May 6, 2022
New Fiction
An Unthinkable Thing by Nicole Lundrigan – Eleven-year-old Tommie Ware’s world is shattered in the summer of 1958, when the aunt who raised him is found murdered. There is only one place for him to go: “home,” to the mother who handed him over the day he was born. All is not as it seems at the Henneberry estate where Tommie’s mother, Esther, is the live-in housekeeper and where he is mostly left on his own to navigate the lavish grounds, the massive house, and the twisted family inside. Soon he is enmeshed in the oppressive attentions of matriarch Muriel, who is often heavily mediated, and of fifteen-year-old Martin, who treats Tommie sometimes like a kid brother, sometimes like a pawn in a confusing game. While Dr. Henneberry generally ignores Tommie, he also seems eager for him to be gone. Then there’s the elderly neighbour, who may know more about the family’s past than anyone else will say. By summer’s end, the secrets and games tighten around Tommie and his mother, until a horrific crime raises the unthinkable question: could an eleven-year-old boy really have committed cold-blooded murder?
Daughters of the Occupation by Shelly Sanders – Miriam, the matriarch of the family, has to make the unthinkable choice to leave her children in the care of a Gentile friend who hides them. Then Miriam and her parents are rounded up and forced to live in Riga’s Jewish ghetto. A few weeks later, Miriam, along with thousands of other Jews, is marched to the execution pits in the Rumbula forest. Incredibly, she is able to escape the carnage. Through a series of dramatic events, she finds sanctuary in the countryside and manages to hide for three years to survive the war. Consumed by guilt, she is finally reunited with her daughter but has lost her son. Thirty-five years later, Miriam lives in Chicago with her family. Her granddaughter, Sarah, who wants to understand her maternal family history, tries desperately to ferret out Miriam’s secret. But Miriam does not wish to revisit the past. Sarah persists and eventually learns enough to impel her to travel to Riga, then under Soviet control and at the height of the Cold War, to search for her uncle, Miriam’s lost son. But her quest for the truth may threaten her freedom when she comes face-to-face with the KGB.
It Happened One Summer by Tessa Bailey – Piper Bellinger is fashionable and influential, and her reputation as a wild child means the paparazzi are constantly on her heels. When too much champagne and an out-of-control rooftop party land Piper in the slammer, her stepfather decides enough is enough. So he cuts her off and sends her and her sister to learn some responsibility running their late father’s dive bar…in Westport, Washington. Piper hasn’t even been in Westport five minutes when she meets big, bearded sea captain Brendan Taggart, who thinks she won’t last a week outside of Beverly Hills. So what if Piper can’t do math and the idea of sleeping in a shabby apartment with bunk beds gives her hives? How bad could it really be? She’s determined to show her stepfather – and the hot, grumpy local – that she’s more than just a pretty face. Except it’s a small town, and everywhere she turns, she bumps into Brendan. The fun-loving socialite and the gruff fisherman are polar opposites, but there’s an undeniable attraction simmering between them. Piper doesn’t want any distractions, especially feelings for a man who sails off into the sunset for weeks at a time. Yet as she reconnects with her past and begins to feel at home in Westport, Piper starts to wonder if the cold, glamorous life she knew is what she truly wants. LA is calling her name, but Brendan – and this town full of memories – may have already caught her heart.
Blood Sugar by Sascha Rothchild - I COULD JUST KILL YOU RIGHT NOW! It’s something we’ve all thought at one time or another. But Ruby Simon has actually acted on it. Three times, to be exact. Though she may be a murderer, Ruby is not a sociopath. She is an animal-loving therapist with a thriving practice. She’s had long-lasting relationships and a husband, Jason, whom she adored. But the homicide detectives at Miami Beach Police Department have doubts about that happy marriage and are eager to uncover why so many people have died within her arm’s reach. When we meet Ruby, she is in a police interrogation room, suddenly accused of killing her husband. But this is one murder that she did not commit, even if a scandal-obsessed public believes differently. As she undergoes questioning, her mind races back to all the details of her life that led her to this exact moment, and to the three dead bodies in her wake. Because while she may not have killed her husband, Ruby certainly isn’t innocent.