Sue Grafton is back with her latest alphabetical detective series starring reader favorite Kinsey Millhone, they wry, intelligent, self-deprecating private investigator. In S is for Silence, Grafton breaks with her first-person narrative tradition in favor of telling the story through vignettes from different characters about a Fourth of July event 34 years ago in which a neglectful mother, Violet Sullivan, disappears. Fast foward three and a half decades to the present where Violet’s daughter Daisy, only seven at the time of the event, hires Kinsey to solve the case of her mother’s disappearance. As Kinsey delves deeper into the case, she discovers that Violet had fooled around with almost every man in town, thus resulting in a number of scandals, secrets, and suspects. The investigation builds up suspense through Grafton’s different narrative technique into a stunny climax that will leave fans talking until the next book.
Read a fan’s review of the novel here.
In On the Run, Grace Archer is a single mom and talented horse handler. Her former employer? The CIA. She leads a tranquil life under protective custody, that is until Marvot, a Middle Easter magnate, wants her to train his horses to lead him to a buried treasure hidden in the Moroccan desert. After the owner of the horse farms Grace is hiding at is killed by Marvot, ex-CIA commando Jake Kilmer (the father of her daughter) is the only man she can trust, despite the fact she blames him for her father’s death and the end of her former career. Author Iris Johansen weaves a an action-packed story filled with suspense and mystery that never lets up.
When Hurricane Katrina devastated New Orleans, it caused billions of dollars in damage, killed and injured thousands, and displaced even more. An entire history, heritage, and culture was literally washed away.
Now that the floodwaters have receded, reconstruction is beginning, but what, Tom Piazza asks in his latest book Why New Orleans Matters, will become of New Orleans now? What will become of its people? And perhaps most important of all, what does New Orleans and its people mean to the rest of America?
Tom Piazza is a New Orleans resident and has a particularly insightful grasp into these important questions. With evident love and affection, he explores the hidden contours of world-renown traditions such as Mardi Gras and Jazz Fest, evoking a sensory paradise of a city that brought us music and creole cooking. He also doesn’t shy away from thecity’s hidden undercurrents of corruption, racism, and injustice — and how New Orleans’ citizens transcend these things.
Why New Orleans Matters is a celebration of the spirit of New Orleans and the resilience of her people. It is a call to America to remember how valuable this city is to the fabric of its existence, and how much would be lost if its light were ever extinguished.
Read what the author has to say on his book here and here.
The third installment of the War Stories series takes us to the heroes of World War II and the Greatest generation’s Greatest Moment, chock full of first-person, harrowing accounts of civillians and military personnel both on the ground, in the air, or battling German U-boats in the waters. The perspectives of British, French, American, Russian, and German individuals come alive in this precisely edited book. Everyone from fighter pilots, to farm boys and field workers, to women working in the factories on the home front is touched upon, giving a well-rounded realistic view of this troublesome time in the last century.
