Trials of Passion, Lisa Appignanesi, Pegasus Books — Victorian-era spinster Christiana Edmonds was extremely unhappy that her letters weren’t returned by her doctor, Charles Beard. Of course he loved her and would leave his wife, but Beard never did. He simply told Christiana to stop writing.
Tigerman – A Novel, Nick Harkaway, Vintage Press — British army Sergeant Lester Ferris has seen his share of action–perhaps too much during a recent posting to Afghanistan. Close to military retirement but still fit, he’s posted to a relic of the British Empire located in the Indian Ocean, an island called Mancreu.
Muse, Jonathan Galassi, Alfred A Knopf — Paul Dukach, a nerdy, small-town boy from upstate New York, finds his spiritual home in the NYC publishing firm of Purcell & Stern. P&S is peopled by eccentrics of all stripes whose brilliance in their fields enables the firm to publish books almost in spite of itself.
In the Kingdom of Ice, Hampton Sides, Anchor Books — For centuries the realms of the far North have excited the imagination. Until late Victorian times it was thought that, beyond the frozen wastes rimming the northern continents, the Arctic was clear of ice.
The Blooding, James McGee, Pegasus Crime — On escaping from Bonaparte’s France, British secret agent Matthew Hawkwood finds himself in the United States. It’s the year 1812, and the young country is now at war with Britain.
Press Start to Play: An Anthology, Wilson and Adams, Vintage Books — We were never designed to live the lives we do nowadays—stuck in cubicles all day instead of out hunting and gathering, fighting for our very survival as our ancestors once did. Modern humans are in desperate need to exorcise their “evolutionary demons,” and what better method to do so than by playing video games?
Trident Code (A Lana Elkins thriller), Thomas Waite, 47North — The cyber-terrorist hijack of a US submarine brings NSA computer expert Lana Elkins forward once again to fight for her country.
The Fall, John Lescroart, Atria Books — Anlya Paulson, seventeen years of age and African-American, takes a fatal plunge from an overpass late one evening. With possible racial overtones to her death, the police and the DA’s office are under intense political pressure to find and convict her killer.
Charlie’s Pride, Dee Hubbard, Fithian Press — Charlie the Hawk can’t help but identify with the Klamath River, his father’s tribe’s ancestral home. It springs forth from the distant mountains and fights its way to the ocean. So like the river, Charlie’s life is one long struggle from its inception to its end, flooded with his tears and littered with his fears.
The Darkest Heart, Dan Smith, Pegasus Crime — Zico is just another young hoodlum living in small-town Brazil. He acts as a hit-man for Costa, the local criminal big shot. Zico is good at the job, but trouble comes when he decides the life is no longer for him.
