THOUGHTS ON THIS 'n THAT

  h A lifetime ago, Ray “Spike” Thorns was a well-regarded caretaker on a boarding school’s grounds. These days, he lives the life of a recluse in a house rammed with hoarded junk, alone and disconnected from family or anyone he might have at one time considered a friend. When his next-door neighbor drops dead on Spike’s doorstep, a case of mistaken identity ensues: according to the police, the hospital, the doctors—everyone—Spike is dead. Spike wants to correct the mistake, really he does, but when confronted with those who knew him best, he hesitates, forced to face whatever impression he’s left on the world. It’s a discovery that brings him up close to ghosts from his past, and to the only woman he ever loved. Could it be that in coming face-to-face with his demise, Spike can live again? And will he be able to put things straight before the inevitable happens—his funeral? The result is a beautiful look at life and what we would all do if given a second chance.

  An Artist’s Life  tells of artist, author, and architect Carlton Davis’s relentless search for his soul’s desire. With degrees in architecture, he works with luminary architects, but his  métier  is making art. He relates to the art stars while berating himself for lacking their talent and discipline. Yet his antennae are always alert. Despite terrifying mood swings, he is a keen observer of human nature which he documents with drawings and words. Life’s travails bedevil Carlton. He attempts suicide, has a failed marriage, becomes addicted to crack cocaine, and discovers he contains a female self he calls Carlotta “because she’s a whole lotta Carl.” He struggles to sit in silent meditation, but ends up at a mental hospital, where a gifted psychiatrist proves to him that he is suffering from Bipolar I disorder and helps him initiate sobriety and recovery. Self-portraits grace every chapter of  An Artist’s Life,  covering 50 years. At first glance, there ap...

  American heiress Eliza Dove was resigned to a polite marriage of convenience...until she spent one wicked night with the Duke. All hopeless romantic Eliza Dove asked for was one night of adventure. One glorious evening of freedom to explore the dark corners of London with a mysterious stranger before a lifetime trapped in a quiet, respectable marriage of convenience. Except now she wants more. Now she wants  him .   Simon Cavell is no gentleman. Known only as ‘the Duke,’ Whitechapel’s prize boxer is one fight away from achieving his goal: to safeguard his late sister’s only treasure and leave the streets for good. He cannot allow some pretty young heiress to spill his secrets, no matter how tempting she might be. In return for her silence, Simon will give Eliza a taste of the darkness…and hope he doesn’t lose his heart in the process. But one night together could never be enough. And now Eliza has a new plan—an even more scandalous bargain that will either land the...

  BATTLE of the BOOKSTORES (Berkley) is a rivalry and romance romcom when two bookstore managers who are opposites in every way find themselves competing for the same promotion by the bestselling authors AliBrady. Despite managing bookstores on the same Boston street, Josie Klein and Ryan Lawson have never interacted much—Josie’s store focuses on serious literature, and Ryan’s sells romance only. But when the new owner of both stores decides to combine them, the two are thrust into direct competition. Only one manager will be left standing, decided by who turns the most profit over the summer. Efficient and detail-oriented Josie instantly clashes with easygoing and disorganized Ryan. Their competing events and contrasting styles lead to more than just frustration—the sparks between them might just set the whole store on fire. Their only solace during this chaos is the friendship they’ve each struck up with an anonymous friend in an online book forum. Little do they know they’re cha...

  An American expat‘s startling discovery plunges her into the glamorous but deadly world of Amsterdam’s diamond industry.  Following a nasty divorce, Rayna Dumont came to Amsterdam for a fresh start. She’s never been the type for a one-night stand, but this move is all about adventure, and Xander is handsome and successful and more than willing to go along for the ride. Until the morning after, when Rayna finds him dead on the shower floor and millions of dollars’ worth of diamonds missing from his safe. From her lavish home in the heart of the city, Willow Prins is captivated by the news. Her husband is Xander’s former boss and heir to a diamond house, and the scandal strains their already-rocky marriage. As the house comes under scrutiny, Willow wonders if her life is about to implode—and how much of the blame she can place on Rayna. Soon, Willow and Rayna are dragged into the dark and dangerous underbelly of the diamond market, where they’ll have to uncover the t...

  From the  New York Times  bestselling author of  The Turnout, Megan Abbott  comes a simmering, atmospheric novel of friendship and betrayal, following a women-led pyramid scheme in suburban Detroit. All I want is to be innocent again.  But that's not how it works. Especially not after the Wheel. The three Bishop sisters (who are all so cool. I'd like to be friends with.. maybe not Diana.) grew up in privilege in the monhheyed suburbs of Detroit. But as the auto industry declined, so did their fortunes. Harper, the youngest, is barely making ends meet when her beloved, charismatic sister Pam—currently in the middle of a contentious battle with her ex-husband—and her eldest sister, Debra, approach her about joining an exciting new club. The Wheel offers women like themselves—middle-aged and of declining means—a way to make their own money, independent of husbands or families. Quickly, however, the Wheel’s success, and their own addiction to it, leads to gre...

  THE GROVE (VikingBooksForYoungReaders) is set in the socioeconomic tinderbox of the 1960s, two sisters in a struggling and damaged family only have each other to rely on . . . until an ugly secret tears them apart and threatens the cause of justice in their small town. Fifteen-year-old Pip and seventeen-year-old Sissy aren't just sisters, they're best friends. Every year, they wait eagerly for the traveling carnival to put its stakes down in their tiny Florida town. It's the only time when the girls can abandon their endless chores on the family's orange grove and give in to pure joy. And the only time Pip and Sissy can forget their many troubles . . . living on the brink of poverty, Mama's despair, and Daddy's perpetual anger. With the arrival of the carnival, the girls’ slow, small lives suddenly feels bigger and brighter. But this year, something is different. Once the carnival leaves, with the charming young sword-swallower with it, Sissy grows increasingl...

  When a restaurateur and serial philanderer turns up stone-cold dead, his trio of exes falls under suspicion in a sharp-witted and suspenseful short story by the  New York Times  bestselling author, Sally Hepworth. Celebrity chef Ian Curley is found dead in his walk-in freezer. The prime suspects are his three ex-wives, who meet up every Friday evening in their favorite corner booth of his restaurant. It’s a tradition for Anita, Mary-Jane, and Rosie to drink, dine, and commiserate. But commit murder? All aggrieved, each one has a motive and an alibi. And a brilliant detective has reservations. Who did it? The night will tell. Sally Hepworth’s  The Ex-Wives Club  is part of  Alibis , a collection of stories about lies, truth, and deception. It’s just a matter of what you can get away with. They can be read or listened to in one sitting. Sally Hepworth is the New York Times bestselling author of nine novels, most recently Darling Girls. Sally’s novels have b...

  Long before Dorothy visits Oz, her aunt, Emily Gale, sets off on her own grand adventure, leaving gritty Chicago behind for Kansas and a life that will utterly change her. In this transporting novel, BEFORE DOROTHY (Berkley)  Hazel Gaynor takes us on her life-changing adventure. Chicago, 1924: Emily and her new husband, Henry, yearn to leave the bustle of Chicago for the promise of their own American dream among the harsh beauty of the prairie. But leaving the city means leaving Emily’s beloved sister, Annie, who was once closer to her than anyone in the world. Kansas, 1932: Emily and Henry have established their new home among the warmth of the farming community in Kansas. Aligned to the fickle fortunes of nature, their lives hold a precarious and hopeful purpose, until tragedy strikes and their orphaned niece, Dorothy, lands on their doorstep. The wide-eyed child isn’t the only thing to disrupt Emily’s world. Drought and devastating dust storms threaten to destroy everythi...

  In the sun-dappled mystery, BEACH READS AND DEADLY DEEDS (MIRA) from  New York Times  bestselling author Allison Brennan, a risk-averse bibliophile gets in over her head when strange notes in a book draw her into a real-life investigation. Mia Crawford is responsible to a fault. She has to be. Between her high-demand job and taking care of her grandmother and her cats, she has little time for anything else. What time she does have, she pours into reading. Mysteries, romances, thrillers…books filled with women who are far more impulsive than she would ever dream of being. Now, forced into taking a long-overdue vacation, she finds herself on a luxurious private island where she just might have a chance to reinvent herself—for a little while, anyway. She can explore the island. Flirt shamelessly with a cute bartender. Have a vacation fling. Live like a heroine in one of her favorite novels. Or she can curl up with a good book on the beach. Turns out reinventing yourse...

  In   this debut memoir from the bestselling author of  The Bear  and  The Last Neanderthal , Claire Cameron confronts the rare genetic mutation that gave her cancer by investigating an equally rare and terrifying event—a predatory bear attack. When Claire Cameron was nine years old, her father, a professor of Old English, told her he was dying. In the years after he was gone, she found a way to overcome her grief among the rivers and lakes of Algonquin Park, a vast Canadian wilderness area. Around that same time, in 1991, a couple was killed by a black bear in a rare predatory attack in the park. Claire was shocked and, never fully sure of what happened, the attack haunted her.       Now older, with children of her own, Cameron was diagnosed with the same kind of deadly skin cancer as her father. Caught in a second wave of grief, she was told by her doctor, “the ideal exposure to UV light is none.” No longer able to venture into the wilderness a...

  Set in the art world of 1970s London,  The English Masterpiece (HarperMuse)  is a fast-paced read to the end, full of glamour and secrets, tensions and lies, as one young woman races against the clock to uncover the truth about a Picasso masterpiece.  As the recently promoted assistant to the Tate's Modern Collections keeper, Diana Gilden, Lily helps plan a world-class Picasso exhibit to honor the passing of the great artist--and she's waited her whole life for this moment. The opening is beyond anyone's expectations--the lighting, the champagne, the glittering crowd, and the international acclaim--until Lily does the unthinkable. She stops in front of a masterpiece and hears her own voice say,  "It's a forgery."  The gallery falls silent. Lily's boss, Diana, is polished perfection, schooled in art, and descends from European high society. She's worked hard to become the trusted voice in London's modern art scene and is respected across the Conti...

  Emmy finds solace in the text-flirting relationship that started as a wrong number exchange—unaware that the man she’s texting is the one she’s fighting for the promotion at work. Emmy Jameson lives by three rules: no dating, no sharing personal news at work, and baseball above everything. As the only female data analyst for a professional baseball team, Emmy is constantly trying to prove herself. Especially when she’s put up for a senior analyst position against her arrogant, infuriating coworker Gabe Olson. Sure, he’s gorgeous and smart and he was a baseball star in college who knows the sport inside and out, but so does Emmy. She is not going to lose to him again. There will be no distractions this summer. Not even her sister’s pending destination wedding in Mexico for which she needs to find a plus one. But then she receives a text from an unknown number with a simple message: “Last night was fun.” When she strikes up a conversation with the mystery texter...

  Indie Next pick for June 2025 • Library Reads pick for June 2025 • Book of the Month Club pick • Starred  Library Journal  • Starred  Kirkus  •  Los Angeles Times  30 Must-Read Books for Summer •  NPR’s  10 books we're looking forward to this spring •  New York Post’s  Must-Read New Thriller Books •  New York Times’s  12 Summer Books We’re Looking Forward To •  USA TODAY’s  Most Anticipated Books of summer 2025 •  The Atlantic’s  24 Books to Read This Summer •  TIME’s  16 Most Anticipated Books to Read This Summer •  People’s  The 15 Most Anticipated Books of Summer 2025 •  Vulture’s  28 Books We Can’t Wait to Read This Summer •  New York Times’s  Books to Read This Summer •  New York Times’s  4 Summer Books We’re Looking Forward To •  Washington Post’s  30 Books to Read This Summer •  New York Post’s  30 Best Beach Reads When eldes...