Sam Keller, a corporate auditor for pharmaceutical giant Pfluger Klaxon, is used to business travel, but his next trip will be far from routine. In Dan Fesperman’s new thriller, Layover in Dubai, Sam’s trip turns nightmarish when Nanette Weaver, vice president of corporate security and investigations, enlists him to rein in colleague Charlie Hatcher while between flights in Dubai. Charlie’s overindulgences in booze and women have embarrassed the company and placed newly acquired assets in Dubai at risk.

When Sam and Charlie arrive in Dubai, Sam acts as chaperone during a night out, only to discover Charlie’s adventures seem less seedy than Weaver had conveyed . . . until their last night in town, that is, when Charlie drags Sam to the York Club, a bar and brothel. At the club, Charlie disappears with a prostitute into the building’s bowels, only to turn up murdered in one of the club’s offices within the hour.

When Sam falls under suspicion, detective Anwar Sharaf comes to his aid. Sharaf is assigned to investigate fellow officers purported to be working with Russian mobsters, including the one investigating Charlie’s murder, Lt. Hamad Assad. When Sharaf sees Sam is innocent and suspects Assad is connected to the crime, he follows Sam into a rabbit hole of murder, mobsters and madams of ill repute.

After the first body drops, Fesperman delivers standard thriller fare: crooked cops, double-crosses, chases, evasions and narrow escapes. However, he enhances and elevates the story with his exotic setting; clearly Fesperman’s travels in the Persian Gulf—he was a reporter during the first Gulf War—have played a huge role in shaping this novel. Dubai, seen through Sam’s eyes, is as alien as a sci-fi spaceport: a city set in an exotic desert landscape, where tourists visit its bustling malls and bundle up to ski on artificial snow. Layover in Dubai primarily succeeds because of its setting, an alien culture expertly presented; but Sam, an average Joe rather than spy or detective, whose only resources are his wits and Sharaf’s considerable help, also adds to its charm. This is a fast-paced thriller that’s perfect for adrenaline junkies looking for a satisfying read to keep them on their toes.

Much to the delight of his fans, the brilliant, fabulously wealthy, king of cool FBI Agent Aloysius Pendergast is back in action and out for revenge. Pendergast, the brainchild of best-selling coauthors Douglas Preston and Lincoln Child, has been the driving force behind 13 previous novels, including Relic, Dance of Death and The Book of the Dead (the only books in the series that the authors recommend reading in sequence).

Their latest book, Fever Dream, is a stand-alone read that exemplifies the authors’ mastery of the suspense genre. The story unfolds as Pendergast and Helen—his much-beloved wife of two years—are relaxing at the end of an African safari. Their peaceful moment is interrupted when Pendergast is summoned to kill a rogue, man-eating lion and Helen—who is a crack shot—goes with him. She is killed during a vicious attack, but an emotionally scarred Pendergast survives the tragedy. Some 12 years later, he discovers that her weapon had deliberately been loaded with blanks. Obviously, his wife had been murdered.

He sets out to find her killer and commandeers his closest ally, NYPD Lt. Vincent D’Agosta, in a search that takes them from Africa to the swamps of Louisiana. Meanwhile Vincent’s love, NYPD Homicide Captain Laura Hayward, is not happy. This isn’t the first time that Pendergast has taken her Vinnie along on a chillingly dangerous ride.

Clues drop and bullets fly as they get ever closer to the elusive truth when Pendergast uncovers Helen’s obsession with artist John James Audubon—and a quest for a missing Audubon painting that proves to be the motive for her death. He can’t help but wonder if he ever really knew his wife.

When deeper, darker secrets are revealed, a disgruntled Captain Hayward is forced into the fray as the killers close in and the action heats up even more as the tale races to its violent conclusion. At the end, though, some questions remain unanswered. Sequel, anyone?

Although the authors live 500 miles apart, their writing is seamless and totally absorbing, the byproduct of a friendship that began around 1985 when the two first met. At the time, Preston worked for the American Museum of Natural History, and Child was an editor, a rising young star in the book-publishing world. They soon became close friends and the rest is history—mixed with heady doses of science and mayhem. Preston & Child fans won’t want to miss Fever Dream.

Not all lawyers are capable of translating legal speak into compelling fiction. One of the remarkable exceptions is Scott Turow, the Harvard-educated attorney and prolific author. In 1987, Turow scored big with his first novel, Presumed Innocent, the suspenseful story of Rusty Sabich, a Midwestern prosecutor who finds himself on trial for the vicious murder of Carolyn Polhemus, a young colleague with whom he had had an affair.

The book was on the New York Times bestseller list for 45 weeks. In 1990, it was translated to film with Harrison Ford starring as Sabich, whose brilliant defense attorney, Sandy Stern, goes head to head with the unglamorous but canny Tommy Molto.

Now, 23 years later, Turow has written Innocent, a long-awaited sequel. Sabich, now 60, chief judge of an appellate court and candidate for the state supreme court, is accused of killing his wife, Barbara, a mathematics scholar. Many of the same characters are back, including Stern, Molto and Sabich’s son, Nat, who was a little boy during the first case. Sabich has engaged in a second affair, this time with a beautiful and witty law clerk 25 years his junior. Anna is not quite “drop dead gorgeous,” but she’s close enough. Sabich can’t believe that such an attractive young woman is on the make for him, and initially he is determined to resist. Not for long. But after several exciting liaisons, Sabich dumps Anna, even though he has fallen deeply in love. Ironically, the broken-hearted Anna later meets Nat, now 28, quite by accident. He is instantly smitten with her, but she is convinced the relationship would be unseemly.

If all of this sounds a little tawdry, be assured that Turow carries it off with skill and flair. The big question is: How will all of this play in the murder trial? The court scenes are riveting, subject to legal twists that keep the reader in constant doubt as to the verdict. Forget the no-sequels rule: Turow is better than ever, especially in the development of his complex characters. And if this one also makes its way to the screen, Harrison Ford is still available.