New Fiction July 2021
Come and find your summer read with us.
21st birthday
Patterson, James, 1947- author
2021
Detective Lindsay Boxer vows to protect a young woman from a serial killer long enough to see her twenty-first birthday. When Tara Burke goes missing with her baby girl, all eyes are on her husband, Lucas. He paints her not as a missing person but a wayward wife--until a gruesome piece of evidence turns the investigation criminal. ADA Yuki Castellano sizes Lucas up as a textbook domestic offender...who suddenly puts forward an unexpected suspect. If what Lucas tells law enforcement has even a grain of truth, there isn't a woman in the state of California who's safe.
Basil's war : a novel
Hunter, Stephen, 1946- author
2021
Basil St. Florian is an accomplished agent in the British Army. But his current mission, going undercover in Nazi-occupied France during World War II, might be his toughest assignment yet. He will be searching for an ecclesiastic manuscript that doesn't officially exist, one that genius professor Alan Turing believes may hold the key to a code that could prevent the death of millions and possibly even end the war.
Clear my name
Daly, Paula, author
2020
When Carrie was accused of brutally murdering her husband's lover, she denied it. She denied it again when they found her blood inside the victim's house, again when they put her in front of a jury, and again when they sent her to prison. Now three years into her fifteen-year sentence, gradually losing hope and separated from her pregnant daughter, she is still maintaining her innocence. Tess is the only employee of Innocence UK, a charity that helps clear the wrongfully convicted, and which accepts Carrie's case. But can she trust Carrie? Meanwhile, in order to find the truth, Tess must face her own past lies, all the while managing the naïve junior investigator assigned to be her shadow. An innovative spin on the crime novel full of wicked twists readers won't see coming, Paula Daly's Clear My Name raises the stakes in a grave miscarriage of justice and proves that even in a cold case, things still run hot.
The coffinmaker's garden
MacBride, Stuart, author
2021
As a massive storm batters the Scottish coast, Gordon Smith's home is falling into the North Sea. But the crumbling headland has revealed what he's got buried in his garden: human remains. With the storm still raging, it's too dangerous to retrieve the bodies and waves are devouring the evidence. Which means no one knows how many people Smith's already killed and how many more he'll kill if he can't be stopped. Ex-Detective Inspector Ash Henderson has got a killer to catch, and God help anyone who gets in his way.
The dictionary of lost words : a novel
Williams, Pip, 1969- author
2021
Esme is born into a world of words. Motherless and irrepressibly curious, she spends her childhood in the "Scriptorium," a garden shed in Oxford where her father and a team of dedicated lexicographers are collecting words for the very first Oxford English Dictionary. As she grows up, Esme realizes that words and meanings relating to women's and common folks' experiences often go unrecorded. And so she begins in earnest to search out words for her own dictionary. To do so, she must leave her sheltered world and venture out to meet the people whose words will fill those pages.
The eagle and the viper : a novel of historical suspense
Estleman, Loren D., author
2021
"This much is history: On Christmas Eve, 1800, an "infernal machine" exploded in one of the busiest streets in Paris, France, destroying buildings and killing innocent civilians. It wasn't the first attempt on the life of Napoleon Bonaparte, First Consul of the newly minted Republic of France. This much is exclusive to our story: Upon the failure of the Christmas Eve plot, the conspiracy takes a new and more diabolical turn. Posterity knows what became of Napoleon: He led France into a series of military adventures that ended in his defeat, followed by decades of peace. But this future hung on a precarious thread. One man can make history; another can change it. Part high-octane suspense, part dire warning, this novel reveals how close our world came-at the dawn of a promising new century-to total war"-- Provided by publisher.
The final twist
Deaver, Jeffery, author
2021
Just hours after the harrowing events of The Never Game and The Goodbye Man, Colter Shaw finds himself in San Francisco, where he has taken on the mission his father began years ago: finding a missing courier bag containing evidence that will bring down a corporate espionage firm responsible for hundreds, perhaps thousands, of deaths.
Find me in Havana
Burdick, Serena, author
2021
Cuba, 1936: When Estelita Rodriguez sings in a hazy Havana nightclub for the very first time, she is nine years old. From then on, that spotlight of adoration - from Havana to New York's Copacabana and then Hollywood - becomes the one true accomplishment no one can take from her. Thirty years later, her young adult daughter, Nina, seeks answers to her mother's mysterious death. Based on true events and exclusive interviews with Nina Lopez.
Great circle
Shipstead, Maggie, author
2021
1914, Missoula, Montana. Marian commences her lifelong love affair with flight. A century later, Hadley Baxter is cast to play Marian in a film that centres on Marian's disappearance in Antarctica. Hadley's immersion into the character of Marian unfolds, thrillingly, alongside Marian's own story, as the two women's fates - and their hunger for self-determination in vastly different geographies and times - collide.
The invisible woman
Robuck, Erika, author.
2021
"In the depths of war, she would defy the odds to help liberate a nation...A gripping historical novel based on a remarkable true story of World War II heroine Virginia Hall, from the bestselling author of Hemingway's Girl. France, March 1944. Virginia Hall wasn't like the other young society women back home in Baltimore-she never wanted the debutante ball or silk gloves. Instead, she traded a safe life for adventure in Europe, and when her beloved second home is thrust into the dark days of war, she leaps in headfirst. Once she's recruited as an Allied spy, subverting the Nazis becomes her calling. But even the most cunning agent can be bested, and in wartime trusting the wrong person can prove fatal. Virginia is haunted every day by the betrayal that ravaged her first operation, and will do everything in her power to avenge the brave people she lost. While her future is anything but certain, this time more than ever Virginia knows that failure is not an option. Especially when she discovers what-and whom-she's truly protecting."-- Provided by publisher.
Irena's war
Shipman, James D., author
2020
September 1939: The conquering Nazis swarm through Warsaw as social worker Irena Sendler watches in dread from her apartment window. Already, the city's poor go hungry. Irena wonders how she will continue to deliver food and supplies to those who need it most, including the forbidden Jews. The answer comes unexpectedly. Dragged from her home in the night, Irena is brought before a Gestapo agent, Klaus Rein, who offers her a position running the city's soup kitchens, all to maintain the illusion of order. Though loath to be working under the Germans, Irena learns there are ways to defy her new employer--including forging documents so that Jewish families receive food intended for Aryans. As Irena grows bolder, her interactions with Klaus become more fraught and perilous. Klaus is unable to prove his suspicions against Irena--yet. But once Warsaw's half-million Jews are confined to the ghetto, awaiting slow starvation or the death camps, Irena realizes that providing food is no longer enough.
The last thing he told me : a novel
Dave, Laura, author
2021
Before Owen Michaels disappears, he manages to smuggle a note to his beloved wife of one year: protect her. Despite her confusion and fear, Hannah Hall knows exactly to whom the note refers: Owen's sixteen-year-old daughter, Bailey. Hannah soon realizes her husband isn't who he said he was. And that Bailey just may hold the key to figuring out Owen's true identity - and why he really disappeared. Hannah and Bailey set out to discover the truth, together. But as they start putting together the pieces of Owen's past, they soon realize they are also building a new future.
Little pieces of me : a novel
Hammer, Alison, author
2021
When Paige Meyer gets an email from a DNA testing website announcing that her father is a man she never met, she is convinced there must be a mistake. But as she digs deeper into her mother's past and her own feelings of being the odd child out growing up, Paige begins to question everything she thought she knew.
The Paris library : a novel
Skeslien Charles, Janet, author
2021
Paris, 1939. When World War II breaks out, Odile Souchet stands to lose everything she holds dear - including her beloved library. But by war's end, Odile tastes the bitter sting of unspeakable betrayal. Montana, 1983. Odile's solitary existence in gossipy small-town Montana is unexpectedly interrupted by her neighbour Lily, a lonely teenager craving adventure. Odile helps Lily navigate the troubled waters of adolescence, never suspecting that Lily will be the one to help her reckon with her own terrible secret. Based on the true story of the American Library in Paris.
Reviving the Hawthorn sisters : a novel
Carpenter, Emily, author
2020
Dove Jarrod was a renowned evangelist and faith healer. Only her granddaughter, Eve Candler, knows that Dove was a con artist. In the eight years since Dove's death, Eve has maintained Dove's charitable foundation - and her lies. But just as a documentary team wraps up a shoot about the miracle worker, Eve is assaulted by a vengeful stranger intent on exposing what could be Dove's darkest secret: murder...Tuscaloosa, 1934: a wily young orphan escapes the psychiatric hospital where she was born. When she joins the itinerant inspirational duo the Hawthorn Sisters, the road ahead is one of stirring new possibilities. And with an obsessive predator on her trail, one of untold dangers. For a young girl to survive, desperate choices must be made. Now, to protect her family, Eve will join forces with the investigative filmmaker and one of Dove's friends, risking everything to unravel the truth behind the accusations against her grandmother. But will the truth set her free or set her world on fire?
The saboteurs
Cussler, Clive, author
2021
Detective Isaac Bell's investigation into an attempted assassination brings him to the construction site of the Panama Canal--and straight into a nest of vipers.
The sister's tale : a novel
Powning, Beth, 1949-, author
2021
With murder dominating the news, the respected wife of a New Brunswick sea captain is drawn into the case of a British home child whose bad luck has turned worse. Mortified that she must purchase the girl in a pauper auction to save her from the lechery of wealthy townsmen, Josephine Galloway finds herself suddenly the proprietor of a boarding house kept afloat by the sweat and tears of a curious and not completely compatible collection of women, including this English teenager, Flora Salford. Flora's place in her new "family" cannot be complete until she rescues the missing person in her life, the only one who understands the trials she has come through and fresh horrors met since they were separated years before.
They never learn
Fargo, Layne, author.
2020
"Scarlett Clark is an exceptional English professor. But she's even better at getting away with murder. Every year, she searches for the worst man at Gorman University and plots his well-deserved demise. Thanks to her meticulous planning, she's avoided drawing attention to herself - but as she's preparing for her biggest kill yet, the school starts probing into the growing body count on campus. Determined to keep her enemies close, Scarlett insinuates herself into the investigation and charms the woman in charge, Dr. Mina Pierce. Everything's going according to her master plan...until she loses control with her latest victim, putting her secret life at risk of exposure."--Publisher description.
This secret thing : a novel
Whalen, Marybeth author
2020
"Everyone in Raleigh, North Carolina, is talking about Norah Ramsey, the single mother accused of being a suburban madam. But Norah's not the only one keeping secrets. After her mother's arrest, Norah's teenage daughter, Violet, is devastated and alone. She has no one to turn to until her grandmother Polly arrives. Polly, long estranged from Norah, is running from her own troubles. Down the street, Bess, once Norah's best friend, desperately tries to hide secrets while Casey, Bess's daughter, flees college after a traumatic event, only to find that home isn't the safe haven she expected. And Nico, the detective who has doggedly pursued Norah Ramsey in hopes that she will lead him to his missing brother, is drawn further into these women's lives while facing his own domestic disturbance. Scandal has brought each of them to a crossroads. Now, as they delve into Norah's secrets, they must come to terms with secrets of their own--ones that still have the power to hurt or to heal."--Page [4] of cover.
What comes after
Tompkins, JoAnne, 1956 July 10- author
2021
In misty, coastal Washington State, Isaac lives alone with his dog, grieving the recent death of his teenage son, Daniel. Next door, Lorrie, a working single mother, struggles with a heinous act committed by her own teenage son. Separated by only a silvery stretch of trees, the two parents are emotionally stranded, isolated by their great losses - until an unfamiliar sixteen-year-old girl shows up, bridges the gap, and changes everything. All three characters are forced to examine what really happened in their overlapping pasts, and what it all possibly means for a shared future.
Who is Maud Dixon? : a novel
Andrews, Alexandra, author
2021
Florence Darrow stumbles into a job as writer's assistant to Maud Dixon, a world-famous, enigmatic novelist. Maud Dixon (whose real name, Florence discovers, is Helen Wilcox) invites Florence along on a research trip to Morocco, where her new novel is set. But when Florence wakes up in the hospital after a terrible car accident, with no memory of the previous night - and no sign of Helen - she wonders if she should take a shortcut. Instead of hiding in Helen's shadow, why not upgrade into Helen's life? As well as her bestselling pseudonym, Maud Dixon.
Why birds sing
Berkhout, Nina, 1975-, author
2020
Opera singer Dawn Woodward deals with her husband's estranged brother-in-law Tariq who is undergoing cancer treatment, Tariq's parrot, and teaching arias to a group of whistlers called the Warblers though she can't whistle herself. Eventualy Tariq and the Warblers have Dawn questioning herself and her career.
Yellow wife : a novel
Johnson, Sadeqa, author
2021
Born on a plantation but set apart from the others by her mother's position as a medicine woman, a young slave is forced to leave home at eighteen and unexpectedly finds herself in an infamously cruel jail.