Minotaur Books reported that DEAD MAN'S GRIP by Peter James has won the Barry Award for Best British Crime Novel of 2011! Congratulations, Peter!
The Barry Awards are awarded for excellence in crime novels by the editorial staff of Deadly Pleasures. More details here.
Publishers Weekly gave DEAD MAN'S GRIP a starred review and said, "The grim creativity of the victims’ deaths and the ease of movement of the action are two of the many compelling reasons to stick with this series."
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For all the Yogis out there looking for their next yoga memoir fix, look no further than HELL-BENT: Obsession, Pain, and the Search for Something Like Transcendence in Competitive Yoga by Benjamin Lorr.
Benjamin Lorr walked into his first yoga studio on a whim, overweight and curious, and quickly found the yoga reinventing his life. He was studying Bikram Yoga (or “hot yoga”) when a run-in with a master and competitive yoga champion led him into an obsessive subculture—a group of yogis for whom eight hours of practice a day in 110- degree heat was just the beginning.
"Meticulously researched, suspenseful and engrossing." -Kirkus Reviews (starred review)
"Backbending and bliss, stretching and sweating, bonding and betrayal have rarely seemed so complementary. Hell-Bent is sure to turn readers' impressions of yoga upside down." -Booklist (starred review)
POSER: My Life in Twenty-three Yoga Poses by Claire Dederer.
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Bestselling Japanese novelist Keigo Higashino puts physics professor Manabu Yukawa on another tricky case in SALVATION OF A SAINT (after THE DEVOTION OF SUSPECT X, 2011).
And if the title sounds familiar it might be because Robin Beerbower mentioned this one during the Shout n' Share panel at BEA!
Yoshitaka, who was about to leave his wife, is poisoned by arsenic-laced coffee. His wife, Ayane, is the logical suspect except that she was hundreds of miles away at the time of the murder. The lead detective, Tokyo Police Detective Kusanagi, is immediately smitten with her so his assistant does what her boss has done for years when stymied—she calls upon Professor Manabu Yukawa.
"Higashino has taken the art and craft of mystery writing to a new level of excellence." -Library Journal (starred review)
"Howdunit, rather than whodunit, appears to be the central question of Edgar-finalist Higashino’s brilliant second mystery. [...] While readers of classic mysteries will be delighted with the elegant solution, the book will also appeal to fans of procedurals that carefully develop the relationships among the investigative team members." -Publishers Weekly (starred review)
Kirkus Reviews included it as one of their "10 Hot Crime Novels for Colder Days."
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Your Russian history buffs will be delighted to hear that we have an dramatic non-fiction title coming soon on the final days of the Russian aristocracy, FORMER PEOPLE, and it's getting starred reviews!
FORMER PEOPLE is the first book to recount the history of the aristocracy caught up in the maelstrom of the Bolshevik Revolution and the creation of Stalin’s Russia. Filled with chilling tales of looted palaces and burning estates, of desperate flights in the night from marauding peasants and Red Army soldiers, of imprisonment, exile, and execution, it is the story of how a centuries’-old elite, famous for its glittering wealth, its service to the Tsar and Empire, and its promotion of the arts and culture, was dispossessed and destroyed along with the rest of old Russia.
"This is an anecdotally rich, highly informative look at decimated, uprooted former upper-class Russians." -Publishers Weekly (starred review)
"Sobering stories about the politics of power—its loss, its gain—and the deep human suffering that inevitably results." -Kirkus Reviews (starred review)
Beware of stampedes! Your patrons will be Russian to get at this one!
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Writers and short story enthusiasts, rejoice! The Paris Review is out to celebrate the power of brief stories with their new compendium, OBJECT LESSONS: The Paris Review Presents the Art of the Short Story.
The exceptionally cool thing about this anthology is that the contents (all originally printed in The Paris Review) were selected and are introduced by twenty contemporary authors. It's an excellent resource for writers, students, or any of your patrons who want to understand fiction from a writer’s point of view.
"This anthology of short stories selected by some of the great practitioners of our time is bound to be read and studies for years to come." -Library Journal (starred review)
"The editors call this a guide for young writers and readers interested in literary technique, and the book achieves that purpose while also serving as a tribute to the role the Paris Review has played in maintaining the diversity of the short story form. The collection reminds us that good stories are always whispering into each other’s ears." -Publishers Weekly
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As the last note of the chant escaped the Blessed Chapel a great silence fell, and with it came an even greater disquiet.
The silence stretched on. And on.
These were men used to silence, but this seemed extreme, even to them.
So begins THE BEAUTIFUL MYSTERY, the eighth entry in Louise Penny's award-winning and New York Times bestselling Chief Inspector Gamache series.
This mystery brings Chief Inspector Armand Gamache and Jean-Guy Beauvoir to the monastery of Saint-Gilbert-Entre-les-Loups, deep in the wilderness of Quebec. Between growing vegetables, tending chickens, making chocolate and singing, one of the monks planned and committed a violent murder.
"Traditional mystery fans can look forward to a captivating whodunit plot, a clever fair-play clue concealed in plain view, and the deft use of humor to lighten the story’s dark patches. On a deeper level, the crime provides a means for Penny’s unusually empathic, all-too-fallible lead to unearth truths about human passions and weaknesses while avoiding simple answers." -Publishers Weekly (starred review)
"This heart-rending tale is a marvelous addition to Penny’s acclaimed series. Fans won’t be disappointed." -Library Journal (starred review)
"There is always something mammoth roiling away beneath the surface of Penny’s novels—but this time the roiling is set against the serenity of the chanting, producing a melody of uncommon complexity and beauty." -Booklist (starred review)
Readers' Advisory librarians take note, Kirkus Reviews said, "The most illuminating analogies are not to other contemporary detective fiction but to THE NAME OF THE ROSE and MURDER IN THE CATHEDRAL."
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Between WILD and TWILIGHT, the Pacific Northwest has captured readers' imaginations of late. Lance Weller's debut, WILDERNESS, will enrapture us further.
Thirty years after the Civil War's Battle of the Wilderness left him maimed, Abel Truman has found his way to the edge of the continent, the rugged, majestic coast of Washington State, where he lives alone in a driftwood shack with his beloved dog. Wilderness is the story of Abel and his final journey over the snowbound Olympic Mountains. It's a quest he has little hope of completing but must undertake to settle matters of the heart that predate even the horrors of the war.
"This tragic tale is the best Civil War novel since COLD MOUNTAIN. It's an important, compelling book for fans of literate historical fiction, dog lovers, or true believers in the resilience of the human spirit. Only those who can't handle extreme violence should stay away." -Library Journal (starred review)
Take a closer look at the setting of the novel with author Weller in his book trailer/conversation as he roadtrips to the north coast of Washington State. Shelf Awareness named it a Book Trailer of the Day!
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We are excited to welcome Anthony and Agatha Award–winning author Hank Phillippi Ryan to the Forge list with THE OTHER WOMAN, the first novel in a new series of political thrillers!
Newspaper reporter Jane Ryland isn’t content to work on her assigned puff pieces. Instead she begins tracking down a candidate’s secret mistress just days before a pivotal Senate election. Detective Jake Brogan is investigating a possible serial killer all the while plagued by a media swarm on his investigation. As the body count rises and the election looms closer, it becomes clear to Jane and Jake that their cases are connected.
"Ryan, the Anthony and Agatha Award–winning author of the Charlotte McNally mysteries, employs her investigative reporting and political background to craft a dizzying labyrinth of twists, turns, and surprises. Readers who crave mystery and political intrigue will be mesmerized by this first installment of her new series." -Library Journal (starred review)
"Political skulduggery and murder make a high-octane mix in this perfect thriller for an election season." -Booklist (starred review)
Ryan wrote a really great post for CriminalElement.com, Getting the Truth: Confessions of an Investigative Reporter, about the fear of being discovered with a hidden camera while undercover. They're also doing an ARC giveaway!
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You think it will never happen to you, that it cannot happen to you, that you are the only person in the world to whom none of these things will ever happen, and then, one by one, they all begin to happen to you, in the same way they happen to everyone else.
So begins WINTER JOURNAL, the second memoir of Paul Auster, bestselling novelist and memoirist (SUNSET PARK, etc.).
Thirty years after the publication of his first memoir (THE INVENTION OF SOLITUDE) Auster writes about his mother's life and death. WINTER JOURNAL is a highly personal meditation on the body, time, and memory, by one of our most intellectually elegant writers and it's getting great reviews.
"Auster is startlingly forthright, mischievously funny, and unfailingly enrapturing as he transforms intimate memories into a zestful inquiry into the mind-body connection and the haphazard forging of a self." -Booklist (starred review)
"This is the exquisitely wrought catalogue of a man’s history through his body." -Publishers Weekly (starred review)
"A consummate professional explores the attic of his life, converting rumination to art." -Kirkus Reviews (starred review)
Kirkus Reviews also conducted an interview with Auster. When asked "What's the most important thing you wanted to portray about yourself?" he responds (in part), "I think basically, what I’m trying to do, is to establish some kind of common humanity. With this particular book, the idea was just to throw myself out there so that people might see their own lives reflected in mine."
Read the rest of the interview here.
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Tochtli lives in a palace. He loves hats, samurai, guillotines, and dictionaries, and what he wants more than anything right now is a new pet for his private zoo: a pygmy hippopotamus from Liberia. But Tochtli's father is a drug baron on the verge of taking over a powerful cartel, and Tochtli is growing up in a luxury hideout that he shares with hit men, prostitutes, dealers, servants, and the odd corrupt politician or two.
DOWN THE RABBIT HOLE, a masterful and darkly comic first novel, is the chronicle of a delirious journey to grant a child’s wish. This debut has been long-listed for The Guardian First Book Award and it just got a starred review from Publishers Weekly!
"The voice never feels overwrought with would-be childlike quirks, nor does it ever read like a convenient lens through which to view an adult world. The cadence of the prose and the vulnerability of the boy create a devastating story." -Publishers Weekly (starred review)
Barbara Hoffert from Library Journal had it on her pick's list for October 2012; she said, "We’re a long way from magic realism with the new narco lit."
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