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Reviews & Publicity
★ LIFE'S TOO SHORT
by Abby Jimenez
Booklist - Starred Review
Travel vlogger and internet sensation Vanessa Price cannot resist hot guys with beards, and one neighbor in her apartment building, workaholic attorney Adrian Copeland, is ticking off every box on her dream-date checklist. Add in Adrian’s uncanny ability to get Grace, Vanessa’s newborn niece, to stop crying as well as the fact that he is fostering a cranky yet adorable old chihuahua, and Vanessa just might be in love. However, while dating Adrian might seem to be perfect on paper, there is a big catch. Given her family’s medical history with ALS, Vanessa knows that in the real world she can’t let herself become romantically involved with anyone, even a man who could very well be her soul mate. Jimenez (The Happily Ever After Playlist, 2020) continues to burnish her well-deserved reputation for delivering truly unforgettable love stories by gifting lucky readers with another sneaky-sweet yet surprisingly sexy romance. Jimenez achieves stunning emotional depth as her realistically imperfect characters power a story line that is in equal measures realistically heart-breaking and gloriously hopeful.
— John Charles
Forever: April 6, 2021/ISBN: 9781538715666: Trade Paperback
★ THE UNFIT HEIRESS: The Tragic Life and Scandalous Sterilization of Ann Cooper Hewitt
by Audrey Clare Farley
Booklist - Starred Review
In 1934, Ann Cooper Hewitt underwent what she thought was an appendectomy. To her shock and horror, she discovered that her fallopian tubes had been removed. Ann’s money-grubbing mother, Maryon, had conspired with doctors to label Ann “feeble-minded” and therefore subject to involuntary sterilization under California law. Maryon had her eyes on Ann’s considerable inheritance, which included a child-bearing stipulation. The resulting trial was a media circus that skyrocketed women’s reproductive rights, sexual liberation, and eugenics to the forefront of the public’s attention. The salacious details of the trial placed both women under intense scrutiny by the press, making them tabloid fodder for years. Farley takes creative license to set the scene and craft conversations, a method that creates an extremely readable narrative. She goes beyond Ann’s story to include the voices of Black, Indigenous, Latina, and poor white women forcibly sterilized throughout modern history—segments that very well could have been expanded into their own book. Given the allegations of forced sterilization at ICE detention centers in 2020, this book is as timely as ever. A gripping tale about the atrocity of systematic reproductive control.
— Michelle Ross
Grand Central Publishing: April 20, 2021; ISBN:781538753354: Hardcover
★ THE GLITTER IN THE GREEN
By Jon Dunn
Booklist - Starred Review
Kirkus - Starred Review
Publishers Weekly – Starred Review
Young naturalist Dunn, on his first trip to London, was entranced by a large glass case in the Natural History Museum. Filled with hundreds of hummingbirds, this case jump-started his craving to see these exuberantly colored, tiny birds in the wild. Hummingbirds can be found from Alaska to Tierra del Fuego, from mountains to deserts to islands. Dunn writes of his years chasing hummingbirds and exploring their terrains. He begins with a journey far north to see the rufous hummingbird, the holder of the longest hummingbird migration on record, 3,500 miles. Dunn moves on to describe all kinds of hummingbird hotspots. Arizona is a hummingbird mecca; Cuba is home of the world's smallest bird, the bee hummingbird. In Costa Rica, he sees 48 hummingbird species in two days. Ecuador is home to the largest hummingbird, Peru has the Nazca Line hummingbird, and the southernmost species dwell on Isla Robinson Crusoe off the coast of Chile. Full of natural history, quotes from early explorers, local history, and adventure, Dunn's chronicle of his hummingbird quests will make readers just as obsessed with these small, quick birds dipped in rainbows.
— Nancy Bent
Basic Books: April 20, 2021/ISBN: 9781541618190: Hardcover
★ A MAN NAMED DOLL
by Jonathan Ames
Booklist - Starred Review
Publisher's Weekly - Starred Review
After only a few pages of this extraordinary thriller, the reader senses a strong, original talent at work. The frame story is conventional: in a gone-to-seed Los Angeles, a PI, ex-cop, and ex-MP wonders if his choice of this sordid line of work comes from a "need to be punished." His name, Happy Doll, seems too cute by half, but then the story takes hold, all spare, steely sentences with an unadorned forward momentum. An old man, a former fellow cop who once took a bullet for Happy, shows up asking about Happy's blood type. He needs a new lung. The plot unveils itself: it's about black-market transplants, which are pricey: $200,000 per lung, $750,000 for a heart. Meanwhile, Happy has his hands full at his night job, protecting the women at a Thai spa whose customers demand special services. Moving from a stunningly written scene at the spa to a finale in which Happy is kidnapped by organ harvesters, Ames delivers an old-school L.A. crime novel that evokes Chandler with maybe an aftertaste of Bukowski. Readers expecting action won't be let down, and the sparkling yet unpretentious language gives the whole an extra kick. Recommend to noir fans, action fans, anyone who likes a good read.
— Don Crinklaw
Little Brown & Co./Mulholland Books: April 20, 2021; ISBN: 9780316703659: Hardcover
★ THE PARIS APARTMENT
By Kelly Bowen
Booklist - Starred Review
For Aurelia “Lia” Leclaire’s entire life, her beloved Grand’Mere Estelle never left Marseille. So how on earth could Estelle’s will include the bequest to Lia of an apartment in Paris? It turns out that this apartment, which contains a treasure trove of art, is just one of the secrets Estelle kept from her family. Lia believes that hiring art appraiser Gabriel Seymour is the first step in finding the answers she seeks. But what the two subsequently discover is a mystery that stretches back more than seven decades and involves two different women who were prepared to give their lives for those they loved. With commendable attention to historical details and a penchant for insightful characterization, award-winning romance author Bowen plays to her literary strengths as she gracefully pivots to historical fiction and offers a stunning tale of high-stakes danger and personal sacrifice that is also a powerful celebration of both the fragility and strength of the human spirit.
— John Charles
Forever: April 20, 2021/ISBN: 9781538718155: Trade Paperback
★ EXCUSE ME WHILE I DISAPPEAR
By Joanna Scott
Booklist - Starred Review
Scott, a virtuoso writer of penetrating imagination, not only returns to the short story after several novels, most recently Careers for Women (2017), but also creates a heady inquiry into how we perpetually narrate our lives. Our storytelling habit has inspired us to invent many forms of narration, all vulnerable to distortion and destruction. “The Limestone Book” is a wrenching tale about ancient cave paintings in a time of modern warfare. “Dreaming of Fire” brings readers to a scriptorium in fifteenth-century Venice, where one scribe laboriously copying manuscripts that will be stitched into books goes rogue. Questions of originals, copies, fakes, and censorship multiply as Scott glides into the future, when all texts have been digitized and are therefore prey to interference. A writer in a besieged Mediterranean village fears for his nearly completed, handwritten novel. Stories sprout and grow in the minds of strangers trapped on a stalled subway car. A story about the hunger for fame is narrated by a bear. A lonely man gets carried away on a stream of comforting lies. Suddenly a booklover can no longer read. Venturing into Borgesian territory with each metaphysical bend or surreal twist, Scott, ironic and compassionate, funny and shrewd, considers how the endless torrent of stories we generate fails to fully dispel our inherent inexplicability.
— Donna Seaman
Little, Brown & CO : April 20, 2021; ISBN: 9780316498746 Hardcover
★BAMBOOZLED BY JESUS
By Yvonne Orji
Booklist - Starred Review
Emmy-nominated actress and comedian Orji offers an intricate account of how Jesus "tricked" her into success in Hollywood. She details her unconventional journey of becoming a comedian, landing the role of Molly on HBO’s Insecure, and opening on tour for Chris Rock. She masterfully parallels her life lessons to the experiences of characters from the Bible, which she affectionately calls DGB (Da Good Book). Her contemporary dissection of biblical stories makes for a fresh and
straightforward interpretation. Although Orji doesn’t shy from portraying Christianity as her guiding light, her cultural colloquialisms and honesty leave room for all readers to relate, no matter their religious beliefs. Orji unpacks universal topics like the artist's struggle, disappointment, depression, and even what to do when you reach your wits' end. The writing is engaging and her comedic timing is absolute gold. Readers are sure to find themselves laughing out loud one minute and clutching their chest out of empathy the next. Inspiration practically leaps off the pages and into the hearts of readers—a feeling Orji demands be followed up with action. After the last page, readers will have no doubt that Orji is a cheerleader and best friend for every dreamer.
HIGH-DEMAND BACKSTORY: Orji has garnered fans worldwide for her Insecure role and comedy special, and with a new show in the works, her star is only rising.
— LaParis Hawkins
Hachette Nashville/Worthy Books: May 25, 2021; ISBN: 9781546012672: Hardcover
★ THE VANISHING POINT
By Elizabeth Brundage
Booklist - Starred Review
It gives nothing away to acknowledge that the famous photographer Rye Adler is presumed dead, though his body hasn’t been found, since the book opens with that startling news as read in the paper by Julian Ladd, who had once been Adler’s fellow student at the famous Brodsky Workshop, where they had been in love with the same young woman, Magda, a fellow student. Julian is obsessively jealous of Rye’s genius but succeeds in marrying Magda when Rye marries Simone, a poet and translator, instead. Time passes, and Magda and Julian’s son, Theo, worried about the deteriorating condition of the world, becomes a heroin addict, dropping out of college and living on the streets. The novel moves smoothly between the points of view of the five principal characters as it shifts between past and present. An ambitious, literary novel, The Vanishing Point is distinguished by its characterizations, its pervasive air of melancholy, and its beautiful style (“The sun steeps like tea in the copper dusk”). Not surprisingly, there is a great deal of thought-provoking attention given to the meaning and aesthetics of photography, and, like great photography, the novel is ultimately a work of memorable art.
— Michael Cart
Little, Brown & Co.: May 18, 2021; ISBN: 9780316430371: Hardcover
★ HOW TO SURVIVE A SCANDAL
By Samara Parish
Booklist - Starred Review
It doesn’t matter one whit that Lady Amelia Crofton has a perfectly reasonable explanation as to why she is dishabille and in the arms of a disheveled Benedict Asterly. But after her father, her aristocratic fiancé, and a gossipy neighboring nobleman discover the two of them, word of the incident is bound to get out. Now, with no other option but to accept Benedict’s begrudging proposal, Amelia sets aside her dreams of being the next duchess of Wildeforde and accepts her future as plain old Mrs. Benedict Asterly. In this dazzling debut, Parish gives historical romance readers everything they could ever desire in a novel, beginning with the brilliantly conceived hero and heroine, who, while not initially matched in terms of social class, prove to be the perfect pair in every way that truly matters. Add in a captivating cast of secondary characters, a fine-tuned plot that ditches the often-used ton setting in favor of exploring the world of business, and an infusion of delectably wry wit, and you have an extraordinary romance that succeeds on every level.
— John Charles
Forever: May 25, 2021; ISBN: 9781538704486: Paperback
★ THE DOUBLE LIFE OF BOB DYLAN: A Restless, Hungry Feeling, 1941-1966
By Clinton Heylin
Booklist - Starred Review
Virtually no one has written as much about Bob Dylan as Heylin, yet he has more to say. Much more, after scouring the Bob Dylan Archive at the Gilcrease Museum in Tulsa, Oklahoma. The previously unseen material he viewed there led him to the conclusion that he had to rethink Dylan’s entire life and career. Heylin begins in the summer of 1953 at Camp Herzl in northern Wisconsin, where the young Bobby Zimmerman made his public performing debut on Talent Night, vamping on the piano with the risqué R&B classic “Annie Had a Baby” and proclaiming that he was going to be a rock n roll star. The book concludes with the summer of 1966 with
Dylan living in Woodstock, New York. It’s always been difficult to separate fact from fantasy when considering this iconic songwriter and performer, but, as always, Heylin separates the chaff from the wheat. Full of dizzying amounts of detail and plentiful anecdotes, the result is an exhaustively meticulous but thoroughly entertaining account of the early to middle years of the elusive Mr. Dylan. We may never really get to know him, but Heylin may well have taken us as close as we can get. A must for Dylan fans and for admirers of Heylin’s work and a mesmerizing triumph.
— June Sawyers
Little, Brown & Co.: May 18, 2021; ISBN: 9780316535212: Hardcover
★ THE QUIET BOY
By Ben H. Winters
Booklist - Starred Review
The year is 2008. During what was supposed to be routine surgery, a boy suffers a mysterious catastrophic event that renders him utterly unresponsive to stimulus, incapable of doing anything other than walk, constantly, around and around his hospital room. More than a decade later, attorney Jay Shenk, who represented the boy’s family in their earlier lawsuit against the hospital, is asked to defend the boy’s father against a charge of murder. The victim: an expert witness who testified at the 2008 trial. Alternating between the two trials, Winters, author of the brilliant Last Policeman trilogy and the more recent Golden State (2019), explores a number of themes here: murder, medical malpractice, and the mysteries of human consciousness. He also explores the relationship between Jay and his adopted son, Ruben, who grows from boy to man over the course of the story, and who plays a key role in the murder case. Winters, who got his start writing parodies (Android Karenina, 2010), has proved himself to be one of of our most fascinating genre blenders of crime and speculative fiction, a writer who never fails to challenge his readers to embrace new ideas and new forms of reality. A wonderful, thoughtful book.
— David Pitt
Little, Brown & Co.: May 18, 2021; ISBN: 9780316505444: Hardcover
★ HOW THE WORD IS PASSED
By Clint Smith
Booklist - Starred Review
Everyone knows that African Americans were once enslaved in the U.S., but how well do we understand what that means? Atlantic staff writer and poet Smith explores this question by visiting sites emblematic of American slavery, including Jefferson’s Monticello, the Whitney plantation, which rejects Old South nostalgia to focus on the enslaved, a Confederate cemetery, Juneteenth’s birthplace of Galveston, and Goree Island in Senegal, embarkation point for thousands of Africans headed to slave markets in the Americas. Along the way, Smith engages with conflicted tour guides and historians, ambivalent Senegalese students, Confederate
reenactors, and descendants of the enslaved and enslavers, including his own grandparents. Smith probes the contradictions of our collective memory and how deliberate miseducation, nostalgia, and denial fuel a belief in Black inferiority and white innocence. Jefferson’s cosmopolitan image, for example, depended on “the people he allowed to be threatened,
manipulated, flogged, assaulted, deceived, and terrorized,” while Confederate apologists insist their ancestors weren't reliant on slavery, despite copious evidence to the contrary. Ultimately, Smith concludes that “in order for our country to collectively move forward," we need "a collective endeavor to learn, confront, and reckon with the story of slavery and how it has shaped the world we live in today.”
HIGH-DEMAND BACKSTORY: Anticipation is running high for Smith's powerful and diligent exploration of the realities and ongoing consequences of slavery in America.
— Lesley Williams
Little, Brown & Co.: June 1, 2021; ISBN: 9780316492935: Hardcover
