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Red Hook Road Ayelet Waldman. Doubleday, $25.95 (352p) ISBN 978-0-385-51786-7

Waldman (Love and Other Impossible Pursuits) delivers a dense story of irreparable loss that tracks two families across four summers. After John Tetherly and Becca Copaken die in a freak car accident an hour after their wedding, their families are left to bridge stark class and cultural divides, and eventually forge deep-rooted bonds thanks to the twin deities of love and music. Becca's family is well off, from New York, and summers in Red Hook, Maine, a small coastal town where John's blue-collar single mother, Jane, cleans houses for a living. They interact, awkwardly, over how to bury the couple, the staging of an anniversary party, and over Jane's adopted niece, whose amazing musical talent makes a connection to Becca's ailing grandfather, a virtuoso violinist, who agrees to give her lessons. Becca's younger sister, Ruthie, a Fulbright scholar, meanwhile, falls in love with John's younger brother, Matt, the first Tetherly to go to college, before he drops out to work at a boatyard and finish restoring his brother's sailboat, which he plans on sailing to the Caribbean. Though Waldman is often guilty of overwriting here, the narrative is well crafted, and each of the characters comes fully to life. (July)

The Blind Contessa's New Machine Carey Wallace. Viking/Pamela Dorman, $23.95 (212p) ISBN 978-0-670-02189-5

This charming and refreshingly modest debut hinges on a romantic triangle consisting of a blind contessa, her aristocratic husband, and an eccentric inventor. As Carolina Fantoni and Pietro prepare for their wedding in early 19th-century Italy, she tells her handsome, well-born fiancé that she is going blind. Like her family, he doesn't take her seriously, and only Turri, Carolina's friend and married neighbor, believes her. While Pietro engages in less than lofty pursuits, Turri and Carolina continue to meet on Carolina's father's property, and Carolina's creeping blindness inspires Turri to invent a machine she can use to write messages. His invention--a typewriter--sparks an affair that could have far-reaching consequences for them both. Wallace has a smooth style and a sure hand in combining near tragedy with whimsy, whether she's detailing Carolina and Pietro's social circle, the state of scientific knowledge, or the progression of Carolina's blindness. Secondary characters, including Carolina's not-so loyal servant girl, Liza, are sketched with hints of a darker, deeper psychology. Despite its relative brevity, this is a work of surprising insight, humor, and heart. (July)

Imperial Bedrooms Bret Easton Ellis. Knopf, $25 (192p) ISBN 978-0-307-26610-1

Ellis explores what disillusioned youth looks like 25 years later in this brutal sequel to Less Than Zero. Clay, now a screenwriter, returns at Christmas to an L.A. that looks and operates much as it did 25 years ago. Trent is now a producer and married to Clay's ex, Blair, while Julian runs an escort service and Rip, Clay's old dealer, has had so much plastic surgery he's unrecognizable. While casting a script he's written, Clay falls for a young, untalented actress named Rain Turner, and his obsession and affair with her powers him through an alcoholic haze that swirls with images of death, mysterious text messages, and cars lurking outside his apartment. The story takes on a creepy noirish bent--with Clay as the frightened detective who doesn't really want to know anything--as it barrels toward a conclusion that reveals the horror that lies at the center of a tortured soul. Ellis fans will delight in the characters and Ellis's easy hand in manipulating their fates, and though the novel's synchronicity with Zero is sublime, this also works as a stellar stand-alone. (June)

Far Cry John Harvey. Houghton Mifflin Harcourt/Penzler, $26 (524p) ISBN 978-0-547-31594-2

Det. Sgt. Helen Walker and Det. Insp. Will Grayson hunt for a missing girl in this worthy sequel to Gone to Ground from Cartier Diamond Dagger--winner Harvey. In 1995, pubescent Heather Pierce and her friend Kelly Efford disappear while on holiday in Cornwall. An eccentric Good Samaritan saves Kelly; searchers find Heather dead at the bottom of an old mining engine house, the apparent victim of a misstep in the fog. In present-day Cambridge, Heather's half-sister, Beatrice, who's about the same age as Heather was in 1995, vanishes. Is Heather's tragic history repeating itself, or is Beatrice the victim of something even darker? While Walker examines Heather's still unresolved death for a link to Beatrice's disappearance, Grayson becomes obsessed with a recently released pedophile, whom he suspects of committing terrible, undetected crimes. Harvey isn't afraid to let his characters grow in this thoughtful, complex thriller. (June)

Lanceheim Tim Davys. Harper, $21.99 (384p) ISBN 978-0-06-179743-9

In the pseudonymous Davys's dithering second novel set in a world populated by stuffed animals (after Amberville), composer Reuben Walrus is weeks away from finishing his new symphonic opus when he discovers that his irreversible hearing loss will be total before he can complete the task. His only hope is to seek the aid of Maximilian, a parable-spouting sage whose growing cult of followers has so alarmed authorities and deacons of the world's orthodox church that they have driven him underground. Davys alternates between the trials and tribulations of Reuben as he copes with his affliction, and the life, times, and persecution of the enigmatic Maximilian, but the two narrative threads converge so belatedly that the plot never coheres. The stuffed animal conceit adds little to a story whose characters are so tritely human that readers may find themselves wondering why the author even bothered to cast it with fantasy surrogates. (June)

Neighborhood Watch Cammie McGovern. Viking, $24.95 (288p) ISBN 978-0-670-02203-8

In this superb suburban thriller from McGovern (Eye Contact), newly tested DNA evidence results in the release from prison of Betsy Treading (aka “the Librarian Murderess”) after serving 12 years for the bludgeoning of sexy divorcée Linda Sue Nelson, a neighbor in Milford, Conn. Betsy, a somnambulist, had confessed out of fear she'd done the deed while sleepwalking. Back home in Milford, Betsy determines to find out who really killed Linda Sue, who was having an affair with their married neighbor, charismatic author Geoffrey Steadman, who was a friend of Betsy's then husband, Paul. Now divorced from Paul, Betsy accepts temporary lodgings with an old friend and neighbor, Marianne Rashke, founder of the local neighborhood watch group. McGovern, a former Stegner Fellow at Stanford, seductively unreels Betsy's pursuit of the truth one shocking spool at a time. Fans of literary suspense fiction will be well rewarded. 4-city author tour. (June)

Snowbound Blake Crouch. Minotaur, $25.99 (320p) ISBN 978-0-312-42573-9

At the start of this overwrought thriller from Crouch (Abandon), attorney Will Innis's wife, Rachael, fails to come home from a late night at work. Her car is found on an Arizona desert highway, the driver's side window smashed, but no sign of blood. After a belligerent cop interrogates him about his wife's disappearance, Will packs up his 11-year-old daughter, Devlin, who suffers from cystic fibrosis, and flees. Five years pass until FBI agent Kalyn Sharp tracks down Will, who's lived in several towns under various identities, to tell him she believes he's innocent. For a lawyer, Will is incredibly gullible. Based on nothing, he fears he'll be prosecuted, and Devlin will have no one to take care of her. He forgets that the girl has loving grandparents as well as aunts and uncles, and ignores that her disease, though in remission, can be life threatening. He accepts Kalyn's involvement with little thought. The story comes to a less than credible climax at a remote Alaskan resort. (June)

Captivity Deborah Noyes. Unbridled, $25.95 (352p) ISBN 978-1-936071-63-0

Noyes (Angel and Apostle) is so constrained by, or perhaps so entranced with the true story of the 19th-century mediums Maggie and Kate Fox that she founders in crafting a satisfying novel based upon their lives. The story opens in rural New York in 1848, when teenage Maggie and her younger sister, Kate, claim that rapping sounds in their house emanate from a ghost whose murdered corpse is buried in the basement. It ends a decade later, after the sisters have achieved widespread fame for their séances. The Fox sisters are credited with inspiring the American Spiritualist movement, which grew rapidly for the rest of the century. Noyes includes some of the key figures who spurred the movement's popularity and aptly draws upon the themes of classism and sexism that influenced its leaders with wonderfully lavish period detail. Viewpoints alternate between Maggie's and her friend Clara Gill, an Englishwoman with a tragic past, but Clara's life seems hopeless from the beginning and the reader is kept at a frustrating distance from Maggie's inner thoughts. The legend of the Fox sisters is intriguing; however, Noyes adds little illumination to the nonfiction canon. (June)

The House on Salt Hay Road Carin Clevidence. Farrar, Straus & Giroux, $25 (304p) ISBN 978-0-374-17314-2

This unremarkable first novel charts a dissolving family of two parentless children, an uncle full of regret, and a stifled aunt. It's 1937 in rural Long Island, and the inhabitants of Fire Island rush into the streets after the explosion of a nearby fireworks factory. Not long after, an equally strong psychological chemistry erupts: a train from Boston brings the mysterious, charming Robert into 19-year-old orphan Nancy's life. When she impulsively decides to marry him, her choice evokes feelings of betrayal from her aunt, uncle, and younger brother. While Nancy finds disappointment in the big city, her brother, Clayton, goes astray without his sister's guidance; aunt Mavis deals with the husband she separated from years ago; and uncle Roy muses over his only marriage bid, which ended tragically. A rendezvous with history--in the form of the hurricane of 1938--gives this family one last chance at survival. Despite the occasional deft touch, this novel is indistinctive, and the various plot lines fail to resonate with one another on more than superficial levels, leaving it to read much like a workshop project in search of inspiration. (June)

The Terrorist Peter Steiner. Minotaur, $23.99 (224p) ISBN 978-0-312-37344-3

Steiner's brisk, sure-footed third spy thriller to feature 71-year-old ex-CIA agent Louis Morgan (after Le Crime and L'Assassin) shows it's hard to outmaneuver an old dog. Happily retired in France, Morgan, who possesses “anti-American bona fides” and “was once thought to be a terrorist,” spurns the CIA's request to help in the so-called war on terror. The agency ratchets up the pressure on Morgan by falsely arresting a friend's 16-year-old son, Zaharia Lefort, who was studying in the U.S. In a brief yet compelling odyssey that takes him from France to Algeria to New Jersey, Morgan adroitly gives his handlers what they want--and brings the situation with Zaharia to a satisfactory resolution, all with a minimum of violence. Wickedly tight prose propels a plot that shows not one shred of fictional obesity. Sam Waterson's production company has optioned the previous two books, with Steiner, a former New Yorker cartoonist, writing the screenplay. (June)

The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet's Nest Stieg Larsson, trans. from the Swedish by Reg Keeland. Knopf, $26.95 (576p) ISBN 978-0-307-26999-7

The exhilarating conclusion to bestseller Larsson's Millennium trilogy (after The Girl Who Played with Fire) finds Lisbeth Salander, the brilliant computer hacker who was shot in the head in the final pages of Fire, alive, though still the prime suspect in three murders in Stockholm. While she convalesces under armed guard, journalist Mikael Blomkvist works to unravel the decades-old coverup surrounding the man who shot Salander: her father, Alexander Zalachenko, a Soviet intelligence defector and longtime secret asset to Säpo, Sweden's security police. Estranged throughout Fire, Blomkvist and Salander communicate primarily online, but their lack of physical interaction in no way diminishes the intensity of their unconventional relationship. Though Larsson (1954--2004) tends toward narrative excess, his was an undeniably powerful voice in crime fiction that will be sorely missed. 500,000 first printing. (May)

Blue-Eyed Devil Robert B. Parker. Putnam, $25.95 (288p) ISBN 978-0-399-15648-9

This excellent posthumous western from bestseller Parker (1932--2010) continues the saga of gun-slinging saddle pals Virgil Cole and Everett Hitch (after Brimstone) as they trade wisecracks and hot lead with back-shooting owlhoots and murderous Apaches in the town of Appaloosa. Cole and Hitch used to be the law in town, but now Appaloosa has a corrupt, ambitious, and deadly police chief named Amos Callico backed up by 12 rifle-toting cops of dubious background, and though Callico sees Cole and Hitch as impediments to his plans for extortion and high political office, his threats don't worry the boys much. Meanwhile, Cole kills the son of a prominent rancher in a fair fight, renegade Apaches plan an attack on the town, and a mysterious dandy arrives in town with a sinister agenda. Fortunately, Cole and Hitch are smart and resourceful, and there's trickery, gunplay, and throat-cutting until only a few folks are left standing. Lean, fast, and full of snappy dialogue, it's everything a series fan would expect. (May)

The Map of True Places Brunonia Barry. Morrow, $25.99 (416p) ISBN 978-0-06-162478-0

Barry's considerable if overplotted latest delves into the long-lingering effects of a mother's suicide. Fifteen years ago, Maureen Finch, a discontented wife and bipolar mother to 13-year-old Zee, commits suicide while Zee watches. Flash forward to the present day, and Zee is a therapist with a new patient, Lilly Braedon, who is far too much like Maureen, and after Lilly kills herself, Zee walks away from her practice and travels back to Salem, Mass., to visit her father and his partner, Melville, only to find that her father's Parkinson's disease is advancing rapidly. With Melville missing, Zee becomes a full-time caregiver and must face the half-truths and twisted memories that have compromised her connection to her father, all the while examining how her mother's legacy extends into her life and a fledgling romance. This is a lovingly told story with many well-drawn characters, who sooner or later reconsider the courses charted by personal decisions and circumstance. But there is almost too much story here, and Barry (The Lace Reader) compromises the third act with a weak subplot about Lilly's traumatic last days that reads as an intrusion on an otherwise well-told tale. (May)

Executive Intent Dale Brown. Morrow, $26.99 (416p) ISBN 978-0-06-156085-9

China and Russia pursue newly aggressive policies in hot spots like Somalia and Yemen that threaten the U.S. in this exciting near-future political thriller from bestseller Brown (Rogue Forces). Kenneth Phoenix, the U.S. vice president, finds himself at odds with Joseph Gardner, the cautious U.S. president, who's inclined to cancel a space weapon system, which includes a precision-guided artificial meteorite, in favor of negotiating treaties to abolish space-based weapons. Characters from past Brown books, like Lt. Gen. Patrick McLanahan (ret.) and Lt. Col. Jason Richter, play key roles as the U.S. faces growing crises at sea and in space. Congress scarcely exists. Techno-thriller fans will enjoy the detailed descriptions of cutting-edge technologies as they morph into action sequences (“The sabots hit the Earth traveling almost two miles a second, each with the force of a two-thousand-pound high-explosive bomb, creating a crater large enough to fit a jumbo jet within it”). (May)

Die Twice Andrew Grant. Minotaur, $24.99 (352p) ISBN 978-0-312-54027-2

Lt. Cdr. David Trevellyan continues to operate on U.S. soil in Grant's testosterone-fueled second adventure to feature the British naval intelligence officer (after Even). After leaving behind seven dead bodies in New York City, Trevellyan reports to veteran liaison officer Richard Fothergill in Chicago, where a rogue British operative, Tony McIntyre, is planning to sell a secret and deadly gas to the tiny West African nation of Equatorial Myene. With Fothergill providing intel, Trevellyan attempts to locate McIntyre with orders to effect a “hard arrest,” i.e., kill him, and to recover the gas canisters from either McIntyre or the Africans. The stakes rise as more than one bidder has his sights set on the gas, and Trevellyan and Fothergill have only each other to rely on. Trevellyan is macho enough and deadly enough to satisfy the most jaded thriller fan, though he's slower than most readers will be to figure out what's going on. (May)

By Accident Susan Kelly. Pegasus, $24 (304p) ISBN 978-1-60598-088-1

Kelly's latest, a delicate novel of grief and recovery, takes readers deep into the mind of a grieving mother. After Laura's son, Whit, dies, she's emotionally paralyzed. Her husband, Russ, is busy with his construction business, and their teen daughter, Ebie, grows disconnected. But when a jovial young arborist named Elliot moves in next door and befriends Laura and Ebie, Laura slowly warms back up to the world, and Elliot, whose fun-loving nature can verge on reckless, takes to Ebie with a Peter Pan--like verve. As it becomes clear that Russ is keeping important secrets from his family, Laura and Elliot's emotional intimacy creepily escalates (is he a substitute for her son? an object of lust?), and Kelly drops in cinematic flashbacks that ratchet up the tension. Kelly's characters--all excellent, except cipherlike Russ--imbue this novel with an understated power. Kelly doesn't go in for the cheap movie-of-the-week melodrama often found in grieving mother fiction, and the reader is much better off for it. (May)

Thief Maureen Gibbon. Sarah Crichton/Farrar, Straus & Giroux, $14 paper (192p) ISBN 978-0-374-27454-2

After placing a personal ad in the local paper, Suzanne, the narrator of Gibbon's abysmal latest (after Swimming Sweet Arrow), is shocked and intrigued when she gets a response from an inmate. Having “always been interested in black sheep and underdogs,” Suzanne writes back, and, as it turns out, Alpha Breville, her prison pen-pal, is a convicted rapist, which strikes Suzanne as providential, as she was raped as a teenager. Thinking maybe she can work out some of the lingering trauma of that event, she embarks on a tempestuous relationship with Breville, first through a series of candid letters, then through visits to the prison. While at first she finds it therapeutic to figure out the other side of the rape “coin,” Suzanne must ultimately face the fact that this miscalculated experiment in self-liberation can depend on no one but herself. But what's in it for the reader is anyone's guess; Suzanne is less a character than a phoned-in grotesque thrown together to serve the requirements of an ill-considered story of petty self-enlightenment. (May)

Marks of Cain Tom Knox. Viking, $26.95 (448p) ISBN 978-0-670-02191-8

Two strangers, American David Martinez and Englishman Simon Quinn, become involved in two apparently unconnected strands of what's revealed as one unified conspiracy in Knox's problematic second thriller, which like his first, Genesis, casts recent human evolution in an unorthodox light. At the urging of his late grandfather, Martinez sets out to learn his family's true history, while Quinn looks into a series of brutal murders involving victims connected to the Basque regions of Spain and France. Both men find answers in the tumultuous history of the Pyrenees and Namibia, answers with implications so terrible that the Catholic Church is willing to conspire with a murderous Basque terrorist to conceal them. Repeated violent confrontations with supposedly deadly assassins somehow never quite result in the protagonists' deaths. That Knox, the pseudonym of British journalist Sean Thomas, supplies a “rational” basis for the Nazi genocide may offend some readers. (May)

The Awful Possibilities: Stories Christian TeBordo. Featherproof (PGW, dist.), $14.95 paper (192p) ISBN 978-0-9771992-9-7

Nine caustic stories by TeBordo find screeching ironies in rhetorical absurdities and writerly subversiveness. In “Took and Lost,” the sense of violation felt by someone “who lost something” in an unspecified theft (though the thief is described as “a brilliant man... penning poems with his left hand and novels with his right, while beautiful and scandalous arias drip from his tongue”) is played out in an elaborate street spectacle. “The Champion of Forgetting” is a chilling chronicle of a brainwashed kid who has been kidnapped by a band of organ snatchers and is enlisted in their schemes; she proves masterly at sedation and surgery, to the reader's increasing horror. TeBordo relishes in tossing narrative wrenches into familiar setups, as with the second-person “SS Attacks,” in which a bored 10th-grade narrator plans a school shooting to compensate for his older brother's cooler existence. Similarly, in “Rules and Regulations,” the narrative transforms itself with vindictive fluidity from a dubious manual on child discipline to offering tips on caring for one's aging parent (“Enact your revenge with double-knotted bows and dirty linen”). Bizarre and biting, these tales leave a mark. (May)

The Language of Sand Ellen Block. Bantam, $15 paper (288p) ISBN 978-0-440-24575-9

Block (The Lightning Rule) explores in her quaint latest the notion of how losing oneself in a new adventure can help heal wounds. After Abigail Harker's husband and four-year-old son are killed when their suburban Boston home burns down, she moves to a place her husband treasured, Chapel Isle, N.C., leaving behind her beloved job as a lexicographer to become caretaker of a defunct lighthouse. Her living quarters are a shambles (and possibly haunted), and as she fixes up her digs and makes friends with the (naturally) colorful locals, Abigail finds a way through grief and toward a less fussy self. Block writes gracefully about heartache and the mending of an injured soul, and the smalltown backdrop is pleasant without being kitschy. (May)

Relapse Nikki Turner. Ballantine/One World, $14 paper (304p) ISBN 978-0-345-51105-8

In her latest, Turner (Ghetto Superstar) offers her usual high drama, betrayal, and street lit hoodlums with moralizing admonishments regarding drugs, greed, fame, and materialism. After surviving, barely, her addicted sister's monstrous attempt to sell her for drugs, Beijing Lee works as a concierge to the rich and famous at the exclusive Tabby hotel chain. Whether hiding superstars from the paparazzi, getting VIPs out of legal snafus, or procuring drugs, Beijing has gone every extra mile for her clientele. Her life takes a turn for the strange, however, when she meets young rapper Teflon the Don, becoming his manager and lover until his heroin addiction goes out of control. A subsequent romance offers a chance for redemption, but before long, Beijing finds that those closest to her aren't what they seem. Turner packs this quickie with melodrama, making it a thoroughly entertaining but predictable affair; with supporting characters straight from central casting, readers may feel as though they've read this novel before. (May)

Not Ready for Mom Jeans Maureen Lipinski. St. Martin's Griffin $13.99 paper (304p) ISBN 978-0-312-53728-9

Young working mothers will relate to Lipinski's (A Bump in the Road) amusing but unsurprising latest. Chicago events planner, popular blogger (Am I Making Myself Clare), and newspaper writer Clare Finnegan dons her black Miss Piggy pants (baby weight!) to return to work after having adorable Sara with cute hubby, Jake. She almost loses her cool when an ex-college flame hires her to plan a society golf function. Clare's also worrying about her friend Reese divorcing husband Matt; her mother battling breast cancer; and the commitment of buying a house. It's all there, but Clare's life via Lipinski's jittery prose reads more like a journal of teenage blog posts than an adult novel. Although it captures the angst of the almost-30 mom finding her way, the manic glee is just too self-aware and giddy (“...This Day Needs to Come to Life So I Can Painfully Kill It”). (May)

Secrets of the Tudor Court D.L. Bogdan. Kensington, $15 paper (352p) ISBN 978-0-7582-4199-3

In the midst of a nearly inexhaustible supply of Tudor historicals, Bogdan's debut views the troubled court of famously lusty Henry VIII through the eyes of Mary Howard, the daughter of the powerful and fearsome duke of Norfolk, whose resolve to get as close to Henry as possible means offering up his niece Anne Boleyn, moving on to niece Catherine Howard, and then finally Mary. When Mary refuses to give herself over, Norfolk's power slips and Mary's family is ruined. Still, she manages to find happiness, however short-lived, despite the suffocating intrigues of the court and her ever-present abusive and manipulative father. Readers familiar with the Tudor period will find little new save an unusually passive heroine (Mary's relationship with her father is at best abusive and at worst contains tinges of incest) and a tediously drawn-out story. Comparable historicals are rescued by powerful heroines who carry the day. Overall, this is a weak entry in a glutted genre. (May)

Band of Angels Julia Gregson. Touchstone, $16.99 paper (464p) ISBN 978-1-4391-0013-1

Gregson (East of the Sun) takes the reader deep into the horrors of the Crimean War in this novel originally published and praised in the U.K. as The Water Horse. Catherine Carreg is permitted extraordinary freedom as a child in Wales in 1844, including friendship with a local drover boy, Deio, until local gossip forces the end of their relationship. Catherine's mother dies in childbirth, and loathing the shallow life she's forced to live at home, Catherine concocts a plan with Deio's help to disguise herself as a boy and run away to London. Once there, Catherine lands a job in Florence Nightingale's home for sick governesses, then volunteers as a nurse in the Crimea while Deio, who owns her heart, joins the war effort as a soldier. Their separation and frightening reunion changes their lives and challenges their love. Gregson's journalistic eye for detail supports the power and connection between the couple as Catherine matures into a strong, driven yet compassionate woman. The stench of war is not softened, and the scenes of the battlefield are not for the fainthearted. (May)

Fortuna Michael R. Stevens. Oceanview (Midpoint, dist.), $25.95 (296p) ISBN 978-1-933515-77-9

Role-playing gamers will best appreciate Stevens's debut, a far-fetched thriller that reads almost like a YA novel. Jason Lind, a Stanford computer science grad student, becomes addicted to Fortuna, an online alternate reality game based on Renaissance Florence and Machiavellian economics. As the line blurs between Jason's RL (real life) and his gaming persona's role as Father Allesandro da Scala, he falls heavily into debt. Frantic to stay afloat, he drops out of Stanford to work for Global Packet Control under his uncle, Frank Stöcker, who once employed his father, Nicholas, who died nine years earlier in a car accident. At GPC, Jason discovers suspicious business dealings, but while the action hurtles toward surprising revelations, the worlds of role-playing and global economics never quite mesh. And some will find the portrayal of the romance between Jason and a fellow Stanford student less than sophisticated. (May)

Falling Is Like This Kate Rockland. St. Martin's Griffin, $13.99 paper (304p) ISBN 978-0-312-57600-4

Despite a vivid backdrop and some colorful supporting characters, Rockland's debut can't overcome the triteness of its heroine. All Harper Rostov knows is that she wants to be a music writer, and soon the 23-year-old has quit her job at a celebrity tabloid, broken up with her video game--addict boyfriend, and nearly moved out of their East Village apartment. But before the reality of moving back with her parents in New Jersey sinks in, she happens to run into Nick, her longtime crush and the guitarist of her favorite band, Hitchhikers Revenge. Nick's attentions are especially flattering, but she eventually has to choose between a new adventure with Nick and the band and putting her old life back together, which includes the depressed, unstable sister who needs her. The tour of dive bars and dingy studios ought to make the protagonists come alive, but the more Rockland attempts to elevate Harper's complaints to the status of profundities, the less endearing Harper becomes. An unsatisfying ending caps this muted rock and roll novel. (May)

How High the Moon Sandra Kring. Bantam, $15 paper (368p) ISBN 978-0-385-34121-9

The summer of 1955 is a tough one for 10-year-old ragamuffin Isabella, nicknamed Teaspoon, who's been enlisted into a Big Sister--style program that's supposed to teach her civilized behavior. Five years earlier, Teaspoon's mother took off for Hollywood, leaving her boyfriend, Teddy, and her daughter to take care of each other; now a full-fledged tomboy, Teaspoon is paired in the program with popular 18-year-old Brenda Bloom, whose mother owns the movie theater in their suburban Milwaukee town. Sketched with nostalgic sweetness, this hard-luck coming-of-age story sees Teaspoon discovering her talent for singing while getting caught up in plans for the theater's gala re-opening, her mother's promised return, Teddy's budding relationship with Sunday school teacher Miss Tuckle, and Brenda's romantic dilemmas. Kring (The Book of Bright Ideas) gives her young, put-upon protagonist an authentically weary voice, but telegraphs her plot revelations, provoking little emotion beyond the mildly touching. Though the chatterbox heroine makes an engaging narrator, readers may be reminded more of Dennis the Menace than Anne of Green Gables. (May)

We Are Never as Beautiful as We Are Now: Stories Adam Gallari. Ampersand (SPD, dist.), $15.95 paper (150p) ISBN 978-0-9841025-3-2

Focusing on baseball fields and bars from New York to Los Angeles, promising newcomer Gallari presents nine fleeting tales of desultory youth. Several involve a pitcher on a downhill slide: the first story, “Throwing Stones,” introduces minor league Coney Island ballplayer Bellingham, who divines the outcome of his games by tossing beach pebbles. “A Beautiful Lie” finds an injured Duke University baseball pitcher meeting up with a former girlfriend from Long Island, who's become a radiant, accomplished traveler: “He wondered if his greatest achievement was to be a footnote to another's glory.” In “Negative Space,” the lonely street painter set up outside the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York finds ample subject matter in passing young women (“They're dynamic. Exciting. Something to be venerated”), whom he can occasionally coax into following him on a museum tour. The final selection, “Warwick Damon,” is a bittersweet coming-of-age tale about two writers on opposite ends of their respective careers; though sometimes familiar, Gallari's tales are earnestly conceived and tenderly wrought. (May)

Looking for a Love Story Louise Shaffer. Ballantine, $15 paper (320p) ISBN 978-0-345-50210-0

For a while, author Francesca Sewell was living her dream: her first novel was a hit, she married a handsome up-and-coming photographer, and she became the toast of her new Upper East Side neighborhood (where the happy couple bought and furnished their dream co-op). Three years on, however, she's struggling with her second book, her husband is distant, and her glamorous social life has grown uncomfortable (as has her wardrobe). When she's dumped by both her husband and her agent, Francesca is left with Annie, their rescue dog, to confront the downside of success. Desperate for work, she agrees to ghostwrite the family history of Chicky, the globe-trotting 90-year-old daughter of two 1920s vaudeville stars. Predictably but satisfactorily, Francesca comes to terms with her (and her parents') divorce by investigating the story of Chicky and her folks, in the process discovering the love story she'd been seeking all along. Shaffer (Serendipity) is at her best telling Chicky's story, a throwback to potboilers of the 1920s, giving this single-gal redemption story unexpected depth. (May)

Flight of Shadows Sigmund Brouwer. WaterBrook, $13.99 paper (320p) ISBN 978-1-4000-7033-6

Futuristic speculative Christian fiction is rare, and Brouwer (Broken Angel) does it with the skills of an episodic storyteller that make a reader wonder when the movie is coming out. In a postapocalyptic setting, people live in their cars, called “soovies,” the government has runaway power, and social classes are stratified into Influentials, Industrials, Illegals, Invisibles. When Caitlyn, an Invisible whose life was a government DNA experiment gone bad, breaks free, she is pursued by a bounty hunter for the Influentials. What's darkly horrifying about the book is the plausibility of the story, built on world conflicts in which water causes war, ethicless DNA testing turns a profit, and immigration is intended to create a labor class bordering on slavery. With vivid character description and fascinating details (implanted credit card chips in the finger tips are used for purchases), Brouwer paints a fierce future. The world as he sees it could decay to this dismal degree without the redemption found in the Judeo-Christian ethic and renewed democracy that puts power under people rather than over them. (May)

The Galilean Secret Evan Drake Howard. Guideposts (Ideals, dist.), $24.99 (448p) ISBN 978-0-8249-4794-1

Since Dan Brown's bestselling The Da Vinci Code, readers have been fascinated with the mysterious relationship between Jesus Christ and Mary Magdalene. Howard, a Rhode Island pastor, offers a fascinating and unique interpretation, setting out a path to realizing the feminine and masculine divine within every soul. The story, essentially a reworking of Howard's 2007 self-published novel The Lost Epistle of Jesus, switches back and forth between two plots, one in the present day and the other in first-century Jerusalem. Karim, a young Palestinian, tries to escape his jihadist father, leader of the Palestinian Patriotic Alliance, and stumbles upon a buried relic. His discovery takes him on a high-stakes adventure to bring the relic's contents to the world. Simultaneously, we read of Judith, a young Jew of the ancient world, who becomes involved with anti-Roman zealots, the radical rabbi Jesus, and his companion Mary Magdalene. Both stories progress toward the same conclusion--a search for Jesus' deepest and as yet unrealized truth that will bring peace and love to all who can truly understand its worth. (May)

The Spoils of Eden Linda Lee Chaikin. Moody, $13.99 paper (336p) ISBN 978-1-8024-3749-5

Prolific author Chaikin (For Whom the Stars Shine) begins the Dawn of Hawaii trilogy with this novel, set in 1880s Hawaii, when the island group still had a queen and talk of annexation to the United States was a hot political potato. Leprosy is another relevant historical fact. The leper colony on the island of Molokai is where the mother of nurse Eden Derrington lives and also where baby Kip was found by his prospective adoptive father, Rafe Easton, a Clark Gable--like coffee plantation owner who is Eden's fiancé. Eden is at least as interested in helping her father, Jerome, research a cure for leprosy as she is in marrying Rafe, who doesn't want her to risk her health helping her father chase a phantom. Chaikin uses a big canvas strewn with beautiful details from Hawaii's landscape; she has also researched Hawaiian history. Her intricate plotting compensates for some clumsy writing and lack of depth in a few of the supporting characters. But fans of historicals and epics will like this new evangelical Christian take on what James Michener did so memorably for the state. (May)

Mystery

A Pig of Cold Poison Pat McIntosh. Soho Constable, $25 (304p) ISBN 978-1-56947-650-5

In McIntosh's busy seventh Gil Cunningham mystery (after 2009's The Stolen Voice), the 15th-century Scottish constable investigates a series of poisonings. When actor Dan Gibson falls down “deathly sick” at the end of a mummer's play performed on All Hallow's Eve at Gil's sister's house in Glasgow, it appears Dan was poisoned by the drops of medicine fellow actor Nanty Bothwell, who was playing an apothecary, gave him. Many of those present saw Dan and Nanty, who were rivals in love over the actress playing the apothecary's daughter, quarrel beforehand. Since Nanty is as distraught as everyone else at Dan's demise, Gil isn't so sure of Nanty's guilt. Soon more victims fall prey to the unknown poisoner. While the action gets off to a fast start, the onslaught of characters and conversation makes the plot somewhat difficult to follow. Series fans will be pleased to revisit old friends, but newcomers may find themselves lost in the Scottish hills. (July)

Dead and Buried: A Benjamin January Mystery Barbara Hambly. Severn, $28.95 (256p) ISBN 978-0-7278-6867-1

Sorrow, grief, and pain pervade Hambly's outstanding ninth Benjamin January mystery (after 2004's Dead Water), set in New Orleans during the summer of 1836. Trapped by poverty and the color of his skin, January, a free black who trained in France as a physician, goes undercover as a piano player in a high-class bordello to investigate possible embezzlement from the Faubourg Tremé Free Colored Militia and Burial Society. The discovery of a white man's body in a coffin meant for one of the FTFCMBS's members propels the justice-seeking January on a harrowing journey full of disturbing revelations to save a young English aristocrat from the gallows. Hambly's sure hand with historical detail, her convincing characterizations, and her view of the slave trade that debased both blacks and their white masters raise this tale of violence, deceit, and humiliation to a must-read commentary on human frailty and redeeming human friendship. (June)

The Bohemian Girl Kenneth Cameron. Minotaur, $24.99 (320p) ISBN 978-0-312-53897-2

Set at the turn of the 20th century, Cameron's memorable sequel to 2009's The Frightened Man finds General Denton, American expatriate and novelist, returned to his London home after six month's travel on the Continent, which included a lengthy stint in a Central European prison. In his mail, Denton finds a two-month-old letter from a Mary Thomason asking him to help her evade a threat. Thomason's plea was forwarded by one Aubrey Heseltine, who discovered the letter attached to the back of a painting he just purchased. Denton, his curiosity piqued, seeks out Heseltine to get a lead on his would-be client. Meanwhile, Denton himself becomes the object of interest of an unknown watcher. The two story strands weave together nicely before coming to resolutions that are anything but obvious. Other authors have set mysteries in the same period and place, but Cameron stands out by virtue of his fine plotting and distinctive characters. (June)

Set Sail for Murder R.T. Jordan. Kensington, $22 (304p) ISBN 978-0-7582-2939-7

Near the start of Jordan's giddy, gossipy fourth Polly Pepper mystery (after 2009's A Talent for Murder), “international entertainment celebrity” Polly--along with her loyal son, Tim, and patient companion, Placenta--embarks from San Francisco on a Polly Pepper Playhouse reunion cruise aboard the Intacti (an anagram of Titanic). The “Kool Krooz” is scarcely under way before someone slashes the throat of Laura Crawford, a showboating former co-star, with a sharpened DVD from season six of the Polly Pepper Playhouse boxed set. The unsinkable Polly is in rare form as she tries to figure out who murdered the hateful Laura--and avoid becoming the killer's next victim before the Intacti reaches Alaska. Celebrity has-beens, their fickle fans, eccentric crew members, and various oddballs add to the fun. Armed with plenty of champagne, Polly proves once again that she's no slouch as a detective. (June)

Moon Spinners: A Seaside Knitters Mystery Sally Goldenbaum. Obsidian, $23.95 (320p) ISBN 978-0-451-22988-5

In Goldenbaum's delightful third knitting mystery (after 2009's Patterns in the Sand), Izzy Chambers, proprietor of the Seaside Knitting Studio, and assorted knitting group friends gather for dinner at the Sea Harbor Yacht Club in Sea Harbor, Mass., to celebrate fund-raising efforts for the new community center and park. Special thanks are due two local construction companies, Santos and Delaney, which have been working together despite the uneasy relationship between the two families. The sudden appearance of drunken Julianne Santos, who threatens her brother, Alphonso, with a beer bottle, interrupts the dinner. Gracie, Julianne's daughter and the estranged wife of Joey Delaney, wishes she, Gracie, could disappear like Alice down the rabbit hole. Later that night, Alphonso's aloof, beautiful Argentinean wife drives her Ferrari off a cliff. Tampered brakes signal murder. Well-drawn characters and an intriguing plot lift this well above the average cozy. (May)

Follow Me Down: An Orwell Brennan Mystery Marc Strange. ECW (IPG, dist.), $24.95 (352p) ISBN 978-1-55022-926-4

This excellent first in a new series from Edgar-finalist Strange (Body Blows) pits a formidable Canadian police chief, Orwell Brennan, against clever criminals and rival law enforcement agencies. While trying to justify the existence of an independent police force for rural Dockerty, Ont., Brennan becomes involved in the case of a man found pinned to a tree by two arrows through the belly. The Toronto police soon conclude their investigation, but Brennan--sharply observant despite his slovenly rube appearance--patiently persists in unpeeling the mystery. Flashbacks reveal how an armored car robbery and a series of murders led to this crime and are still causing violent deaths. There's a lot going on under the surface of the little town and its scheming residents. Readers will appreciate the freshly drawn setting, especially the farms and woods outside Dockerty, as well as the vivid characters capable of startling revelations. (May)

The End Game Gerrie Ferris Finger. Minotaur, $24.99 (304p) ISBN 978-0-312-61155-2

A hunt for two young sisters propels Finger's compelling if at times sobering debut, which won the 2009 Malice Domestic Best First Traditional Mystery Novel Competition. When Jessie and Dottie Rose vanish after their foster parents, Ed and Wanda Barnes, die in a fire that destroys their home in Atlanta's Cabbagetown neighborhood, Portia Devon, a juvenile judge, turns for help to Moriah Dru, a former cop who runs Child Trace Inc. Dru and her detective boyfriend, Lt. Richard Lake, who's officially assigned to the case, conclude that Wanda and a neighbor friend of hers, Millicent Goddard, may have known the predator who took the Rose sisters--and other girls in the area over the years. Millicent's murder and a tip that a child prostitution ring is involved raise the stakes. A well-researched plot and snappy dialogue--plus some fine rail-yard K-9 detecting by Buddy, a German shepherd, and Jed, a Labrador retriever--keep the action moving. (May)

State Fair Earlene Fowler. Berkley Prime Crime, $24.95 (304p) ISBN 978-0-425-23422-8

Set in 1997, Fowler's folksy 14th Benni Harper mystery (after 2007's Tumbling Blocks) finds the avid quilter, museum curator, and reluctant sleuth readying herself for the annual San Celina (Calif.) County Mid-State Fair. Racial tensions revolving around the fair's first black general manager, Levi Clark; Levi's half-white daughter, Jazz; and Jazz's various suitors stir the plot. So, too, does the visit from Arkansas of Benni's great-aunt, Garnet Wilcox. Garnet and her sister, Dove, Benni's grandmother, get along “like two bobcats trapped in a burning outhouse.” A valued African-American quilt stolen from a fair exhibit and a corpse in another exhibit add fuel to the fire. Fowler's congenial mix of humor (prickly, surprising Garnet applies lessons learned from mystery books and cop shows), folklore (the history of black cloth dolls), and murder makes this Agatha Award--winning series as much fun to visit as a county fair and a likely ribbon winner. (May)

SF/Fantasy/Horror

A Book of Tongues Gemma Files. ChiZine (Diamond, dist.), $16.95 paper (275p) ISBN 978-0-9812978-6-6

A Pinkerton detective infiltrates a Wild West gang led by a spell-casting preacher in this boundary-busting horror--fantasy debut. Agent Ed Morrow is dispatched by a professor of magical research to evaluate the “hexslinging” abilities of Rev. Asher Rook, a renegade chaplain who survived his own hanging, and his lover, the prickly sharpshooter Chess Pargeter. As Morrow becomes part of the gang, the Aztec goddess Ixchel slowly seduces Rook into a bloody ritual marriage that endangers Pargeter and leads their followers down a road to hell. Files smoothly weaves an unusual magic system, Aztec mythology, and a raunchily explicit gay love story into a classic western tale of outlaws and revenge. Though it grows somewhat cumbersome in the leadup to a cliffhanger that demands resolution in the planned sequel, this promising debut fully delivers both sizzling passions and dark chills. (May)

The Devil in Green Mark Chadbourn. Pyr, $16 paper (348p) ISBN 978-1-61614-198-1

British Fantasy Award--winner Chadbourn (The Silver Skull) returns to a contemporary England overrun by magic, first presented in his Age of Misrule novels. Fabulous beasts fly over the countryside, while humans huddle together and struggle to comprehend the new world. Cynical atheist Mallory joins the newly reformed Knights Templar for the promise of “food, drink, and shelter” and meets supernaturally gifted Sophie Tallent, whose nomadic Wiccan group is uneasily allied with the Christians. Sophie and Mallory soon discover their own greater destiny as Brother and Sister of Dragons, the core of a new group of five heroes who must join to thwart a threat against reality itself. Despite some cinematic scenes, much of the material feels like setup for the rest of the series, and the central mystery of Mallory's past remains frustratingly intact through the muddled conclusion. (May)

Recovering Apollo 8 and Other Stories Kristine Kathryn Rusch. Golden Gryphon (IPG, dist.), $24.95 (316p) ISBN 978-1-930846-62-3

Rusch collects eight well-done recent speculative stories with death as a central theme. The elegiac title novella takes place in an alternate universe where the first manned flight to the moon missed its orbital insertion point, dooming its crew. “Diving into the Wreck,” expanded in Rusch's recent novel of the same title, concerns a salvage team that finds a derelict spaceship armed with a terrible weapon. Other notable stories include the fantasy “Substitutions,” in which men are granted immortality in exchange for their willingness to harvest souls at the point of death, and “June Sixteenth at Anna's,” in which an elderly man enters a VR recording of an exquisitely captured moment in his late wife's early life. Readers looking for serious, somber SF will appreciate Rusch's thoughtful examinations of sorrow and loss. (May)

One Bloody Thing After Another Joey Comeau. ECW Press (www.ecwpress.com), $14.95 paper (168p) ISBN 978-1-55022-916-5

Canadian author Comeau, best known for his darkly surreal Web comic, A Softer World, turns his adaptable talents to overt horror in this oddly touching novel of ghosts, friendship, bloody secrets, and family relationships. Jackie is infatuated with her best friend, Ann, but hides her feelings rather than risk rejection. Ann has more dramatic problems: her mother, an increasingly ravenous and highly infectious supernatural creature, demands that Ann supply her with live prey. Distracted by their personal obsessions, Ann and Jackie very nearly occupy different novels despite their frequent physical proximity; Jackie wanders through a tale of teen lesbian romance, while Ann struggles to survive the dark horror of monstrous transformation. A staccato structure allows for surprising intricacy in so few pages, and the crescendos of terror are leavened by moments of unexpected humor and warmth. (May)

Under Heaven Guy Gavriel Kay. Roc, $25.95 (512p) ISBN 978-0-451-46330-2

Historical fantasist Kay (Ysabel) delivers an exquisitely detailed vision of Kitan, a land much like Tang Dynasty China. Shen Tai's father died leading troops in battle, so he spends his mourning year burying the bones of soldiers on both sides, laying their ghosts to rest. He attracts the attention of Cheng-wan, a princess of his people sent to wed one of the enemy. As her gifts make Shen Tai wealthy, an assassin kills his best friend. Shen Tai hires a bodyguard, Wei Song, to keep him alive while he figures out what to do with his riches and who wants him dead. Kay writes deftly of women who are sexually suborned by their societies, neither minimizing their constraints nor denying their agency, and the complex intrigues of poets, prostitutes, ministers, and soldiers evolve into a fascinating, sometimes bloody, and entirely believable tale. (May)

A Taint in the Blood S.M. Stirling. Roc, $25.95 (432p) ISBN 978-0-451-46341-8

Stirling (The Sword of the Lady) launches a new series with a messy and unappetizing mix of well-worn monster tropes and excessive sexual violence. The ancient, powerful, and sociopathic Shadowspawn have always lived among (and interbred with) humans. When Adrian Brézé, the one Shadowspawn capable of resisting his violent urges, discovers that his ex, Ellen, has been kidnapped by his evil twin sister, Adrienne, he begins a war against his own kind. Adrienne repeatedly rapes Ellen, who endures using psychological techniques she developed during childhood abuse, as she prepares her own political machinations. Stirling hits just about every cliché, from the grizzled vampire hunter and mentor to Adrienne's pathologically devoted servants (who call themselves “lucies” and “renfields”). Stirling's prose is competent, but there's nothing new in his story, and few readers will have the stomach for the over-the-top sadism. (May)

Mass Market

Nobody's Angel Jack Clark. Hard Case Crime, $7.99 (224p) ISBN 978-0-8439-6327-4

Clark (Westerfield's Chain) originally self-published this slim, sparse, and heartbreaking novel, selling it to passengers in his Chicago taxicab, and apparently autobiographical elements add poignant realism at the cost of emotional resolution. Eddie Miles is shaken when fellow nighttime cabbie Lenny Smigelkowski falls victim to a serial killer. Eddie also discovers Relita, a teen prostitute brutally mutilated and abandoned in an alley. As Eddie mourns Lenny's death and Relita's pain and tries to find their assailants, he ponders other losses: his father's real estate investments; the innocence of young women entering prostitution; Eddie's daughter, now in his ex-wife's custody; and his faith in humanity as his fares try to abuse, intimidate, and rob him. Little gems of hope sparkle throughout the gloom, but the bleak conclusion of Eddie's “long trip to nowhere” leaves him and the reader mired in despair. (June)

Damaged Pamela Callow. Mira, $7.99 (464p) ISBN 978-0-7783-2750-9

Callow's predictable romantic suspense debut introduces Kate Lange, a new attorney with one of the top law firms in Halifax, Nova Scotia. She's frustrated at receiving a steady diet of family law cases, but a routine consultation with Marian MacAdam, who wants custody of her granddaughter, Lisa, proves considerably more exciting when the teen is found savagely murdered. Callow throws in standard complications: Lisa's mother is an influential judge, and the assigned detective is Kate's ex-fiancé. Kate advised Marian not to seek custody and ignored her own instinctive urge to call Child Protection Services, believing that bringing a case against a judge would wreck her career; now she worries that her hesitation led to Lisa's death. Readers will find little to love in bland, defensive Kate or the coincidence-heavy plot of her first outing. (June)

The Demon in Me Michelle Rowen. Berkley Sensation, $7.99 (352p) ISBN 978-0-425-23468-6

Rowen (Bitten & Smitten) throws together a demon with a checkered past, an exorcist with an agenda, and a witch with a self-help book in this funny, suspenseful, and frequently hot paranormal series launch. Eden Riley is nearly 30 and unemployed when she inherits a half-share in a detective agency. The police learn of her powers and take her on a hunt for a serial killer--who happens to be possessed. When the killer gets his comeuppance, the demon picks Eden for his new host. Darrak seems to be a nice enough guy, but he can hear and see everything that Eden does, which considerably compromises Eden's budding romance with police detective Ben Hanson. The twists come thick and fast, and Rowen leaves plenty of tangles unresolved for sequels. (May)

Sparrow Rock Nate Kenyon. Leisure, $7.99 (336p) ISBN 978-0-8439-6377-9

Stoker-winner Kenyon shambles through postapocalyptic horror in this awkward mélange of teen angst drama and implausible post--nuclear war ecological terror. Pete, whose troubled past is revealed in a series of clichéd anecdotes, narrates the story of a small group of high school students who survive a sudden and largely unexplained catastrophic nuclear war thanks to what at first seems to be pure luck but later proves to be something darker. The teens soon realize that survival involves not just waiting out the radioactive fallout but overcoming the profound, possibly deliberate ecological changes it incurs, including undead rats and man-eating ants. Kenyon invokes science gone horribly wrong without stooping to mere plausibility, spicing his tale with a secret all-powerful crypto-fascist conspiracy spanning generations. The result is a serviceable game of Last Man Standing, played out with a cast of forgettable stock characters. (May)

Comics

The Spark Martin Renard and Nahuel Sagarnaga Cozman. Aftercomics Studio/Studio 407 (Studio-407.com), $11.99 (96p) ISBN 978-1-935385-01-1

In an unnamed city at an unspecified point in time, Lucas discovers that he is one of the four individuals of his generation granted a generic set of special powers by some mysterious phenomenon known only as “the Spark.” Distracted from his studies by family responsibilities and aware that the previous Spark-touched quartet gave their lives to save Earth, Lucas is extremely reluctant to become a superhero. Forced at last to help save Earth from an infestation of catastrophically inquisitive extra-dimensional scholars, he finds a way to crusade on his own terms rather than the government's. Readers looking to independent publishers for something unconventional and original should look elsewhere; The Spark is utterly conventional, from an origin event oddly similar to the one in Marvel's now defunct New Universe to its collection of two-dimensional stereotypes posing as characters. It is also not particularly well done; the art, which varies from crude to grotesquely crude, does not distract from the fact that this is a completely derivative superhero book, offering nothing new to this now elderly and declining genre. (July)

Art in Time: Unknown Comic Book Adventures, 1940--1980 Dan Nadel. Abrams, $40 (304p) ISBN 978-0-8109-8824-8

This isn't exactly a sequel to Nadel's celebrated 2006 anthology Art Out of Time, but a “companion,” he explains in its introduction. In fact, there seem to be three different collections of comics bypassed by conventional wisdom jostling for room here. One is work by well-known cartoonists in genres outside their specialties (like two horror stories by John Stanley, better known for his work on Little Lulu and other kid-humor comics, and war-comics artist Sam Glanzman's peculiar jungle adventure, “Kona”). Another continues the Art Out of Time project of unearthing forgotten, distinctive pulp-comics stylists. Pete Morisi's Johnny Dynamite noir-PI stories, for instance, are clichéd far past the point of parody, but there's something weirdly compelling about his figures' stiff, pained look, and Pat Boyette's 1967 “Children of Doom” is an intriguing variation on the sci-fi illustration style of its era. A third subset of the book's 14 artists are underground cartoonists with very different aesthetics from the 10-cent adventures they're sandwiched between: Sharon Rudahl, Michael McMillan, Willy Mendes, and John Thompson (a Rick Griffin--inspired psychedelic artist whose tripped-out, classicist Cyclops Comics is the oddest rediscovery). Nadel doesn't quite manage to draw the lines that connect this volume's artists, but he's spotlighted some intriguing work. (May)

Sweet Tooth: Out of the Woods Jeff Lemire. DC/Vertigo, $9.99 paper (128p) ISBN 978-1-4012-2696-1

The latest entry in the postapocalyptic survivalist fantasy stakes has a peculiar sentimental streak in it. Gus, an almost parodically naïve young boy with antlers sprouting from his forehead and a taste for chocolate, is one of the few children born after some kind of manmade catastrophe. Following the death of his Bible-thumping father, the only other person he's ever known, he's rescued from hunters by a hulking, rifle-toting man called Jepperd, who promises to take him to a sanctuary for kids like him (and slaughters the refugees from Clichéd Dialogue University who get in their way en route). But could Jepperd be more than he seems? (One guess.) Lemire's thick, crunching brush strokes can be rawly expressive; he's got a terrific sense of composition and narrative flow, and the crumbling settings he draws effectively evoke a blasted, forsaken world. Too often, though, his artwork simply comes off as crude. His characters' bodies and features are often distractingly inconsistent from one panel to the next. And Gus's dream vision of a cartoon deer (identified as “Dandy”) telling him to run away, which should be a dramatic peak of this volume, falls flat because Lemire can't pull off his attempted shift away from his baseline style. (May)

Ristorante Paradiso Natsume Ono. Viz, $12.99 paper (172p) ISBN 978-1-4215-3250-9

Telling the story of Nicoletta, a young girl seeking out the mother who left her as a child, Ristorante Paradiso exemplifies the best and worst elements of the slice-of-life genre. The protagonist's mother, Olga, is spirited off to Rome to marry her dream man, Lorenzo, whom she believes would have refused her had she revealed the existence of her child. Fifteen years later, the adult Nicoletta plans to expose her mother by telling Lorenzo the truth. However, it would be a mistake to think that Ono is actually interested in such weighty issues as child abandonment and familial loyalty. Instead, readers are in for a shallow soap opera focused on curiously identical-looking waiters and the women who pine for them. Nicoletta herself at the end of the story sums up the unbelievably cheap development and resolution of the family drama with one perfect descriptor: anticlimactic. On the plus side, for those who can get over the lack of depth and realism, the story offers cute subplots for anyone who has imagined what sort of drama may await in the back rooms of Italian restaurants. (Mar.)

Twilight: The Graphic Novel, vol. 1 Stephenie Meyer, art and adaptation by Young Kim. HBG/Yen, $19.99 (224p) ISBN 978-0-7595-2943-4

The Twilight Saga continues as the world's most beloved teen vampire story arrives in yet another package: the graphic novel. The story has remained the same: girl meets vampire, girl falls in love with vampire, vampire loves her back and almost gets her killed. Meyers's trilogy has captured by storm the anguished hearts of teens and romance readers--not to mention the jealous attention of the rest of the publishing industry. With each book in the saga, Meyers has built a devoted audience with an insatiable appetite for her series. Yen Press is clearly capitalizing on that audience with this graphic novel adaptation. The hardcover presentation and price-point signal that the book is intended as a collector's item and, at its best, another way to relive the Twilight experience. Unfortunately, this first half of the two-volume adaptation of Meyers's first book brings nothing new to the table. While Young Kim's paneling isn't terrible, her pacing is off, and the book reads unevenly. The dialogue is stilted and the characters come across as annoying rather than expressing longing. Twilight: The Graphic Novel reads like a first draft where all the pieces are there, but have yet to meld to one another and actually fit. There are certain angles and physical poses that Kim has not yet mastered, and they stand out starkly in this book. Nevertheless, retailers will be hard-pressed to keep copies of this book on their shelves. (Mar.)

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