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Bestseller Preview November - January |
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Return of the Spider (Alex Cross #33)
by James Patterson
Detective Alex Cross; the “human superhero” versus Gary Soneji; the "most deliciously wicked character since Hannibal Lecter”.
But that wasn’t their first meeting. Police discover that Soneji kept a murder book, “Profiles in Homicidal Genius,” detailing his transformation from substitute teacher to hardened serial killer—including clues that imply missteps that Alex Cross may have made a rookie homicide detective. Now, Alex must retrace the steps of that long-ago investigation and face…the Return of the Spider.
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The Seven Rings (Lost Bride #3)
by Nora Roberts
Sonya MacTavish lives in a manor that has been cursed for generations. Within its walls, she has witnessed the deaths of seven brides and the thefts of seven wedding rings. Refusing to let her spirit be broken, Sonya searches each room for clues to her ancestors' hidden story. But the enemy in the black dress continues to hover, to come at her in frightening forms. They may be illusions-but illusions can be powerful enough to wound and kill.This dark-hearted witch wants to be mistress of Poole Manor, at any cost. And Sonya will need to fight a battle across two realms to finally take possession of the house on the clifftop-and of her own future..
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Nash Falls
by David Baldacci
Walter Nash is a sensitive, intelligent and kindhearted man. He has a wife and a daughter and a very high-level position at Sybaritic Investments. Following his father's funeral, Nash is approached by the FBI in the middle of the night. They have an important request: become their inside man to expose an enterprise that is laundering large sums of money through Sybaritic. At the top of this illegal operation is Victoria Steers. Nash accepts the FBI's demands and try to bring Steers and her partners to justice. But when Steers discovers that Nash is working with the FBI, she turns the tables on him. That forces Nash to take the ultimate step both to survive and to take his revenge.
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The King's Ransom
by Janet Evanovich
Gabriela Rose, recovery agent extraordinaire, can find just about anything. Too bad she can’t seem to lose her gorgeous-but-infuriating ex-husband Rafer Jones. And now he needs her help. His cousin, Harley, is in trouble. As the president of a bank, he invested in insuring some of the world’s most priceless artifacts. Recently, these insured pieces started going missing and worse, there’s no paper trail of Harley being directed to make these risky investments. Unless the artwork can be recovered soon, it looks like Harley is going to be heading to jail.Gabriela knows what she must do: travel around the world with Rafer to find the missing works of art, keep Harley out of jail, and save both his skin and his bank.
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Exit Strategy (Reacher #30)
by Lee Child
Reacher makes his way towards the entrance of a coffee shop. A young, stressed-looking guy in a suit brushes against him. Instinctively Reacher checks the pocket holding his cash and passport. There's no problem. Nothing is missing. But later in the day he finds something new has appeared in another pocket. A cryptic note. Reacher figures the guy in the suit must have planted it during their brief contact. Impressed by the guy's technique and intrigued by the message, he decides to find out more...
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The Color of Hope
by Danielle Steel
Following the unexpected death of her beloved husband, art gallery owner Samantha Thompson finds herself adrift in their Malibu beach house. Her three adult children are concerned for her and encourage her to take a trip to Paris. Once abroad, an impulsive day trip from Paris to Biarritz leads Samantha to discover the charming medieval village of Arcangues.The château is the ancestral home of Xavier de Bonport. He needs rental income as much as Samantha needs a refuge. With Xavier living in a smaller house on the property, Samantha begins to transform the château into a temporary home. As a newfound family begins to fill the château, Samantha and Xavier wonder if their friendship is becoming something more.
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Evil Bones (Temperance Brennan #24)
by Kathy Reichs
Small creatures—a rat, a rabbit, a squirrel—have been turning up throughout Charlotte, North Carolina, mutilated and displayed in a bizarre manner. One day, as Tempe is relaxing at home she’s diverted by a disturbing call. The perp is upping the ante. This find could be human. Tempe visits the scene and discovers that the victim is a dog. Tempe agrees to help apprehend the person responsible, and she acquires an ally in semi-retired homicide detective Erskine “Skinny” Slidell. And then it happens. A woman is found disfigured and posed in a manner that mimics the animal killings. Next, people Tempe cares about begin to go missing until it becomes clear she is being taunted. A game that has her and Slidell racing against the clock.
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Queen Esther
by John Irving
Esther Nacht is born in Vienna in 1905. Her father dies on board a ship to Portland, Maine; her mother is murdered by anti-Semites in Portland. Dr. Larch knows it won’t be easy to find a Jewish family to adopt Esther; in fact, he won’t find any family who’ll adopt her. When Esther is fourteen, soon to be a ward of the state, Dr. Larch meets the Winslows, a philanthropic New England family with a history of providing foster care for orphans. The Winslows aren’t Jewish, but they despise anti-Semitism. Esther’s gratitude for the Winslows is unending; even as she retraces her roots back to Vienna, she never stops loving and protecting the Winslows.
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Otherwise Engaged
by Susan Mallery
When Shannon gets engaged, her mom, Cindy, is the first person she wants to tell, and the last. Cindy’s engaged, too, and has already hinted at a double wedding. She’ll keep her engagement a secret until Cindy’s I-dos are done. Victoria has never been proper enough for her mother, Ava. She lives on her own terms. Ava loves but doesn’t understand her stuntwoman daughter. When a movie-set mishap brings Victoria home, Ava longs to finally connect. Chance brings the four women together at a wedding venue, where a shocking secret comes tumbling out. Twenty-four years ago, teenager Cindy chose wealthy Ava to adopt her baby—then changed her mind. As Shannon and Victoria deal with the fallout from the decisions their mothers made, they wrestle with whether who they are is different than who they might have become.
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False Witness
by Phillip Margolin
Defense Attorney Karen Wyatt exposed corruption in the police force and the District Attorney's office while getting her client exonerated in court. But in doing so, she put a target on her back and she was set-up on fake drug charge, imprisoned and disbarred until the conspiracy unraveled and her innocence was proven. Now reinstated to the bar, Wyatt is still interested in finding out who ordered her to be set-up. In the meantime, Wyatt is a practicing defense attorney, whose current client is either guilty of a heinous murder, or is a too-trusting patsy for an acquaintance set-up for a crime he didn't commit.
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Robert B. Parker's Showdown (Spenser #52)
by Mike Lupica
Vic Hale isn’t anyone’s idea of a father figure. He is one of the biggest – and loudest -- podcasters in the nation and got there by spewing overheated rhetoric that’s reviled by some but loved by even more.
Spenser is there on behalf of Daniel Lopez, a young man who believes Hale may be his father. It’s a potentially explosive revelation for a man in the podcaster’s position. That could explain the bodies that start popping up. There are a lot of questions remaining, and Spenser’s going to have to find the answers before someone shuts Hale or Daniel up for good.
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Spasm (Jack & Laurie #15)
by Robin Cook
When Laurie Montgomery temporarily steps down from her position as Chief Medical Examiner to get a break from office politics, she and Jack decide to embark on a weekend getaway. And the timing couldn't be better when they receive a call from Jack's old peer, Robert Neilson MD,about two strange deaths and their potential association with the upswing in Alzheimer's cases in Essex Falls.It's apparent that most of the residents are earnest in their undying wish to return America back to the 1950s. Two of the dead are known white extremists. Prior to their deaths, they were complaining of muscle spasms, nausea, and off-the-charts anxiety. As Jack and Laurie get to work, they are led to believe that a dangerous bioweapon might be at play.
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Stuart Woods' Blown Away (Teddy Fay #8)
by Brett Battles
Teddy Fay whisks away to join Peter and Hattie Barrington in Palm Springs. But his hope for a relaxing vacation vanishes when he attends a prominent actor’s annual birthday party, where he witnesses a heated squabble between two women, only for one of them to turn up dead the next day. Teddy takes it upon himself to investigate who might be lurking in the shadows and uncovers a web of intrigue involving a sinister plan to take over a cutting-edge energy company. If he doesn’t act fast, valuable secrets risk falling into the wrong hands, but more importantly innocent lives could be in jeopardy next.
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W. E. B.Griffin Direct Action (Presidential Agent #10)
by Jack Stewart
Charley Castillo, the original Presidential Agent is in Virginia Beach to visit his son when two gunmen appear. Charley is able to thwart a deadly mass shooting, but he is hit and badly injured. Meanwhile Pick McCoy is at the Naval Academy catching up with some old friends. When the news of the attack reaches him, he senses that this is no random event. While Charley clings to life, Pick searches for the men responsible and in the process uncovers a deadly plot that threatens to strike deep at the heart of American democracy.
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Sharpe's Storm (Sharpe #24)
by Bernard Cornwell
War against Napoleon rages across Europe. As Britain prepares to invade France for the first time, the formidable Richard Sharpe and his men brace themselves for a cold, hard winter.
Before them, across flooded rivers and fortified bridges, lies the fiercest French army they have ever encountered. There is only one way forward for Wellington's army, and it will be bloody. . . .
Major Sharpe may be in for his toughest winter yet.
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Silent Bones(Karen Pirie #8)
by Val McDermid
When torrential winter rain causes a landslide on a motorway, it reveals a skeleton, concealed when the road was built eleven years prior. Sam Nimmo, an investigative journalist who'd been poking his nose into the murky politics of the Scottish independence referendum, had become the prime suspect in the brutal murder of his girlfriend when he vanished. Now he's reappeared, buried under the motorway. It's the perfect cold case for DCI Karen Pirie, chief of Police Scotland's Historic Cases Unit. But when an allegation of murder surfaces over the supposedly accidental death of a hotel manager, it unearths a series of interlinked puzzles that will test Karen and her team unlike ever before.
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Everybody Wants to Rule the World
by Ace Atkins
Peter Bennett is convinced his mom’s new boyfriend is a Russian agent. Peter thinks Gary only wants to get close to his mom because she works at Scientific Atlanta, a lab with big government contracts. But who is going to believe him? After a woman who works at the lab is killed, Peter recruits an unlikely pair of allies—a has-been pulp writer and muckraker named Dennis Hotchner and his drag performer buddy, Jackie Demure. Sylvia Weaver, anFBI agent, investigates Scientific Atlanta in the wake of the employee’s murder and discovers a nest of Russian spies in the Southern “city too busy to hate.As Ronald Reagan and Soviet Premier Mikhail Gorbachev prepare for a historic nuclear summit in Geneva, what happens in Atlanta might change the course of the Cold War, the twentieth century, and Peter Bennett’s freshman year of high school.
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White Wolf
by Eric Lustbader
Evan Ryder races against time in a landscape where secrets can no longer hide behind digital walls. Ilona Shokova, the elusive, deadly assassin White Wolf, holds the key to mastering this unhackable method. Two powerful, deadly women, one quest. Will either one of them survive? In this pulse-pounding thriller, the future isn't just written in code - it's locked behind it.
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The Cyprian
by Mercedes Lackey
Elena Whitstone and her seven brothers, abandoned by her mother, find themselves with a new stepmother. At first she seems more neglectful than evil, until just after Christmas she proves herself to be worse than evil; she is an actual magician, a Master of Water, who attempts to murder Elena's seven brothers when they are skating. When they survive that attempt by transforming into swans, she drives them away.
Furious, and possessing "only" what was gifted to her during her marriage, the stepmother retreats to Bath, to take up residence in the luxurious townhouse that was bought for her, and resume her former profession as a "Cyprian," a very exclusive courtesan, with Elena posing as a page-boy and her servant. Alone, Elena must not only find a way to save herself, but to reverse the spell that has transformed her brothers.
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Terror on the Train
by Jeanne M. Dams
Dorothy Martin and her husband, retired chief constable Alan Nesbitt, are leaving England behind to attend a wedding on Vancouver Island, Canada. Opting for the scenic route, the pair board the Empire Builder sleeper train from Chicago to Seattle. But the journey takes a terrifying turn when Dorothy witnesses a person falling from the train. The body of a man is quickly found on the route, and Dorothy feels compelled to investigate. Could his fate be linked to a confrontation on the train? As Dorothy and Alan unravel the secrets surrounding the dead man, they uncover disturbingly dark truths . . .
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Closing Time (Michael Gannon #5)
by Michael Ledwidge
It's springtime in Key West, and Michael Gannon is busy supporting his son’s dreams of making it in minor league baseball. But a late-night encounter with a seemingly harmless Australian at a dive bar turns deadly when Gannon unwittingly becomes the prime suspect in a convenience store shoot-out. Seeking the mysterious Australian to clear his name, Gannon uncovers a deadly conspiracy involving a global banker on the run from a shadow paramilitary force that will go to any lengths to stop him. From the Florida Keys to Wall Street, Gannon’s quest for answers takes him deep into the middle of a deadly game of power where one wrong move could be his last.
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The Devil's Daughter
by Danielle Steel
Graduating magna cum laude from MIT is the happiest day of Billie Banks’s life, although her family is not part of it. Her mother died when Billie was seventeen. Her father has been slowly drinking himself to death on the family farm in Iowa, and she and her younger sister, Mickie, have grown even more estranged. So when Mickie invites Billie to move in with her in Los Angeles, Billie is both wary and hopeful. She joins her sister on the West Coast. Mickie lands a modeling job and falls in with a fast crowd, Billie begins working at a pathology lab and starts dating a warm, supportive reporter at the Los Angeles Times. This is a story of sisterly bonds strained to the breaking point by narcissism and temptation is an unforgettable tale of good and evil.
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Private Rome : A Private Novel
by James Patterson
Jack Morgan, ex-Marine helicopter pilot and CIA agent, is in Italy to open the latest outpost of his international private investigation firm. But when a priest is murdered at the firm’s opening party, Morgan and Matteo Ricci—a decorated Rome police inspector, and Morgan’s newly appointed deputy come under intense scrutiny. As Morgan and Ricci work the case, they discover that eight priests have died, all under watch of the Swiss Guard and the Vatican Police. Private relies on the world’s most advanced forensic tools to make and break cases. This one rests on breaking the secret hold of the Holy See’s all-powerful, all knowing inner circle.
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The Shop on Hidden Lane
by Jayne Ann Krentz
The Harper and the Wells families have regarded each other with deep suspicion for four generations. They share the responsibility for protecting a long-buried and very dangerous secret. Sophy Harper and Luke Wells are shocked to learn that her aunt and his uncle have been sleeping together, and now they are both missing. Clearly, someone is willing to kill to obtain the secret their families have been protecting. Despite their mutual distrust, they both know that the terms of the pact must be honored. Their investigation uncovers a psychic trail leading to a bizarre desert art colony. By a twist of fate, a Harper and a Wells have no choice but to trust each other.
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The Right to Remain (Jack Swyteck #20)
by James Grippando
Miami criminal defense lawyer Jack Swyteck must contend with a unique problem. His client, Elliott Stafford, indicted for murder, has gone silent. Elliott refuses to speak. Undeterred by the hoopla and calls to walk away, he keeps his client and tries his best to save Elliott from himself. As he digs for facts, Jack discovers virtually everything Elliott told Jack before the indictment is proving false. As Jack plunges deeper, he comes to believe that Elliott isn’t trying to hide his own guilt. He may be protecting someone else—and the stakes could not be higher.
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The Viper (Zig & Nola #3)
by Brad Meltzer
Andrew Fechmeier is a master at hiding. When he’s diagnosed with a terminal disease, he heads for the local funeral home carrying the blue suit he eventually wants to be buried in. But what no one knows is that Fechmeier secretly tucked something inside, turning the suit into a final, untraceable hiding spot.It's a perfect plan. Until Fetch is brutally murdered by a mysterious killer who will stop at nothing to find the priceless object hidden in the suit. Wasting no time, Roddy LaPointe opens an investigation into Fetch’s murder, recruiting help from his friend, the brilliant “Zig” Zigarowski. As the killer closes in, Roddy’s twin sister, Nola Brown, starts investigating for herself, uncovering a plot that reveals their mother’s dark history, the true identity of her killer, and the shocking secret behind her death.
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Dear Debbie
by Freida McFadden
Debbie Mullen is losing it. For years, she has compiled all of her best advice into her column, Dear Debbie, where the wives of New England come for sympathy and neighborly advice. Through her work, Debbie has heard from countless women who are ignored, belittled, or even abused by their husbands. These days, Debbie's life seems to be spiraling out of control. She just lost her job. Something strange is happening with her teenage daughters. And her husband is keeping secrets. Debbie's done being the bigger person. It's time to take her own advice. Now it's time for payback against all the people in her life who deserve it the most.
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The First Time I Saw Him
by Laura Dave
Five years after her husband, Owen, disappeared, Hannah Hall and her stepdaughter, Bailey, have settled into a new life in Southern California. Together, they’ve forged a relationship with Bailey’s grandfather Nicholas and are putting the past behind them. But when Owen shows up at Hannah’s new exhibition, she knows that she and Bailey are in danger again. Hannah and Bailey are forced to go on the run in a relentless race to keep their past from catching up with them. As a thrilling drama unfolds, Hannah risks everything to get Bailey to safety—and finds there just might be a way back to Owen and their long-awaited second chance.
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My Husband's Wife
by Alice Feeney
Eden Fox sets off for a run. When she returns to the home she recently moved into, Spyglass, nothing is as it should be. Her key doesn't fit. A woman, eerily similar to her, answers the door. And her husband insists that the stranger is his wife. Six months earlier, a reclusive Londoner called Birdy, reeling from a life-changing diagnosis, inherits Spyglass. This unexpected gift brings her to the pretty seaside village of Hope Falls. But then Birdy stumbles upon a shadowy London clinic that claims to be able to predict a person's date of death. Secrets start to unravel, and as the line between truth and lies blurs, Birdy feels compelled to right some old wrongs.
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Pendergast : The Beginning (Pendergast #25)
by Douglas Preston and Lincoln Child
The Agent Pendergast origin story—an event for longtime fans of the beloved series and for new readers who want to start at The Beginning.
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Missing Sam
by Thrity Umrigar
One night after a party, old grievances surface between married couple Aliya and Sam and the night ends with a heated argument. Sam goes for a run early the next morning to clear her head—and doesn’t come back. Aliya reports her wife missing, but as a gay, Muslim daughter of immigrants, she can't escape the scrutiny and suspicion of those around her. Scared and furious and feeling isolated as nearly everyone doubts her innocence, Aliya makes one wrong choice after another. All the while, Sam is being held captive, terrified that she won't get out alive. Aliya must fight to prove her innocence in the public eye and save her wife.
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