July New Popular Books

The following new books have been added this month to the Popular Reading Collection located next to the circulation desk.   These books and any other titles currently checked out can be placed on hold.
See a staff member at the circulation desk for assistance.

 

Rage, by Jonathan Kellerman
Velocity, by Dean Koontz
Devil's Corner, by Lisa Scottoline
The Twelfth Card, by Jeffery Deaver
Specimen Days, by Michael Cunningham
Dance of Death, by Douglas J. Preston
Shadows, by Edna Buchanan
Eleven on Top, by Janet Evanovich

This Month's Great Escapes
by Bill McCleary


Cold Case, by Robert B. Parker

It’s Spenser’s turn at bat in the Parker series rotation and this time Spenser’s best friend, Hawk, is the main focus.  Hawk has been hired to protect a Boston bookie from some Ukrainian mobsters that want to move in on the bookie’s territory.  The Ukrainians are vicious and ruthless; the bookie ends up dead and Hawk is shot three times and severely wounded—both to his body and his pride.  It takes Hawk nearly a year to fully recover—and all the while he is plotting his revenge.  And, revenge he is determined to have come what may.  Of course, Spenser is not going to sit idly by and he will lend his assistance—and wisecracks—as needed.   This was a leisurely-paced book with a rather so-so plot this time around but the Spenser characters are all in fine form and as witty and fun as ever.


Honeymoon, by James Patterson and Howard Roughan

Nora Sinclair is young, beautiful, and intelligent.  She is also talented and has a successful career as an interior designer.  She is rich and lives in a knockout New York penthouse loft that she designed, of course.   Unfortunately, wherever Nora has been, husbands and fiancés have turned up dead—from apparent heart attacks.   Did they die of natural causes or did Nora hurry their deaths?  Handsome FBI agent John O’Hara is dispatched to get close to Nora and find out the truth.  Playing an insurance agent with a big payoff for Nora due to the death of her latest fiancé, John will find Nora to be one of the most intriguing women he has ever met.  But will he end up as her latest victim?  According to the jacket cover this book has been named ‘2005 International Thriller of the Year’.  Respectfully, I’d like a recount.  It was ok but nothing more than that.  What precious little suspense there was got bogged down in a poorly developed subplot that added nothing to the story.


Two Dollar Bill, by Stuart Woods

Two Dollar Bill is the nickname for Billy Bob Barnstormer, a filthy rich Texan who blows into New York with a pocketful of two dollar bills.  He lands at the famous bar/eatery Elaine’s, where Stone Barrington is having dinner.  Billy Bob is in need of a lawyer—for what he doesn’t say--and Stone is elected.  In short order Billy Bob and Stone are shot at as they leave Elaine’s.  Stone fears for Billy Bob’s safety and he puts him up at his Turtle Bay townhouse. Well, as always, no good deed goes unpunished and soon Billy Bob has disappeared—but not before leaving a murdered woman in Stone’s guest room bed.  Hmm.  This guy is beginning to look like the client from hell.  But wait it gets worse.  The medical examiner determines that Billy Bob had left Stone’s townhouse before the woman’s death and can’t be her killer—leaving Stone as the prime suspect.  And, the $50,000 check he gave Stone to retain his services?  It bounces.  It’s up to Stone, with a little help from his friends, to find Billy Bob and solve the mystery of the woman’s murder.  Nicely done.


Long Spoon Lane, by Anne Perry

It’s the summer of 1893.  Queen Victoria still reigns but London is uneasy.  Thomas Pitt, of Britain’s Special Branch, is called out early one morning to go to a neighborhood in London’s East End, where anarchists have warned they have set a bomb in a house. The street is evacuated and Pitt gets there just in time to witness the explosion.  The anarchists are tracked to a hideout and their leader is killed—but by whom?  He is dead when the police and Pitt arrive.  When Pitt interviews the two surviving members, they claim their leader was killed by a corrupt policeman.  The anarchists are protesting against rampant extortion by members of the police.  This extortion is news to Pitt and he is determined to solve the murder and investigate the corruption—which will lead him to once again go up against the powerful and sinister Inner Circle, which is trying to take control of Britain’s government.  This is an excellent addition to Perry’s interesting and entertaining Victorian series.



 

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Revised June 27, 2005

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