Reader's Choice Nominees January - April 2024
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Better the Blood
by Michael Bennett
Hana Westerman, a Maori detective juggling career pressures, single motherhood, and endemic prejudice, investigates two ritualistic murders that have a chilling connection to the execution of a Maori chief during the bloody British colonization of New Zealand.
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The Chinese Groove
by Kathryn Ma
Leaving China behind to claim his destiny in San Francisco, 18-year-old Shelley soon discovers the loving family he hoped would embrace him wants nothing to do with him. Shelley, ever the optimist, concocts a plan to resuscitate his American dream by winning them over.
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The Circus Train
by Amita Parikh
In 1938, Lena Papadopoulos, the wheelchair-bound daughter of an extraordinary headlining illusionist, must confront her doubts and dare to believe in herself when she is separated from everything she knows during World War II.
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The Collected Regrets of Clover
by Mikki Brammer
Feeling a stronger connection with the dying than to the living, Clover, a death doula in NYC, has no life of her own until the final wishes of a feisty old woman send her across the country to uncover a forgotten love story, and perhaps, her own happy ending.
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Emily Wilde's Encyclopaedia of Faeries
by Heather Fawcett
A Cambridge professor, scholar, and researcher on the study of faeries visits the hardscrabble village of Hransvik where she gets closer to uncovering the secrets of the Hidden Ones while she resists her insufferably handsome academic rival.
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Everyone in My Family Has Killed Someone
by Benjamin Stevenson
A self-published author of crime novel writing guides attends a reunion with his family of expert killers and investigates when a body is found outside in the snow as another storm approaches.
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Joan
by Katherine J. Chen
1412. France is mired in a losing war against England. Its people are starving. Its king is in hiding. From this chaos emerges a teenage girl who will turn the tide of battle and lead the French to victory, an unlikely hero whose name will echo across the centuries.
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Kit McBride Gets a Wife
by Amy Barry
Tired of cleaning, cooking, and mending for her big brothers, Junebug places an ad in The Matrimonial News to find her brother Kit the wife he never knew he needed.
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Learning America
by Luma Mufleh
A visionary leader and gifted refugee activist shows how she grew a soccer team into a nationally acclaimed network of schools by homing in on what traumatized students require to learn making schools for those most in need.
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Lone Women
by Victor LaValle
In 1915, Adelaide Henry, after her secret sin killed her parents, sets out for Montana. Dragging an enormous steamer trunk that's locked at all times, she becomes one of the “lone women” taking advantage of the government's offer of free land where she hopes to bury her past.
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Mr. Perfect on Paper
by Jean Meltzer
Creator and CEO of the popular Jewish dating app J-Mate, Dara Rabinowitz knows the formula for lasting love for everyone else. When it comes to her own love life, she’s been idling indefinitely. Then her beloved bubbe shares Dara’s checklist for “The Perfect Jewish Husband” on national television, and charming news anchor Chris Steadfast proposes they turn Dara’s search into must-see TV.
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The Nightmare Man
by James Markert
When a series of gruesome murders mirror his latest horror novel, Ben Bookman quickly becomes the prime suspect and digs deep into the history of his ancestral home and his grandfather's secret room full of books without words, fearing he may have triggered a release of something trapped long ago.
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The Other Family Doctor
by Karen R. Fine
The memoir of one woman's dream to become a veterinarian in a field historically dominated by men, and how, through her work both with her patients and their people, she comes to better understand humanity, mortality, and the unique role animals play in our lives.
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The Perfect Neighborhood
by Liz Alterman
When the disappearance of two young children rocks their tight-knit community, the town is put under a microscope and the police, racing against time to find the children, are drawn into the dark side of suburbia where someone will do anything to keep their dangerous secrets buried forever.
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The Storyteller's Death
by Ann Dávila Cardinal
When Isla turns 18, and her grandmother, a great storyteller, dies, she discovers she has a gift. The tales of dead family storytellers are brought back to life, replaying themselves over and over in front of her. When Isla has a vision of an old murder mystery, she realizes that if she can't solve it to make the loop end, these seemingly harmless stories could cost Isla her life.
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Thank You for Listening
by Julia Whelan
An audiobook narrator, former actress Sewanee Chester, after having a one-night stand with a handsome stranger in Las Vegas, returns home to narrate a romance novel under her romance pseudonym and forms a connection with her co-narrator, Brock McNight. When she discovers Brock's true identity, she wonders what she will risk for desires she has long buried.
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Wolf Trap
by Connor Sullivan
A former Ground Branch paramilitary officer, Brian Rhome, thinking his time with this elite group of shadow operatives was over, instead finds himself in the midst of a deadly conspiracy that threatens the highest levels of American democracy.
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Wormhole
by Keith Brooke and Eric Brown
Gordon Kemp is assigned to an 80 year old cold case murder investigation that stretches across light years and risks the future of mankind's new home on the planet of Mu Arae.
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You Are Here
by Karin Lin-Greenberg
One of the remaining businesses in the local mall, Sunshine Clips, becomes the setting for a shocking act that forces a group of people to reevaluate who they are and what they want, including a hair stylist and her son, a high school cashier and her stalker, and a judgmental old woman.
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You Should Smile More
by Anastasia Ryan
When Vanessa Blair is fired because of her facial expressions, her friends help her launch a revenge plan that'll bring down the whole company.
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