Prepub Alert

By Barbara Hoffert -- Library Journal, 11/1/2006

Fiction | Nonfiction

Fiction

Andersen, Kurt. Heyday. Random. Mar. 2007. 608p. ISBN 0-375-50473-7 [ISBN 978-0-375-50473-0]. $25.95.
Having recently arrived in the newly minted United States, English gentleman Benjamin Knowles finds himself on the run out West with part-time actress Polly Lucking and slightly crazed journalist Timothy Skaggs. From the author of Turn of the Century; with a five-city tour.

Binchy, Maeve. Whitethorn Woods. Knopf. Mar. 2007. 368p. ISBN 0-307-26578-1 [ISBN 978-0-307-26578-4]. $25.95. CD: Random Audio.
Spiritual haven? Or source of superstitious nonsense? Strong opinions bubble up when St. Ann’s Well, long a place of prayer, is set to be bulldozed to make way for a highway. Reading group guide.

Black, Benjamin. Christine Falls. Holt. Mar. 2007. 352p. ISBN 0-8050-8152-6 [ISBN 978-0-8050-8152-7]. $25. CD: Audio Renaissance.
Booker Prize winner John Banville does a quick name change and launches a crime series starring Dublin pathologist Quirke. Quirke is shocked to find that a doctor (his brother-in-law, no less) has covered up the cause of poor Christine Falls’s death, and he’s even more shocked that the reason is corruption in Dublin’s Catholic high society, circa the 1950s. With a ten-city tour.

Chevalier, Tracy. Burning Bright. Dutton. Mar. 2007. 394p. ISBN 0-525-94978-X [ISBN 978-0-525-94978-7]. $24.95. CD: Penguin Audio.
The Kellaways are country mice come to work for Astley’s Circus in 1790s London, where they meet city mouse William Blake—and no one is ever the same. The next blockbuster from Chevalier.

Gwyn, Richard. The Color of a Dog Running Away. Doubleday. Mar. 2007. 336p. ISBN 0-385-51855-2 [ISBN 978-0-385-51855-0]. $21.95.
An odd invitation leads Barcelona musician/translator Lucas to an art gallery and an affair with Nuria. Then the two are kidnapped by a cult leader who proclaims them to be reincarnated Cathars. Why does no one believe Lucas when he finally escapes? Poet/translator Gwyn’s debut is getting big treatment, including a reading group guide.

Hawke, Richard. Bleeding Hearts. Random. Mar. 2007. 320p. ISBN 1-4000-6426-0 [ISBN 978-1-4000-6426-7]. $24.95.
Friendly neighbor Robin appeared at the murder trial of famed TV host Marshall Fox, and now she’s dead, too. Of course P.I. Fritz Malone has to act. With a five-city tour.

Kyle, Aryn. The God of Animals. Scribner. Mar. 2007. 320p. ISBN 1-4165-3324-9 [ISBN 978-1-4165-3324-5]. $25. CD: S. & S. Audio.
There’s good word on this debut starring a 12-year-old girl intent on helping shore up her family’s sagging Colorado ranch after her sister runs off with a cowboy.

Lethem, Jonathan. You Don’t Love Me Yet. Doubleday. Mar. 2007. 288p. ISBN 0-385-51218-X [ISBN 978-0-385-51218-3]. $24.95. CD: Random Audio.
When Lucinda introduces a guy she’s helped on the Complaint line to her band members, his kvetching inspires some great lyrics—and great big trouble when the Complainer insists on joining the band. Look for echoes of A Midsummer Night’s Dream.

McCaig, Donald. Canaan. Norton. Mar. 2007. 480p. ISBN 0-393-06246-5 [ISBN 978-0-393-06246-5]. $24.95.
Having visited Civil War Virginia in Jacob’s Ladder, McCaig travels on to Reconstruction and, finally, the Battle of Little Bighorn, with guidance from a Santee woman who’s married to an ex-slave. With an eight-city tour.

Mason, Daniel. A Far Country. Knopf. Mar. 2007. 288p. ISBN 0-375-41466-5 [ISBN 978-0-375-41466-4]. $24. CD: Random Audio.
In a nameless country undone by drought and war, a 14-year-old girl leaves the sugarcane plantation she calls home to follow her brother to a mysterious city to the south. Sounds as enigmatically interesting as Mason’s debut, The Piano Tuner. With an eight-city tour; reading group guide.

Mengestu, Dinaw. The Beautiful Things That Heaven Bears. Riverhead: Putnam. Feb. 2007. 240p. ISBN 1-59448-940-8 [ISBN 978-1-59448-940-2]. $22.95.
After watching soldiers drag away his battered father, Sepha Stephanos flees the Ethiopian revolution, landing in a Washington, DC, neighborhood. Now gentrification threatens to displace him again. Ethiopian-born Mengestu starts out big.

Perry, Anne. At Some Disputed Barricade. Ballantine. Mar. 2007. 320p. ISBN 0-345-45658-0 [ISBN 978-0-345-45658-8]. $21.95.
Perry, Anne. We Shall Not Sleep. Ballantine. Apr. 2007. 336p. ISBN 0-345-45660-2 [ISBN 978-0-345-45660-1]. $21.95.
Perry closes out her World War I series with back-to-back titles that finally give featured players Joseph, Matthew, and Judith Reavley news regarding their parents’ killers. With a ten-city tour by request.

Rice, Luanne. The Edge of Winter. Bantam. Feb. 2007. 352p. ISBN 0-553-80527-4 [ISBN 978-0-553-80527-7]. $24. CD: Random Audio.
Escaping a lousy husband, Neve settles on Rhode Island’s starkly beautiful coast with teenaged daughter Mickey and reaches out tentatively to a man with problems of his own.

Steel, Danielle. Sisters. Delacorte. Feb. 2007. 368p. ISBN 0-385-34022-2 [ISBN 978-0-385-34022-9]. $27. lrg. prnt. CD: Random Audio.
Sizzling model Candy. TV producer Tammy. Lawyer Sabrina. And Annie, who worships art in Florence. Four sisters charging to the top on different tracks, but when tragedy strikes one, they gather for mutual support.

White, Randy Wayne. Hunter’s Moon. Putnam. Mar. 2007. 352p. ISBN 0-399-15370-5 [ISBN 978-0-399-15370-9]. $24.95. CD: Penguin Audio.
Pity poor Doc Ford. He saves a former President from assassination, then finds himself drug into the man’s plans to counter a covert CIA strike against a key Central American country. With a national tour.

White, Stephen. Dry Ice. Dutton. Mar. 2007. 352p. ISBN 0-525-94997-6 [ISBN 978-0-525-94997-8]. $25.95.
Remember bad guy Michael McClelland from Privileged Information? He’s been sprung from the Colorado State Mental Hospital, giving his old psychiatrist, Alan Gregory, cause for alarm.

Nonfiction

Anderson, John. Follow the Money: How George W. Bush and the Texas Republicans Hog-Tied America. Scribner. Mar. 2007. 320p. ISBN 0-7432-8643-X [ISBN 978-0-7432-8643-5]. $26.
The author of Burning Down the House considers the house that well-heeled conservative Texas Republicans have built for George W. Bush.

Arroyo, Raymond, ed. Mother Angelica’s Little Book of Life Lessons and Everyday Spirituality. Doubleday. Mar. 2007. 192p. ISBN 0-385-51985-0 [ISBN 978-0-385-51985-4]. $16.95.
News director for EWTN (that’s Eternal Word Television Network), Arroyo collects the wit and spiritual wisdom of Mother Angelica, founder of Our Lady of the Angels Monastery in Birmingham, AL, and an EWTN fixture for more than 25 years.

Bach, Steven. Leni: The Life and Work of Leni Riefenstahl. Knopf. Mar. 2007. 384p. ISBN 0-375-40400-7 [ISBN 978-0-375-40400-9]. $30.
The biographer of Marlene Dietrich and Moss Hart (and author of the best-selling Final Cut) illuminates the life of Leni Riefenstahl while shooting holes in her claim to know nothing of the Holocaust. With a four-city tour.

Barber, Benjamin R. Consumed: The Fate of Citizens Under Capitalism Triumphant. Norton. Mar. 2007. 320p. ISBN 0-393-04961-2 [ISBN 978-0-393-04961-9]. $26.95.
Capitalism wants more and more shoppers, and its final goal is not to give us what we want but to make us want what it gives us. Consuming arguments from the author of Jihad vs. McWorld; with a four-city tour.

Hunt, Lynn. Inventing Human Rights: A History. Norton. Mar. 2007. 320p. ISBN 0-393-06095-0 [ISBN 978-0-393-06095-9]. $25.95.
A former president of the American Historical Society explains why the concept of human rights burst forth in the late 1700s.

Jones, Chris. Too Far from Home: A Story of Life and Death in Space. Doubleday. Mar. 2007. 304p. ISBN 0-385-51465-4 [ISBN 978-0-385-51465-1]. $24.95. CD: Random Audio.
After the shuttle Columbia blew up, three astronauts way up high at the International Space Station had to find another, much trickier way to get home. With a national tour.

Karabell, Zachary. Peace Be upon You: The Story of Muslim, Christian, and Jewish Coexistence. Knopf. Mar. 2007. 320p. ISBN 1-4000-4368-9 [ISBN 978-1-4000-4368-2]. $26.95.
The author of the award-winning The Last Campaign points out huge chunks of time—during the Ottoman Empire and in medieval Spain, for instance—when Muslims, Christians, and Jews dwelled as one.

Lamott, Anne. Grace (Eventually): Thoughts on Faith. Riverhead: Putnam. Mar. 2007. 272p. ISBN 1-59448-942-4 [ISBN 978-1-59448-942-6]. $24.96. CD: Penguin Audio.
The best-selling writer of literate spirituality considers everyday crises of love, parenting, and work and how we grow.

Sloan, Cle “Bone” with Magalis Martinez. Bastards of the Party: The Evolution of Bangin’. One World: Ballantine. Mar. 2007. 192p. ISBN 0-345-49643-4 [ISBN 978-0-345-49643-0]. $21.95.
A history of the long-term bloody battle between Los Angeles street gangs the Crips and the Bloods, by a former gang member whose documentary on the subject airs on HBO this spring.

Ury, William. The Power of a Positive No: How To Say No and Still Get to Yes. Bantam. Feb. 2007. 256p. ISBN 0-553-80498-7 [ISBN 978-0-553-80498-0]. $25. CD: Random Audio.
A handy guide to go along with Ury’s phenomenal best seller, Getting to Yes: how to protect yourself without feeling bad or acting nasty.

Walker, Rebecca. Baby Love: Choosing Motherhood After a Lifetime of Ambivalence. Riverhead: Putnam. Apr. 2007. 256p. ISBN 1-59448-943-2 [ISBN 978-1-59448-943-3]. $24.95.
As evidenced by her Black, White, and Jewish, Walker struggled with her mixed-race background, but her biggest fight with herself—happily resolved—was about having a baby in the postfeminist era.

Wallis, Michael. Billy the Kid: The Endless Ride. Norton. Mar. 2007. 288p. ISBN 0-393-06068-3 [ISBN 978-0-393-06068-3]. $25.95.
American Roads host Wallis tries to find the kid behind the myth; with a six-city Western tour.