Fiction Book Reviews: 1/11/2010
Reviews of New Fiction, Mystery, Science Fiction and Comics

Jan 11, 2010

Amandine Marlena de Blasi. Ballantine, $25 (368p) ISBN 978-0-345-50734-1

De Blasi, a bestselling memoirist (A Thousand Days in Venice) and food-writer, makes a solid fiction debut with this poignant tale of an orphan growing up in Europe as it descends into WWII. Amandine Gilberte Noiret de Crécy, an illegitimate child born into Polish royalty and ditched at five months by her grandmother at a convent in Montpellier, grows up surrounded by a loving governess, Solange Jouffroi, and adoring nuns and priests. Yet the bitter abbess, Mother Paul, who runs the convent, inexplicably loathes her. Aware of this hatred and longing to find her birth mother, Amandine becomes a serious child who believes there is something wrong with her. After a rash of scarlet fever breaks out at the convent, Solange decides to take Amandine to live with her family, and not long after they leave the convent grounds, they are confronted with the horror the war has brought to France, which has especially dire consequences for Solange. In de Blasi’s tale of unexpected turns taken during the search for understanding and identity, she balances heartbreak, loneliness, fear, and hope with aplomb. (May)

Sylvan Street Deborah Schupack. Plume, $15 paper (352p) ISBN 978-0-452-29628-2

Schupack (The Boy on the Bus) cleverly plays out in her latest what happens when you mix five sets of suburban New York neighbors with a suitcase full of cold cash. The large cast, while initially overwhelming, provides Schupack with bountiful opportunities for plots, counterplots, and all manner of nefarious doings as the neighbors decide what to do after finding a briefcase packed with $1 million in the new neighbors’ back yard during a pool party. The page-turning pace never flags among the “reproductively challenged” wealthy couple, the bachelor artist, the overburdened family of seven, the retired schoolteachers, and the seemingly happy new neighbors. Schupack also provides a startling peek into the lives of the immigrants who inhabit an entirely different part of New York than domestic Sylvan Street. Teeming with plot twists and social unrest, Schupack shows with poignant prose and commendable plotting the good, the bad, and the ugly that money brings out in people. (May)

American Taliban Pearl Abraham. Random, $25 (272p) ISBN 978-1-4000-6858-6

Abraham (The Seventh Beggar) sends a young man of privilege from Washington. D.C.. on a spiritual quest that takes him from surfing the Outer Banks to encountering jihad in Pakistan. It’s 2000, and John Jude Parish is an 18-year-old surfer with a nose for exploring spirituality. He reads about Bob Dylan, digests the Tao, and corresponds online with Arabic friends about Islam. When he breaks a leg, he uses his time of enforced immobility to study Sufi poetry, which leads him, eventually, to Brooklyn, where he befriends a young man from Pakistan who suggests going abroad to learn more about Muslim culture. Once in Pakistan, each small step takes him closer to becoming radicalized. His journey toward Islam is not one of disenchantment, but of enlightenment, described in an evocative prose that mimics the confusion and grandeur of a young man driven by ideals. The novel is at its best when John’s questing is an earnest, balanced search for meaning, though when Abraham shifts her focus to John’s mother late in the book, the story flattens. Mostly, the book is excellent—considered, magnetic, surprising—but the fizzled ending is a major disappointment. (Apr.)

Pearl of China Anchee Min. Bloomsbury, $24 (288p) ISBN 978-1-59691-697-5

As a girl in Maoist China, Min (Red Azalea) was ordered to denounce Pearl S. Buck; now she offers a thin sketch of the Nobel laureate’s life from the point of view of fictional Willow Yee, a fiercely loyal friend. A lifelong friendship begins in Chin-kiang when Willow meets Pearl, whose missionary father converts Willow’s educated but impoverished father. Under threat from hostilities toward foreigners, Pearl departs for the safety of Shanghai, and, later, to America for college, but she returns for her wedding to find that Willow is the satisfied founder of a newspaper and a very unhappy wife. While a changing China swirls around them, their friendship is tested as they both fall in love with the same poet. As the 1949 revolution looms, Pearl flees China, and Willow’s husband becomes Mao’s right-hand man, leading to a fateful showdown with Madam Mao when Willow refuses to denounce her lifelong friend. Though the setting and revolutionary backdrop are inherently dramatic, Min’s account of an epic friendship is curiously low-key, with some sections reading more like a treatment than a narrative. (Apr.)

This Is Just Exactly Like You Drew Perry. Viking, $25.95 (352p) ISBN 978-0-670-02154-3

In his turgid debut, author Perry delves into the life of bland suburbanite Jack Lang after his wife, Beth, leaves him and their autistic six-year-old son, Hendrick, for Jack’s best friend, Terry, who has recently separated from girlfriend Rena (who happens to be Beth’s friend). When Rena discovers Beth is living with Terry, she immediately throws herself at Jack, who, having earlier impulsively purchased the house across the street, moves there with Rena and Hendrick, though Rena, bossy and needling from day one, is probably the least plausible therapeutic lay in history. Meanwhile, Hendrick begins to come out of his shell. Every 30 or so pages, Jack and Beth stalwartly refuse to discuss what is wrong between them: throughout their numerous confrontations, the exact reasons and circumstances for their separation are only vaguely sketched, and the reader feels cheated. By never knowing what went wrong, indifference can be the only reaction to their stabs at reconciliation, and if they did clear the air, the novel would have no dramatic necessity. (Apr.)

The November Criminals Sam Munson. Doubleday, $23.95 (258p) ISBN 978-0-385-53227-3

Munson’s funny, stoner-friendly debut follows high school senior Addison Schacht as he stumbles through the Washington, D.C., teenage underworld to investigate a classmate’s unsolved murder. Schacht—a small-time pot dealer, consummate anti-social, and Jewish collector of Holocaust jokes—makes for a poor but entertaining detective, and when he places a stoned phone call to his prime suspect, Addison and his friends become caught up in the mystery he set out to solve. As Addison’s sleuthing begins to unravel and his life crumbles along with it, his ramblings offer an interesting counter to, and often context for, his misguided attempt to discover the truth. Munson keeps things lightly dark, though his weakness for wandering asides—Addison is just as likely to riff on the Aeneid, Latin syntax, or his favorite movies as he is to discuss his investigation and efforts to outsmart the police—trips up the pace, even if they are what one would expect from a self-absorbed adolescent. The plotting could use some work, but Munson nails the voice. (Apr.)

Matterhorn Karl Marlantes. Grove/Atlantic, $24.95 (592p) ISBN 978-0-8021-1928-5

Thirty years in the making, Marlantes’s epic debut is a dense, vivid narrative spanning many months in the lives of American troops in Vietnam as they trudge across enemy lines, encountering danger from opposing forces as well as on their home turf. Marine lieutenant and platoon commander Waino Mellas is braving a 13-month tour in Quang-Tri province, where he is assigned to a fire-support base and befriends Hawke, older at 22; both learn about life, loss, and the horrors of war. Jungle rot, leeches dropping from tree branches, malnourishment, drenching monsoons, mudslides, exposure to Agent Orange, and wild animals wreak havoc as brigade members face punishing combat and grapple with bitterness, rage, disease, alcoholism, and hubris. A decorated Vietnam veteran, the author clearly understands his playing field (including military jargon that can get lost in translation), and by examining both the internal and external struggles of the battalion, he brings a long, torturous war back to life with realistic characters and authentic, thrilling combat sequences. Marlantes’s debut may be daunting in length, but it remains a grand, distinctive accomplishment. (Apr.)

Freshwater Boys Adam Schuitema. Delphinium (HarperCollins, dist.), $13.95 paper (240p) ISBN 978-1-883285-37-1

Michigan native Schuitema explores the lakeside life of his home state with deep enthusiasm in this debut collection, candidly recounting the passage through childhood, youth, and adulthood. A variety of fears are laid out as his characters come into contact with several incarnations of the inscrutable, from the hermit of “New Era, Michigan,” who lives in a school bus in the woods, to the struggle in “The Lake Effect” of a man’s attempt to balance fatherhood, marriage, and work during a nasty blizzard. Intense attention to geographical detail is chief among Schuitema’s concerns, sometimes to the detriment of narrative structure; most of the stories end with an all too neat flourish. Still, the stories contain numerous moments of memorable, tension-filled sensual descriptions, as in the harrowing search for a missing boy in “Camouflage Fall,” where the “glacial residue glowing under a cool glacial moon” coupled with the notion that a “flashlight seemed like a thin dagger compared to the huge chunks of darkness” stand as one of the book’s many moments of crisp, effective prose. (Apr.)

Think Twice Lisa Scottoline St. Martin’s, $26.99 (384p) ISBN 978-0-312-38075-5

Bestseller Scottoline’s 13th novel centered on the all-female Philadelphia law firm headed by Bennie Rosato (after Lady Killer) offers contrived situations and paper-thin characters on top of a premise that strains credibility. After Bennie’s evil identical twin sister, Alice Connelly, drugs her and leaves her to die, buried in a remote farm field, Alice takes advantage of her physical resemblance to Bennie to assume her identity at the law firm as well as gain access to her wealth and, eventually, her ex-boyfriend. Many will wonder why the ruthless Alice didn’t kill Bennie outright, leaving open the possibility that her victim will escape and attempt to foil her scheme. With authors like Lisa Unger proving that intelligent plotting and page-turning aren’t incompatible, this tired effort is unlikely to win Scottoline new converts. 500,000 first printing; author tour. (Mar.)

Money to Burn James Grippando Harper, $25.99 (368p) ISBN 978-0-06-155630-2

Bestseller Grippando’s overwrought financial thriller gives its hero, Michael Cantella, almost as rude an awakening as Kafka’s Gregor Samsa. Scandals involving subprime lending, short selling, and Ponzi schemes provide a timely backdrop. On the eve of his 35th birthday, Cantella goes from being a star performer at a premier Wall Street investment firm to a financially wiped-out victim of identity theft. His Job-like troubles are just beginning as the fallout not only rocks his second marriage and his firm but sets him up for a life on the run. Grippando (Intent to Kill) keeps the reader guessing why Cantella specifically is targeted and how the vicious and relentless personal attacks relate to the unexplained disappearance (and presumed death) of his first wife on their wedding day seven years earlier. Despite a few plot holes, the dramatic tension remains high with a sadistic hired killer, high-stakes wheeler-dealers, and plenty of cinematic escapes. (Mar.)

Walking to Gatlinburg Howard Frank Mosher. Crown/Shaye Areheart, $25 (352p) ISBN 978-0-307-45067-8

A Civil War odyssey in the tradition of Charles Frazier’s Cold Mountain and Robert Olmstead’s Coal Black Horse, Mosher’s latest (after On Kingdom Mountain), about a Vermont teenager’s harrowing journey south to find his missing-in-action brother, is old-fashioned in the best sense of the word. Seventeen-year-old Morgan Kinneson goes in search of his older brother, Pilgrim, a Union soldier reported MIA at Gettysburg. But first, Morgan accidentally causes the death of a runaway slave he was leading to safety in Canada. In the course of tracking down his missing brother, Morgan is pursued by slave catchers, accompanies an elephant on an Erie Canal showboat, visits the battlefield at Gettysburg, meets an escaped slave who turns out to be the dead slave’s granddaughter, and gets wounded during a mountain feud before learning of Pilgrim’s fate. Complicating matters is a rune stone the dead slave left to Morgan, which could compromise the security of the Underground Railroad if the slave catchers get their hands on it. The story of Morgan’s rite-of-passage through an American arcadia despoiled by war and slavery is an engrossing tale with mass appeal. (Mar.)

Dimiter William Peter Blatty Forge, $24.99 (304p) ISBN 978-0-7653-2512-9

Blatty fans looking for straight-up horror in the vein of The Exorcist will be disappointed, but those with broader tastes will find this a beautifully written, haunting tale of vengeance, spiritual searching, loss, and love. In 1973 Albania, Colonel Vlora (aka “the Interrogator”), the head of a team of torturers, questions “the Prisoner,” who the reader later learns is Paul Dimiter, “an American clandestine agent referred to in some quarters of the world as 'legendary,’ while in others as 'the agent from hell.’ ” (Rumor has it Dimiter poisoned Ho Chi Minh while the Vietnamese leader was visiting Albania shortly before his death in 1969.) Dimiter escapes to Jerusalem, where he encounters a number of engaging characters, including a doctor of neurology, a sharp-tongued nurse, and a grief-stricken Israeli policeman. The complicated plot confounds until the isolated pieces of the psychological puzzle that’s Dimiter match up and fall into place, revealing surprising truths. (Mar.)

Once a Spy Keith Thomson Doubleday, $24.95 (320p) ISBN 978-0-385-53078-1

Huffington Post columnist Thomson’s wildly original debut, a darkly satirical thriller, features an unlikely, if endearing, father-son spy duo: retired appliance salesman Drummond Clark, who at age 64 suffers from Alzheimer’s disease, and Charlie Clark, a down-on-his-luck gambler who owes $23,000 to Russian loan sharks. Soon after Charlie rescues Drummond from the Brooklyn streets, where he’d been wandering, the older man’s house blows up and the two barely escape with their lives. Clark and son begin an adrenaline-fueled cross-country flight in which they must evade ruthless CIA assassins long enough to understand why they’re being targeted. During rare moments of lucidity, Drummond hotwires a car and effortlessly kills multiple assailants, suggesting to Charlie he was once much more than just a washing machine salesman. Poignant themes of love and redemption underpin an action-packed story line that includes exotic locales, high-tech gadgetry, and international intrigue. (Mar.)

The Winter Thief Jenny White Norton, $24.95 (384p) ISBN 978-0-393-07017-0

Set in 1888, White’s gripping third thriller to feature Turkish detective Kamil Pasha (after The Abyssinian Proof) will appeal to fans of Laura Joh Rowland’s Japanese historical series. Like Rowland’s hero, Kamil serves as a special investigator for his country’s ruler (in his case, the sultan of the Ottoman empire), and he must compete for influence with a ruthless and powerful rival. The discovery of a shipment of illegal arms and an explosion and robbery at the Imperial Ottoman Bank compound the sultan’s fears about threats to his rule. The challenges mount for Kamil when Vahid, the vicious head of the secret police, frames him for murder before Kamil can go to the Choruh Valley to find out whether a socialist commune is actually a base for revolutionaries. Vahid plots to gain even more control over the empire by being put in charge of a new intelligence service. While there’s no mystery about who committed the crimes, the atmospherics and period detail are first-rate. (Mar.)

The Hole We’re In Gabrielle Zevin. Grove/Black Cat, $14 paper (304p) ISBN 978-0-8021-1923-0

Zevin (YA novel Memoirs of a Teenage Amnesiac, etc.) delivers in her blazing second adult novel a Corrections for our recessionary times. While Roger Pomeroy spins his middle-aged wheels in graduate school, his wife, George, supports the family mainly via an ever larger number of credit cards opened in her recent college grad son Vinnie’s name. Meanwhile, daughter Helen insists on an expensive wedding, and youngest daughter Patsy gets pregnant and is transferred to a religious school out of state. Struggling to stay afloat, Roger and George deplete Patsy’s college fund, and Patsy in turn enlists in the army for the tuition benefits. She’s sent to Iraq and comes back injured and suffering from PTSD. Roger, in a not-quite-convincing turn, becomes an ultra-conservative Christian pastor, and long-suffering George goes off the deep end. Zevin mixes sharp humor with moments of grace as she gives readers terrific insights into the problems of adult children removing themselves from the influence of parents, and establishes herself as an astute chronicler of the way we spend now. (Mar.)

Spring Break Kayla Perrin St. Martin’s Griffin, $14.99 paper (336p) ISBN 978-0-312-54728-8

Set during spring break on the Caribbean island of Artula, Perrin’s intriguing if flawed romantic thriller centers on the hunt for college student Ashley Hamilton, who disappears after breaking up with her boyfriend, Ryan Sinclair, and meeting Jason Shear, a New York editor who’s researching a story on human trafficking. Jason’s sister disappeared on Artula in 1987, and he’s learned 19 women have gone missing on the resort island in the last seven years. Jason joins forces with Ashley’s friend, Chantelle Higgins, to investigate, while the local authorities remain surprisingly indifferent. After Ashley’s family arrives, the stakes rise with the murder of someone with information he wanted to share with Chantelle. Essence bestseller Perrin (We’ll Never Tell) succeeds in building a mood of nail-biting suspense, but toward the end the plot takes some dubious twists before rushing to a less than convincing resolution. (Mar.)

How to Escape from a Leper Colony Tiphanie Yanique. Graywolf, $15 paper (192p) ISBN 978-1-55597-550-0

The effects of colonialism throb in Yanique’s vivid debut collection. The chilling title story is set in 1939, when the Trinidadian island of Chacachacare was still used as a leper colony; the narrator, a 14-year-old orphan with leprosy, befriends a curious boy her age, Lazaro, whose mother was murdered there when he was a baby, and whose troubled relationship with the nuns leads him to a terrible retribution. “The Bridge Stories” are elucidating snapshots of islanders struggling to carve out lives for themselves on St. Thomas and elsewhere amid an exploitative tourist economy. Yanique frequently dips into rich, fanciful vernacular, such as in “Street Man,” a beautiful, sad glimpse at a doomed love affair between a college student and a St. Croix local. In the affecting novella, “International Shop of Coffins,” Yanique depicts characters of mixed African/Creole/Indian descent torn between the white and island worlds in all their complexity and conflictedness. A smattering of dark humor leavens the tense narratives as Yanique penetrates the perils and pleasures of lives lived outside resort walls. (Mar.)

From the Hilltop: Stories Toni Jensen. Univ. of Nebraska, $19.95 paper (160p) ISBN 978-0-8032-2634-0

The rich array of characters in Jensen’s sobering collection are often Native Americans with one foot in an unforgiving white world and the other in the vanishing Native culture. The young protagonist of “Butter,” admiring the butter sculptures at the Minnesota State Fair, is a Blackfoot girl from the Blood Reserve in Alberta later adopted by a white couple. When a melee breaks out, she finds comforting words for the distressed Dairy Queen that obliterate the ideas each of them has about the other. “At the Powwow Hotel” is an extraordinary, mystical tale: corn has begun reappearing in ancestral cornfields, attracting a migration of Indians and allowing a recent widower and his son to find new purpose in running their West Texas hotel. The title story, chronicling an accident involving a group of drinking kids that leaves one with a life-threatening injury, offers, via a clever use of repetition, a regretful litany of complaints endured as the cost of assimilation into white culture. These stories are as much about tradition as they are about the now; Jensen’s understated and powerful prose easily bridges that divide. (Mar.)

Long Time Coming Robert Goddard Bantam, $15 paper (432p) ISBN 978-0-385-34361-9

In this irresistible thriller full of deceit, duplicity, and vengeance, British author Goddard (Name to a Face) shifts effortlessly between 1976, when 68-year-old Eldritch Swan, thought killed in the Blitz, resurfaces from 36 years in an Irish prison, and 1940, when Eldritch, a cocksure secretary for an unscrupulous Antwerp diamond merchant, Isaac Meridor, prepares to leave for America. The older Eldritch, who appears as weird as his given name implies, assures his nephew, Stephen, he’d been framed in Dublin for unspecified “offenses against the state,” though he admits to helping steal Meridor’s Picasso collection. Eldritch needs Stephen’s help to prove the collection rightfully belongs to Meridor’s wife, daughter, and granddaughter, Rachel Banner. Bit by tantalizing bit the convoluted tale of Eldritch’s unknowing involvement in high wartime crimes and misdemeanors during Britain’s “finest hour” emerges, deftly counterpointed by Stephen’s growing attachment to Rachel. (Mar.)

2017 Olga Slavnikova, trans. from the Russian by Marian Schwartz Overlook, $26.95 (416p) ISBN 978-1-59020-309-5

Set a century after the Russian Revolution, this satirical political thriller, which won “the Russian Booker Prize” in 2006, follows the less than engaging adventures of a Russian gem cutter named Krylov and the consequences of his affair with a virtual stranger. Heavy-handed parody undercuts Slavnikona’s attempt to sound a warning about the future direction of Russia. For example, a few months after the U.S. president, Pamela Armstrong, perishes in a terrorist attack in Beirut, Armstrong’s image appears on a new $600 bill, and her biography, “which was published with lightning speed in every language,” emphasizes her having adopted “eighteen orphans of every existing skin color, from a Yakut as yellow as melted grease to a blue-black girl from Ghana.” Fantasy elements, like the disappearances related to a mountain spirit known as the Stone Maiden, may remind some of The Master and Margarita, but American readers should be prepared for a futuristic fable that falls far short of Bulgakov’s masterpiece. (Mar.)

King, Ship and Sword Dewey Lambdin. St. Martin’s/Dunne, $25.99 (368p) ISBN 978-0-312-55184-1

Alan Lewrie, intrepid sailor and charming scoundrel, is back in Lambdin’s superb 16th Royal Navy adventure. Lewrie is an endearing character—hero, philanderer, smuggler, spy: a courageous naval officer unencumbered by high morals or indecision—and during the brief peace between England and France in 1801, while on a reconciliation vacation to Paris with his wife, Lewrie encounters old enemies and former lovers, all seeking revenge for past injuries and insults. A botched audience with Napoleon Bonaparte sets assassins on Lewrie’s trail, and after they kill someone close to Lewrie, he vows bloody revenge. When war resumes in 1803, he is given command of a heavily armed frigate and another chance to go to sea and kill Frenchmen. The harrowing sea adventures that follow take Lewrie and his crew from France to Louisiana and put Lewrie’s seamanship and quick thinking to the test. As expected, Lambdin leaves just enough loose ends in this swashbuckler to ensure there will be another sequel of intrigue and cannonballs. (Mar.)

Postcards from a Dead Girl Kirk Farber Harper Perennial, $13.99 paper (288p) ISBN 978-0-06-183447-9

Sid Higgins, the appealing, self-deprecating narrator of Farber’s poignant, funny debut, has been receiving postcards from his old girlfriend Zoe. Unfortunately, the whimsical Zoe has disappeared, and the postmarks on the cards are more than a year old. Though he doesn’t really expect to find her, Sid travels to Europe in search of Zoe. Since Sid works for a travel agency, a slick telephone operation that uses the amusingly named Randomizer to dial potential clients, the trip is easy to arrange. Sid plaintively and self-mockingly relates his interactions with his boss, Steve; his neighbor, “Gerald the Post Office Guy”; and, most of all, his dog, Zero, whose deftly described postures convey so much, though perhaps not quite as much as Sid reads into them. Sid’s older sister, Natalie, a doctor who provides welcome perspective on Sid, is by turns affectionate, irritated, supportive, and occasionally fed up. The reader is likely to feel the same. (Mar.)

Do They Know I’m Running? David Corbett Ballantine, $15 paper (464p) ISBN 978-0-8129-7755-4

Corbett (Blood of Paradise) delivers a rich, hard-hitting epic that illuminates the violent and surreal landscapes of Central America and Mexico. After 18-year-old Roque Montalvo’s uncle, Faustino, an illegal Salvadoran immigrant, is deported in an INS sweep, Roque’s criminal cousin, Pablo “Happy” Orantes, cooks up a scheme to smuggle Faustino back to California, along with a mysterious Palestinian asylum seeker, but it involves a hefty price to Latin American thugs. Happy strikes a deal with an FBI agent, offering up a major drug dealer for his family’s citizenship papers. Roque travels from California to El Salvador, where he discovers that the gangsters want him to deliver a beautiful girl about his age, Lupe, to a vicious border crime leader. Roque and Lupe embark on an unforgettable journey north, pursued by banditos, police, and the FBI. Of course, Roque falls for Lupe and vows to help her escape a dismal fate. Fans of Luis Alberto Urrea and Don Winslow alike will be richly rewarded. (Mar.)

Easy for You Shannan Rouss. Simon & Schuster, $12 paper (176p) ISBN 978-1-4391-4835-8

This debut collection of L.A. stories concentrates its efforts, overwhelmingly, on the mostly failing love lives of its mostly female first-person protagonists. At its best, the stories are bittersweet, but Rouss often veers into cliché and melodrama. “Die Meant Enough” is an unflinching description of life as the new girlfriend of a divorcing man, and is threaded with humor and messiness reminiscent of Lorrie Moore. “Swans by the Hour” delivers a heartfelt narrative about a man who hosts his ex-girlfriend’s wedding. Despite some phoned-in bits (the awkward toast; a tedious description of the narrator’s fabulous home), it beautifully illustrates regret and desperation. But Rouss’s well-crafted prose cannot save her from the cartoonishness of many of her story’s characters. “Beverly Hills Adjacent” features a stock grumpy old man, a hapless, repressed racist whose new neighbors are savvy, very kind Iranian-Americans. Frequently, there are pregnancies (“Dog People,” “Last Ice Age,” “Easy for You”) and the ambivalence the protagonists feel about them, as well as marriages and the ambivalence the characters feel about them. The prose can be quite good, but Rouss’s thin, one-note L.A. gets tiresome. (Mar.)

Stations West Allison Amend. Louisiana State Univ., $18.95 paper (264p) ISBN 978-0-8071-3617-1

Amend’s debut novel (after the collection Things That Pass for Love) is the thin and grim multigenerational story of a pioneer family hacking its way through the frontier states, beginning with the 1880 marriage of Jewish-Cherokee dishwasher Moshe Haurowitz to pregnant Irish prostitute Alice O’Malley in Orerich, Colo. After Moshe abandons Alice and baby Garfield, he works for the railroad and later returns to fetch Garfield, father and son eventually settling in Denton Station, Okla., where they form a business partnership with a family of Swedes headed by Fritz and Rika. Garfield, now a hotheaded adolescent, falls in love with Fritz and Rika’s pregnant daughter, Dora, and runs away to ride the rails, changing his name and staking his fortune in oil before settling down in “the land of misfits and can’t-get-alongs.” Amend dashes through some 50 years and four generations, but the brisk pace shortchanges drama and character development—except for Garfield, who emerges as a shrewd and forceful personality—and leaves the reader feeling underwhelmed by what could be an immersive epic. (Mar.)

The Scarlet Lion Elizabeth Chadwick. Sourcebooks Landmark, $14.99 paper (576p) ISBN 978-1-4022-2999-2

William Marshal returns in this sequel to The Greatest Knight with the older and wiser William well settled with his wife, Isabelle de Clare, and their ever-growing brood. However, he is now in uneasy service to King John, who suspects William for his ties to John’s late brother Richard I, but cannot openly despise the powerful earl’s allegiance. Still, ever spiteful John systematically strips William of titles, power, honors, and even his son, Will, who the king demands as his squire. Then John dies suddenly, and William must take the rebellious kingdom in hand and assume the regency. Chadwick delivers another accomplished historical, albeit without the thrills of its predecessor. Like William, the story is too settled and comfortable to be as exciting as the story of the young knight on the rise, but the in-depth exploration of the intrigues of King John’s court is riveting. Isabelle remains a powerful noblewoman and excellent match for William. This will be best appreciated by fans of Chadwick’s other work or readers curious to learn more about medieval England. (Mar.)

Dancing for Degas Kathryn Wagner. Bantam, $15 paper (400p) ISBN 978-0-385-34386-2

From Wagner’s debut, a fictional portrait of an aspiring ballerina who inspires famous works of art by Edgar Degas, a living picture emerges of dancers at the turn-of-the-20th-century Paris Opera. After gangly 12-year-old Alexandrie’s brother marries a girl even poorer than himself, Alexandrie becomes her provincial family’s last hope for prosperity, and soon she’s taking lessons in ballet and culture to prepare herself for Paris society. Once in Paris, Alexandrie follows star performer Cornelie’s lead and quickly snags a prospective patron, but she’s most powerfully drawn to Degas, who captures on canvas the dancers’ beauty and humanity. Like Tracy Chevalier, Wagner imagines how layers of meaning pervade works of art, but her real forte is detailing the sexual politics of poverty and evoking the rivalry among dancers, especially between stars and the newcomers who wish to replace them. Wagner’s description of art and sacrifice in old Paris doesn’t have the heft of the classics, but her abandonment of the masterpiece-in-the-making formula is a nice turn. (Mar.)

A Million Blessings Angela Benson, Marilynn Griffith, Tia McCollors. Kensington/Dafina, $14 paper (320p) ISBN 978-0-7582-4211-2

Three popular African-American novelists address the topic of sudden prosperity in novellas that each feature characters winning the lottery, a popular fantasy for millions— disproportionately in hardscrabble neighborhoods—about acquiring millions. Benson presents Andrew Gooden, an assistant pastor with a hidden gambling problem. Griffith’s story centers on pro football player Craig Richards, who loses his career, trophy wife, and palatial home following an injury. McCollors creates motorcycle-riding Dara Knight, whose lottery win fuels her dream of refurbishing the dilapidated neighborhood where she does outreach for her church. Each writer offers nice touches of observation or dialogue that move things along in brisk and clever ways. All three offer traditional Christian ways of thinking about character redemption, using an unsubtle approach to painting the moral to these stories about how to use money. Benson and Griffith write with more satisfying arcs of resolution; McCollors’s tale just gets going as it ends. The work feels somewhat hasty, but fans will like it. (Mar.)

Forget Me Not Vicki Hinze. Multnomah, $13.99 paper (352p) ISBN 978-1-60142-205-7

Author of more than 20 novels of romance and suspense and three works of nonfiction, Hinze has written a masterful, complicated tale of suspense that gains momentum with each turn of a page. Her writing flows surely, moving from one character to the next, one setting to another, with readers keeping the swift pace. . Benjamin Brandt, owner of the Crossroads Crisis Center, hasn’t set foot in the center since his wife and son were murdered a few years earlier. Then Susan comes to the center, beaten and battered, suffering a case of amnesia, and also bearing a close resemblance to Benjamin’s deceased wife, also named Susan, and wearing the dead woman’s cross necklace. The two clash at first, but even as murders occur around them, the tension between them relaxes. Still, there is a mystery to be solved involving Susan’s identity and a past that must be reckoned with before either can move ahead. Hinze’s plot may have readers puzzling over how this tangled tale will ever resolve itself, but that underestimates the author’s talent for transforming the unlikely into something beautiful. (Mar.)

Going Through Ghosts Mary Sojourner. Univ. of Nevada, $25 paper (280p) ISBN 978-0-87417-809-8

Sojourner’s suspenseful and finely observed second novel (after several story collections and works of nonfiction) reaches deeply into Native American lore as it pursues an unlikely friendship between two hard-luck women—one living, one dead. Maggie Foltz (aka Maggie May “for tips”) is a cocktail waitress with a heart of gold at the Crystal Casino in Creosote, Nev. At 54, Maggie is weary of falling for charismatic men and helps Sarah, a young transient, get a job at the casino. Sarah, who grew up in the small Willow tribe of Bone Lake, has fled man trouble of her own, and the two women become pals—all too briefly before Sarah is murdered. However, their friendship only intensifies from here on, as Sarah returns—with the help of the Willow healer Minnie Siyala—and guides Maggie back to Bone Lake to resolve spiritual issues. In punchy, alternating points of view, Sojourner introduces potential murderers and plenty of quirky customers as Maggie helps Sarah’s spirit transition to what comes next. Sojourner’s sympathy for her characters is palpable and gracious, making this a notable and worthy effort. (Mar.)

Magnolia Wednesdays Wendy Wax. Berkley, $15 paper (448p) ISBN 978-0-425-23235-4

Life in Atlanta’s suburbs becomes a hot topic for a mom-to-be who knows more about news than diapers in Wax’s bittersweet potboiler. After investigative TV reporter Vivien Armstrong Gray gets shot in the butt while chasing a story, she becomes an overnight sensation, but that doesn’t keep the newsroom from adding attractive new talent to her department. Seeing the writing on the wall, Vivien quits, but soon learns that finding a job isn’t so easy for a newly pregnant 41-year old. She relocates to suburban Atlanta and lands a column writing about suburbia from an outsider perspective. She finds plenty of fodder in her family, but her questions about the death of her sister’s husband may have serious consequences. Vivien’s an easy protagonist to love; she’s plucky, resourceful, and witty—the perfect outsider’s guide to the SUV and bake sale zoo. (Mar.)

Lonely Hearts Killer Tomoyuki Hoshino, trans. from the Japanese by Adrienne Carey Hurley. PM Press (IPG, dist.), $15.95 paper (288p) ISBN 978-1-60486-084-9

Something feels lost in translation in Hoshino’s parable-like tale of intrigue set in a conformist island nation that bears a striking resemblance to Japan. After the popular young emperor dies and is replaced by his less-than-competent sister, two alienated young men post online a personal/political manifesto and participate in a murder-suicide that sparks wave after wave of copycat murder-suicides. Narration is then assumed by Iroha, a young woman who was connected to both men and is now hidden away at a mountain retreat because she fears for her life and wants to avoid the public scorn stemming from her relationship with originators of the murder-suicide trend. Unfortunately, the prose is achingly dull, and the narrative’s lack of focus prevents readers from connecting. Clearly, there’s supposed to be symbolic and satirical significance, but the lack of clarity—both in the writing and the concept—is deadly. (Mar.)

Mystery

A Darker God: A Laetitia Talbot Mystery Barbara Cleverly Bantam, $15 paper (416p) ISBN 978-0-385-33991-9

Set in 1928, Cleverly’s third Laetitia Talbot mystery (after 2008’s Bright Hair About the Bone) offers a cleverer puzzle than its predecessors, but fails to measure up to her Joe Sandilands historical series (Folly du Jour, etc.). In Athens, the stabbed body of Sir Andrew Merriman turns up during a rehearsal of an English production of Aeschylus’ Agamemnon. Merriman, a classics scholar, was about to finish writing a biography of Alexander the Great that would answer two burning questions about the conqueror—the identity of his murderer and the location of his tomb. Fortuitously, Det. Chief Insp. Percy Montacute of Scotland Yard, who recently has been “[s]econded to Athens” as a CID officer, is a member of the play’s cast. Aided by archeologist Talbot, Montacute investigates. Talbot, who had an affair with Merriman, is a less memorable lead than such other female sleuths of the same period as Maisie Dobbs and Phryne Fisher. (Apr.)

Freeze Frame Peter May Poisoned Pen, $24.95 (294p) ISBN 978-1-59058-694-5; $14.95 paper ISBN 978-1-59058-717-1

May’s excellent fourth Enzo McLeod mystery (after 2008’s Blacklight Blue) takes the Scottish forensics wizard, who impulsively bet his daughter’s boyfriend he could solve seven cold cases, to the Ile de Groix off the coast of Brittany, where he may finally meet his Waterloo. The quaint island is the site of the notorious 1990 slaying of tropical disease specialist and entomologist Adam Killian in his study. For two decades the crime scene—and the cryptic hints Killian supposedly left to identify his killer—have remained as undisturbed as an insect frozen in amber. Can Macleod, distracted by personal dramas that involve his sometime lover, Charlotte, and a menacing stalker, decipher the message—and stay in one piece? With its intricate plot, compelling characters, and bombshell denouement, this unsettling Enzo Files installment is a must-read. (Mar.)

Water Hazard Don Dahler Minotaur, $24.99 (272p) ISBN 978-0-312-38353-4

Readers should be prepared for lengthy golf descriptions in Dahler’s slightly better follow-up to 2009’s A Tight Lie, which introduced pro golfer Huck Doyle, a nonpracticing lawyer who works as a PI in Los Angeles. Sing Ten Wong, the wealthy banker father of Rick, an old law school buddy of Huck’s, has secured him a place in the Sony Open in Hawaii, an opportunity for the struggling Huck to regain his lost status on the PGA Tour. Before the start of the tournament, during a practice round at Waialae Country Club, someone shoots the senior Wong in the back, apparently with a high-powered rifle, from the direction of the ocean. Rick asks his friend to investigate, suspecting that the killing may be connected with a huge bank merger his father was working on. Huck’s digging soon triggers a hostile response from some bad guys, who ransack his hotel room and attempt to warn him off. The solution may disappoint mystery fans. (Mar.)

Antiques Bizarre: A Trash ’n’ Treasure Mystery Barbara Allan Kensington, $22 (240p) ISBN 978-0-7582-3421-6

In Allan’s giddy fourth antiques mystery set in the Midwestern Mississippi River town of Serenity (after 2008’s Antiques Flee Market), Vivian Borne persuades elderly Nastasya Petrova to contribute her Fabergé egg to a charity auction for Serenity flood victims. When Madam Petrova dies in a mass poisoning at the auction and someone pushes the winning bidder for the Fabergé egg, a Chicago art dealer, down a spiral staircase to his death, Vivian and daughter Brandy swing into dizzy detecting mode. Brandy must cope with morning sickness (she’s a surrogate carrier for close friends) and digest the news from her biological mom that her biological dad is a U.S. senator, but these distractions don’t prevent Brandy from getting closer to hunky Serenity police chief Tony Cassato as more bodies pile up. Auction tips and a recipe for spicy beef stew enhance this satirical cozy. Allan is the husband-wife writing team of Max Allan Collins and Barbara Collins. (Mar.)

The Fall David Fulmer Five Stones (www.fivestonesllc.com), $14 paper (282p) ISBN 978-0-9776729-3-6

Set in 2002, this stand-alone will likely disappoint fans of Shamus-winner Fulmer’s acclaimed Valentine St. Cyr series set in early 20th-century New Orleans (Lost River, etc.). Richard Zale, a New York City actor who makes his living from doing TV commercials, starts thinking by chance of his best friend, Joey Sesto, back in their hometown of Wyanossing, Pa. When Richard tries to phone Joey, he reaches Joey’s sister, Angela, his old flame. A distraught Angela reveals Joey fell to his death from a cliff three weeks earlier. Impulsively, Richard drives to Wyanossing, where he becomes convinced Joey was the victim of foul play. Newly attracted to Angela, he puts off his return to his wife and kids in Manhattan again and again. Heavy-handed prose (“Somewhere in that dark shade lurked an evil that had been visited upon my friend”) doesn’t help a routine tale of amateur detecting. (Mar.)

Naked Moon Domenic Stansberry Minotaur, $24.99 (304p) ISBN 978-0-312-36454-0

In Edgar-winner Stansberry’s strong fourth novel to feature San Francisco PI Dante Mancuso (after 2008’s The Ancient Rain), leaked secrets about “the company,” Mancuso’s shadowy former employer (“a front for intelligence operations”), prompt the company to end the stalemate that allowed Dante to walk away in the previous book. Meanwhile, Leanora Chin, a cop with Special Investigations, is threatening Dante’s cousin Gary, who runs a shady warehouse operation. Gary fears the wrath of the powerful Wu Benevolent Association if he cooperates with Chin. The company tells Gary it can halt the investigation if Dante will help the company. Trapped in a three-way vise, Dante searches for a way to neutralize the explicit threats to his cousin and others dear to him, while knowing that the only permanent solution is to disappear. San Francisco’s North Beach is a virtual character as the stoic Dante fearlessly plays out the poor hand he’s been dealt against a table of sharks with all the chips in the pot. (Mar.)

The Terror and the Tortoiseshell John Travis Atomic Fez (www.atomicfez.com), $34.99 (304p) ISBN 978-0-9811597-3-7

Animal Farm meets The Big Sleep in this quirky but compelling hard-boiled mystery, the first in a new series, from British author Travis (Mostly Monochrome Stories). A mysterious event has reversed the roles of animals and humans in England. In an instant, pets have grown in height, gained the ability to speak, and started assuming the jobs of their former masters. People have become the animals’ pets or playthings in a savage outburst of revenge. Some animals oppose the violence, in particular, a cat who adopts the name and profession of his owner, becoming “Benji Spriteman, Detective.” Travis packs a lot in, including a twisty whodunit plot, humorous sequences to leaven the grimness, and a cult persuaded that Arthur Machen’s 1917 novella, The Terror, is a true account of an animal revolt in Britain. Despite superficial resemblances to Tim Davys’s Amberville (2009), a crime novel featuring walking and talking stuffed animals, this is a far superior work with a more fully realized imaginary world. (Mar.)

The Lord Is My Shepherd (The Psalm 23 Mysteries) Debbie Viguié. Abingdon, $13.99 paper (320p) ISBN 978-1-4267-0189-4

Prolific fantasy and YA author Viguié (coauthor of the Wicked series) adds a new genre with this mystery, a sort of cozy but not entirely. Church secretary Cindy Preston stumbles over a dead body at First Shepherd Presbyterian; racing almost immediately to her aid is Jeremiah Silverman, rabbi of the neighboring synagogue, who can bust some pretty good moves from having spent his youth in Israel. It’s clear soon enough that the events of Christian Holy Week, which coincide with the celebration of Passover for Silverman and his congregants, have special significance for the killer, and Cindy, Jeremiah, and Det. Mark Walters work to solve the mystery while the killer continues. Many elements are blended: murder mystery, comical church staff, a soupçon of romantic tension, interfaith exploration, backstories that get a tad of exposure (series writer Viguié knows how to lay groundwork for follow-ups). The result is uneven, although promising enough to draw fans; some Christian fiction readers might question the serial-killer plot element. (Mar.)

SF/Fantasy/Horror

The Lucky Strike Kim Stanley Robinson PM (IPG, dist.), $12 paper (122p) ISBN 978-1-60486-085-6

Hugo-winning novelist Robinson (Galileo’s Dream) began his career with short fiction. “The Lucky Strike,” a novelette first published in 1984, posits an alternate history in which the Enola Gay crashes on a test run before dropping the first atomic bomb. Replacement bombardier Capt. Frank January deliberately misses Hiroshima, but the Japanese analyze the explosions and surrender anyway. January is executed for disobeying orders, becoming a martyr who inspires total nuclear disarmament by 1956. Robinson’s skill with human drama lends credibility to an otherwise wildly optimistic scenario. The volume also includes a short essay on whether history follows laws akin to physics, and an interview with Robinson conducted by fellow radical SF author Terry Bisson. This stimulating little chapbook would work very well as a basis for classroom debate on speculative fiction, history, or the notion of free will. (Mar.)

The Dead Travel Fast Deanna Raybourn Mira, $13.95 paper (320p) ISBN 978-0-7783-2765-3

Excitement, danger, and romance await independent, headstrong writer Theodora Lestrange when she flees 1858 Scotland and miserable spinsterhood for the wilds of Transylvania, joining a childhood friend who will soon be wed. Ensconced in a crumbling castle steeped in sinister legend, Theodora finds herself drawn equally to its gloomy atmosphere and its rakish master, Count Andrei Dragulescu. Rita Award—winning author Raybourn (the Lady Julia Grey series) delightfully evokes the language, tension, and sweeping grandeur of 19th-century gothic novels. Theodora is a delightful heroine, so much so that cruel, petty, misogynistic Andrei never really seems worthy of her. The book unfortunately drags during the middle, and its leading man’s motives are confused throughout, but Raybourn’s intriguing treatment of vampire legends will delight fans of the genre. (Mar.)

Empire in Black and Gold Adrian Tchaikovsky Pyr, $16 paper (418p) ISBN 978-1-61614-192-9

Longtime epic fantasy readers will find many familiar elements in this intriguing debut. There’s the peaceful, vulnerable land, in this case the Lowlands, threatened by the Mongol-like Wasp Empire. The lone man who sees the danger is unwilling Lowlands spymaster Stenwald Maker. A charmingly diverse group of agents and allies draws from most of the strictly delineated insect-themed clans (which rather resemble the character classes of role-playing games) and runs the gamut from naïve student to embittered mercenary. Patriotic but conflicted Wasp Thalric puts a sympathetic face on evil. Tchaikovsky exercises considerable talent in assembling these well-worn pieces into a new puzzle, developing an interesting story and world with humor and skillful prose. Readers may be pleasantly surprised to find themselves looking forward to future installments. (Mar.)

Shadows in the Cave Caleb Fox Tor, $24.99 (320p) ISBN 978-0-7653-1993-7

Fox weaves a colorful tale of ancient Cherokee legends, magic, and the beings known as the Immortals, the creators of the world. Years after the events of 2009’s Zadayi Red, Shonan is chief of his people and refuses to allow his family to use magic, which he blames for a great loss. But his son, Aku, inherited his mother’s shape-shifting ability and longs to use it. Just as he begins to learn his power, he encounters a violent tribe called the Brown Leaf People and is forced on a quest to the Darkening Land, the underworld, to save his sister and father with the help of his great-grandmother and unusual companions. Readers who like plenty of introspection to accompany their spell casting will enjoy this exploration of Cherokee lore combined with a classic coming-of-age narrative. (Mar.)

The Hundred Thousand Kingdoms N.K. Jemisin Orbit, $13.99 paper (432p) ISBN 978-0-316-04391-5

Convoluted without being dense, Jemisin’s engaging debut grabs readers right from the start. Yeine desires nothing more than a normal life in her “barbarian” homeland of Darr. But her mother was of the powerful Arameri family, and when Yeine is summoned to the capital city of Sky a month after her mother’s murder, she cannot refuse. Dakarta, her grandfather and the Arameri patriarch, pits her against her two cousins as a potential heir to the throne. In an increasingly deep Zelaznyesque series of political maneuverings, Yeine, nearly powerless but fiercely determined, finds potential allies among her relatives and the gods who are forced to live in Sky as servants after losing an ancient war. Multifaceted characters struggle with their individual burdens and desires, creating a complex, edge-of-your-seat story with plenty of funny, scary, and bittersweet twists. (Mar.)

Where Angels Fear to Tread Thomas E. Sniegoski Roc, $14 paper (304p) ISBN 978-0-451-46314-2

The pedestrian third novel in Sniegoski’s Remy Chandler series (after 2009’s Dancing on the Head of a Pin) finds the Seraphim-turned-PI drawn into the case of a missing little girl with prophetic gifts. Also searching for the child is the biblical character Delilah, now cursed to endless life without love. Naturally, the blind but still powerful Samson also gets drawn into the mix, as do the followers of the ancient god Dagon, leading to an inevitable (and interminable) showdown in Dagon’s West Virginia lair. Chandler is a great lead, but the interesting supporting characters take a back seat to the generically villainous Delilah, the blustering Samson, and the missing girl’s bland parents. Fans of Chandler will enjoy his developing character, but there’s little to distinguish the book within the paranormal PI genre. (Mar.)

Taming the Moon Sherrill Quinn Brava, $14 paper (288p) ISBN 978-0-7582-3191-8

Quinn packs plenty of sex and suspense into her third werewolf novel. This time Chief Insp. Rory “Sully” Sullivan of Scotland Yard is in trouble. Eddy, the sociopathic Alpha of a New York werewolf pack, had sent Olivia Felan to kill Sully in 2009’s Seducing the Moon. She accidentally turned him into a werewolf instead. Eddy is still holding Olivia’s daughter, six-year-old Zoe, as hostage, and when he demands that Olivia finish the job, she doesn’t think she can refuse. Soon Olivia and Sully join forces to take out Eddy, rescue Zoe, and have hot sex at every opportunity. But Sully has sworn revenge on the werewolf who turned him. What will he do when he finds out it’s the woman he’s falling for? Quinn reliably spices the action with explicit scenes that will keep readers hot and happy. (Mar.)

Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter Seth Grahame-Smith Grand Central, $21.99 (352p) ISBN 978-0-446-56308-6

Following the success of his bestselling Pride and Prejudice and Zombies with another mélange of history and horror, Grahame-Smith inserts a grandiose and gratuitous struggle with vampires into Abraham Lincoln’s life. Lincoln learns at an early age that his mother was killed by a supernatural predator. This provokes his bloody but curiously undocumented lifelong vendetta against vampires and their slave-owning allies. The author’s decision to reduce slavery to a mere contrivance of the vampires is unfortunate bordering on repellent, but at least it does distract the reader from the central question of why the president never saw fit to inform the public of the supernatural menace. Grahame-Smith stitches hand-to-hand vampire combat into Lincoln’s documented life with competent prose that never quite manages to convince. (Mar.)

The Sorcerer’s House Gene Wolfe Tor, $24.99 (304p) ISBN 978-0-7653-2458-0

World Fantasy Award—winning novelist Wolfe (An Evil Guest) spins a complex, spellbinding web of otherworldly sorcery and hauntings. When scholar and ex-con Baxter Dunn arrives in the Midwest town of Medicine Man, he learns that a mysterious benefactor has deeded him a rambling old house. As the building grows around him, Bax encounters a number of wonders and terrors, including family secrets, windows into Faerie, and a murderous animal dubbed the Hound of Horror. However, the greatest challenge Bax faces may be his twin brother’s jealousy and rage. Both terrifying and touching, this book of wonders speaks eloquently about the nature of responsibility and family, but Wolfe’s unforgettable world is marred by stereotypes—a flighty and submissive Japanese woman, a scandalmongering journalist, a rapacious and sadistic dwarf—and a rushed, incoherent ending. (Mar.)

Mass Market

Out of Body Stella Cameron Mira, $7.99 (400p) ISBN 978-0-7783-2762-2

Bestseller Cameron (All Smiles) launches a confident and compulsively readable paranormal romantic suspense series. Descended from a long line of psychics, Marley Millet has been seeing terrifying visions of young women being tortured and killed by an Embran, an underworld creature with a grudge against Marley’s ancestors. Marley turns to the police for help, but no one believes her except Gray Fisher, a retired cop turned journalist who interviewed many of the victims. Gray soon finds that working with Marley awakens his latent psychic powers as well as a smoldering attraction to his crime-solving partner. Cameron compellingly develops the sexy, bold protagonists and Marley’s charming family as she strikes the perfect balance of action, sassy dialogue, and steamy love scenes: never excessive, just enough to leave readers wanting more. (Mar.)

City of War Neil Russell Harper, $7.99 (496p) ISBN 978-0-06-172168-7

Russell’s uneven debut pits hunky billionaire adventurer Rail Black against an unlikely combo of villains. Stuck in L.A. freeway gridlock, Rail is shocked to see drop-dead gorgeous Kimberly York, entirely naked, escape from a nearby van. She winds up in his Rolls-Royce and soon reveals that she possesses information of a highly sensitive nature, which has made her a target. Rail wants to help her, but his only lead is the enigmatic phrase “city of war,” and there’s little excitement in his efforts to glean further clues from the kind of offbeat friends and colleagues that only billionaire adventurers seem to have. There’s not enough action for a thriller and not enough intrigue for a mystery, and a glut of description and dialogue will leave readers snoozing. (Mar.)

Shock and Awe David Isaak Pan (IPG/Trafalgar Square, dist.), $8.95 (472p) ISBN 978-0-230-70004-8

The goal is to fight terrorism with terrorism in Isaak’s action-packed debut. Cashiered Special Forces operative Carla Smukowski, devastated by her brother’s death at the hands of Iraqi terrorists, is lured into an anti-Arab conspiracy. Financed by a politically connected billionaire, Carla trains American militia members to hijack a nuke and divert it to Mecca. Undercover FBI agent Boyce Hammond must pretend support while secretly sabotaging the project, struggling with his relationship with another militia member, and flirting with Carla. Strong female characters, complex questions of loyalty and patriotism, moral gray areas, and an effective depiction of paramilitary psychological and interpersonal dynamics bring unusual depth, but the story’s power is undermined by Bush-era politics (this U.K. import was first published in 2007, and it shows) and an unfortunate twist that leads to an anticlimactic ending. (Mar.)

Cat’s Claw Amber Benson Ace, $7.99 (320p) ISBN 978-0-441-01843-7

Benson follows up Death’s Daughter with a complicated, slow-moving tale. Being the half-human daughter of the Grim Reaper has advantages—such as immortality—but Calliope Reaper-Jones would rather just get on with her ordinary life in New York City. Then Callie learns that her lost love may still be alive; a dangerous cat-shaped spirit guide seeks human form; and Cerberus, the three-headed guardian of Hell, demands Callie locate and turn over a mysterious architect who’s gone missing. Callie bounces from twist to twist as she explores Benson’s richly imagined world, where multiple mythologies blend, and the afterlife is run as a corporation. The chick lit voice gets its share of laughs, but the frenzied pace fails to hide the lack of heart or the sense that this time around, the stakes never really amount to much. (Mar.)

Comics

Greek Street, Vol. 1: Blood Calls for Blood Peter Milligan and Davide Gianfelice. DC/Vertigo, $9.99 (144p) ISBN 978-1-4012-2573-5

Inspired by classical Greek dramas, the series constructs a crime epic following intertwined stories in modern London and most succeeds in channeling the shock value of the original works. At the center is Eddie, the young man whose effort to rediscover his family leads to disaster. There’s also Detective Daedalus, whose murder investigation turns bizarre when the victim returns from the dead as an enraged monster, and organized crime boss Harold Furey and his sons. While Milligan borrows characters’ names from ancient Greek tales, the story is not a direct retelling of any of these. Instead it employs a few of the original plot elements with an overall tone evocative of the ancient Greek tragedies. The often shocking violence and sex of the old plays and myths is presented so as to have the same effect on a modern audience that the original works had over 2,000 years ago. Artist Gianfelice doesn’t shy away from gore or nudity, but his greatest strength is the expressive faces of the characters. Every look of anguish, suspicion, lust, and fear is rendered successfully to draw readers into the story. (Mar.)

The Unclothed Man in the 35th Century A.D. Dash Shaw Fantagraphics, $19.99 (104p) ISBN 978-1-60699-307-1

Collecting storyboards and comics from the animated series created for the Independent Film Channel along with short stories previously presented in Mome, this anthology spotlights Shaw’s complex visual poetry about human relationships. The book opens with alternating full stories and storyboards taken from Shaw’s work on his animated project, about a special agent in the far future sent to impersonate a robotic life model at an art school in order to secretly break the custom against drawing real human beings. Shaw’s artwork creates a unique, fantastic future and gives the reader insight into his creative process through its presentation of multiple stages of production. The rest of the book assembles short pieces on how people relate to each other. Often with elements of science fiction and distorted time presentation, the best of these, “First Son of Terra Two” combines both into a story of a man and a woman from different worlds, each traveling in an opposite direction in time. In a stunning display of visual creativity, each story has its own distinct artistic style and presentation format. Color and shape serve as language as much as if not more than written words in this striking collection. (Jan.)

Crossing the Empty Quarter and Other Stories Carol Swain Dark Horse, $24.95 (200p) ISBN 978-1-59582-388-5

This career-spanning collection of Swain’s short stories is a needed retrospective on an underrated cartoonist. Swain trained as a painter, and her comics are distinguished by an accomplished, atmospheric tonal style that delicately shades her carefully observed, heavily stylized characters and landscapes. Her panels feature striking compositions within a strict grid for panel layouts that enables startling transitions keeping the reader off balance. The stories vary from slight incident or political parable to visual tone poem, usually building to an oblique punch line. In some, Swain refracts subcultural narrative traditions through a blue-collar, British sensibility; other pieces are merely elusive to a fault. Many of her best stories take place in a literal nowhere—an uncharted land (in the title story), an obsidian deposit, a toxic shore—but even in recognizable landscapes characters seem to be on an endless search. The book is rounded out by some sharp political work, including an effective piece recapitulating the well-documented barriers Florida voters encountered in the 2000 U.S. presidential election. The collection overall makes a case for Swain as a visual storyteller whose unmistakable style will surely earn her followers willing to forgive the occasional slight plot line. (Dec.)

Sublife: Vol. 2 John Pham Fantagraphics, $8.99 paper (48p) ISBN 978-1-60699-309-5

The second volume of Pham’s biannual anthology continues some stories from the first and adds several new ones. In the space adventure that begins the book, Pham uses spectacular imagery to convey the experience of a time/space warp, symmetrically drawn designs that are precise, hallucinatory, and fascinating. A brief episode from the “Sycamore St.” story about a household of white supremacists is followed by a short autobiographical strip in which fragmented panels recall episodes from grade school. Pham’s sharp sense of humor makes an appearance in a strip about conflict between bloggers, and the final, long story, which is wordless, expresses a powerful sense of darkness as much through its moody shading as through its violent events. The variety of stories and styles is unified by duotone inking and thin, precise lines, and Pham’s consistently innovative graphic storytelling makes every page of this short volume worth dwelling on. A gem. (Dec.)