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Featured Titles

New titles - selected on the basis of good reviews. Nonfiction, fiction and mystery titles are included on these lists. Books for kids and teens (fiction and nonfiction) are also listed.

December 2008

Nonfiction

• Eating the Sun: How Plants Power the World
  Author: Morton, Oliver
  Publisher: HarperCollins $ 28.95 ISBN: 9780007163649 Date: 2008
  Kirkus PW LJ
  The everyday miracle of photosynthesis is the topic of this accessible book by an award-winning science journalist, who received high praise for his last book, Mapping Mars.
  Updated 11.31.08
  

Fiction

• Brimstone Kiss
  Author: Douglass, Carole Nelson
  Publisher: Juno $ 7.99 ISBN: 9780809573042 Date: 2008
  PW
  Delilah and her partner - tall, dark, handsome, and Hispanic ex-FBI guy Ric Montoya - are busy solving a "Romeo and Juliet" double-murder and she's got plenty more to deal with: vampires, werewolves, and tigers, oh my!
  Updated 10.31.08
  
• Blindspot
  Author: Kamensky, Jane
  Publisher: Bantam $ 24.95 ISBN: 9780385526197 Date: 2008
  LJ
  Set in boisterous, rebellious Boston on the eve of the American Revolution, Blindspot ingeniously weaves together the fictional stories of a Scottish portrait painter and notorious libertine Stewart Jameson, and Fanny Easton, a fallen woman from one of Boston's most powerful families.
  Updated 10.1.08
  
• Disquiet
  Author: Leigh, Julia
  Publisher: Penguin $ 12 ISBN: 9780143113508 Date: 2008
  PW Kirkus
  Olivia arrives at her mother's chateau in rural France--the first time in more than a decade--with her two young children in tow. Soon the family is joined by Olivia's brother Marcus and his wife Sophie--but this reunion is far from joyful, in this exquisitely written, atmospheric story.
  Updated 9.17.08
  
• The Suicide Collectors
  Author: Oppegaard, David
  Publisher: Tor $ 23.95 ISBN: 9780312381103 Date: 2008
  PW
  The Despair has plagued the earth for five years. Most of the world's population has inexplicably died by its own hand, and the few survivors struggle to remain alive. A mysterious, shadowy group called the Collectors has emerged, inevitably appearing to remove the bodies of the dead. But in the crumbling state of Florida, a man named Norman takes an unprecedented stand against the Collectors, propelling him on a journey across North America. It's rumored a scientist in Seattle is working on a cure for the Despair, but in a world ruled by death, it won't be easy to get there.
  Updated 10.31.08
  
• The Livability: Stories
  Author: Raymond, Jonathan
  Publisher: Bloomsbury $ 15 ISBN: 9781596916555 Date: 2008
  PW
  A collection of rich, powerfully human stories from the author of The Half-Life and the movies "Old Joy" (one of the finest American films of the year ("New York Times") and "Wendy and Lucy."
  Updated 10.1.08
  
• The Sweet In-Between
  Author: Reynolds, Sheri
  Publisher: Random $ 23 ISBN: 9780307393890 Date: 2008
  PW
  A "New York Times"-bestselling author weaves unforgettable characters and sumptuous Southern storytelling in this compelling novel of life in a small, Southern seaside town.
  Updated 11.31.08
  

Crime Fiction

• The Spanish Game
  Author: Cumming, Charles
  Publisher: Minotaur $ 24.95 ISBN: 9780312366391 Date: 2008
  PW
  The latest thriller from the international bestselling author of A Spy by Nature will delight fans of such British masters of spy fiction as John le Carre, Robert Ludlum, and Len Deighton ("Publishers Weekly," starred review).
  Updated 10.1.08
  
• The Inner Circle
  Author: Jungstedt, Mari
  Publisher: Minotaur $ 24.95 ISBN: 9780312363789 Date: 2008
  PW LJ
  "Unseen has everything we have come to expect from a great Swedish crime novel---graceful prose, deft characterization, and a setting that is somehow both familiar andstrange, like a kind of dream-world. But what makes this first novel unique is its author's ability to write with a bird's-eye view about horrible events while at the same time maintaining a poet's sense of intimacy about what her characters think and feel. Possessing such gifts as these---scope and heart, a desire to get to the truth---makes Mari Jungstedt the new writer to watch."---Daniel Judson, Shamus Award winner and author of The Darkest Place.
  Updated 10.31.08
  
• Defending Angels
  Author: Stanton, Mary
  Publisher: Berkley $ 7.99 ISBN: 9780425224984 Date: 2008
  PW
  The first novel in a new series. With a long list of ethereal clients who need her help, Savannah lawyer Brianna Winston Beaufort is asked by an already-dead businessman for help in finding his murderer and proving his innocence against a charge of greed issued by the Celestial Court.
  Updated 10.31.08
  
• The King of Swords
  Author: Stone, Nick
  Publisher: HarperCollins $ 24.95 ISBN: 9780060897314 Date: 2008
  PW Booklist
  When Detective Max Mingus and his partner, Joe Liston, are called to the scene of a death at Miami's Primate Park, it looks like another routine--if slightly bizarre--investigation. That is, until two things turn up: the victim's family, slaughtered, and a partly digested tarot card in the dead man's stomach--the King of Swords.
  An increasingly bloody trail leads Max and Joe first to a sinister fortune-teller and her scheming pimp son, then to the infamous Solomon Boukman. Few have ever met the most feared criminal in Miami, but rumors abound of a forked tongue, voodooesque ceremonies, and friends in very high places.
  Against a backdrop of black magic and police corruption, Max and Joe must distinguish the good guys from the bad--and track down some answers. What is the significance of the King of Swords? What makes those who have swallowed the card go on a killing spree just before they die? And can Max find out the truth about Solomon Boukman before death's shadow reaches his own front door?
  The King of Swords is a feat of black magic, combining a thrilling plot, unforgettable characters, and the uniquely menacing atmosphere that made Nick Stone's Mr. Clarinet the most celebrated crime debut of 2006. - Publisher Marketing
  Updated 10.31.08