This powerful debut novel pulls no emotional punches as it explores the life of a troubled, vulnerable gay man trying to hold body and soul together as he searches for healing and acceptance. Jonah Keller is a broke waiter in New York City, clinging to his dream of becoming a famous playwright in the face…
What makes something real? Is it something tangible, or is it the feeling something evokes? Mary Dixie Carter poses this question in her psychological thriller, The Photographer. This novel follows a photographer, Delta, who becomes engrossed in the life of her clients, and in doing so seems to create her own version of reality. However,…
Available wherever books are sold on January 11, 2022 — pre-order today from any of these partner bookstores: Anderson’s Book Shop (Naperville, IL) BookBar Denver (Denver, CO) Book Carnival (Orange, CA) Cavalier House Books (Denham Springs, LA) Copper Dog Books (Beverly, MA) Fiction Addiction (Greenville, SC) Fountain Bookstore (Richmond, VA) Itinerant Literate (Charleston, SC) My Sister’s Books (Pawley’s Island, SC) Murder by the Book (Houston,…
Firekeeper’s Daughter by Angeline Boulley is a debut novel and groundbreaking YA thriller about a Native teen who must root out the corruption in her community. I ugly cried my way through the ending of this book at 5:30 a.m. after reading all night, which I hope is enough of a recommendation for readers who…
Twenty-four years ago, two eleven-year-old girls disappeared in the small town of Repentance, Arkansas. Mary Grace Dobbs remembers that year very well—she was a sixth-grader herself, a classmate of the missing girls. I was coming up on the anniversary of my parents’ death when the girls began disappearing. That summer twenty-four years ago, right…
It’s hard to believe that this highwire act of tight plotting, alternating perspectives, and shifting timelines is a debut novel, but Alex Finlay’s Every Last Fear is a remarkable addition to the thriller genre, juggling all its many plot points so deftly that it kept me guessing whodunnit and why till the very end. Matt…
Technology, and social media in particular, is interwoven into our daily lives in large and small ways we might not even think about anymore. Assuming you’re not reading this on your phone right now, you probably have your phone handy and I’d wager that you’ve checked at least one social media site today—and have probably…
CHAPTER 7 SARAH KELLER Agent Keller slid the key into the door of the small ranch-style house, moths circling the porch light above her. Readington, New Jersey, wasn’t a fancy neighborhood, which was just as well. That would’ve been cost prohibitive, given her FBI salary. But it was safe, filled with working-class families and young…
Odessa Dean is still getting used to life in New York City after spending her first quarter-century or so in the sleepy Louisiana town of Piney Island. Her aunt needed a cat-sitter while jaunting off to Europe for three months, so Odessa happily took the opportunity to see the big city, rent-free. Aunt Melanie tried…
There’s something about dark narratives about dysfunctional families that pulls readers in. It probably stems from a sense of empathy mixed with familiarity. However, some stories take dysfunction into places so dark and dangerous that readers aren’t pulled in; they’re brutally dragged. Abigail Dean’s Girl A belongs to this second group. A crushing tale that…
