slug that, at one point, swallows her only to regurgitate her at the ride's end. Ward's art is absolutely enchanting. The unrelated stills at the end of the book are worth as much as the stories; it's got an arty steampunk, tentacle-porn edge that's charming and deep. Gazing at his images of leggy, soulful girls with octopi, spiders and other creepy-crawlies on leashes, you understand the appeal of the genre. In the end, however, Ward seems one of a growing number of illustrator/cartoonists who are more evocative artists than true storytellers. (Aug.)

Wagner's multifarious Grendel character takes a leap several centuries into the future with his 10-part God and the Devil series, originally serialized in 1989 and remastered in 2003, collected in a dense graphic novel that will serve as a hearty meal for serious fans but may baffle newcomers. It's the year 2530 and most of the world's surface is ravaged wasteland. A newly reconstituted Vatican lords over the livable areas of the American West, its corrupt hierarchy greedily raking in donations for the construction of a Babel-like tower, while instituting a savage new Inquisition to keep the faithful in line. Two things stand in the way of iron-fisted Pope Innocent XLII: straight-laced investigator Orion Assante and the masked nihilist trickster Grendel himself. Wagner's take on the church as evil empire comes straight out of the Middle Ages and works quite well for a pseudo-postapocalyptic America. But while the money-grubbing clergy (and their mercenary guards) are quite adequate villains, Assante is a blank protagonist. The story lines are densely tangled, and Wagner's penchant for overwrought narration and random moments of ultraviolence throws more layers on top of it all. (Aug.)