By: Kaira Rouda

ISBN:  9781525811401

Publisher:  Graydon House

Publication Date: 9/19/2017 

Format: Hardcover

My Rating: 5 Stars +++

Best Books of 2017 

Psychologically rich, Kaira Rouda's latest, BEST DAY EVER is one of the most satisfying and entertaining books I have read in 2017! 5 Stars +++ When I add (+s): my Top List for the year. 

Kaira Rouda creates an unpredictable delicious unique domestic suspense at its finest. I predict BEST DAY EVER will be a blockbuster hit and prime for the wide screen. What goes on behind closed doors? 

BEST DAY EVER, a Big Little Lies, but better. The author’s best work to date and this psychological domestic thriller sets itself apart from all the rest due to, a number of things which I will address in my review. (sorry for the length of the review, but have a lot to say).

There are so many psychological elements at play here (starting with the car ride). A weekend trip. The allure. A lake house. A dinner. The anticipation. Afterwards. The perfect set up. You will be dying to know what will happen next. Truly edge-of-your-seat. 

I can envision Alexander Skarsgård (Paul) and Nichole Kidman (Mia) starring in the film. I want a front row seat. An ideal choice for BEST DAY EVER. Hint, someone! Will need to ponder the cast for Buck. (he needs to be hot and hunky)! 

Skillful writing and execution tactics abound. The story takes place within a 24 hr. period. Tick Tock. There is not one moment of boredom. It is addictive and compelling. 

The banter is to die for! 

The author has outdone herself. Spine-tingling. Impending peril (not knowing what Paul will do next) creating intense tension, that propels this claustrophobic cat-and-mouse tale toward its hold your breath, gratifying conclusion. 

Meet Paul and Mia Strom. 

Mia was once a copywriter at an advertising agency when they met. She is from a wealthy family. Paul is an advertising executive and he thinks he is God. He thinks everyone worships him. It does not matter what he does wrong. He can put a spin on it. He has secrets. 

He, of course, has taught his wife everything. (gag) Sex, love, fine food, travel. He is the sophisticated older man she pledged to love honor and obey. As most psychopaths, they do not respect women. They are a conquest. They seek them out. Put on the charm. Slowly turn on their dark side. 

We hear from Paul, in Ohio and his plans to take his wife away for the weekend to their home on Lake Erie. It is a Friday afternoon and Paul feels some tension. He has made these plans and he wants nothing to go wrong. He appears charming and romantic. It will be the BEST DAY EVER. 

They have not been away for a weekend together in more than a year. This day was going to be just for them and it was time to go. The phone rings causing a little delay. 

They drop the kids off at the sitter’s house and then they are on their way. After all, he has loaded and syncing all his wife’s favorite songs. It will be a romantic weekend, with candles, wine, and a fabulous restaurant. Everything to set the mood. Nothing will stand in his way. 

As for most of us, we are aware of any sort of relationship- when you are traveling, you have expectations of an upcoming trip. Emotions run high. She is thinking. He is thinking. Trying to read the other's mind. However, as the car winds its way to the lake, we soon get the feeling, Paul has a dark side. 

However, we are not quite sure what is going on with Mia. 

Of course, he does not like it when she wants to stop for a restroom break (God forbid) or stop at a bakery for croissants. However, he is in a flexible mood. He will throw her a bone or two. This once. Paul also talks about the neighbors and bad mouths them if they do not like him. He is all about appearances. 

First, I knew nothing about this book going in, except the summary and the book trailer. At first glance, you think this will be another murder at the lake. Been there, done that. Think again. This book is nothing like anything I have read. 

Not the blood and gore. It is the most dangerous of all. The mind. The thoughts. The suspense. The impending danger. The mystery. The intrigue and the dark humor. Character-driven. 

You pretty much suspect early on Paul (husband) looks at life through rose-colored glasses. He thinks he can do no wrong. Everyone is beneath him and he can manipulate anyone to his advantage. What a jerk. 

He is king of their castle and his queen needs to fall back in line. He is all about action, like a super hero. About achieving and success. Their family is superior. What is this talk about her going back to work? No way. 

You have no clue what he has planned for the romantic weekend away at the lake without the boys. You know something is hidden in the car in the glove compartment, but you do not know what. It will be the BEST DAY EVER. 

He has a lot riding on this weekend. More than you can imagine. 

Paul is trying to make this a pleasant experience to smooth things over, or so it appears. We soon learn Mia has been sick. It annoys him when she eats healthy and controls their eating and dining habits. He appears to be trying, yet he does not like it when the conversation does not go his way. 

Everything he is thinking is played out in the book. He continues to steer it in his direction. He demands control. 

This is where the book excels in my opinion. I could not put this book down. If I had to, I was dying to get back to it. You know something has occurred and he is trying to make a good impression to get Mia back to his side. He wants to smooth things over for some reason. 

He gets annoyed when she starts talking about her strawberries and garden at the lake. The guy Buck is their next door neighbor and his wife died. He helps look after her garden when they are away.

Of course, Paul does not like Buck. Mmmmm . .

The next thing which keeps the reader guessing. Mia does not seem like the meek and mild type with an overbearing controlling (Sleeping with the Enemy husband). She seems a little cocky. She is not argumentive, but yet she brings up topics which are uncomfortable for her husband. 

It is a tug and pull; a little tit for tat, cat and mouse game. She appears calm and collected. What does she have on him? She keeps him on his toes. 

She is intriguing. Mysterious. You do not know what is going through her mind at all. It is all coming from Paul’s viewpoint (which you soon find out, he is wacky). Love her character. 

A modern-day psychopath. 

Mia, on the other hand, does not seem too worried about what her husband has planned, and pretty much drives the night in a subtle way, much to her husband’s displeasure.

When Buck interrupts their alone time, throws dinner reservations late, and at dinner, appears the waiter hates him (because he is a pompous ass) and always looks at his wife, plus his wife seems to be looking at the window in a daze with a smile on her face. He is thrown off his game. 

Could Mia have turned the tables on him? Mia knows much more than she has let on about her husband’s secrets and lies. She is the one who comes from money (parent’s wealthy) and they do not like him and never have. 

How could he have not been paying attention? When did little Mia become so confident and bold? And what does she know? Has someone told her what is going on? He has many skeletons in his closet. 

“This was supposed to be the best day ever, and now it is deteriorating, decaying like the memories of his childhood. “

Frantic, we see Paul’s world unraveling and spinning out of control. And the letter . . . . Priceless!!! I have never laughed so hard. Karma will bite you in the butt when you least expect. 

WOW! It is hard to describe a book of this nature since you do not want to give anything away. You want to provide enough to encourage others, they “Must” read this book. From the cover, author, characters, plot – from the first page to the last (A complete package). I would not change a thing. 

All the dirty secrets are revealed. 

Rouda has created a character so evil with his banter and thoughts. I would put him next to any of the bad guys out there. One reviewer compared him to Joe in You and I agree. I think also Perry in Big Little Lies and Jack Behind Closed Doors. An utterly compelling journey through the darker side of the human psyche. 

The things which go on in his head! Clever writing. Both creepy, and witty. Paul is psychotic, entitled, and a narcissist with a capital N! Rouda reminds me of Paul Cleave here. Another favorite author which uses a lot of dark humor mixed with the thoughts of his psychos. 

As many of you read, my personal notes in my recent review of Emma in the Night— this topic is very relatable and one I have researched for years since my ex-husband was a narcissist. Most everything in this book is so realistic. I think Paul and my ex could be brothers. SCARY. If you meet someone too charming and too good-looking. RUN. 

The author keeps you guessing all the way through the book. You want to savor each moment and not rush. What I did indeed enjoy (which I wish more authors would follow)- Kaira recaps the night and the events leading up to the night from Mia’s point of view at the end. A "behind the scenes." 

During the reading, the author does not give anything away. As a reader, you think she is being manipulated by her husband. By providing all the final details, this balances the story for a satisfying conclusion.

Note: Kaira, if I see Paul around Palm Beach at the Breakers or shopping along Worth Avenue in his pink shirt with an older rich lady on his arm, will let you know. This could be a great follow-up book. Even better, he and Donald Trump have a lot in common, so I am sure Paul will worm his way into Mar-a-Lago. I can view his estate from my apartment window. Will keep you updated! 

Seriously, this may be my favorite psychological/domestic thriller this year. Congrats. Can’t wait to see what’s next. You have found your groove. Give us more of this, please. (no pressure).

Have ordered the hardcover (to arrive today), and currently listening to the audiobook, narrated by Graham Halstead and Amy McFadden. Look forward to reading 2018  PLENTY TO GO AROUND. (sneak preview included). 

If I have not convinced you yet. Readers, pre-order this now. The best psychological thriller of 2017! Fans of Mary Kubica, Fiona Barton, and B.A. Paris will enjoy.

A special thank you to Graydon House and NetGalley for an early reading copy. 

JDCMustReadBooks

In the Mirror 
Here Home Hope 
The Goodbye Year 

Darktown #2

By:  Thomas Mullen 

ISBN: 9781501138799

Publisher: Atria 

Publication Date: 9/12/2017

Format: Hardcover 

My Rating: 5 Stars + 

From the acclaimed author, Thomas Mullen who introduced readers to the hit, Darktown landing on my Top Books of 2016 —racial integration of Atlanta’s police department in 1948 — with an explosive multi-layered complex follow-up: LIGHTNING MEN. 

Racial violence and corruption continue in 1950’s Atlanta, with African-American police officers, Boggs and Smith. 

As they say in the South, these two find themselves in a "heap of trouble.” (Among others). 

“Hot Atlanta” is not just sizzling. It is blistering. Fiery. Tensions and emotions run high. Loyalties are tested between family and law. Color lines are threatened. Moral lines are blurred. 

The second in the Darktown series, Mullen uses his hard-boiled crime, cop procedural, to explore post-WWII racism in the South. 

The highly anticipated character-driven LIGHTNING MEN is much more than just a crime-fictional thriller. It is infused with critical historical details and timely controversial subjects we face today.

“Any candid observer of American racial history must acknowledge that racism is highly adaptable.” – Michelle Alexander, The New Jim Crow 

Highly-charged, Mullen turns up the intensity with characters facing moral, family, social issues and compromises. 

Tensions rise. From racial prejudice, moonshining, drugs, greed, conspiracy, Klansmen, fascist Columbians, white supremacist, corruption, bigotry, violence, Jim Crow laws, preachers, shootouts, paybacks, fear, power, and segregated neighborhoods.

In Darktown, we met rookies: Officer Lucius Boggs and his partner, Tommy Smith. 

From different backgrounds, their office was housed in the basement of the Negro YMCA, a makeshift precinct. They were not even allowed to arrest white men, nor allowed to drive a squad car. They could not patrol outside of the Negro neighborhoods that constituted their beat. No respect and little support. 

Only ten black officers patrolled those thousands of souls. A third of Atlanta were black, yet they were crowded into only a fifth of the land. 

Boggs and Smith had not taken bribes; however, with two years on the force, it appeared half of the white officers took bribes, so how long would the Negro officers resist? 

They were tiring of their powerlessness. The son of a preacher, Boggs was all too familiar with the fallibility of men, even men with power. 

Denny Rakestraw (white) is distrusted by his fellow officers for his suspected role in the disappearance of his former partner, Lionel Dunlow. 

Rakestraw is not a racist but finds it difficult to fit in with his fellow white cops and work with the ten black cops. Neither side, fully trusts him. 

Denny’s problems increase when his Klansman brother-in-law, Dale Simpkins, gets involved in a plot to stop the influx of African-Americans into his neighborhood, Hanford Park. 

Some cops are part of the Klan. Will they accuse one of the richest men in Atlanta of selling moonshine and marijuana?

Boggs had come to respect McInnis over the last two years. He had stuck up for his charges during a few disputes with white officers. How far can he go to protect them? 

Boggs (preacher’s son) is dating Julie with a young son, Sage. Soon to be married. His family opposes the relationship since she is not of their social status. She has a secret past. She is intimidated by their prestigious family. 

When a black man, Jeremiah is released from prison after five years, things get personal. Boggs life gets complicated when he learns the connection. 

Two years earlier, Boggs came close to resigning his position and had second thoughts after a near-death experience. Now, he is unsure again.

Too many mistakes that weighed heavily on his soul. He is sure there would be more guilt and an awkward relationship with his partner. Can he remain as a cop? 

Events will lead each character to major soul-searching. Smith had crossed another line as well. He was afraid. 

. . . The Armor. The façade victims’ families typically wore when they needed to protect themselves or the memory of their loved ones. Folks who wore The Armor sometimes had secrets to hide. 

The Armor was firmly in place as they parried the officer’s attempts to learn more about the deceased. They wore The Armor to keep the cops from learning things. The secrets. . . 

The Armor was worn by the innocent, who had nothing to hide but their dignity, and they were so deeply offended to be questioned by these employees of the corrupt City of Atlanta, these paid enforcers of Jim Crow, that they refused to play along. They may be innocent, hurt, or protective. 

. . . “And lines are only ideas people dream up, to govern what should be possible, to keep you from moving toward the forbidden.”

Three policemen struggle. Each has an agenda and react in different ways to protect. Loyalties are tested. Family versus law. 

Can they continue to work with one hand tied behind their packs without the proper support to do their jobs? Will the latest emotional events, their actions, and tensions make them second guess their current careers? Will they continue to serve and make Atlanta a better city, or is it a useless effort? 

After violence and a shootout, will Hanford Park be transformed? Will the lines between white and black be blurred after the postwar crowding, pushing blacks into areas formerly considered whites-only (without violence)? 

From racial politics and struggles of history, Mullen does not miss a beat! 

The complex emotions of each character are portrayed in depth, making the characters jump off the page. Others threaten lives. Others protect. Struggles both interior and exterior. 

Complications. Affairs interrupted. Old scores settled. Blood feuds magnified. Pride. Costs were high. Greed. 

Hard-boiled. Explosive. Riveting. Timely! 

Love this enthralling series and looking forward to seeing what is in store next for Smith and Boggs. 

When reading of Boggs at his dad’s house for dinner with Julie, reminds me strongly of Greenleaf (a favorite show) and their preacher/family dinners. Heaven forbid, their children do not follow their well-laid controlled plans. 

Movie-worthy! For those who enjoy good crime fiction, and historical fiction as Mullen meticulously traces the civil rights movement through his well-written crime stories and cop procedurals, that involve "real" characters you come to care about. 

Fans of TV mini-series: Underground, Greenleaf and Queen Sugar will enjoy this intense series as well as Michael Connley’s Harry Bosch and Greg Iles' Penn Cage series. 

In addition to the early digital reading copy (thank you) provided by NetGalley and Atria, I also purchased the audiobook, narrated by Yahya Abdul-Mateen II – for an award-winning performance. Just finished. 

Move this series to the top of your list. If you reside in the South, this is a “must read.” Especially for those of us who found (find) Atlanta our home for many years. Another Southern winner! 

JDCMustReadBooks

****
Due to post-Irma, residing in South Florida with water damages, power outage, cell towers, and loss of internet for nine consecutive days; no gas, grocery, or mail service – late posting my review on pub day. Let's hope Maria does not pay us a visit. 

Yay! Today we have internet restored, power, cell towers, and mail service! Back in business. Ordered the hardcover copies of both DARKTOWN and LIGHTNING MEN for my personal library. So excited, they are out for delivery today, from Amazon! (Love the covers) Looking forward to receiving my copies. (Now, I have to figure out how to get the author to autograph) my copies. 

Busy catching up with posting reviews and my blog. Thanks everyone for your patience.

 

 

 

City on the verge of a race riot in ‘Darktown’ sequel

Thomas Mullen’s new novel examines brotherly hate  

By Tray Butler - For the AJC

 

 

 

By: Joyce Maynard

ISBN: 978-1635570342

Publisher:  Bloomsbury USA

Publication Date: 9/5/2017 

Format: Hardcover

My Rating:  5 Stars

From New York Times bestselling author Joyce Maynard, a memoir about discovering strength in the midst of great loss--"heart-wrenching, inspiring, full of joy and tears and life." (Anne Lamott)

From the author of (2016) Under the Influence Joyce Maynard once again delivers a mesmerizing and beautiful journey and love story.  Love, loss, grief, and marriage. Cancer, and its battles. Life changing experiences. 

I loved THE BEST OF US! A deeply moving and powerful tribute. One of the best memoirs I have read in 2017. 

Raw and honest, a poignant and beautifully written memoir that accompanied me for a 20 hr. car ride in bumper-to-bumper gridlock traffic while evacuating Hurricane Irma from South Florida. This was supposed to be a birthday weekend trip with my sons coming into town from NC to Florida. Then with IRMA, the hotel canceled and the airlines. Not happening. 

Recalculate. Now, I had to evacuate and leave Florida. The perfect book would be THE BEST OF US. Loaded on all my devices and synced to my car. I knew she would carry me through. 

What was supposed to be a trip to Highlands, NC (Western Mountains north of Atlanta) to escape Florida and IRMA on Thursday before the upcoming disaster. With only two roads out of Florida and 7 million people in South Florida trying to evacuate. This would have been a 12-15 hr drive. 

However, it turned into a 20 hr. drive and never even got out of Florida, much less cross into Atlanta or NC. I could not wait to get out of the car and no hotels on this strip of the turnpike. I only made it a little north of Orlando, in Ocala, FL. (On a normal day, would take you 4 hrs.). At the end of the Florida Turnpike, when I saw I-75 after driving all night, lack of sleep, lack of fuel for travelers, overcrowded highways, and no vacancy; you can bet I grabbed the first hotel I could find when they had a last minute cancellation. 

I recall sitting there in the heat, trying to decide where to go, with my A/C running at a truck stop on the turnpike with hundreds of stranded families with their children and pets, sitting in my car listening to THE BEST OF US. 

I looked around at all the hundreds of families that may never see their homes again and are sleeping in their cars. While listening to Joyce and her brave fight as well as Jim's courage and tenacity.  

I am currently riding out the impending storm here in Ocala, FL at the same hotel for its duration before I can return home to Palm Beach. This central location may still face issues as well, but at least I will not be on the waterfront in South Florida. Still waiting it out until Monday and beyond to see what will happen. 

Without the audiobook, to accompany me on this stressful journey, narrated by Joyce, not sure I could have made it thru this time. I always purchase her audiobooks. Her voice is spellbinding. Her stories grab you by the heartstrings and never let go. 

While listening, filled with anxiety and stress worrying if I would (will) have an apartment to return to on the water, top floor in West Palm Beach and on the heels shortly after my dad's death in June (heart) and mom's (cancer) last August, I had to take a moment to think beyond my current situation, while listening to this beautiful and heartbreaking love story. I related on so many levels. I have so much to be thankful for. Her voice was calming and soothing. 

Being around the same age as the author, and single (divorced), I found it refreshing —two courageous and talented people were able to find one another and bring so much joy to one another if only for a short time. 

From the love, tears, fears, and sorrows, I adore Joyce Mayard's writing and highly recommend this amazing book. Flaws and all, she shares a personal story with passion, heart, and soul; filled with humor, wit, love, grief, honesty, and raw emotion. From the darkest hours to the magical moments. 

An added bonus for the audiobook readers, the author, and Jim share their wedding vows. Priceless! Readers, you have to meet Jim. An incredible man and one which will not be forgotten. 

An inspiring story! For readers who enjoyed When Breath Becomes Air. Highly Recommend the author and this amazing book. Buy the audio!  An ideal choice for book clubs and further discussions. Book Guide 

 The New York Times 

By: Kaira Rouda

ISBN:  9781525811401

Publisher:  Graydon House

Publication Date: 9/19/2017 

Format: Hardcover

My Rating: 5 Stars +++

Best Books of 2017 

Psychologically rich, Kaira Rouda's latest, BEST DAY EVER is one of the most satisfying and entertaining books I have read in 2017! 5 Stars +++ When I add (+s): my Top List for the year. 

Kaira Rouda creates an unpredictable delicious unique domestic suspense at its finest. I predict BEST DAY EVER will be a blockbuster hit and prime for the wide screen. What goes on behind closed doors? 

BEST DAY EVER, a Big Little Lies, but better. The author’s best work to date and this psychological domestic thriller sets itself apart from all the rest due to, a number of things which I will address in my review. (sorry for the length of the review, but have a lot to say).

There are so many psychological elements at play here (starting with the car ride). A weekend trip. The allure. A lake house. A dinner. The anticipation. Afterwards. The perfect set up. You will be dying to know what will happen next. Truly edge-of-your-seat. 

I can envision Alexander Skarsgård (Paul) and Nichole Kidman (Mia) starring in the film. I want a front row seat. An ideal choice for BEST DAY EVER. Hint, someone! Will need to ponder the cast for Buck. (he needs to be hot and hunky)! 

Skillful writing and execution tactics abound. The story takes place within a 24 hr. period. Tick Tock. There is not one moment of boredom. It is addictive and compelling. 

The banter is to die for! 

The author has outdone herself. Spine-tingling. Impending peril (not knowing what Paul will do next) creating intense tension, that propels this claustrophobic cat-and-mouse tale toward its hold your breath, gratifying conclusion. 

Meet Paul and Mia Strom. 

Mia was once a copywriter at an advertising agency when they met. She is from a wealthy family. Paul is an advertising executive and he thinks he is God. He thinks everyone worships him. It does not matter what he does wrong. He can put a spin on it. He has secrets. 

He, of course, has taught his wife everything. (gag) Sex, love, fine food, travel. He is the sophisticated older man she pledged to love honor and obey. As most psychopaths, they do not respect women. They are a conquest. They seek them out. Put on the charm. Slowly turn on their dark side. 

We hear from Paul, in Ohio and his plans to take his wife away for the weekend to their home on Lake Erie. It is a Friday afternoon and Paul feels some tension. He has made these plans and he wants nothing to go wrong. He appears charming and romantic. It will be the BEST DAY EVER. 

They have not been away for a weekend together in more than a year. This day was going to be just for them and it was time to go. The phone rings causing a little delay. 

They drop the kids off at the sitter’s house and then they are on their way. After all, he has loaded and syncing all his wife’s favorite songs. It will be a romantic weekend, with candles, wine, and a fabulous restaurant. Everything to set the mood. Nothing will stand in his way. 

As for most of us, we are aware of any sort of relationship- when you are traveling, you have expectations of an upcoming trip. Emotions run high. She is thinking. He is thinking. Trying to read the other's mind. However, as the car winds its way to the lake, we soon get the feeling, Paul has a dark side. 

However, we are not quite sure what is going on with Mia. 

Of course, he does not like it when she wants to stop for a restroom break (God forbid) or stop at a bakery for croissants. However, he is in a flexible mood. He will throw her a bone or two. This once. Paul also talks about the neighbors and bad mouths them if they do not like him. He is all about appearances. 

First, I knew nothing about this book going in, except the summary and the book trailer. At first glance, you think this will be another murder at the lake. Been there, done that. Think again. This book is nothing like anything I have read. 

Not the blood and gore. It is the most dangerous of all. The mind. The thoughts. The suspense. The impending danger. The mystery. The intrigue and the dark humor. Character-driven. 

You pretty much suspect early on Paul (husband) looks at life through rose-colored glasses. He thinks he can do no wrong. Everyone is beneath him and he can manipulate anyone to his advantage. What a jerk. 

He is king of their castle and his queen needs to fall back in line. He is all about action, like a super hero. About achieving and success. Their family is superior. What is this talk about her going back to work? No way. 

You have no clue what he has planned for the romantic weekend away at the lake without the boys. You know something is hidden in the car in the glove compartment, but you do not know what. It will be the BEST DAY EVER. 

He has a lot riding on this weekend. More than you can imagine. 

Paul is trying to make this a pleasant experience to smooth things over, or so it appears. We soon learn Mia has been sick. It annoys him when she eats healthy and controls their eating and dining habits. He appears to be trying, yet he does not like it when the conversation does not go his way. 

Everything he is thinking is played out in the book. He continues to steer it in his direction. He demands control. 

This is where the book excels in my opinion. I could not put this book down. If I had to, I was dying to get back to it. You know something has occurred and he is trying to make a good impression to get Mia back to his side. He wants to smooth things over for some reason. 

He gets annoyed when she starts talking about her strawberries and garden at the lake. The guy Buck is their next door neighbor and his wife died. He helps look after her garden when they are away.

Of course, Paul does not like Buck. Mmmmm . .

The next thing which keeps the reader guessing. Mia does not seem like the meek and mild type with an overbearing controlling (Sleeping with the Enemy husband). She seems a little cocky. She is not argumentive, but yet she brings up topics which are uncomfortable for her husband. 

It is a tug and pull; a little tit for tat, cat and mouse game. She appears calm and collected. What does she have on him? She keeps him on his toes. 

She is intriguing. Mysterious. You do not know what is going through her mind at all. It is all coming from Paul’s viewpoint (which you soon find out, he is wacky). Love her character. 

A modern-day psychopath. 

Mia, on the other hand, does not seem too worried about what her husband has planned, and pretty much drives the night in a subtle way, much to her husband’s displeasure.

When Buck interrupts their alone time, throws dinner reservations late, and at dinner, appears the waiter hates him (because he is a pompous ass) and always looks at his wife, plus his wife seems to be looking at the window in a daze with a smile on her face. He is thrown off his game. 

Could Mia have turned the tables on him? Mia knows much more than she has let on about her husband’s secrets and lies. She is the one who comes from money (parent’s wealthy) and they do not like him and never have. 

How could he have not been paying attention? When did little Mia become so confident and bold? And what does she know? Has someone told her what is going on? He has many skeletons in his closet. 

“This was supposed to be the best day ever, and now it is deteriorating, decaying like the memories of his childhood. “

Frantic, we see Paul’s world unraveling and spinning out of control. And the letter . . . . Priceless!!! I have never laughed so hard. Karma will bite you in the butt when you least expect. 

WOW! It is hard to describe a book of this nature since you do not want to give anything away. You want to provide enough to encourage others, they “Must” read this book. From the cover, author, characters, plot – from the first page to the last (A complete package). I would not change a thing. 

All the dirty secrets are revealed. 

Rouda has created a character so evil with his banter and thoughts. I would put him next to any of the bad guys out there. One reviewer compared him to Joe in You and I agree. I think also Perry in Big Little Lies and Jack Behind Closed Doors. An utterly compelling journey through the darker side of the human psyche. 

The things which go on in his head! Clever writing. Both creepy, and witty. Paul is psychotic, entitled, and a narcissist with a capital N! Rouda reminds me of Paul Cleave here. Another favorite author which uses a lot of dark humor mixed with the thoughts of his psychos. 

As many of you read, my personal notes in my recent review of Emma in the Night— this topic is very relatable and one I have researched for years since my ex-husband was a narcissist. Most everything in this book is so realistic. I think Paul and my ex could be brothers. SCARY. If you meet someone too charming and too good-looking. RUN. 

The author keeps you guessing all the way through the book. You want to savor each moment and not rush. What I did indeed enjoy (which I wish more authors would follow)- Kaira recaps the night and the events leading up to the night from Mia’s point of view at the end. A "behind the scenes." 

During the reading, the author does not give anything away. As a reader, you think she is being manipulated by her husband. By providing all the final details, this balances the story for a satisfying conclusion.

Note: Kaira, if I see Paul around Palm Beach at the Breakers or shopping along Worth Avenue in his pink shirt with an older rich lady on his arm, will let you know. This could be a great follow-up book. Even better, he and Donald Trump have a lot in common, so I am sure Paul will worm his way into Mar-a-Lago. I can view his estate from my apartment window. Will keep you updated! 

Seriously, this may be my favorite psychological/domestic thriller this year. Congrats. Can’t wait to see what’s next. You have found your groove. Give us more of this, please. (no pressure).

Have ordered the hardcover (to arrive today), and currently listening to the audiobook, narrated by Graham Halstead and Amy McFadden. Look forward to reading 2018  PLENTY TO GO AROUND. (sneak preview included). 

If I have not convinced you yet. Readers, pre-order this now. The best psychological thriller of 2017! Fans of Mary Kubica, Fiona Barton, and B.A. Paris will enjoy.

A special thank you to Graydon House and NetGalley for an early reading copy. 

JDCMustReadBooks

In the Mirror 
Here Home Hope 
The Goodbye Year 

By:  J.T. Ellison 

ISBN: 9780778330950

Publisher:  MIRA

Publication Date: 9/5/2017 

Format: Paperback 

My Rating:  4.5 Stars  

From No One Knows (2016) to the present with her latest standalone. 

From the southern town of Franklin, Tennessee to glamorous streets of Paris, and Hemingway’s old haunts, talented storyteller J. T. Ellison delivers a gripping domestic suspense thriller. LIE TO ME – the highly anticipated story of need and desire. Of betrayal, secrets, lies, and danger. 

Reminiscent of Gone Girl (even better), two writers' lives set on a downward course driven by lies, secrets, evil, and revenge.

Love, the author’s journey, the literary references, and her passion. From the inspiration, the setting, and the final words, which jump off the page. (not sure how the author can crank out so many books, and travel – she is superwoman)!

Two ultimately unreliable narrators. The third one is freaky, creepy. Watch your back. Trust no one.

“Chaos is a name for any order that produces confusion in our minds.”— George Santayana

As the book opens we meet a nameless and faceless demented person. She/he is talking to the reader. This person informs us we are not going to like them. Stealing, killing, manipulating, and leaving a trail of destruction. 

Everyone is powerless. 

Next, there is a body in the woods. It has been there for six days before she was found. Who is this body burned and left to decay?

Moving along we meet a literary power couple. Ethan and Sutton Montclair. They made a powerful and attractive couple. Looks, brains, and success. However, all is not so perfect behind this façade.

Their son, Dashiell had died. SIDS. (Sudden Infant Death Syndrome). He was not even six months old. Things were not the same after this. Their marriage and relationship were on the rocks.

Presently, Ethan finds a note from Sutton stating she has gone away. She is unhappy. She asks him to forgive her for being a coward and instructs him not to look for her.

She was gone. 

He deserved this. He was selfish. (A narcissist) However, why would she leave without her things? Her laptop, and phone. These things were her lifeline. She was a writer. 

Frantic, he must call her friends. They would know. Rachel, a yoga teacher. Ellen the head of library sciences at Vanderbilt, Filly (Phyllis), and Ivy. Ivy, a self-employed stock broker- was out of town on business and she was Sutton’s closest friend and confidant for the last three years. 

Then, of course, the bloody mother, Siobhan. They do not get along but she receives a monthly check from her daughter. 

We soon learn there were cracks and fissures in this domestic house of bliss. Was Ethan abusing her? There had been multiple domestic calls. What was missing?

Ethan thought he was the best writer. However, he had not produced anything since the baby’s death. Sutton had sustained them with her historical romance, which he never gave her the credit or respect. 

Sutton never wanted children. Ethan knew heirs were simply part of the things that should be expected from someone of his standing. 

However, he got desperate. He had made a mistake. 

He loved Sutton. If she did not show up, he would call the police. It was the anniversary of their son’s death. 

From beauty and the beast. A love and hate relationship. From then to now. 

Most of his family money was gone now, eaten up by the Victorian house they purchased, the renovations, and no writing. An advance paid back, humiliated in the industry and social media. He relied on Sutton’s income to support them. He simply had not been able to write a word since Dashiell’s death. He resented his wife. She resented him. They blamed one another. 

He needs a lawyer. The cops always look at the husband first.

Their lives had unraveled. The affair, the death of the baby, the book cancellation, and now Sutton’s disappearance.

He had not told her the truth. 

Where could she be? And who is the woman they found dead? What about her friends? Is Sutton dead or alive? 

What dark secrets does Sutton hold? Money missing. An investigation. 

Sergeant Roy Moreno and Holly Graham. However, Holly does not seem to think Ethan is the culprit. She has to find out more about the stalker, the friends, and where Sutton could have disappeared to. 

However, was it really SIDs? Ethan had lost his son, his marriage, his wife. His life. Are the friends reliable? Then there was the horrible review from a blogger.  Everything had spiraled out of control. The video. 

Had his wife snapped, or is there something more sinister going on? All the signs point to foul play; however, who is at the wheel and why?

Get ready for the ride of your life! Ellison takes readers from Tennessee to Paris and back. Character-driven (unpredictable) we hear from Ethan’s voice in the first part of the novel. Then Sutton the second part. From the past to present and all the dark juicy evil secrets in between. 

Skillfully executed, with twists and turns keep you guessing as to the real murderer. The creepy (third narrator) voice, carefully orchestrating a plan, watching the cops and all the puppets. Tick tock. 

A compelling journey through the darker side of the human psyche. An absorbing complex web of deceit. 

Ellison withholds the identity of the killer until the end. (the final little twist, was perfect). The note from the author seals the deal making this a “must read” if you love literary, psychological thrillers and domestic suspense. (Holly) was the best character. Otherwise, not a lot of likable characters here. 

If you enjoyed Gone Girl, The Marriage Lie, Every Last Lie, and Behind Closed Doors, LIE TO ME is for you. Movie-worthy and an ideal choice for book clubs and further discussions. 

4.5 Stars. A special thank you to MIRA and NetGalley for an advanced reading copy. 

Also pre-ordered the audiobook. Listen to clip which should be quite entertaining narrated by Matthew Waterson, Saskia Maarleveld, Sarah Naughton, and Julia Whelan (my favorite). 

PS Be sure and look for Dead Ends: Stories from the Gothic South Coming Sept 28, featuring 13 original stories by 13 incredible authors.

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By: Laura Marshall 

ISBN: 9781478948513

Publisher: Grand Central 

Publication Date: 9/5/2017 

Format: Hardcover

My Rating: 4 Stars 

Laura Marshall delivers a twisty and suspenseful edge-of-your-seat debut, FRIEND REQUEST – when a single divorced mother gets the shock of her life when receiving a Facebook friend email request. 

However, this woman happened to die twenty-five years ago, and Louise still feels the fear and guilt.

Who would guess this is a debut? Enjoyed learning of the author’s journey and her empowering story. 

Louise Williams is a divorced middle class, nearly middle-aged woman. Her cheating ex-husband Sam left her for another woman. 

She runs her own interior design business in London and is raising her four-year-son, Henry. Henry splits time with his two parents. Sam and Louise attended high school together. They have their secrets. 

When Louise sees the name, Maria Weston, she begins to shake. A blast from the past. She can just delete the email and go to Facebook and decline the request without looking at the page.

Don’t think so. . . 

A part of her wants to end this here and now, but another part of her wants to see. To know. To understand.

So she clicks, "confirm request." 

Maria stares at her from behind the screen. How can Maria Weston want to be friends with her, when she is dead? More than twenty-five years.

This girl, (would be— woman) . . . "has been hovering at the edge of her consciousness for all her adult life, but she had been good at keeping her out, just a blurred shadow in the corner of her eye, almost but not quite out of sight."

From 1989 to 2016, the author takes us back to the bullying, manipulation, and the secret life of these teens and their high school years.

Presently, there is also an upcoming Sharne Bay High School Reunion for the class of 1989. Could this be a coincidence she is getting this the same day? 

Who is doing this? Could Maria still be alive? She had drowned twenty-five years ago. Some thought she committed suicide. 

The party. The last she was seen. Louise has a secret. Who else knows her secret? 

Desperate frightened teens trying to cover their misdeeds and dark secrets. As adults, they can no longer hide. 

The messages become even more threatening and dangerous. This person knows something. Louise is paranoid and fearful. Afraid her secrets of the past will unravel. She must contact the other girls. 

She desperately needs to find out who is tormenting her. Louise bullied others, and now it is payback. 

In between the past and present, the author cleverly inserts another voice. The reader is unsure of the voice. 

A sick joke? This person is watching her. They know things. A terrible gnawing sense of dread.

“A text: “You don’t deserve to be happy. Not after what you’ve done.”

As the danger gets closer, and someone else is murdered, Louise must find the person before she is next and her son. However, the danger may be closer than she thinks.

“Maybe it’s only be going back that she will be able to move forward.”

Truth. Lies. Secrets. Family Ties. Revenge. Actions. Consequences. Choices. Sins of the past. Justifying actions. 

Marshall keeps the reader in suspense and just when you think you know the identity— a new twist you did not see coming. Not a lot of likable characters; however, hats off to the author for an accomplished debut. 

A riveting psychological suspense thriller which also highlights topics of bullying, peer pressure, fears, insecurities, social media, dangers of the internet, privacy, rape fantasies, BDSM, sexual violence, drugs, sadism, and darker more sinister abuse. 

In addition, we learn even through generations, teenage girls, especially are desperate to fit in, willing to do or say anything to gain acceptance. 

I am not a fan of Facebook. When I first started reading, was unsure if I could get past the drama; however, as the book moves on it becomes more intriguing and mysterious. A whodunit. 

A good portrayal of how choices and experiences as teens can carry over to our adult lives. In addition, a nice comparison of how social media and Facebook also can affect adults as well as teens today. Anyone can be anyone on Facebook. It is easy to hide behind a faceless page. Someone lurking, watching your every move.

A solid and entertaining debut. Looking forward to seeing what’s next for this new found talented author! 

A special thank you to NetGalley and Grand Central for an early reading copy.

By:  Ali Land

ISBN:1250087643

Publisher: Flatiron Books

Publication Date: 9/5/2017 

Format: Hardcover 

My Rating:  4 Stars  

DEBUT

UK author Ali Land has dedicated her new breakout psychological gripping thriller to mental nurses everywhere. In fact, it happened to be a conversation the author had with a teenage girl when she was working as a mental health nurse that sparked the idea for the book. 

Ultimately this became her chilling debut hit, GOOD ME BAD ME. An Interview with Ali Land 

Land, once a full-time nurse to a full-time writer. It seems her former career has inspired new talent in the area of mental health; crosses psychological thriller. This is one highly courageous debut novel, and can only imagine how difficult this was to write — as she delves into the disturbing mind of a teenage girl. 

Milly (Annie) tries so desperately to be good. However, is this possible? A strong contender for debut of the year! 

“ . . . The playground. That’s what she called it. Where the games were evil, and there was only ever one winner. When it wasn’t my turn, she made me watch. A peephole in the wall. Asked me afterward. What did you see, Annie? What did you see?” . . .

“Forgive me when I tell you it was me. It was me that told.”

Annie’s mother Ruth is a serial, killer. (Peter Pan Killer). Her mom kidnapped and murdered children.

Annie has finally turned over her mom to the authorities. She loves her but she must keep her from killing other children. 

Now she has a new family with a new name. Milly. This is her chance to start over. 

Or so she thinks . . .

A foster dad named Mike. A psychologist, an expert in trauma. His wife Saski and daughter Phoebe. (Phoebe is not so nice). Phoebe turns out to be a bully, making it more difficult for Milly. She turns others at school against her.

Milly has enough problems with the stress of her traumatic childhood, sexual abuse, the guilt of her mother and the damage she has inflicted on her daughter, plus the upcoming trial, and now this girl and this family. 

Plus, the voices in her head. The continued taunting voices from her mom. The lessons she taught her.

She curls up in the floor. She read once that people who are violent are hotheaded, while psychopaths are cold hearted. Hot and cold. Head and heart. But what if you come from a person who’s both? 

What happens then?

The person Milly wants to run from is also the person she wants to run to. Game on.

Milly has secrets. What is she hiding?

Will she ever be normal growing up with an abusive and murderous mother? Good or bad?

She wants desperately to do the right thing, but her mother’s voice urging her on to do bad things. A child groomed and sexualized from a very young age, now fifteen. She has to take the stand. 

“Good me. Bad me. Siamese twins inside of me at war.”

The upcoming trial and the dreams. Now another toxic home. What happens when the trial is over? Can Milly fit in anywhere? Maybe she thinks there may be no place. 

A skillfully woven plot, with an unreliable narrator, GOOD ME BAD ME is heart wrenching, engrossing, terrifying, disturbing and filled with horror, tension, and suspense. 

This unsettling yet gripping tale will keep you glued to the pages. The author does an outstanding job of portraying mental and physical damages and trauma to a young disturbed girl and its outcome… A struggle between good and evil. 

For fans of Ruth Ware, Candice Fox, Wendy Walker, Louise Jensen, Jennifer Jaynes, and Jennifer Hillier. Looking forward to seeing what’s next. (love the cover and the twisty conclusion).

A special thank you to Flatiron Books and NetGalley for an advanced reading copy. 

JDCMustReadBooks

Top 21 Must Read Books Coming Sept

 

By: Kaira Rouda

ISBN:  9781525811401

Publisher:  Graydon House

Publication Date: 9/19/2017 

Format: Hardcover

My Rating: 5 Stars +++

Best Books of 2017 

“I glance at my wife as she climbs into the passenger seat, and I am bursting with confidence. Today will be everything I’ve promised her…and more…”

Paul Strom has the perfect life: a glittering career as an advertising executive, a beautiful wife, two healthy boys and a big house in a wealthy suburb. And he’s the perfect husband: breadwinner, protector, provider. That’s why he’s planned a romantic weekend for his wife, Mia, at their lake house, just the two of them. And he's promised today will be the best day ever.

 

But as Paul and Mia drive out of the city and toward the countryside, a spike of tension begins to wedge itself between them and doubts start to arise. How much do they trust each other? And how perfect is their marriage, or any marriage, really?

 

Forcing us to ask ourselves just how well we know those who are closest to us, Best Day Ever crackles with dark energy, spinning ever tighter toward its shocking conclusion. In the bestselling, page-turning vein of The Couple Next Door and The Dinner, Kaira Rouda weaves a gripping, tautly suspenseful tale of deception and betrayal dark enough to destroy a marriage…or a life.  Read More

 

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Lightning Men 

 

By:  Thomas Mullen 

ISBN: 9781501138799

Publisher: Atria 

Publication Date: 9/12/2017

Format: Hardcover 

My Rating: 5 Stars + (ARC)

“[Writes] with a ferocious passion that’ll knock the wind out of you.” —New York Times

“Reads like the best of James Ellroy.” —Publishers Weekly (starred review)

“Mullen is a wonderful architect of intersecting plotlines and unexpected answers.” —Washington Post
 

From the acclaimed author of The Last Town on Earth comes the gripping follow-up to Darktown, a “combustible procedural that will knock the wind out of you” (New York Times).

 

Officer Denny Rakestraw, “Negro Officers” Lucius Boggs and Tommy Smith, and Sergeant McInnis have their hands full in an overcrowded and rapidly changing Atlanta. It’s 1950 and color lines are shifting and racial tensions are simmering. Black families—including Smith’s sister and brother-in-law—are moving into Rake’s formerly all-white neighborhood, leading some residents to raise money to buy them out, while others advocate a more violent solution.

 

Rake’s brother-in-law, Dale, a proud Klansman, launches a scheme to rally his fellow Kluxers to save their neighborhood. When those efforts spiral out of control and leave a man dead, Rake is forced to choose between loyalty to family or the law.

 

He isn’t the only one with family troubles. Boggs has outraged his preacher father by courting a domestic, and now her ex-boyfriend has been released from prison. As Boggs, Smith, and their all-black precinct contend with violent drug dealers fighting for turf in new territory, their personal dramas draw them closer to the fires that threaten to consume Atlanta once again.

 

With echoes of James Ellroy and Denis Lehane, Mullen demonstrates in Lightning Men why he’s celebrated for writing crime fiction “with a nimble sense of history...quick on its feet and vividly drawn" (Dallas Morning News). Read More 

 

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The Blackbird Season 

 

By:  Kate Moretti 

ISBN: 9781501118456

Publisher: Atria 

Publication Date: 9/26/2017  

Format: Paperback 

My Rating:  4 Stars (ARC)

Known for novels featuring “great pacing and true surprises” (Kirkus Reviews, starred review) and “nerve-shattering suspense” (Heather Gudenkauf, New York Time bestselling author), New York Times bestselling author Kate Moretti’s latest is the story of a scandal-torn Pennsylvania town and the aftermath of a troubled girl gone missing.

 

“Where did they come from? Why did they fall? The question would be asked a thousand times…

 

Until, of course, more important question arose, at which time everyone promptly forgot that a thousand birds fell on the town of Mount Oanoke at all.”

In a quiet Pennsylvania town, a thousand dead starlings fall onto a high school baseball field, unleashing a horrifying and unexpected chain of events that will rock the close-knit community.

 

Beloved baseball coach and teacher Nate Winters and his wife, Alicia, are well respected throughout town. That is, until one of the many reporters

investigating the bizarre bird phenomenon catches Nate embracing a wayward student, Lucia Hamm, in front of a sleazy motel. Lucia soon buoys the scandal by claiming that she and Nate are engaged in an affair, throwing the town into an uproar…and leaving Alicia to wonder if her husband has a second life.

And when Lucia suddenly disappears, the police only to have one suspect: Nate.

 

Nate’s coworker and sole supporter, Bridget Harris, Lucia’s creative writing teacher, is determined to prove his innocence. She has Lucia’s class journal, and while some of the entries appear particularly damning to Nate’s case, others just don’t add up. Bridget knows the key to Nate’s exoneration and the truth of Lucia’s disappearance lie within the walls of the school and in the pages of that journal.

 

Told from the alternating points of view of Alicia, Nate, Lucia, and Bridget, The Blackbird Season is a haunting, psychologically nuanced suspense, filled with Kate Moretti’s signature “chillingly satisfying” (Publishers Weekly) twists and turns. Read More 

 

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Don't Let Go  

 

By:  Harlan Coben 

ISBN: 978-0525955115

Publisher: Dutton

Publication Date: 9/26/2017 

Format: Hardcover 

My Rating:  5 Stars  (ARC)

With unmatched suspense and emotional insight, Harlan Coben explores the big secrets and little lies that can destroy a relationship, a family, and even a town in this powerful new thriller.

 

Suburban New Jersey Detective Napoleon “Nap” Dumas hasn't been the same since senior year of high school, when his twin brother Leo and Leo’s girlfriend Diana were found dead on the railroad tracks—and Maura, the girl Nap considered the love of his life, broke up with him and disappeared without explanation. For fifteen years, Nap has been searching, both for Maura and for the real reason behind his brother's death. And now, it looks as though he may finally find what he's been looking for.

 

When Maura's fingerprints turn up in the rental car of a suspected murderer, Nap embarks on a quest for answers that only leads to more questions—about the woman he loved, about the childhood friends he thought he knew, about the abandoned military base near where he grew up, and mostly about Leo and Diana—whose deaths are darker and far more sinister than Nap ever dared imagine. Read More

 

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Lie to Me 

 

By:  J.T. Ellison 

ISBN: 9780778330950

Publisher:  MIRA

Publication Date: 9/5/2017 

Format: Paperback 

My Rating:  4.5 Stars ARC)

Domestic noir at its best. Readers will devour this stunning page-turner about the disintegration of a marriage as grief, jealousy, betrayal and murder destroy the facade of the perfect literary couple. New York Times bestselling author J.T. Ellison takes her exceptional writing to a new level with this breakout novel. 

They built a life on lies. 

 

Sutton and Ethan Montclair's idyllic life is not as it appears. They seem made for each other, but the truth is ugly. Consumed by professional and personal betrayals and financial woes, the two both love and hate each other. As tensions mount, Sutton disappears, leaving behind a note saying not to look for her. 

 

Ethan finds himself the target of vicious gossip as friends, family and the media speculate on what really happened to Sutton Montclair. As the police investigate, the lies the couple have been spinning for years quickly unravel. Is Ethan a killer? Is he being set up? Did Sutton hate him enough to kill the child she never wanted and then herself? The path to the answers is full of twists that will leave the reader breathless. Read More

 

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Good Me, Bad Me 

 

By:  Ali Land

ISBN:1250087643

Publisher: Flatiron Books

Publication Date: 9/5/2017 

Format: Hardcover 

My Rating:  4 Stars  (ARC)

ONE OF THE MOST EXTRAORDINARY, CONTROVERSIAL AND EXPLOSIVE DEBUTS OF 2017, Good Me Bad Me is for fans of quality psychological suspense and reading group fiction.

'The new Girl on The Train, which was the new Gone Girl. You get the picture. This psycho-thriller by Ali Land is set to be massive' —Cosmopolitan

'Incredible, very special' —Radio 4's Open Book

 

'NEW N A M E.

NEW F A M I L Y.

S H I N Y.

NEW.

ME .  

Annie's mother is a serial killer.

The only way she can make it stop is to hand her into the police.

 

But out of sight is not out of mind.

As her mother's trial looms, the secrets of her past won't let Annie sleep, even with a new foster family and name - Milly.

 

A fresh start. Now, surely, she can be whoever she wants to be.

 

But Milly's mother is a serial killer. And blood is thicker than water.

 

Good me, bad me.

 

She is, after all, her mother's daughter... Read More 

 

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Friend Request 

 

By: Laura Marshall 

ISBN: 9781478948513

Publisher: Grand Central 

Publication Date: 9/5/2017 

Format: Hardcover

My Rating: 4 Stars (ARC)

MARIA WESTON WANTS TO BE FRIENDS. BUT MARIA WESTON'S DEAD. ISN'T SHE?

1989. When Louise first notices the new girl who has mysteriously transferred late into their senior year, Maria seems to be everything the girls Louise hangs out with aren't. Authentic. Funny. Brash. Within just a few days, Maria and Louise are on their way to becoming fast friends.

 

2016. Louise receives a heart-stopping email: Maria Weston wants to be friends on Facebook. Long-buried memories quickly rise to the surface: those first days of their budding friendship; cruel decisions made and dark secrets kept; the night that would change all their lives forever.

 

Louise has always known that if the truth ever came out, she could stand to lose everything. Her job. Her son. Her freedom. Maria's sudden reappearance threatens it all, and forces Louise to reconnect with everyone she'd severed ties with to escape the past. But as she tries to piece together exactly what happened that night, Louise discovers there's more to the story than she ever knew. To keep her secret, Louise must first uncover the whole truth, before what's known to Maria--or whoever's pretending to be her--is known to all. Read More 

 

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Lies She Told 

 

By:  Cate Holahan 

ISBN: 9781683312956

Publisher:  Crooked Lane Books

Publication Date: 9/12/2017 

Format: Hardcover 

My Rating: 4 Stars (ARC)

Sometimes the truth is darker than fiction. 

Liza Jones has thirty days to write the thriller that could put her back on the bestseller list. In the meantime, she’s struggling to start a family with her husband, who is distracted by the disappearance of his best friend, Nick. With stresses weighing down in both her professional and her personal life, Liza escapes into writing her latest heroine.

Beth is a new mother who suspects her husband is cheating on her while she’s home alone providing for their newborn. Angry and betrayed, Beth sets out to catch him in the act and make him pay for shattering the illusion of their perfect life. But before she realizes it, she’s tossing the body of her husband’s mistress into the river.

 

Then the lines between fiction and reality begin to blur. Nick’s body is dragged from the Hudson and Liza’s husband is arrested for his murder. Before her deadline is up, Liza will have to face up to the truths about the people around her, including herself. If she doesn’t, the end of her heroine’s story could be the end of her own. Read More

 

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The Trust 

 

By: Ronald H. Balson 

ISBN: 1250127440

Publisher: St Martin's Press

Publication Date:  9/19/2017

Format: Paperback 

My Rating:  4 Stars  (ARC)

The newest novel from Ronald H. Balson, the international bestselling author of Once We Were Brothers, finds private investigator Liam Taggart returning to his childhood home for an uncle's funeral, only to discover his death might not have been natural.

When his uncle dies, Liam Taggart reluctantly returns to his childhood home in Northern Ireland for the funeral―a home he left years ago after a bitter confrontation with his family, never to look back. But when he arrives, Liam learns that not only was his uncle shot to death, but that he’d anticipated his own murder: In an astonishing last will and testament, Uncle Fergus has left his entire estate to a secret trust, directing that no distributions be made to any person until the killer is found. Did Fergus know, but refuse to name, his killer? Was this a crime of revenge, a vendetta leftover from Northern Ireland’s bloody sectarian war? After all, the Taggarts were deeply involved in the IRA. Or is it possible that the killer is a family member seeking Fergus’s estate? Otherwise, why postpone distributions to the heirs? Most menacingly, does the killer now have his sights on other family members?

 

As his investigation draws Liam farther and farther into the past he has abandoned, he realizes he is forced to reopen doors long ago shut and locked. Now, accepting the appointment as sole trustee of the Fergus Taggart Trust, Liam realizes he has stepped into the center of a firestorm. Read More  

 

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Little Fires Everywhere  

 

By:  Celeste Ng

ISBN: 9780735224292

Publisher: Penguin Press

Publication Date:  9/12/2017

Format: Hardcover 

My Rating:  4 Stars

"Witty, wise and tender. It's a marvel." – Paula Hawkins, New York Times-bestselling author of The Girl on the Train and Into the Water

From the bestselling author of Everything I Never Told You, a riveting novel that traces the intertwined fates of the picture-perfect Richardson family and the enigmatic mother and daughter who upend their lives.

 

"I read Little Fires Everywhere in a single, breathless sitting.  With brilliance and beauty, Celeste Ng dissects a microcosm of American society just when we need to see it beneath the microscope..." –Jodi Picoult, New York Times-bestselling author of Small Great Things and Leaving Time
 
In Shaker Heights, a placid, progressive suburb of Cleveland, everything is planned – from the layout of the winding roads, to the colors of the houses, to the successful lives its residents will go on to lead. And no one embodies this spirit more than Elena Richardson, whose guiding principle is playing by the rules.

 

Enter Mia Warren – an enigmatic artist and single mother – who arrives in this idyllic bubble with her teenaged daughter Pearl, and rents a house from the Richardsons. Soon Mia and Pearl become more than tenants: all four Richardson children are drawn to the mother-daughter pair. But Mia carries with her a mysterious past and a disregard for the status quo that threatens to upend this carefully ordered community.

 

When old family friends of the Richardsons attempt to adopt a Chinese-American baby, a custody battle erupts that dramatically divides the town--and puts Mia and Elena on opposing sides.  Suspicious of Mia and her motives, Elena is determined to uncover the secrets in Mia's past. But her obsession will come at unexpected and devastating costs. 

 

Little Fires Everywhere explores the weight of secrets, the nature of art and identity, and the ferocious pull of motherhood – and the danger of believing that following the rules can avert disaster. Read More  

 

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The Surrogate 

By: Louise Jensen

ASIN: B073HDRSWV 

Publisher:  Bookouture

Publication Date: 9/27/2017 

Format: Kindle 

My Rating:  5 Stars +++ (ARC)

 

You know that feeling? When you want something so badly, you almost feel you’d kill for it?’ 

Be careful what you wish for…

Kat and her husband Nick have tried everything to become parents, and are on the point of giving up. Then a chance encounter with Kat’s childhood friend Lisa gives Kat and Nick one last chance to achieve their dream. 

But Kat and Lisa’s history hides dark secrets. 

 

And there is more to Lisa than meets the eye. 

 

As dangerous cracks start to appear in Kat’s perfect picture of happily-ever-after, she realises that she must face her fear of the past to save her family… 

From the no. 1 bestselling author of The Sister and The Gift, this is an unputdownable psychological thriller which asks how far we will go to create our perfect family.  Read More 

 

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When We Were Worthy  

 

By: Marybeth Mayhew Whalen 

ISBN: 1503941604

Publisher: Lake Union 

Publication Date:  9/12/2017 

Format: Paperback 

My Rating: 4 Stars

A win brought them together, but loss may tear them apart.

When the sound of sirens cuts through a cool fall night, the small town of Worthy, Georgia, hurtles from triumph to tragedy. Just hours before, they’d watched the Wildcats score a winning touchdown. Now, they’re faced with the deaths of three cheerleaders—their promising lives cut short in a fatal crash. And the boy in the other car—the only one to survive—is believed to be at fault. As rumors begin to fly and accusations spin, allegiances form and long-kept secrets emerge.

 

At the center of the whirlwind are four women, each grappling with loss, regret, shame, and lies: Marglyn, a grieving mother; Darcy, whose son had been behind the wheel; Ava, a substitute teacher with a scandalous secret; and Leah, a cheerleader who should have been in the car with her friends, but wasn’t. If the truth comes out, will it bring redemption—or will it be their downfall? Read More 

 

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White Bodies  

 

By: Jane Robins

ISBN: 9781501165085

Publisher: Touchstone 

Publication Date: 9/19/2017 

Format: Hardcover 

My Rating:  TBR
 

This chilling psychological suspense novel—think Strangers on a Train for the modern age—explores the dark side of love and the unbreakable ties that bind two sisters together.

Felix and Tilda seem like the perfect couple: young and in love, a financier and a beautiful up-and-coming starlet. But behind their flawless façade, not everything is as it seems.

 

Callie, Tilda’s unassuming twin, has watched her sister visibly shrink under Felix’s domineering love. She has looked on silently as Tilda stopped working, nearly stopped eating, and turned into a neat freak, with mugs wrapped in Saran Wrap and suspicious syringes hidden in the bathroom trash. She knows about Felix’s uncontrollable rages, and has seen the bruises on the white skin of her sister’s arms.

 

Worried about the psychological hold that Felix seems to have over Tilda, Callie joins an Internet support group for victims of abuse and their friends. However, things spiral out of control and she starts to doubt her own judgment when one of her new acquaintances is killed by an abusive man. And then suddenly Felix dies—or was he murdered?

 

A page-turning work of suspense that announces a stunning new voice in fiction, White Bodies will change the way you think about obsession, love, and the violence we inflict on one another—and ourselves. Read More 

 

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Dead Ends: Stories from the Gothic South 

 

By:  J. T. Ellison 

ISBN: 0996527362

Publisher: Two Tales Press

Publication Date:  9/28/2017 

Format: Hardcover

My Rating: TBR (Pre-ordered)

Look at this picture. Tell me what you see…

The American South is rife with stories of a haunted past—especially its houses. In this eclectic and impressive collection, thirteen novelists were asked to build their tales around the photo of a dilapidated mansion. They were given two requirements—the house must appear in the story, and it should be a Southern Gothic tale. And they delivered.

 

From childish demons to a mad novelist, from the Mississippi delta to the Appalachians, this collection from emerging voices and New York Times bestselling authors explores what happens when secrets that lie beneath the dust are disturbed—and our worst nightmares begin. 

 

Darkness lurks behind every corner, especially dead ends. Read More 

 

Contributors:  

Jeff Abbott 
Helen Ellis 

Patti Callahan Henry 

Amanda Stevens 

Paige Crutcher 

Dana Chamblee Carpenter 

Laura Benedict 

Bryon Quertermous 

Dave White 

Lisa Morton 

David Bell 

J.T. Ellison 

Ariel Lawhon

 

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The Woman Who Couldn't Scream 

 

By:  Christina Dodd 

ISBN: 9781250028488

Publisher: St. Martin's Press

Publication Date:  9/5/2017 

Format: Hardcover

My Rating:  4 Stars 

"Another stunner." -- Library Journal Starred Review

Merida Falcon is a world-class beauty, a trophy wife who seems to have it all…except she has no voice.

 

For nine bitter years, Merida lived to serve her wealthy elderly husband, never leaving his side, always doing his bidding…

 

On his death, Merida vanishes…and reappears in Virtue Falls with a new name, a new look, and a plot to take revenge on the man who loved her, betrayed her and walked away, leaving her silent, abused and bound to an old man's obsession.

 

But Merida faces challenges. Her school friend Kateri Kwinault is the newly elected sheriff of Virtue Falls. A chance meeting with her former lover intrigues him and brings him on the hunt for her, and meeting him face to face shakes her convictions. Will she have time to discover the truth about the events that occurred nine years ago? For someone in Virtue Falls is stalking women and slashing them…to death.

 

Danger closes in. Merida's fears build. There’s no one to turn to…no one she dares to trust. And she has to wonder—who is the killer stalking? Is he trying to silence forever THE WOMAN WHO COULDN'T SCREAM?  Read More

 

"The payoff Kateri fans have been waiting for!" -- RT Book Reviews

 

Read the acclaimed Virtue Falls Suspense Series:
 

#1 THE LISTENER: A Virtue Falls short story
#2 VIRTUE FALLS: The First Virtue Falls Full-Length Suspense
#3 THE RELATIVES: A Virtue Falls short story
#4 OBSESSION FALLS: The Second Virtue Falls Full-Length Suspense
#5 LOVE NEVER DIES: A Virtue Falls short story
#6 BECAUSE I'M WATCHING: The third Virtue Falls Full-Length Suspense
#7 THE WOMAN WHO COULDN'T SCREAM: A Virtue Falls Full-length Suspense Sept. 5, 2017

-- THE WATCHER: A Virtue Falls Short Story starring Sheriff Kateri Kwinault
-- A DARK AND STORMY NIGHT: A compilation of three short stories: THE LISTENER, THE RELATIVES, and LOVE NEVER DIES, as well as extras from the Virtue Falls series.   

 

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The Last Move 

 

By:  Mary Burton

ISBN:  1542046920

Publisher:  Montlake Romance

Publication Date: 9/19/2017

Format:  Paperback

My Rating: TBR

In this gripping stand-alone from bestselling author Mary Burton, an FBI agent must catch a copycat killer. The only difference this time: she’s the final victim.

Catching monsters helps FBI agent Kate Hayden keep her nightmares at bay. Now an urgent call brings her back to San Antonio, the scene of her violent past. A brutal new murder shows hallmarks of a serial killer nicknamed the Samaritan. Tricky part is, Kate already caught him.

 

Either Kate made a deadly error, or she’s got a copycat on her hands. Paired with homicide detective Theo Mazur, she quickly realizes this murder is more twisted than it first appeared. Then a second body is found, the mode of death identical to a different case that Kate thought she’d put behind her.

 

Now Kate and Detective Mazur aren’t just working a homicide; the investigative pair is facing a formidable enemy who knows Kate intimately. While Mazur is personally trying to protect Kate, the closer they are drawn to the killer, the clearer it becomes that in this terrifying game, there is only one rule: don’t believe everything you see… Read More

 

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A Time To Stand 

 

By:  Robert Whitlow

ISBN: 9780718083038

Publisher: Thomas Nelson Fiction

Publication Date:  9/12/2017 

Format: Paperback 

My Rating: TBR (ARC)

In a small Georgia town where racial tensions run high and lives are at stake, can one lawyer stand up for justice against the tide of prejudice on every side?

Adisa Johnson, a young African American attorney, is living her dream of practicing law with a prestigious firm in downtown Atlanta. Then a split-second mistake changes the course of her career.

 

Left with no other options, Adisa returns to her hometown where a few days earlier a white police officer shot an unarmed black teen who is now lying comatose in the hospital.

 

Adisa is itching to jump into the fight as a special prosecutor, but feels pulled to do what she considers unthinkable—defend the officer.

 

As the court case unfolds, everyone in the small community must confront their own prejudices. Caught in the middle, Adisa also tries to chart her way along a path complicated by her budding relationship with a charismatic young preacher who leads the local movement demanding the police officer answer for his crime.

 

This highly relevant and gripping novel challenges us to ask what it means to forgive while seeking justice, to pursue reconciliation while loving others as ourselves. Read More 

 

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Close to Home 

The Tracy Crosswhite Series (Book 5)

By:  Robert Dugoni 

ISBN: 1542045010

Publisher: Thomas & Mercer 

Publication Date: 9/5/2017 

Format:   Paperback 

My Rating: 4 Stars

New York Times bestselling author Robert Dugoni’s acclaimed series continues as Tracy Crosswhite is thrown headlong into the path of a killer conspiracy.

While investigating the hit-and-run death of a young boy, Seattle homicide detective Tracy Crosswhite makes a startling discovery: the suspect is an active-duty serviceman at a local naval base. After a key piece of case evidence goes missing, he is cleared of charges in a military court. But Tracy knows she can’t turn her back on this kind of injustice.

 

When she uncovers the driver’s ties to a rash of recent heroin overdoses in the city, she realizes that this isn’t just a case of the military protecting its own. It runs much deeper than that, and the accused wasn’t acting alone. For Tracy, it’s all hitting very close to home.

 

As Tracy moves closer to uncovering the truth behind this insidious conspiracy, she’s putting herself in harm’s way. And the only people she can rely on to make it out alive might be those she can no longer trust. Read More 

 

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Cardinal Cabin  

 

By:  Joanne  DeMaio

ISBN:  B074DZSDFS

Publisher: Joanne Demaio

Publication Date: 9/12/2017

Format: Kindle 

My Rating: 5 Stars

 

**Blog Tour Oct 18 **

From New York Times bestselling author Joanne DeMaio comes a heartwarming novel as merry and bright as a red-feathered cardinal taking flight.

Frank Lombardo's never been spontaneous. The closest he's come was accepting a side job chopping firewood for a lakeside community of rustic cabins. But with another lonely holiday season imminent, Frank's sister urges him to be spontaneous because, seriously, who does he ever expect to meet out in the woods?

 

With a suitcase in hand and a bit of reluctance, too, Penny Hart arrives at Cardinal Cabin on Snowflake Lake. It's only for a brief stay, though nobody knows where she is. Not her boss, not her friends...

 

Only Frank Lombardo. As the two unexpectedly meet at Addison's hidden hideaway, a spontaneous kiss sets everything amiss. But can the magic of this quaint New England town keep these snowy sweethearts together?

 

Cardinal Cabin is an enchanting tale about finding love where you least expect it. So come on inside. A cozy fire crackles, lights twinkle on the evergreen tree, snowflakes tap at the windowpanes, and little redbirds bring cheer this time of year.  Read More

 

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The Best of Us 

 

By: Joyce Maynard

ISBN: 978-1635570342

Publisher:  Bloomsbury USA

Publication Date: 9/5/2017 

Format: Hardcover

My Rating:  5 Stars +

From New York Times bestselling author Joyce Maynard, a memoir about discovering strength in the midst of great loss--"heart-wrenching, inspiring, full of joy and tears and life." (Anne Lamott)

In 2011, when she was in her late fifties, beloved author and journalist Joyce Maynard met the first true partner she had ever known. Jim wore a rakish hat over a good head of hair; he asked real questions and gave real answers; he loved to see Joyce shine, both in and out of the spotlight; and he didn't mind the mess she made in the kitchen. He was not the husband Joyce imagined, but he quickly became the partner she had always dreamed of.

 

Before they met, both had believed they were done with marriage, and even after they married, Joyce resolved that no one could alter her course of determined independence. Then, just after their one-year wedding anniversary, her new husband was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer. During the nineteen months that followed, as they battled his illness together, she discovered for the first time what it really meant to be a couple--to be a true partner and to have one.

 

This is their story. Charting the course through their whirlwind romance, a marriage cut short by tragedy, and Joyce's return to singleness on new terms, The Best of Us is a heart-wrenching, ultimately life-affirming reflection on coming to understand true love through the experience of great loss. Read More 

 

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Anxious for Nothing

 

Finding Calm in a Chaotic World

By:  Max Lucado

ISBN:  9780718096120

Publisher: Thomas Nelson-LUCADO BRAND

Publication Date: 9/12/2017

Format: Hardcover

My Rating:  5 Stars

 
Anxiety is at an all time high, but there's a prescription for dealing with it. Max Lucado invites readers into a study of Philippians 4:6-7 where the Apostle Paul admonishes the followers of Christ, "Do not be anxious about anything . . ."

Philippians 4:6 encourages the believer to "be anxious for nothing." As Lucado states, the apostle Paul seems to leave little leeway here. "Be anxious for nothing. Nada. Zilch. Zero."

What's he suggesting? That we should literally be anxious for absolutely nothing? Lucado says, "The presence of anxiety is unavoidable, but the prison of anxiety is optional. It's the life of perpetual anxiety that Paul wants to address. Don't let anything in life leave you perpetually in angst."

 

Americans especially know about living in perpetual anxiety. According to one research program, anxiety-related issues are the number one mental health problem among women and are second only to alcohol and drug abuse among men. Stress-related ailments cost the nation $300 billion every year in medical bills and lost productivity. And use of sedative drugs like Xanax and Valium have skyrocketed in the last 15 years. Even students are feeling it. One psychologist reports that the average high school kid today has the same level of anxiety as the average psychiatric patient in the early 1950s.

 

"The news about our anxiety is enough to make us anxious," says Lucado. But there's a prescription for dealing with it. Lucado invites readers into a study of Philippians 4:6-7, the most highlighted passage of any book on the planet, according to Amazon:

 

Do not be anxious about anything, but in every situation, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God. And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.

 

"With His help you will learn to face the calamities of life. You'll learn how to talk yourself off the ledge. Under the guidance of the Holy Spirit, you will learn to view bad news through the lens of sovereignty; to discern the lies of Satan and tell yourself the truth. You will manifest a gentleness that is evident to others. Anxiety comes with life. But it doesn't have to dominate your life."  Read More 

 

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By: Sandra Brown 

ISBN: 978-1455572106

Publisher: Grand Central 

Publication Date: 8/15/2017 

Format: Hardcover

My Rating: 4 Stars

From the queen of romantic suspense, Sandra Brown returns following, (2016) Sting, (2015) Friction, making my 2015 Top 50 Books, and (2014) Mean Streak with “prime” movie-worthy SEEING RED. 

From the Pegasus Hotel in downtown Dallas, a 1992 historic event killing hundreds twenty-five years ago, to the present. 

Kerra Bailey is a hungry TV journalist. She wants an interview with the legendary Major Franklin Trapper. 

After all, he was a hero of the bombing of the Hotel. The 25th Anniversary of the event, Kerra is determined to land the story. 

The Major became a national hero after an award-winning picture was captured of him rescuing a group of people, including an innocent 5-year-old little girl, in the aftermath of a hotel bombing.

Kerra’s life was spared. She was the little girl which is now revealed. Why is he a recluse now, after being famous for so long? Why problems between father and son? 

Everyone has secrets and motives . . .

She must go through his estranged son, former ATF agent John Trapper. John wants no part of the Major. 

What were the motives behind Major's heroism? 

Enter a tension-filled relationship between John and Kerra. (of course, who does romantic tension) better than Brown?

Will Kerra (beautiful and savvy) and Trapper (rough, hot, sexy) wind up joining forces and risk their lives in order to expose a conspiracy and uncover the murderer of Major Trapper? 

From tension, murder, conspiracy, crimes, danger, betrayal, deceit, and lots of sizzle –Brown delivers another edgy twisty mystery suspense thriller, combined with hot romantic suspense and humor. 

SEEING RED will continue to keep Brown fans satisfied and longing for a movie. We can only imagine the cast of stars playing out on the big screen. I also purchased the audiobook narrated by Victor Slezak for an entertaining performance.

A special thank you to Grand Central and NetGalley for an early reading copy. 

JDCMustReadBooks

By:  B. A. Paris 

ISBN: 978-1250122469

Publisher:  St. Martin's Press 

Publication Date:  7/18/2017 

Format: e-book

My Rating:  5 Stars

British author, BA Paris (one of my favorites) returns following her sensational debut, Behind Closed Doors, on my Top Books of 2016 with another gripping second thriller THE BREAKDOWN – A fitting title for a mysterious car breakdown, to a possible mental breakdown. 

The dark truths behind a façade. From friendship, love, trust, deception, madness, jealousy, gaslighting, to murder. 

It is summer in July and Cass’s husband has told her to drive carefully. There is a storm coming. Secondly, he cautions her not to drive through the woods on her own at night. She promises. 

Cass leaves a party early to go home when it begins to rain. She should have waited out the storm with her friends. However, she does not heed the warning. At the very last minute, she veers off to the left, taking the shortcut, Matthew told her not to take.

An eerie setting, Cass is determined she will be home soon. Suddenly there is the wind and she is in her Mini. She fears she will be stranded in the woods. More thunder and lightning. The road is deserted. She does not want to wake her husband. He would be furious. She cannot call him. She sees a car up ahead. The car is stopped. It is a woman. A woman looks back at her, her features blurred by the rain.

Thinking she has broken down, she pulls in a little way in front of her and comes to a stop. She waits to see if the woman will get out of the car. She does not get out. Why can’t she leave the car? Why is she just sitting there?

Then Cass notices there is something off about the way she is sitting with her headlights on. A shiver runs down her spine. It does not seem right to drive off and leave her. Maybe someone is on their way to help her. 

She is afraid and does not want to stop and help because it could be dangerous. Everything tells her to go. So, she does. But the woman is still her on her mind and wonders if she could call the breakdown services to tell them or the police.

Then she sees a text from Rachel. The message was strange. Did she forget something? She racks her brain. Memories of her mum, uncomfortable ones flood her mind and she quickly pushes them away. By tomorrow she will have remembered.

Rachel is the sister she never had. Their mothers had been friends. Rachel had spent a large part of her childhood at their house and they always referred to her as their second daughter. 

Cass is a teacher and had to give up her job to take care of her mum. She and Matthew had not been on a real honeymoon because they had been busy renovating their cottage. Turned out when her mom died she had been wealthy instead of a penniless widow after her father passed away. Her mum had lived on so little when she could have lived in luxury. 

The next morning, she learns the woman is on the news. A woman was found dead. Blackwater Lane. Could it be the same woman?

A woman had been found dead in her car near Browbury in Suxxex. Did she commit suicide? 

Feeling overwhelming guilt, Cass thinks if she had stopped to check on her, things might have turned out differently. 

Her death was being treated as suspicious. Had the killer been in the same spot? Had he been lurking in the bushes waiting for the opportunity to kill. Murder. 

Cass cannot stop thinking about taking this road. What about the woman? She had left her to her fate. . . to be murdered.

Turns out the mystery woman was Jane Waters, a young mother whom Cass recently befriended. A mother with two-year-old twins. She is shocked. She recently had lunch with her. Her cottage was only a few miles from where she was killed. She was her new friend. They had met by chance at a party.

Between this, Rachel and her husband continuing to tell her she is forgetting things, she begins questioning her own sanity. Or, is she getting like her mom with early onset dementia? She is terrified. 

Rachel and Matthew do not like one another. There is mistrust there. Rachel disapproved of Matthew. Could Rachel be jealous that she has someone in her life?

Jane haunts her. The constant nagging guilt. She has to find out what happened. Should she contact the police? She was on the road at around eleven-thirty but another voice tells her not to because she kept this information to herself. Could she be putting herself in danger if the killer is still out there?

Now she is worried about her own safety living so close to the murder. Strange things begin happening. 

The only thing she can’t forget is that woman, the woman she might have saved, and the terrible nagging guilt.

Cass has a surprise for Rachel. A house. She will give her the keys to her house of dreams. She will keep the secret. Her mum and dad would have wanted her to have it. 

Tension builds to the point of madness or is it paranoia? Either someone is gaslighting her with an evil plot to make her think she is crazy, and losing her mind or she is actually losing her mind.

From Matthew to Rachel, something is not right. Someone is manipulating circumstances and Cass soon does not trust anyone. 

From the intensity and worry of trying to solve Jane’s murder — could there be a connection with her husband, Rachel, and Jane? Nothing is as it appears and Cass feels like she has nowhere to turn. Why is everyone out to get her? Does someone want her money? 

Cass wants the truth no matter how it turns out. However, will she get too close to the truth and put herself in harm's way? 

Once again, the author delivers a brilliantly crafted intense psychological thriller grabbing you from the first page to the last. Enjoyed reading the inspiration behind the book by the author. 

Gripping, riveting, and maddening, the author takes readers on a twisty, dark and scary journey. A page-turner which will keep you on the edge of your seat turning into the night. Emotional and addictive— (great cover)! Would make a suspenseful movie. Love the author’s style. 

The setting reminds me of all the rainy stormy late nights stuck out in the dark deserted woods on the Silver Comet 150 mile bike trail in Atlanta, GA — I rode every week (alone) 8 hrs (for years) and often after the time change I would be stuck out after dark before returning to the end, where I parked my car. There was no cell signal since most parts were very remote. I literally could not see anything in front of me, and no one on the trail for miles and miles. Pitch dark in the middle of thunder and lightning and pouring rain storms. 

Everyone warned me to stop doing this, but I was an avid cycler. Later, of course, several women were murdered on the trail. (guess it was fortunate I moved to Florida ). Also hiking on a mountain top in the dark with thunder, lightning, and rain on so many occasions. When looking back on these times, I wonder how I survived. Young, crazy, foolish, and adventurous. Would love for someone to write a book about this trail. I definitely have some scary and chilling stories. 

In addition to the reading copy also purchased the audiobook, narrated by Georgia Maguire for a chilling performance. (love the accent). 

Fans of Wendy Walker, Mary Kubica, and Fiona Barton (also my favorites) will enjoy this top-notch psychological suspense thriller. Can't wait to see what's next! 

A special thank you to St. Martin's Press and NetGalley for an early reading copy. 

JDCMustReadBooks 

On a personal note: 
My apologies for the delay in posting my review since I was fortunate to have read THE BREAKDOWN prior to the pub date back in March, and wanted to wait until closer to pub date to post a review. 

In early May-June, my dad became critical with congestive heart failure (I was his POA) and flew home rather suddenly to care for him (my mom passed away ten months earlier). Wound up remaining in North Carolina for another two months, was in a bad car accident (his SUV), and my dad passed away the same evening, planned a funeral, deal with the insurance claim, car repairs, and had to clear out and sell his home. (closed on it this week). Also being the executor of my dad's estate, dealing with probate, among other things. So just getting back home to Florida and returning to work full time, this week. 

Tons of reviews, book blogging, and lots of reading to catch up! (May-Aug)

By: Wendy Walker

ISBN: 978-1250141439

Publisher: St. Martin's Press

Publication Date:  8/8/2017

Format: Hardcover

My Rating:  5 Stars + 

Talented Wendy Walker returns following her standout debut, All is Not Forgotten—landing on my Top Books of 2016, with another gripping and twisty, addictive psychological suspense thriller EMMA IN THE NIGHT revolving around narcissistic personality disorder and abuse. 

Top Books of 2017! 5 Stars + 

Two girls go missing. Three years later, only one comes home. What happened to Emma?

One of the most difficult things to understand in life is how someone who professes to love you can then go on to abuse you. Combine narcissistic behavior with obsession, insecurity, control, jealousy, love, hate, and revenge, and you have a nasty evil person. 

Emotional coercion, blame, guilt, manipulation, negative comparison, jealousy, and possessiveness. (great character traits for a parent, right)? 

Judy Martin (well I do like the name), but she is one evil horrible person. Her daughters call her Mrs. Martin. Readers will despise her. She lives to be the center of attention. 

Walker does an outstanding job with her characters. (I cannot imagine how difficult this book was to write). Judy inflicts pain (her ways and motives) onto everyone around her. A devil of a mother. She manipulates everyone around her. Everything is a game. Even Emma gets caught up in the game. 

Everything is a competition. Not sure how either of these girls had time to live a normal life. Game on every day. Like an endless tennis match. 

Two daughters. Emma and Cass Tanner. 

Their mother remarried a guy she was having an affair with. Mr. Martin. Their biological dad is Owen. 

The two girls have been missing for three years. 

Cass was 15 and her older sister Emma was 17. No one knew whether they were dead or alive? 

Now Cass shows up on her mother’s doorstep. She claims her sister is on an island and she escaped and needs help in rescuing her and her baby girl. Who knew she was pregnant?

Of course, at the time of the original investigation, there was the FBI psychologist, Abigail Winter (Abby) who was engrossed in the case. She herself lived with a narcissistic mother and was a pro on the subject.

Now Cass returns without Emma. 

Is she telling the truth? Can she provide enough clues to lead them to her sister Emma? Are they really on an island? Apparently, her sister had a horrible argument with Judy the night she left and went to the beach. Cass hid in her car.

A man and woman who befriended them, turned against them and held them hostage. For three years they attempted to escape. 

What is this family hiding? Everyone seems to be hiding a dark secret. From Mr. Martin (step-dad), his son—Hunter, Owen—the dad, Judy, Emma, and Cass. 

Wow, this is one dysfunctional family! Nerve-wracking suspense. Walker knows how to build suspense with unreliable narrators. You know something is coming. Something is lurking around the corner. Which one will outsmart the other in this cat and mouse game?

You know there is a scheme, a plan; however, you are not sure where this story will lead. What is Judy hiding? Mr. Martin? Cass? Hunter?

The author keeps you guessing from the first page to the last. From slow burning manipulation, Walker hits on all cylinders. 

I had a lot going on in my life during the reading of this book; however, I found myself rushing to get back to this saga. This subject is one I did quite a bit of research on years ago and have read many books on the subject. My ex-husband (I emphasize "EX" for 20 yrs. now), was a true narcissistic personality. He could give Judy a few lessons. Will give you chills. 

Reading this book brought back all these dangerous, manipulative, and scary personality traits and their sense of entitlement, which he handed down to his own sons. (Thank goodness I did not have any children with him; however, mine saw the damage) and we were able to get away from this life after five years. 

Narcissistic abuse was originally just defined as a specific form of emotional abuse of children by narcissistic parents, parental narcissistic abuse, where parents who require the child to give up their own wants and feelings in order to serve the parent's needs for esteem. 

It is real. You can be assured a narcissist can have “intellectual empathy” and no emotional empathy. Not in their vocabulary. If faced with a narcissist, you will ask yourself, “How much abuse am I prepared to take?” RUN! However, if you are a child, this is somewhat difficult to do. 

How could an island be any worse than living with Mr. and Mrs. Martin? There has to be a good reason to return. Yes, it was. 

Walker works her way back to that night slowly as all the pieces unravel for dynamite ending. Outstanding twists, intense characterizations, and interesting subject matter make EMMA IN THE NIGHT a top psychological thriller. 

I also purchased the audiobook and Therese Plummer and Julia Whelan provided an edge- of-your-seat award-winning performance!

What an intense mind-bending page-turner! Move this one to the top of your list. A devilish cat and mouse game. Who will win in the end? Read and find out. . . 

Read more on the author’s website Behind the Book. Good Stuff! 

A special thank you to St. Martin's Press and NetGalley for an early reading copy. 

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By: Paul Cleave
ISBN: 9781501153013

Publisher: Atria 

Publication Date: 8/1/2017 

Format: Hardcover

My Rating: 5 Stars

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Paul Cleave, the internationally bestselling powerhouse New Zealand author returns following Trust No One landing on my Top 10 Books of 2015 and Five Minutes Alone making its way to my Top 30 Books of 2014 with yet another jaw-dropping twisty suspense horror thriller — A KILLER HARVEST. It is indeed "Killer." 

An avid Cleave fan: What sets this author apart from the competition? Many things. Tops: His creativity, talent, and his wicked dark humor! 

Oh, and what a cover! Dynamite. Atria is killing it! I kept swishing at the last page, hoping for inspiration from the author. Would love to know the spark which ignited this story. 

Those who enjoyed the movie Blink (1993) and Seven Pounds (2008) will be fascinated with A KILLER HARVEST — a new unique twist which keeps on spinning . . . 

Now back to the book. Cellular Memory Horror. Dark secrets. 

Poor Joshua Logan. He has had a run of very bad luck. A family curse. (I would say he is on to something here, for sure). 

His dad jumped in front of a bus a few months before Joshua was born. He did it to save a small girl he never met who had slipped away from her mother’s grasp and had stumbled into the street. 

A hero? A dad who was missing in his life. His mom was in his life for five months before meeting a bus of her own, in the form of a brain embolism. 

Predestination. 

Blind from birth. Biological parents gone. Joshua’s world is black. It has been his entire sixteen years. The curse made sure of that. 

Now his current father (his aunt and uncle), Detective Mitchell Logan is killed. On a case. The suspect construction foreman, Simon Bowers. What do a killer and a cop have in common? Eyes. 

Detective Inspector Ben Kirk (Logan’s partner) takes out Simon. However, before he takes him out, he needs to get answers to a few health questions. 

The clock is ticking. Mitchell and Ben wanted to improve the world. Taking organs from the evil to give to the good. 

The four best friends through high school: Mitchell (cop), Michelle (vet), Ben (cop), and Ben’s brother Jesse (teacher). 

A dad's promise. He wanted his eyes to go to his son, Joshua. 

Detective Vega, once again states his dad was a hero. No hero left for him. The guy that killed his dad was a bad guy and his dad makes sure that guy could not hurt anyone else. 

However, now there is Simon’s friend, Vincent who wants revenge. He is a nasty one as well. 

Joshua is the recipient of his dad’s eyes. He is hoping to be able to see the world his dad saw it. The new Joshua Logan is going to see for the first time, something he has wanted more than anything—just not at this price. The curse is not about balance. It takes and takes. 

However, there was a mishap by a technician. His dad’s eyes and the killer’s eyes were dropped. Switched in error. Now, Josh has one of each. 

The interesting twist is how he knows, or suspects. His mom says he owes it to his dad to be the best man he can. Was his dad a criminal as well? 

The Doctor: Twenty-eight years of harvesting organs. For the last five years, a doctor has been harvesting them from the likes of Simon Bower. 

Those killed in the commission of crime have had their names retroactively added to the database of organ donors whether they want to donate or not. 

From a cabin in the woods, abduction, dogs, torture, blood, a woman, death. Josh begins seeing things. A nightmare or is he seeing things from the owner of his new eyes? Will his eyes and cellular memory give him two perspectives in order to solve a crime? 

A vampire named Frederick in his books, to bullying, a partner in crime, danger, a serial killer, a girl named Ruby Carter, and a scar he has inherited. How many others are having weird dreams from their own donor?

Wow, Cleave knows how to create complex plot twists and intensity! Cellular memory takes on an evil twist (s) and no one does it better than Cleave. When the line (s) between good and evil are blurred.

The secrets of the past refuse to keep quiet in this razor-sharp, unputdownable, taut thriller. Readers will be immersed until the final page while never trusting a surgeon again in this lifetime. 

I am beginning to suspect Paul Cleave/Stephen King may be long lost, brothers. 

Looking forward to someone picking up his Cleave’s books for the wide screen. I want a front row seat! Also how about Cleave for a guest appearance on Younger (TV series) with Atria. 

A special thank you to Atria and NetGalley for an early reading copy. Once again, top book list for the year. 

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Praise for A Killer Harvest: 

"Starting with a macabre setup, Cleave keeps upping the stakes till any scrap of plausibility is left far behind and only an increasingly effective series of hair-raising thrills remains." (Kirkus Reviews)

“Edgar-finalist Cleave makes an implausible, but very creepy, premise work in this powerful, thought-provoking novel…impressive crime thriller." (Publishers Weekly (starred review))

“Cleave, a master of dark and compelling thrillers, puts a moral spin on this twisting, chilling tale with its disturbing finale.” (Booklist)

About the Author

 

Paul is an award winning author who often divides his time between his home city of Christchurch, New Zealand, where all his novels are set, and Europe, where none of his novels are set.

His works have been bestsellers that been translated into over a dozen languages and have sold over a million copies. He’s won the Ngaio Marsh Award, the Saint-Maur book festival’s crime novel of the year award, has been shortlisted for the Edgar and the Barry and the Ned Kelly.

When he’s not at home with the stereo cranked up loud and working on his next novel, he can normally be found on a tennis court, a golf course, or throwing a Frisbee somewhere. Trust No One, a stand-alone about a crime writer suffering from Alzheimer’s, is his latest novel. Read More 

By: Joanne Demaio

ASIN: B06XRHJCX9

Publisher: Joanne Demaio

Publication Date: 5/16/2017 

Format: Kindle

My Rating:  5 Stars

What another fantastic summer beach read! 

Join me for Blog Tour Stop July 31! 

A longtime favorite New England author, Joanne DeMaio returns following the unforgettable summer beach series (2017) BEACH BREEZE, with her latest THE BEACH INN, as we continue the journey with the memorable characters of charming Stony Point, a beach town on the coast of Connecticut.

Having read ALL of DeMaio’s books, and an avid fan of her work was anxious to catch up with the characters we have come to love and care about, as family and close friends. There has been a lot of tragedy and some of the characters (more than others), are having a very difficult time with their grief and loss. 

“Much of grief and sadness is like the tide here at Stony Point, the way it comes and goes.”

An entire community has been shaken to the core, with the loss of a dear friend, Salvatore Deluca. He came into their lives and brought second chances to many. He made a huge impact (larger than life attitude, touching many), and his presence will not soon be forgotten.

Jason is having a particularly hard time. He had a second chance to live when his brother Neil died nine years earlier in an accident. He was able, to walk away after the wreck with the help of a prosthetic leg, below the knee. 

He also was given a chance at love two years earlier when Maris unexpectedly returned to Stony Point and his life. However, now he feels like Neil is not there to give him inspiration any longer. He can no longer hear his voice. 

Then Sal came into their lives like a breath of fresh air. Someone for Jason to fish with. Someone to talk with about construction, design, his father’s Vietnam war stories, and his brother. It felt as though Neil had returned in the guise of Sal. He had just given the eulogy and left shortly afterward. He feels cheated. Jason feels as though he has lost his brother all over again. 

Picking up from the last book, Jason returns to his wife and home, and attempts to help Sal’s mom Elsa, also making some drastic decisions, since the passing of her son. 

She had planned to renovate the Bed and Breakfast Inn (the old Foley’s cottage) and Jason was the architect. However, now she is putting a stop to the project and putting it up for sale; ready to return to Italy. The town rallies to convince her to stay and move on with her plans. 

Elsa DeLuca is determined to leave; however, it is time for an inn-intervention. Operation "Make Elsa Smile." Will their efforts be enough to change her mind? They will need to come up with something big and momentous. 

Sal wanted this beach inn to be the premier destination on the Connecticut coast. 

Celia was also filled with sadness over the life she and Sal would never have. She has gone back to Addison. Even though his visit to their town this past summer was brief. Will Jason try and convince her to return? She also is full of surprises. 

Maris is also making changes in her life. She had returned to Stony Point from a Chicago fashion career to settle her father’s estate and reunited with her sister Eva. Now Maris has left her job to take care of her loved ones. What is next for her? New beginnings?

Everyone was supposed to make a pack not to make any sudden grief-motivated decision that they would regret in time. Not until at least six months had passed. There were many who wanted to pack up and leave their paradise to escape their loss and pain. 

. . . “Grieving is okay because it comes from love.” 

Michael, Sal’s friend from New York has delivered all of Sal’s messages and letters, as well as few surprises for those he left behind. Emotions run high. Jason is out of control and pushing everyone away. 

Cliff and the entire community hold an inn-intervention. The entire family is in crisis. They try and stop the sale of the house. Elsa does not want to think about the business team: Jason, Celia, and Lauren. It was to be the future Ocean Star Inn, and now Sal was gone, Celia has left, and her dream had evaporated into the sea’s midst.

Everyone is out of sorts with the grief. Everyone is concerned about the Inn and their loss. A place that holds all their friend’s history. However, will Jason and Elsa be able to bond and carry on with their dreams in Sal’s loving memory as well as the rest of their friends and community? 

Have they lost themselves when they lost Sal? Is this what he would have wanted?

"A new season of love, adventure, and heart-healing awaits in the quaint seaside village of Stony Point. So pull up a sand chair and book your stay for a page-turning getaway in The Beach Inn." 

A time of healing and rediscovery. The best place to start over . . . by the sea. They each will need plenty of love and magic connections in order to pull off the impossible. 

A true demonstration of how people handle grief differently. Plus some new unexpected adventures are in store and hopefully, Sal is smiling down at all the new events unfolding. 

If you have not read Joanne Demaio’s books, you are missing a rare treat. Full of emotion, heart, and soul, with vivid descriptions and settings, memorable characters and sea breezes which transport you.

Highly recommend reading in order, to enhance your overall reading experience. Still hoping for a Hallmark TV series! 

If you enjoy Debbie Macomber and Sherryl Woods, you will devour Joanne Demaio’s storytelling. Characters which linger long after the book ends.

Join me for Blog Tour July 31 to highlight this special book THE BEACH INN and this special talented author. Always on my best book list! 

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Top 20 Books on My Reading Shelf, Coming August  

 

By: Paul Cleave
ISBN: 9781501153013

Publisher: Atria 

Publication Date: 8/1/2017 

Format: Hardcover

My Rating: 5 Stars (ARC)

A new thriller from the Edgar-nominated author of Trust No One and Joe Victim about a blind teenager who receives new eyes through corneal donation and begins to see and feel memories that he believes belong to the previous owners—a detective and a serial killer.

Joshua is convinced there is a family curse. It’s taken away his biological parents, robbed him of his eyesight, and is the reason his father Logan, the detective who raised him, is killed while investigating the homicide of a young woman. The suspect, Simon Bowers, is killed by Logan’s partner Ben, whose intentions are murkier than expected.

 

After this tragedy, Joshua is handed an opportunity he can't refuse: a new pair of eyes. But a mishap during the surgery leads to Joshua unknowingly getting one eye from his father, and the other from Simon. As Joshua navigates a world of sight, he gets glimpses of what his eyes might have witnessed in their previous life. Memories, truths, and lies—Joshua discovers a world darker than the one he has emerged from. What else has he failed to see?

 

Meanwhile, Simon’s accomplice Vincent is bent on revenge, going after the loved ones of those involved in Simon’s death…and Vincent is drawing closer and closer to Joshua.

 

Thriller virtuoso Paul Cleave is back with another riveting story of hidden secrets and unspeakable horrors that will keep readers guessing until the very last page. Read More

 

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The Cottingley Secret 

 

By:  Hazel Gaynor 

ISBN: 0062690485

Publisher: HarperCollins 

Publication Date:  8/1/2017 

Format: Hardcover 

My Rating: 4 Stars

The New York Times bestselling author of The Girl Who Came Home turns the clock back one hundred years to a time when two young girls from Cottingley, Yorkshire, convinced the world that they had done the impossible and photographed fairies in their garden. Now, in her newest novel, international bestseller Hazel Gaynor reimagines their story.

1917… It was inexplicable, impossible, but it had to be true—didn’t it? When two young cousins, Frances Griffiths and Elsie Wright from Cottingley, England, claim to have photographed fairies at the bottom of the garden, their parents are astonished. But when one of the great novelists of the time, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, becomes convinced of the photographs’ authenticity, the girls become a national sensation, their discovery offering hope to those longing for something to believe in amid a world ravaged by war. Frances and Elsie will hide their secret for many decades. But Frances longs for the truth to be told.

 

One hundred years later… When Olivia Kavanagh finds an old manuscript in her late grandfather’s bookshop she becomes fascinated by the story it tells of two young girls who mystified the world. But it is the discovery of an old photograph that leads her to realize how the fairy girls’ lives intertwine with hers, connecting past to present, and blurring her understanding of what is real and what is imagined. As she begins to understand why a nation once believed in fairies, can Olivia find a way to believe in herself? Read More 

 

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The Address 

 

By: Fiona Davis 

ISBN: 9781524741990

Publisher: Dutton

Publication Date: 8/1/2017

Format: Hardcover

My Rating:  4 Stars (ARC)

Fiona Davis, author of The Dollhouse, returns with a compelling novel about the thin lines between love and loss, success and ruin, passion and madness, all hidden behind the walls of The Dakota, New York City’s most famous residence.

After a failed apprenticeship, working her way up to head housekeeper of a posh London hotel is more than Sara Smythe ever thought she’d make of herself. But when a chance encounter with Theodore Camden, one of the architects of the grand New York apartment house The Dakota, leads to a job offer, her world is suddenly awash in possibility—no mean feat for a servant in 1884. The opportunity to move to America, where a person can rise above one’s station. The opportunity to be the female manager of The Dakota, which promises to be the greatest apartment house in the world. And the opportunity to see more of Theo, who understands Sara like no one else . . . and is living in The Dakota with his wife and three young children.

 

In 1985, Bailey Camden is desperate for new opportunities. Fresh out of rehab, the former party girl and interior designer is homeless, jobless, and penniless. Two generations ago, Bailey’s grandfather was the ward of famed architect Theodore Camden. But the absence of a genetic connection means Bailey won’t see a dime of the Camden family’s substantial estate. Instead, her “cousin” Melinda—Camden’s biological great-granddaughter—will inherit almost everything. So when Melinda offers to let Bailey oversee the renovation of her lavish Dakota apartment, Bailey jumps at the chance, despite her dislike of Melinda’s vision. The renovation will take away all the character and history of the apartment Theodore Camden himself lived in . . . and died in, after suffering multiple stab wounds by a madwoman named Sara Smythe, a former Dakota employee who had previously spent seven months in an insane asylum on Blackwell’s Island.

 

One hundred years apart, Sara and Bailey are both tempted by and struggle against the golden excess of their respective ages—for Sara, the opulence of a world ruled by the Astors and Vanderbilts; for Bailey, the free-flowing drinks and cocaine in the nightclubs of New York City—and take refuge and solace in the Upper West Side’s gilded fortress. But a building with a history as rich—and often tragic—as The Dakota’s can’t hold its secrets forever, and what Bailey discovers in its basement could turn everything she thought she knew about Theodore Camden—and the woman who killed him—on its head.

With rich historical detail, nuanced characters, and gorgeous prose, Fiona Davis once again delivers a compulsively readable novel that peels back the layers of not only a famed institution, but the lives —and lies—of the beating hearts within.  Read More

 

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Atlanta Noir 

 

By:  Tayari Jones, Editor 

ISBN: 978-1617755378

Publisher: 978-1617755378

Publication Date: 8/1/2017  

Format: Paperback 

My Rating:  4 Stars (ARC)

"Atlanta has its share, maybe more than its share, of prosperity. But wealth is no safeguard against peril...Creepy as well as dark, grim in outlook...Hints of the supernatural may make these tales...appealing to lovers of ghost stories."
--Kirkus Reviews

"These stories, most of them by relative unknowns, offer plenty of human interest...All the tales have a Southern feel."
--Publishers Weekly

"Jones, author of Leaving Atlanta, returns to the South via Akashic's ever-growing city anthology series. The collection features stories from an impressive roster of talent including Jim Grimsley, Sheri Joseph, Gillian Royes, Anthony Grooms and David James Poissant. The 14 selections each take place in different Atlanta neighborhood."
--Atlanta-Journal Constitution 

 

Brand-new stories by: Tananarive Due, Kenji Jasper, Tayari Jones, Dallas Hudgens, Jim Grimsley, Brandon Massey, Jennifer Harlow, Sheri Joseph, Alesia Parker, Gillian Royes, Anthony Grooms, John Holman, Daniel Black, and David James Poissant.

 

Atlanta is one of America's most dynamic and fastest-growing cities, with an increasingly diverse population. This volume honors the city's transformation--albeit in a chilling manner--with a highly talented crew of contributors who know the city inside and out.  Read More 

 

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Mrs. Saint and the Defectives 

 

By: Julie Lawson Timmer 

ISBN: 978-1477819968

Publisher:  Lake Union 

Publication Date: 8/1/2017

Format: Other

My Rating:  4 Stars

Critically acclaimed author Julie Lawson Timmer returns with a tale of how community can heal the brokenness in all of us.

Markie, a fortysomething divorcée who has suffered a humiliating and very public fall from marital, financial, and professional grace, moves, along with her teenage son, Jesse, to a new town, hoping to lick her wounds in private. But Markie and Jesse are unable to escape the attention of their new neighbor Mrs. Saint, an irascible, elderly New European woman who takes it upon herself, along with her ragtag group of “defectives,” to identify and fix the flaws in those around her, whether they want her to or not.

 

What Markie doesn’t realize is that Mrs. Saint has big plans for the divorcée’s broken spirit. Soon, the quirky yet endearing woman recruits Markie to join her eccentric community, a world where both hidden truths and hope unite them. But when Mrs. Saint’s own secrets threaten to unravel their fragile web of healing, it’s up to Markie to mend these wounds and usher in a new era for the “defectives”—one full of second chances and happiness.  Read More 

 

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See What I Have Done  

 

 

By:  Sarah Schmidt

ISBN: 9780802126597

Publisher: Grove Atlantic

Publication Date: 8/1/2017 

Format: Hardcover

My Rating: 4 Stars (ARC)

Lizzie Borden took an ax
And gave her mother forty whacks
When she saw what she had done,
She gave her father forty-one.

Or did she?

In this riveting debut novel, See What I Have Done, Sarah Schmidt recasts one of the most fascinating murder cases of all time into an intimate story of a volatile household and a family devoid of love.

On the morning of August 4, 1892, Lizzie Borden calls out to her maid: Someone’s killed Father. The brutal ax-murder of Andrew and Abby Borden in their home in Fall River, Massachusetts, leaves little evidence and many unanswered questions. While neighbors struggle to understand why anyone would want to harm the respected Bordens, those close to the family have a different tale to tell—of a father with an explosive temper; a spiteful stepmother; and two spinster sisters, with a bond even stronger than blood, desperate for their independence.

 

As the police search for clues, Emma comforts an increasingly distraught Lizzie whose memories of that morning flash in scattered fragments. Had she been in the barn or the pear arbor to escape the stifling heat of the house?

 

When did she last speak to her stepmother? Were they really gone and would everything be better now? Shifting among the perspectives of the unreliable Lizzie, her older sister Emma, the housemaid Bridget, and the enigmatic stranger Benjamin, the events of that fateful day are slowly revealed through a high-wire feat of storytelling. Read More 

 

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Emerald Coast 

 

By:  Anita Hughes

ISBN:  9781250130877

Publisher: St. Martin's Press

Publication Date:  8/1/2017 

Format: Paperback 

My Rating: TBR

Lily Bristol arrives at a luxurious resort in Sardinia for the grand opening of her newest home furnishing store on the Emerald Coast. She’s a successful business woman with an international chain of stores from San Francisco to Milan. Thirty-two and newly divorced, she’s ready to handle things on her own. At least until her private butler, Enzo, escorts her to a beautiful suite where she notices a suspiciously familiar pair of men’s slippers and shaving kit.

 

Lily is horrified. Her ex-husband Oliver moved out of their restored Connecticut farmhouse six months ago, but they booked this trip when they were trying to save their marriage and never cancelled the reservation. Oliver, a food critic for the New York Times, is here covering Sardinia’s hottest new restaurant. The only other available room is the adjoining suite; and worse, Oliver isn’t alone. He’s brought a twenty-something named Angela with him.

 

Lily is determined to make do and enlists Enzo to find her a suitable man. But it’s not as easy to find new love as they both expected. When Lily and Oliver find themselves alone on a very important night, they turn to each other. Sparks begin to fly, but can they be together without breaking each other’s hearts?

 

Set on the glamorous Italian island, Emerald Coast is a touching and humorous story about marriage and the difficulty of finding love and happiness at the same time. Read More 

 

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The Good Daughter 

 

By:  Karin Slaughter

ISBN: 978-0062430243

Publisher:  William Morrow

Publication Date: 8/8/2017

Format:  Hardcover

My Rating:  5 Stars 

The stunning new novel from the international #1 bestselling author — a searing, spellbinding blend of cold-case thriller and psychological suspense.

Two girls are forced into the woods at gunpoint. One runs for her life. One is left behind…

 

Twenty-eight years ago, Charlotte and Samantha Quinn's happy small-town family life was torn apart by a terrifying attack on their family home. It left their mother dead. It left their father — Pikeville's notorious defense attorney — devastated. And it left the family fractured beyond repair, consumed by secrets from that terrible night.

 

Twenty-eight years later, and Charlie has followed in her father's footsteps to become a lawyer herself — the ideal good daughter. But when violence comes to Pikeville again — and a shocking tragedy leaves the whole town traumatized — Charlie is plunged into a nightmare. Not only is she the first witness on the scene, but it's a case that unleashes the terrible memories she's spent so long trying to suppress. Because the shocking truth about the crime that destroyed her family nearly thirty years ago won't stay buried forever…

 

Packed with twists and turns, brimming with emotion and heart, The Good Daughter is fiction at its most thrilling. Read More 

 

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Emma in the Night  

 

By: Wendy Walker

ISBN: 978-1250141439

Publisher: St. Martin's Press

Publication Date:  8/8/2017

Format: Hardcover

My Rating: 5 Stars (ARC)

One night three years ago, the Tanner sisters disappeared: fifteen-year-old Cass and seventeen-year-old Emma.

 

Three years later, Cass returns, without her sister Emma. Her story is one of kidnapping and betrayal, of a mysterious island where the two were held. But to forensic psychiatrist Dr. Abby Winter, something doesn't add up. Looking deep within this dysfunctional family Dr. Winter uncovers a life where boundaries were violated and a narcissistic parent held sway. And where one sister's return might just be the beginning of the crime. Read More  

 

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Any Dream Will Do 

 

By: Debbie Macomber

ISBN: 9780399181191

Publisher: Random House 

Publication Date: 8/8/2017 

Format: Other

My Rating: 3.5 Stars

A woman finds the strength to overcome a painful history and faces the challenge of learning to trust and love again in this powerful and uplifting novel.

Shay has never had a happy life. After growing up in an abusive home, she finally secures a job at a bank when her father passes away. Her brother, Caden, quickly falls into the wrong crowd and finds himself indebted to a dangerous drug lord. In a desperate attempt to rescue her only living family member, Shay risks everything, and finds herself sentenced to two years in prison.

 

When she’s finally released, even the brother she gave everything to save has abandoned her. Dejected and alone, Shay wanders into a church. She catches the attention of Pastor Andrew Douglas, a leader in the community and recent widower. Together, she and Andrew find healing and remember how to open their hearts to a brighter future. Read More 

 

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TRUTH Doesn't Have a Side 

 

My Alarming Discovery about the Danger of Contact Sports

Bennet Omalu (Author), Will Smith (Foreword), Mark Tabb (Contributor)

By:  Dr. Bennet Omalu 

ISBN: 9780310351962 

Publisher:  Zondervan Non-Fiction

Publication Date: 8/8/2017 

Format: Hardcover

My Rating:  5 Stars  (ARC)
 

One day in 2002 the fifty-year old body of former Pittsburgh Steeler and hall of famer Mike Webster was laid on a cold table in front of pathologist Dr. Bennet Omalu. Webster’s body looked to Omalu like the body of a much older man, and the circumstances of his behavior prior to his death were clouded in mystery. But when Omalu cut into Webster’s brain, it appeared to be normal. Something didn’t add up.

It was at this moment, Omalu studying slides of Webster’s brain tissue under a microscope, that the world of contact sports would never be the same: the discovery of Chronic Traumatic Encephalopathy. CTE can result in an array of devastating consequences including deterioration in attention, memory loss, social instability, depression, and even suicide. And Omalu’s discovery of CTE in the brain of an American football player has become the catalyst of a blazing controversy across all contact sports.

 

At the center of that controversy stands the unlikely Dr. Bennet Omalu, a Nigerian-born American citizen, a mild-mannered, gentle man of faith. It is fascinating that it would take someone on the outside of American culture to make this amazing discovery, and refuse to let it be kept hidden. Dr. Omalu began his life in strife, growing up in war-torn Nigeria. But his medical studies in forensic pathology proved to be a lifeline. It fed his natural curiosity and awakened within a deeper desire to always search for the truth. Who would have thought that such an unexpected character would play such a role in bringing to life this world-changing data?

 

In Truth Doesn’t Have a Side, discover the truth about CTE: Its causes and symptoms, how we might keep our children safe and guide professional athletes when CTE sets in. The problem of CTE is coming to light with each new story about an athlete’s concussion problem, and we are likely facing dramatic changes to professional sports. You’ll be inspired by Dr. Bennet Omalu a man driven by his love and concern for the welfare of all people, and his professional vow to speak the truth. Read More 

 

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Seeing Red 

 

By: Sandra Brown 

ISBN: 978-1455572106

Publisher: Grand Central 

Publication Date: 8/15/2017 

Format: Hardcover

My Rating:  4 Stars (ARC)

#1 New York Times and USA Today bestselling author Sandra Brown delivers her trademark nonstop suspense and supercharged sexual tension in this thriller about tainted heroism, cold fury, and vengeance without mercy. 

Kerra Bailey is a television journalist on the rise, and she's hot on the trail of a story guaranteed to skyrocket her career to even greater heights: an interview with the legendary Major Trapper. Twenty-five years ago, the Major emerged a hero from the bombing of the Pegasus Hotel in downtown Dallas when he was photographed leading a handful of survivors out of the collapsing building. The iconic picture transformed him into a beloved national icon, in constant demand for speeches and interviews--until he suddenly dropped out of the public eye, shunning all members of the media. However, Kerra is willing to use any means necessary to get to the Major--even if she has to wrangle an introduction from his estranged son, former ATF agent John Trapper. 

 

Still seething over his break with both the ATF and his father, John Trapper wants no association with the hotel bombing or his hero father, and spurns the meddling reporters determined to drag them back into the limelight. Yet Kerra's sheer audacity and tantalizing hints that there's more to the story rouse Trapper's interest despite himself. And when her interview of a lifetime goes catastrophically awry--with unknown assailants targeting not only the Major, but also Kerra--Trapper realizes he needs her under wraps if he's going to track down the gunmen before they strike again . . . as well as discover, finally, who was responsible for the Pegasus bombing. 

 

Kerra is wary of a man so charming one moment and dangerous the next, and she knows Trapper is withholding evidence collected during his ATF investigation into the bombing. But having no one else to trust and enemies lurking closer than they know, Kerra and Trapper join forces and risk their very lives to expose a sinuous network of lies and conspiracy running deep through Texas--and uncover who would want a national hero dead. Read More 

 

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Exposed

 

Rosato & DiNunzio Book #5

By: Lisa Scottoline 

ISBN: 978-1250099716

Publisher: St Martin's Press

Publication Date: 8/15/2017 

Format: Hardcover 

My Rating:  4 Stars (ARC)

"Plot twists aplenty raise the stakes." ―People Magazine

A BATTLE FOR JUSTICE PITS PARTNER AGAINST PARTNER...

Mary DiNunzio wants to represent her old friend Simon Pensiera, a sales rep who was wrongly fired by his company, but her partner Bennie Rosato represents the parent company. When she confronts Mary, explaining this is a conflict of interest, an epic battle of wills and legal strategy between the two ensues―ripping the law firm apart, forcing everyone to take sides and turning friend against friend.

 

SOMETIMES LOYALTY CAN BE LETHAL.  Read More

 

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A Promise to Kill 

 

By:  Erik Storey

Clyde Barr #2
ISBN: 978-150112418

Publisher: Scribner

Publication Date: 8/15/2017 

Format: Other

My Rating:  4 Stars (ARC)

From the author dubbed by Jeffery Deaver “a born storyteller” whose first novel Nothing Short of Dying was hailed as “exceptional,” “a rollercoaster read,” and “adrenaline-fueled” by publications on both sides of the Atlantic, this is Erik Storey’s next entry in the Clyde Barr series, a locomotive-paced brawler that has its hero teaming with besieged members of a Native American reservation to thwart outlaw bikers who are putting hundreds of thousands of lives at risk.

 

Clyde Barr, the drifter with lethal skills, is alone again, wandering the highways of the American West in search of something to believe in. As summer turns to autumn, he trades his car for a horse and heads for the mountains, planning to clear his head and regain his edge with some hunting. But when he runs across an elderly sick man—a Ute Indian from a nearby reservation—Clyde’s dream of solitude is quickly dashed.

 

On the reservation, Clyde finds the old man’s daughter, Lawana, and grandson, Taylor, as well as a group of menacing bikers called Reapers running wild in the economically depressed, half-abandoned village. Gripped by the desire to do good in a hard world, Clyde offers to stay on Lawana’s ranch to help out until her father is released from the hospital. He controls himself around the bikers, even when he sees them harass a few Native American women—but when the Reapers attack a local boy Clyde has to do something. As tensions rise between the locals and the Reapers, Clyde’s efforts to protect the reservation become a fight for his, Lawana’s, and Taylor’s lives. And then the stakes ratchet up even more.

 

In the remote Utah desert, surrounded by enemies, with no law enforcement presence, and with communication effectively cut off, Clyde must find a way to save his new friends, defeat the gang, and, hopefully, escape with his own skin intact. A Promise to Kill is an edge-of-the-seat thriller, pushing its no-hold-barred hero to new levels of improvisation and bare-knuckled blunt force. Read More 

  

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A Stranger in the House 

 

By:  Shari Lapena

ISBN: 978-0735221123

Publisher: Penguin/Pamela Dorman Books

Publication Date:  8/15/2017 

Format: Hardcover 

My Rating: 3 Stars (ARC)

From the New York Times bestselling author of The Couple Next Door, a new thriller featuring a suspicious accident, a wife who can’t account for herself, and unsettling questions that threaten to tear the couple apart 

You’re home making dinner for your husband. You expect him any second.
 
The phone rings—it’s the call you hoped you’d never get. 
 
You jump in your car and race to a neighborhood you thought you’d never visit.  
 
You peer into the dark, deserted building. You brace yourself for the worst.  
 
And then, you remember nothing else.
 
They tell your husband you’ve been in an accident. You lost control of your car as you sped through the worst side of town.
 
The police suspect you were up to no good. But your husband refuses to believe it. Your best friend is not so sure. And even you don’t know what to believe… Read More

 

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The Other Girl 

 

By: Erica Spindler

ISBN: 9781250083654

Publisher: St. Martin's Press 

Publication Date: 8/22/2017 

Format: Hardcover

My Rating: 5 Stars + (ARC)

From the New York Times bestselling author of Justice for Sara and The First Wife Erica Spindler comes The Other Girl, a chilling new thriller about a ritualistic murder of a college professor that sends a small town cop back into the trauma she thought she’d put behind her.

Officer Miranda Rader of the Hammond PD in Louisiana is known for her honesty, integrity, and steady hand in a crisis—but that wasn’t always so. Miranda comes from Jasper, just south of Hammond, a place about the size of a good spit on a hot day, and her side of the tracks was the wrong one. She’s worked hard to leave the girl she used to be behind and earn respect in her position as an officer.

 

However, when Miranda and her partner are called to investigate the murder of one of the town’s most beloved college professors, they’re unprepared for the gruesomeness of the scene. This murder is unlike any they’ve ever investigated, and just when Miranda thinks she’s seen the worst of it, she finds a piece of evidence that chills her to the core: a faded newspaper clipping about a terrible night from her long-buried past. Then another man turns up dead, this one a retired cop, and not just any cop—Clint Wheeler, the cop who took her statement that night. Two murders, two very different men, two killings that on the surface had nothing in common—except Miranda. 15 years ago.

 

And when her fingerprints turn up at the scene of the first murder, Miranda once again finds herself under the microscope, her honesty and integrity doubted, her motivations questioned. Alone again, the trust of her colleagues shattered, Miranda must try to trust the instincts she’s pushed down for so long, and decide what’s right—before it’s too late. Read More

 

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Map of the Heart 

 

By: Susan Wiggs

ISBN: 978-0062425485

Publisher: William Morrow 

Publication Date: 8/22/2017 

Format: Hardcover

My Rating: TBR

Love and family. War and secrets. Betrayal and redemption.

#1 New York Times bestselling author Susan Wiggs returns with a deeply emotional and atmospheric story that spans oceans and decades, from the present-day Delaware shore to the battlefields of WWII France.

 

Widowed by an unspeakable tragedy, Camille Palmer has made her peace with the past and settled into the quiet safety of life with her teenage daughter Julie in a sleepy coastal town. Then the arrival of a mysterious package breaks open the door to her family’s secret past. In uncovering a hidden history, Camille has no idea that she’s embarking on an adventure that will utterly transform her.

 

Camille, Julie, and Camille’s father return to the French town of his youth, sparking  unexpected memories — recollections that will lead them back to the dark days of the Second World War. And it is in the stunning Provençal countryside that they will uncover their family’s surprising history.

 

While Provence offers answers about the past, it also holds the key to Camille’s future. Along the way, she meets a former naval officer who stirs a passion deep within her — a feeling that she thought she’d never experience again.

 

“Susan Wiggs seamlessly melds historical drama with contemporary romance,” raves Mary Kay Andrews. Now, this hugely popular author has created her biggest, most powerful story yet — a beautiful and heartfelt novel that celebrates the bonds of family and pays homage to the sacrifices of the past.  Read More

 

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If the Creek Don't Rise 

 

By: Leah Weiss 

ISBN: 9781492647454

Publisher:  SOURCEBOOKS Landmark

Publication Date: 8/22/2017 

Format: Other 

My Rating: 4 Stars (ARC)

A strikingly sincere portrait of a town and its buried secrets from an outstanding new voice in southern fiction.

In a North Carolina mountain town filled with moonshine and rotten husbands, Sadie Blue is only the latest girl to face a dead-end future at the mercy of a dangerous drunk. She’s been married to Roy Tupkin for fifteen days, and she knows now that she should have listened to the folks who said he was trouble.

 

But when a stranger sweeps in and knocks the world off-kilter for everyone in town, Sadie begins to think there might be more to life than being Roy’s wife.

 

As stark and magnificent as Appalachia itself, If the Creek Don’t Rise is a bold and beautifully layered debut about a dusty, desperate town finding the inner strength it needs to outrun its demons. The folks of Baines Creek will take you deep into the mountains with heart, honesty, and homegrown grit.  Read More

 

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Fall

 

 

 

By:  Candice Fox 

Series:  Archer & Bennett #3

ISBN:  9780857987426

Publisher:  Pinnacle  

Publication Date:  08/29/2017 

Format:  Kindle 

My Rating  Currently Reading 

Before the blood, before the screaming, before the fall . . .

The first victim is discovered on the edge of the park. Young. Female. Beautiful. Or at least she was before her face was destroyed. Homicide detective Frank Bennett suspects that this is a first kill. And it won’t be the last. To stop a serial killer in the making, Frank will have to place his faith in his beautiful, dangerous partner Eden Archer—a cop who moonlights as a killer . . .
 
Eden knows the temptation of evil. Her intimate knowledge of the relentless forces that drive a killer gives her a unique edge. But with each jogger found brutally murdered in Sydney’s pristine parks, Eden can see where the investigation is headed. And it gives her a feeling she hasn’t felt in a long time. A fear she’s never known. A fear she can’t escape. A fear that, after all these years, she will have to face . . . Read More

 

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Working Fire 

 

By:  Emily Bleeker

ISBN: 154204572X

Publisher: Lake Union

Publication Date:  8/29/2017 

Format:  Paperback  

My Rating: 4 Stars

From the Wall Street Journal bestselling author of When I’m Gone comes a compelling novel of a bond between sisters, tested by tragedy…

Ellie Brown thought she’d finally escaped her stifling hometown of Broadlands, Illinois; med school was supposed to be her ticket out. But when her father has a stroke, she must return home to share his care with her older sister, Amelia, who’s busy with her own family. Working as a paramedic, Ellie’s days are monotonous, driving an ambulance through streets she’d hoped never to see again.

 

Until a 911 dispatch changes everything. The address: her sister’s house. Rushing to the scene, Ellie discovers that Amelia and her husband, Steve, have been shot in a home invasion. After Amelia is rushed to the hospital, Ellie tries to make sense of the tragedy. But what really happened inside her sister’s house becomes less and less clear. As Amelia hangs on in critical condition, Ellie uncovers dark revelations about her family’s past that challenge her beliefs about those closest to her…and force her to question where her devotions truly lie. Read More

 

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