Deadly Animals, Marie Tierney’s brilliantly plotted debut mystery, introduces readers to Ava Bonney: a 14-year-old English girl obsessed with decomposing bodies.
Deadly Animals, Marie Tierney’s brilliantly plotted debut mystery, introduces readers to Ava Bonney: a 14-year-old English girl obsessed with decomposing bodies.
John Straley’s nonstop, high-octane Big Breath In introduces the unforgettable Delphine, a 68-year-old cancer patient-turned-investigator.
John Straley’s nonstop, high-octane Big Breath In introduces the unforgettable Delphine, a 68-year-old cancer patient-turned-investigator.
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What would the fallout be if someone could prove that the modern state of Israel is in the wrong place that it occupies a territory far distant from the one divinely promised the Jews and specified in the original version of the Old Testament? What if the historical Israel had actually been located in what is now Saudi Arabia? Would the revelation of these facts inevitably bring the always bubbling Mideast to a full boil? It is around these potentially apocalyptic prospects that Steve Berry weaves The Alexandria Link. His premise is that the contents of the fabled Library of Alexandria including the Old Testament still exist at a secret site, the whereabouts of which have been made known only to a succession of wise and deserving scholars. So now the race is on to find the library, with one faction intent on exposing Israel’s tenuous historical hold on the land.

To play out this adventure, Berry brings back characters he introduced in The Templar Legacy. Chief among these are Cotton Malone, the retired government spook; his former boss, Stephanie Nelle; and the beautiful but deadly Cassiopeia Vitt, who functions here as Nelle’s guardian angel. There are so many doublecrosses it practically takes a scorecard to keep track of them. Breathlessly paced, The Alexandria Link is a wonderful dramatic ride.

What would the fallout be if someone could prove that the modern state of Israel is in the wrong place that it occupies a territory far distant from the one divinely promised the Jews and specified in the original version of the Old Testament? What…
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Debut novelist Tracy Kiely has come up with the smashing idea of marrying Jane Austen’s wit and social acuity to the form of the modern cozy mystery and gotten excellent results in Murder at Longbourn, which has all the signs of beginning a fine new series. Kiely uses some Austen plot lines, particularly from Pride and Prejudice, and gives her own 21st century take on many of Austen’s favorite social situations (the poor cousin dependent on a wealthier one is particularly notable).

The appropriately named Elizabeth Parker has just broken up with her boyfriend, a man “obsessed with argyle,” and is desperate to find something entertaining to do on New Year’s Eve, something that won’t make her feel so alone. Fortunately, her favorite relative, her Aunt Winnie, is opening a Cape Cod B&B that night and is celebrating the holiday with a planned murder party. Despite the presence of Peter McGowan, the bane of her childhood, Elizabeth decides this is just the way to start off her New Year.

Things, of course, do not go strictly as planned: local, soon-shown-to-be-unpopular, wealthy developer Gerald Ramsey is found shot. Aunt Winnie is a prime suspect since Ramsey was determined to get the property she bought for her B&B. Elizabeth determines to investigate the crime just in case the police decide they have the guilty party in Aunt Winnie. Complicating matters is her interest in the handsome Englishman staying at the B&B. Is he the lover of the dead man’s wife or is he sincerely interested in Elizabeth? And what is Peter, who persists in calling Elizabeth by her childhood nickname of Cocoa Puff, up to?

Elizabeth, much like Austen’s Elizabeth Bennet, is not always as wise as she thinks she is, but she can be great company. She is often amusingly self-deprecating. At one point she compares her reflection to the appearance of the dead man’s daughter, who is looking particularly good.  The morning after an evening when she’s had far more to drink than normal (in her defense, she had a really awful day), she notes she looks “anything but dewy fresh.” She continues, “In fact, I looked like something that sucked the life out of dewy fresh things.”

In the next installation, this reader hopes that Elizabeth’s newly engaged friend and roommate, Bridget, will get more time on the page. Elizabeth’s known her since childhood and remembers that “her dolls were always clad like some bizarre cross of Joan Collins and Liberace.” Peter does not yet feel fully formed as a character, at least in comparison to Elizabeth, but that’s likely to be addressed in future books, as well.

Joanne Collings cozies up with a good book in Washington, D.C.

Debut novelist Tracy Kiely has come up with the smashing idea of marrying Jane Austen’s wit and social acuity to the form of the modern cozy mystery and gotten excellent results in Murder at Longbourn, which has all the signs of beginning a fine new…

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With True Blue, best-selling author David Baldacci says he knew “from the beginning” that his memorable duo, Mace and Beth Perry, would be taking center stage again in future thrillers. No wonder: this pair of sisters, who both started out as cops but ended up on different roads, make for compelling reading.

Beth is the chief of police in Washington, D.C., while Mace is just out after doing two years in prison for a crime she didn’t commit. Now she wants to clear her name and win back her badge. The sisters, whose close and supportive friendship held strong all through Mace’s imprisonment, are still watching each other’s backs, and now they’re zeroing in on a web of murder and deception that is spiraling outward, taking in D.C.’s darkest criminal neighborhoods as well as the upper echelons of Washington’s political hierarchy.

Baldacci is at the top of his game here, exercising his talent for creating both winsome and darker-than-dark characters that keep readers turning the pages. Mace grinds her mental gears and operates on a short fuse, but she keeps the book going at a breakneck pace as she steams through D.C.’s mean streets on her cherry red Ducati. Chief Perry has worked hard to get where she is, but her stubborn honesty and inner stability keep the book from bursting apart at the seams. Together these two complement each other as they stand alongside a cast of intriguing characters, including Roy, the hoop-shooting lawyer who found the first body (we know he’ll be back!); Captain, a disheveled homeless vet with a penchant for Twinkies; Abe, the richer-than-rich research scientist who hires Mace; and Mona, a vengeful U.S. attorney with friends in high places. Central to the action are Psycho, Razor, Alisha and other streetwise residents of the “Seven D” neighborhood on one side of town, and the high-flying politicos and shadowy intelligence agents who populate the other side—leaving us not at all clear about which is really the wrong side of the tracks.

In researching True Blue, Baldacci accompanied police patrols on their rounds of D.C. neighborhoods, and wrote a nationally published profile of the capital city’s real-life police chief, Cathy Lanier, the first top-ranked female law enforcement officer in that city’s history. The author’s in-depth research into Lanier’s up-through-the-ranks career helped inspire many of the absorbing details that elevate this book to a notch above most crime thrillers.

With True Blue, best-selling author David Baldacci says he knew “from the beginning” that his memorable duo, Mace and Beth Perry, would be taking center stage again in future thrillers. No wonder: this pair of sisters, who both started out as cops but ended up…

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One of the biggest challenges faced by the author of cozy mystery series is finding original and convincing ways to involve his or her amateur detective protagonist in murder investigations book after book. After all, the best part-time sleuths have much in common with their readers and it is unlikely that most of them get involved in homicides on a regular basis. That the connection to the crime is in some way personal is a given for the first book; after that, more invention and imagination are required, or, perhaps, just honesty.

That’s where Clare O’Donohue is to be commended. The first death in A Drunkard’s Path (the second Someday Quilts Mystery after The Lover’s Knot) is connected to heroine Nell Fitzgerald only because the local police chief, stands her up on their first date without even calling to explain—a body has been discovered in their quiet Hudson River community. That’s enough to pique Nell’s active imagination, but her life is too full at the moment—she’s working at her grandmother’s quilt shop, starting art classes, meeting a talented but mysterious and apparently homeless fellow student—for her to get too involved in the investigation.

But the next death is someone she knows, and the young woman is killed in the backyard of Nell’s grandmother’s house. One of the suspects is Nell’s teacher, Oliver White, a famous artist who’s been showing a lot of interest in Nell’s grandmother, Eleanor. Though Nell now has all sorts of reasons to be curious, she’s also willing to admit that she’s also just plain nosy, a refreshing confession for an amateur detective.

Nell gets plenty of assistance from her fellow quilters of all ages, who are happy to unleash their own inner Nancy Drews in order to protect Eleanor. She gets less support from that police chief, Jesse Dewalt, and they once again take a detour on the road to romance.

O’Donohue finds a lot in quilting that applies to murder investigations: you’ve got to step back from what you’re working on once in a while in order to see it; the process is important; and “There’s no reason that solving a murder . . . should be any less organized than a quilt meeting.” These are lessons that Nell, a novice quilter, gradually takes in: “[A]nything, no matter how scary it seems at first, can be sorted out if you take it step by step. I just wasn’t sure if I was thinking about quilting, the murder investigation, or my relationship with Jesse.”

Joanne Collings cozies up with a good book in Washington, D.C.

One of the biggest challenges faced by the author of cozy mystery series is finding original and convincing ways to involve his or her amateur detective protagonist in murder investigations book after book. After all, the best part-time sleuths have much in common with their…

In 1991, Douglas Coupland burst onto the literary scene with the groundbreaking Generation X, a novel that brilliantly captured the minds and imaginations of those who stepped tentatively across the threshold of adulthood in the late 1980s. Now, nearly 20 years later, Coupland revisits the generational divide, this time focusing on the pressures and insecurities looming on the horizon of the 21st century.

Generation A uses the same framed narrative style as its predecessor; five disenfranchised 20-somethings—all trying to find their place in the world—unfold their individual stories through alternating chapters. They are scattered across the globe, unaware of each other’s existence until the unthinkable occurs, irrevocably linking them to one another: they are each stung by a bee. In Coupland’s vision of the future, bees have long been extinct, so getting stung by one is not just something to blog about, it’s worthy of attention from the National Guard! All five Wonka kids (as they call themselves) are rushed into isolation where they are scrutinized and studied for several weeks before finally being released back into the wild without any explanation. Soon an undeniable pull causes them to seek one another out, eventually uniting on a small island where their narratives slowly begin to merge as they piece together not just what has happened to them, but more importantly, why.

Within the first pages of Generation A, readers will realize that they are in the hands of a master, that they have been gifted with something more lofty and ambitious than the average work of fiction. Coupland playfully exposes the contemporary contradictions that plague us: in the era of Twitter and mass communication, as we play exhibitionist and voyeur on a global stage, how is it that we feel more isolated than ever? Where can genuine human connections be found, or are they a thing of the past?

A piercing analysis of our modern society, Generation A is exhilarating and insightful, bubbling with wit and verve. Readers who are willing to brave Coupland’s literary pyrotechnics and unconventional exercises in style will be richly rewarded with a thoughtful and mind-bending analysis of what makes us tick. Coupland is better than ever, and Generation A is certain to thrill readers of every generation.

Stephenie Harrison writes from Nashville and now considers herself part of Generation A.

In 1991, Douglas Coupland burst onto the literary scene with the groundbreaking Generation X, a novel that brilliantly captured the minds and imaginations of those who stepped tentatively across the threshold of adulthood in the late 1980s. Now, nearly 20 years later, Coupland revisits the…

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<b>Did she or didn’t she?</b> Pam Lewis’ suspenseful first novel, <b>Speak Softly, She Can Hear</b>, opens with an incident that spirals into the macabre. Two teenaged girls who attend a posh school in New York have planned to use a ski trip to Stowe, Vermont, as a cover for a liaison with an aspiring actor who has agreed to deflower them. Carole Mason is an intelligent but self-conscious girl. Her friend Naomi is the edgy product of a flamboyantly dysfunctional family. The actor is named Eddie, and from the start it’s clear that he’s bad news.

After Eddie and Carole have had sex at a seedy motor lodge, another woman named Rita shows up. Eddie tries to involve the drunk Carole in a threesome, but she ends up instead crouching clumsily at the head of the bed, more in the way than intimately involved. Suddenly, Eddie breaks through Carole’s drunken haze, announcing that Rita is dead and claiming Carole has somehow broken her neck. After Naomi shows up, the three of them drag Rita’s corpse into the woods behind the motor lodge, where they bury it in the deep snow.

Carole can never clearly reconstruct how she might have killed Rita, and since the story is told from her point of view, the reader shares her confusion. For the rest of the novel, Carole tries to get away from the memory of that night and from Eddie and Naomi, but she somehow keeps circling back to it and to them. Without any explanation to her parents, she drops out of Vassar, goes across the country to the Haight-Ashbury district of San Francisco, and then comes back to settle in Montpelier, Vermont. There she opens a restaurant called Chacha’s and falls in love with a black man named Will. The author cleverly integrates the suspense elements of the story with a perceptive depiction of the social and political tumult of the ’60s. The dramatic climax is not entirely a surprise, and the resolution is a little too neat, but Lewis’ skill in depicting character, incident and milieu make this a very promising debut. <i>Martin Kich is a professor at Wright State University.</i>

<b>Did she or didn't she?</b> Pam Lewis' suspenseful first novel, <b>Speak Softly, She Can Hear</b>, opens with an incident that spirals into the macabre. Two teenaged girls who attend a posh school in New York have planned to use a ski trip to Stowe, Vermont,…

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Reading The Scarpetta Factor, Patricia Cornwell’s 17th novel about medical examiner Kay Scarpetta and her gang of detectives and forensic criminologists, is not unlike taking a 500-page romp on a Tilt-a-Whirl.

Diehard Cornwell fans already know the drill, but for the uninitiated: Expect plot twists to snowball at a rate of tricky-to-solve murders, bomb threats and mistaken identities popping up every few pages (with some mafia involvement thrown in, too). In other words, there’s no predicting what will happen to Scarpetta over the course of the novel. The plot loops, spins and changes directions until the very end.

In this installment, Scarpetta is working in New York City to crack the murders of high profile financial advisor Hannah Starr and beautiful waitress Toni Darien—all while serving as senior forensic analyst for CNN’s (fictitious) “The Crispin Report.” Her husband, forensic psychiatrist Benton Wesley, is caught up in the case of a patient who may (or may not) be connected to Scarpetta’s murders. Rounding out the crew are NYPD detective Pete Marino, who shares a sticky past with Scarpetta, and Lucy Farinelli, Scarpetta’s computer investigator niece.

Scarpetta is serious about her work. “The body doesn’t lie,” she thinks during an argument about the timeline of a murder. “Don’t try to force the evidence to fit the crime.” When the crime starts to directly involve Scarpetta—a mysterious package shows up at her apartment; Lucy’s past involves some dangerous liaisons—the plot gets complicated as we fear for our heroine’s life.

Although Cornwell’s prose can be corny and over-dramatic (“She was volatile, couldn’t settle down, and she hated it, but hating something didn’t make it go away . . .”), The Scarpetta Factor is still a rip-roaring read, in no small part because of explicit details and forensic jargon (perhaps aided by Cornwell’s six years as a writer and computer analyst at Chief Medical Examiner’s office in Richmond, Virginia).

The point of view alternates between the main characters. Because of these shifts and the multiple details to resolve, the plot can drag; just when we think we’ll get some resolution—bam!—the narrator changes and 200 pages later we’re still wondering what’s going to happen.

Although frustrating, this technique keeps us hooked and biting nails until the end, the objective of any good crime novel.

In her childhood, Eliza Borné read a Nancy Drew book a day. She can whip through a “Scarpetta” book in about the same amount of time.

Reading The Scarpetta Factor, Patricia Cornwell’s 17th novel about medical examiner Kay Scarpetta and her gang of detectives and forensic criminologists, is not unlike taking a 500-page romp on a Tilt-a-Whirl.

Diehard Cornwell fans already know the drill, but for the uninitiated: Expect plot twists to…

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John LeCarré is thought by many of his myriad admirers worldwide to be the master of the modern spy novel. In fact, he is perhaps the innovator of the complex and intricately plotted tales of the cold War, which pit the secret services of Great Britain against those of the Soviet KGB. His early The Spy Who Came In From the Cold and the later Smiley’s People series built his deserved reputation, based no doubt in part upon his experiences in years of working in British Foreign Services.

His new novel, rocketing to the top of the best seller lists, is for this reader his best work. The Russia House brings the period under contemplation to the present of Gorbachev, glasnost and perestroika and examines it with meticulous attention.

A brilliant Russian defense physicist of the highest rank, for what he has come to feel are moral and totally compelling reasons, has decided to betray his country and reveal secrets of the utmost importance to the West. By accident he meets and is greatly impressed by a British publisher called Barley Blair: a drinker, facile, talented and eccentric, who is on a business trip to a Russian book fair. He decides that Barley must publish for the West a manuscript that will reveal the secret material, devastating in its impact.

Blair, not particularly interested, is with the greatest reluctance enlisted by British intelligence and the American CIA to deal with the Russian and secure this greatly desired material for them. Blair, sent back to Moscow, meets and is immediately and seriously attracted to Katya, a beautiful Russian woman, the former lover and now trusted friend of the Informant, code-named Bluebird, who is to be the intermediary between her friend and Barley. The intricate plot, not to be detailed here, finally winds to the somewhat ambiguous but ultimately satisfying conclusion.

Le Carré, whose writing improves with every book, is a very good writer indeed; he is, in fact, a fine novelist. The Russia House, while it entertains brilliantly, does much more. The view given us of the working style and techniques of the American and British intelligence services is absorbing and more than a bit frightening, particularly as it reveals jealousy and lack of confidence and trust which exist between the western services. He also makes it quite clear that whatever leaders at the top may appear to feel about the lessening of tension between East and West, the intelligence professionals remain unconvinced, even if hopeful. The Cold War continues on those levels, as always. Whether this is LeCarré’s own view is one of the principal ambiguities. And then, finally, there is the beautiful, lovely, passionate love that blooms for Katy and Barley, at whatever cost to their countries and to themselves. The major characters are engrossing, and the lesser figures, mainly intelligence personnel, are entirely convincing and always interesting. In sum, a splendid novel, read at whatever level.

Alan Zibart, a bookseller for more than 50 years, is the publisher’s father.

A well-crafted tale of espionage, The Russia House entertains brilliantly, and does much more.
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Don’t let anyone tell you that you don’t learn anything from reading fiction. Here is an abbreviated list of things I learned from Jess Lourey’s September Fair: Neil Diamond went to NYU on a fencing scholarship, his fans are called Diamondheads (a fact that would have come in handy when I worked in an office of Neil Diamond fans), there is a competitive “sport” known as sheep riding or mutton busting, and Araucana chickens lay blue and green eggs. But September Fair is a lot more than a compendium of Neil Diamond and State Fair knowledge.

Mira James, a librarian/newspaper reporter from Battle Lake, Minnesota, is on a week-long assignment covering fair activities. She’s glad to be there, having discovered four murdered bodies in as many months after moving to Battle Lake for a quieter life. She’s considered giving up on Battle Lake but decides to stay. “It was a new idea, this sticking-it-out approach, and it looked good on paper.” Then she witnesses the death of the new Milkfed Mary, Queen of the Dairy, and reporting on the fair gets a lot more complicated.

Mira now has to look into the murder as well as the fair’s attractions. She’s assisted by her elderly friend, Mrs. Berns, major Diamondhead and winner of tickets to Diamond’s fair concert, which she shares with Mira; Berns also introduces Mira to sheep riding. Also in attendence is Battle Lake’s steamroller of a mayor, Kennie Rogers, who talks with a heavy Southern accent despite her Minnesota roots.

Lourey’s affection for the state fair is evident. She’s particularly good on the food, especially Mira’s weakness, the Deep-fried Nut Goody on a Stick. (Just about anything you can imagine—and some things you can’t—are sold deep-fried on a stick at fairs.) Mira may question how anyone ever thought of the idea of sculpting a head in butter, but she remains respectful of the talent and difficulty it takes to do this. And, since this is the fifth in the murder-by-month series, Lourey indicates awareness of the darker side of the fair: behind-the-scenes nastiness and more serious crimes and the unsavory influence of big business on the foods we consume, deep-fried or not, in this lively mystery.

Joanne Collings writes from Washington, D.C.

Don’t let anyone tell you that you don’t learn anything from reading fiction. Here is an abbreviated list of things I learned from Jess Lourey’s September Fair: Neil Diamond went to NYU on a fencing scholarship, his fans are called Diamondheads (a fact that would…

Review by

Karin Slaughter is known for her intricately plotted mysteries, which usually contain graphic depictions of violent crimes, most often against women. In Undone, she continues to alarm and enmesh the reader, this time with a villain whose aversion to and lust for the female sex causes him to blind his victims so they can’t see their fates, and perform an act of surgery (without anesthesia) which ultimately gives his pursuers a clue to his identity.

If readers can get past the harsh details of the crimes Slaughter depicts—and since she’s an international bestseller, obviously millions can—then Undone is just what the doctor ordered. The doctor in this case is Sara Linton, who in previous books has seen her police chief husband, the man she believes to be her one true love, murdered before her eyes. Trying to put the past behind her, she has moved to Atlanta where she is now head of emergency medicine at Grant County Medical Hospital.

Sara is on duty when the first victim is brought to the emergency room after being hit by a car while escaping her captor. Georgia Bureau of Investigation agents Will Trent and Faith Mitchell, last seen in Fractured, are also first-hand witnesses to the arrival of the tortured and traumatized victim. Faith has fainted while at work and Will, her partner, has brought her to the hospital. Will heads out to the scene of the accident; Faith fumes because she has been left behind. However, she soon finds out she has some major problems of her own to deal with, specifically diabetes, which means a major lifestyle change and the possibility of being chained to a desk—a fate worse than death for Faith. Plus she’s pregnant by her now departed boyfriend.

Slaughter does a masterful job of weaving the personal lives of her characters with their professional responsibilities. Sarah is using her work as a doctor to keep from dealing with her husband’s death. Will, due to profound dyslexia, cannot read, a condition he is desperate to hide from his co-workers. Nor does he get much comfort at home, since his wife spends the majority of her time in other men’s beds.

Slaughter gives her characters tremendous depth of character, making them totally believable. Readers appreciate their quirks, share their angst, savor their interactions with each other. Slaughter says her fans often ask ,“Is this real?” It’s not hard to understand why—her writing makes it feel that way.

Perhaps that’s one reason why her books can be so unsettling. It’s disturbing to read about the truly evil villain at the heart of this fast-paced thriller. One cannot help but think, “What if that happened to me?”

For readers who like their suspense as gritty and violent as a real-life crime spree, Slaughter’s Undone is a sure winner.

Rebecca Bain writes from Nashville.

For readers who like their suspense as gritty and violent as a real-life crime spree, Slaughter's Undone is a sure winner.  
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Several years ago, Canadian writer Linwood Barclay was having breakfast with his teenage daughter when she posed a question guaranteed to give any parent heart palpitations. “Dad,” she asked, “Suppose you came to pick me up at my job, and found I’d never worked there?”

It was a scenario Barclay found truly disturbing—and equally irresistible. He took the idea and ran amok with it, creating a parent’s worst nightmare and a mystery reader’s delight with his new thriller, Fear the Worst.

Barclay is a well-respected author whose success has been much greater outside the United States. Too Close to Home was a number one bestseller in England, and also won the Best Novel category of the Arthur Ellis Awards, Canada’s top prize for crime fiction. Now with Fear the Worst, which Barclay calls his “best book yet,” the writer may finally receive similar attention and acclaim from readers in the U.S.

Tim Blake is a divorced dad with a lot of charm but no head for business. His only child, a 19 year-old daughter named Sydney, lives with him during the summer. The previous year, she spent those three months working at the car dealership where Tim is a salesman; this year, Sydney has taken a job as a desk clerk at the Just Inn Time, a cinder-block budget motel where the rooms are clean but the “complimentary breakfast” is free largely because no one really wants stale muffins and bad coffee.

Tim and Sydney have an altercation over breakfast which causes her to leave in a huff for work. But when she doesn’t return that evening, a worried Tim begins calling her friends, hoping the argument is the reason Sidney hasn’t come home. When Sidney’s not back by the next morning, now frantic, he races to the Just Inn Time to see if she’s shown up for work, only to be met with blank stares. No one has seen her, no one knows her, and no, Sydney doesn’t work there. Never has.

“When I got back to the house, it was empty.
Syd did not come home that night.
Or the next night.
Or the night after that.”

These events comprise only 14 pages of this 400-page book, which has all the twists, turns and thrills of a good roller coaster ride, compelling anyone who picks it up to keep reading. In addition to its intricate plot, one of the book’s best qualities is the balance between what is and what is not important when a child goes missing. In his quest to find Sydney, Tim discovers things about his daughter that might have sent him reeling before her disappearance: she drinks when she parties, some of her friends are “wild,” and she might be pregnant. But put in the context of her disappearance—and possible murder—they pale in importance.

“At least it would mean she was okay. That she was alive. I could welcome home a pregnant daughter if there was a pregnant daughter to welcome home.”

It’s not long before a pregnant daughter would be one of the best case scenarios Tim could possibly imagine. By the book’s end, some may feel Barclay has put too many twists and turns in his story; others may be disappointed by its fairly predictable conclusion. But the majority of readers will find Fear the Worst nearly impossible to put down, savoring every bit of this satisfying suspense novel right up to the very last page.

Several years ago, Canadian writer Linwood Barclay was having breakfast with his teenage daughter when she posed a question guaranteed to give any parent heart palpitations. “Dad,” she asked, “Suppose you came to pick me up at my job, and found I’d never worked there?”

It…

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Josh Bazell landed a lucrative publishing deal for his first novel shortly after graduating from medical school. To say that he's better at writing than most writers would be at practicing medicine is to understate Bazell's talent, but it's too good a line to pass up. Beat the Reaper, his highly anticipated debut, may be a bit short on art, but it's long on page-turning action and laughs.

When it comes to the human body, Bazell knows his bones. He has an M.D. from Columbia University and is a medical resident at the University of California, San Francisco. His protagonist, Pietro Brnwa, is also a doctor—an overworked Manhattan hospital intern who goes by the name Peter Brown. Pietro took an unusual road to his Hippocratic oath, having spent his earlier years as a mob hit man nicknamed "The Bearclaw." After seeing the error of his ways—which in the mafia means he testified against his former employers and joined the witness protection program—he became a doctor as penance.

Not surprisingly, Brnwa's former life catches up with him. Mobster Eddy Squillante, in the hospital for a life-saving surgery with about a 50 percent success rate, recognizes the killer-turned-doctor. Now Brnwa must keep him alive or Squillante will hand his new knowledge over to a wannabe hit man named Skinflick.

In chapters that alternate between past and present, Bazell fills us in on how Brnwa became "The Bearclaw" while keeping the action rolling. He includes medical footnotes, mostly confirming that the craziest thing a sick person can do is check into a hospital.

Bazell doesn't waste time. In the very first paragraph, an unfortunate mugger is pointing a gun in Brnwa's face after the doctor stops to watch a rat fight a pigeon—a true Manhattan undercard. The mugger serves his purpose, however, since the pistol winds up in Brnwa's scrub pants pocket. However, it would be unwise for the reader to relax. It's chapter one, the firearm is introduced and the good doctor Bazell knows his Chekhov.

Ian Schwartz writes from San Diego.

Josh Bazell landed a lucrative publishing deal for his first novel shortly after graduating from medical school. To say that he's better at writing than most writers would be at practicing medicine is to understate Bazell's talent, but it's too good a line to pass…

Making a move that's sure to delight connoisseurs of the legal thriller, John Grisham takes something of a sentimental journey in his latest novel, The Associate, on sale January 27. The book's plot might sound strangely familiar to fans of his 1991 blockbuster, The Firm: newly minted Ivy League law school grad takes job with powerhouse firm and soon finds himself in deep trouble. That book catapulted Grisham to perennial bestsellerdom and established him as the superstar of the legal thriller genre.

The character at the heart of The Firm was Mitch McDeere, a cocky kid just out of Harvard Law who discovers that the Memphis firm that hired him is controlled by the Mob. In the successful 1993 film adaptation, McDeere was portrayed by Tom Cruise, an inspired piece of casting that gave a strong boost to Cruise's career and Grisham's film franchise. Author Photo

Grisham sets his new novel, The Associate, in New York City, the first time that one of his books has taken place entirely in the city that never sleeps. Where better to follow the dilemma facing young lawyer Kyle McAvoy, described by Grisham's publisher as "one of the outstanding legal students of his generation: he's good looking, has a brilliant mind and a glittering future ahead of him. But he has a secret from his past, a secret that threatens to destroy his fledgling career and, possibly, his entire life."

In a note posted on his UK website, Grisham comments on the similarities between the two characters: "Kyle reminds me of another young lawyer, Mitch McDeere, who was featured in one of my earlier novels, The Firm. Like Mitch, Kyle finds himself in way over his head, with no one to turn to and no place to hide."

As The Associate opens, Kyle has just graduated from Yale Law when he discovers that his dark secret has been captured on video. He's shocked when, instead of demanding money, the blackmailers put a surprising price on their secrecy: they ask Kyle to take a job at the largest law firm in the world, and one of the best in New York City. He's soon making big money and on the track to a partnership, but what his employers don't know is that he's sharing information about a crucial trial between two defense contractors with his blackmailers.

With his future on the line, Kyle is caught between the criminals and the FBI, who suspect a leak and are investigating his firm. Though he's one of the top young associates, does Kyle have what it takes to get out of this dilemma—without destroying his future? The only thing that's for certain is that readers will be turning the pages as fast as they can to find out.

Grisham's agent has already landed a film deal for The Associate with Paramount Pictures, no small feat at a time when the economic slowdown finds even best-selling authors having trouble selling their stories to studios. The film will star Shia LaBeouf, a choice that might surprise moviegoers who remember him best as the shaggy teen star of the Disney Channel and the movie Holes. At 22, however, LaBeouf has grown into a handsome young actor and bona fide Hollywood celebrity (with the arrest record to prove it). This film will be his sixth major movie for Paramount, including the 2007 hit Transformers. A director has yet to be named for The Associate, which will be the 12th film based on a Grisham book or story.

Grisham remains active in the legal world, regularly serving as host or keynote speaker at events for organizations like the Legal Aid Justice Center. At a recent benefit in Virginia, guests bid on the right to have a character in an upcoming Grisham novel named after them. Grisham has also faced legal issues of his own related to his 2006 work of nonfiction, The Innocent Man, based on the life of Ron Williamson, who was wrongly imprisoned for murder. Grisham and two other writers who've written about Williamson's case were sued for defamation of character by three of the Oklahoma law enforcement officials who prosecuted Williamson back in 1982. A U.S. District Court judge dismissed the lawsuit, saying the justice system deserved the criticism it received. George Clooney has purchased the film rights to The Innocent Man, which is currently in development. 

Making a move that's sure to delight connoisseurs of the legal thriller, John Grisham takes something of a sentimental journey in his latest novel, The Associate, on sale January 27. The book's plot might sound strangely familiar to fans of his 1991 blockbuster, The Firm:…

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