Otherwise Engaged

Amanda Quick (Get this book)
When Victorian world traveler Amity Doncaster meets an injured Benedict Stanbridge in a dark alley on a small Caribbean island, she saves his life and falls in love with him, leading them both into peril. When Benedict, an engineer, is unwittingly caught up in an international intrigue that nearly costs him his life, he's saved by Amity, an intrepid travel-guide writer. Arriving back in London weeks after her, he learns that she has been attacked by a notorious serial killer, but due to her quick thinking and a clever secret weapon, she has survived. Determined to catch the killer, Benedict and Amity offer their help to the Scotland Yard investigator on the case, piecing together clues that link Amity's assault to the work Benedict was doing on behalf of the crown that led to his attack. Sexy romance and intriguing mystery combine for a wholly satisfying and entertaining read. --Kirkus

Everything to Lose

Andrew Gross (Get this book)
Down-on-her-luck 36-year-old Hilary Blum, the heroine of this enjoyable thriller from bestseller Gross, has run out of options. She's lost her job at a small marketing firm, is overwhelmed with debt, and is getting no financial help from her deadbeat ex-husband, the father of her seven-year-old autistic son, Brandon. Everything changes when, on a backcountry road between Westchester County, N.Y., and Greenwich, Conn., she sees the car ahead of her swerve to avoid a deer and roll down a steep embankment. Hilary stops her car and rushes down the slope. In the wreck she finds not only the male driver dead but also a leather satchel containing $500,000 in neat bundles of crisp one-hundred-dollar bills. Readers will cheer her every step of the way heart-stopping climax.--Publisher's Weekly

Natchez Burning

Greg Iles (Get this book)
A searing tale of racial hatreds and redemption in the modern South, courtesy of Southern storyteller extraordinaire Iles. Natchez didn't burn in the Civil War, having surrendered to the Yankees while its neighbors endured scarifying sieges. It burns in Iles' pages, though, since so many of the issues sounded a century and a half ago have yet to be resolved. His story is long in the telling, but a patient reader will find that the pages scoot right along without missing a beat. Iles is a master of regional literature, though he's dealing with universals here, one being our endless thirst to right wrongs. A memorable, harrowing tale.--Kirkus

Ruin Falls

Jenny Milchman (Get this book)
Liz and Paul Daniels have two young children and live a seemingly idyllic life on an organic family farm. Paul is a professor determined to live a green, post-consumer lifestyle, and Liz goes along with it as much as possible. They take their first family vacation in years, a road trip to visit Paul's parents on their commercial farm, stopping at a hotel along the way. When Liz wakes up, her children are gone, and then Paul disappears, too. Milchman shows her chops with this sophomore effort, and she carves out a new niche with this unusual mix of ecothriller and family suspense drama.--Booklist

The Serpent of Venice

Christopher Moore (Get this book)
Moore's mash-up of Othello and The Merchant of Venice with Poe's "The Cask of Amontillado" is a standout sequel to Fool, his twisted retelling of King Lear from 2009. After a dastardly trio of Venetians (including Iago) plot to bury alive Pocket the fool for thwarting an attempt to cook up a new Crusade from which they'd hoped to profit, he is saved by what he believes is a seriously horny mermaid. He washes up in Venice's Jewish ghetto and is rescued by Shylock's lovably abrasive daughter, Jessica. Moore's imaginative storytelling, bawdy prose, puns aplenty, as well as his creation of a violent sea creature intent on helping Fool's cause, and Jessica's "piratey" disguise, succeed in transforming two classical tragedies into outrageously farcical entertainment. In conjunction with the historical setting, the humor also allows Moore to skewer greed, hypocrisy, and racism e.g., Middle Eastern wars for profit, segregation all of which are still endemic in modern culture.--Booklist

Casebook

Mona Simpson (Get this book)
Simpson's latest ensnaring, witty, and perceptive novel of family life under pressure in Los Angeles mines the same terrain as her much-lauded last novel, the immigrant-nanny-focused My Hollywood. Here she puts a clever spin on domestic surveillance as young Miles begins spying on his mother, Irene, a mathematician, just as fault lines begin to appear in her marriage to his father, a Hollywood lawyer. Simpson's opening gambit is a Note to Customer from the publisher of Two Sleuths, the best-selling comic created by Miles and Hector, but she wisely uses this framing device lightly, allowing this exceptionally incisive, fine-tuned, and charming novel to unfold gracefully as she brings fresh understanding and keen humor to the complexities intrinsic to each stage of life and love.--Booklist

Death on Blackheath

Anne Perry (Get this book)
A truly unusual mystery distinguishes bestseller Perry's 29th Victorian puzzle featuring Charlotte and Thomas Pitt. The local police call on Thomas, who's still adjusting to his relatively new role as head of Special Branch, about the disappearance of a housemaid who lives in a London suburb near Greenwich. Traces of blood and hair have been found in the areaway outside the house where she works, but what triggers the involvement of Special Branch is the fact that she's employed by Dudley Kynaston, a government official intimately involved with developing Britain's naval defense systems. Perry balances plot and character neatly before providing a resolution that few will anticipate.--Publisher's Weekly

Can't and Won't

Lydia Davis (Get this book)
With her fifth collection, Davis continues to hone her subtle and distinctive brand of storytelling. These poems, vignettes, thoughts, observations, and stories defy clear categorization; each one is an independent whole, but read together they strike a fine rhythm. Davis circles the same central point in each entry: her characters examine the world with a detached, self-contained logic that seems to represent the process of writing itself. Davis's bulletproof prose sends each story shooting off the page.--Publisher's Weekly

And the Dark Sacred Night

Julia Glass (Get this book)
Stuck in a nightmare of unpaid bills, dwindling bank accounts, and leaky roofs, unemployed art-history professor Kit Noonan needs a jolt. Convinced that deep-seated identity issues are fueling Kit's inertia-inducing depression, his wife urges him to find the identity of his biological father, a fact his otherwise loving mother refuses to divulge. Divided into sections written from the perspective of key characters, Glass explores the pain of family secrets, the importance of identity, and the ultimate meaning of family.--Booklist

Children of the Revolution: An Inspector Banks Novel

Peter Robinson (Get this book)
Robinson's latest Inspector Banks novel is an English murder mystery sure to please lovers of the genre. The body of Gavin Miller shows up on a lonely pathway beneath a railroad bridge in the Yorkshire countryside. Was it an accident? Or suicide? Or murder? The dead man has 5,000 in his pocket, so robbery seems an unlikely motive. DCI Alan Banks heads the investigation, which leads him and his team to ask unwelcome questions of some rich and powerful people. It's well-plotted and satisfying right to the end. Robinson has won many awards for his Detective Banks novels, and with this latest, he demonstrates his mastery of the craft.--Kirkus

The Storied Life of A. J. Fikry

Gabrielle Zevin (Get this book)
Zevin chronicles the life of A. J. Fikry, a man who holds no brief for random acts, who yearns for a distinct narrative, who flounders about until his life is reordered by happenstance. Fikry owns Island Books on Alice Island, a summer destination off Massachusetts--think Nantucket. He's not yet 40 but already widowed, his wife, Nic, dead in an auto accident. Fikry drinks. Island Books drifts toward bankruptcy. Then, within a span of days, his rare copy of Poe's Tamerlane (worth $400,000) is stolen, and 2-year-old Maya is deposited at his bookstore. Zevin writes characters who grow and prosper, mainly A. J. and Lambiase, in a narrative that is sometimes sentimental, sometimes funny, sometimes true to life and always entertaining. A likable literary love story about selling books and finding love.--Kirkus

The Cairo Affair

Olen Steinhauer (Get this book)
One of the two best espionage novelists working today, Steinhauer follows his acclaimed Milo Weaver trilogy with a stunning stand-alone that is as emotionally rich as it is layered with intrigue. Budapest, March 2011: career diplomat Emmett Kohl is shot dead in a restaurant, in front of his disbelieving wife, Sophie. Determined to find out why, she follows a trail that leads to the American embassy in a tumultuous Cairo; to the revolution under way in neighboring Libya; to Langley, Virginia; and to her own ill-fated honeymoon in Eastern Europe. It has become de rigeur to compare Steinhauer to le Carr', but it's nearly time to pass the torch: for the next generation, it's Steinhauer who will become the standard by which others are measured.--Booklist

Decoded

Mai, Jia (Author), Milburn, Olivia (Translator), Payne, Christopher (Translator)
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A bestseller in his native China, Mai's first novel translated into English opens with the introduction of the Rong family, as told in Chinese folklore: aboard a ferry in 1873, Rong Zilai leaves China to study dream interpretation in order to save his grandmother from her nightmares. After her tragic passing, Zilai decides on another course. On his return, he finds that his grandmother has willed him her silver, and with this inheritance, he opens Lillie's Academy of Mathematics, the predecessor of N University, around which the remainder of the narrative is based. Mai's careful attention to pacing and the folklore-inspired narration make for a fascinating story, neatly interwoven with complex mathematical theory.--Publisher's Weekly

Tempting Fate

Jane Green (Get this book)
An affair threatens a woman's marriage, yet it also forges unexpected bonds that transcend the narrow definition of family. At 43, Gabby is certain the best years of her life are behind her. Eighteen years of marriage to Elliott, a highly successful gastroenterologist, have given her two lovely daughters and a secure future, but she's feeling anything but sexy. While her friends dress to the nines for a girls' night out, Gabby dresses simply, hoping to camouflage the more womanly curve of her hips. As her friends desperately chat up older men, Gabby finds herself drawn into a deeply flirtatious conversation with a gorgeous man 10 years her junior. Matt listens avidly to her thoughts, making her feel desirable and even beautiful. Soon, several martinis as well as the witching hour have passed. Although Gabby hasn't been literally unfaithful, as her friendship with Matt intensifies over the coming weeks, it is only a matter of time. A Scarlet Letter for the 21st century.--Kirkus

Without Warning

David Rosenfelt (Get this book)
At the start of this riveting standalone from Edgar-finalist Rosenfelt, a hurricane destroys a Wilton, Maine, dam. When newspaper publisher Katie Sanford and her staff unearth the time capsule they buried nearly five years earlier to check for water damage, they discover skeletal remains and a set of predictions about future crimes, including the murder of the wife of police chief Jake Robbins. Only some minor chronological discrepancies mar this suspenseful page-turner.--Publisher's Weekly

The Auschwitz Escape

Joel C. Rosenberg (Get this book)
The strong religious conviction evident in Rosenberg's previous novels, which were focused on the Middle East and Muslim-Western relations, is reflected in his latest book a work of historical fiction, about a heroic escape from the Nazis. Rosenberg has done what he does best: create believable characters set in a political milieu and also in religious context, acting on conviction or exploiting religion for selfish or evil ends. This is Rosenberg's most deeply moving work to date.--Publisher's Weekly