New releases for the week of 22 October 2010

The Philanthropist by John Tesarsch

Blurb: This novel centres on Charles Bradshaw, an ageing tycoon haunted by his past. When he suffers a heart attack, he abruptly retires and announces that he will give his fortune to charity. This leads to conflict with his wife and adult children. A terrible secret from his past comes back, along with an old girlfriend. Unnerved by their renewed affection for each other, Charles and Anna struggle to overcome their remorse and to make amends, but tension inevitably flares. Meanwhile, Charless son is taking over the company, he is intoxicated with his newfound power, and Charles might have to intervene to save him from self-destruction.

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The Autobiography of Mark Twain edited by Lin Salamo et al

Blurb: Ive struck it! Mark Twain wrote in a 1904 letter to a friend. And I will give it away to you. You will never know how much enjoyment you have lost until you get to dictating your autobiography. Thus, after dozens of false starts and hundreds of pages, Twain embarked on his Final (and Right) Plan for telling the story of his life. His innovative notion to talk only about the thing which interests you for the moment meant that his thoughts could range freely. The strict instruction that many of these texts remain unpublished for 100 years meant that when they came out, he would be dead, and unaware, and indifferent, and that he was therefore free to speak his whole frank mind. The year 2010 marks the 100th anniversary of Twains death. In celebration of this important milestone and in honor of the cherished tradition of publishing Mark Twains works, UC Press is proud to offer for the first time Mark Twains uncensored autobiography in its entirety and exactly as he left it. This major literary event brings to readers, admirers, and scholars the first of three volumes and presents Mark Twains authentic and unsuppressed voice, brimming with humor, ideas, and opinions, and speaking clearly from the grave as he intended.

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Losing Faith by Denise Jaden

A terrible secret. A terrible fate. When Bries sister, Faith, dies suddenly, Bries world falls apart. As she goes through the bizarre and devastating process of mourning the sister she never understood and barely even liked, everything in her life seems to spiral farther and farther off course. Her parents are a mess, her friends don't know how to treat her, and her perfect boyfriend suddenly seems anything but. As Brie settles into her new normal, she encounters more questions than closure: Certain facts about the way Faith died just dont line up. Brie soon uncovers a dark and twisted secret about Faith's final nighta secret that puts her own life in danger.

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Zombies vs. Unicorns edited by Holly Black and Justine Larbalestier

Blurb: It is a question that has long been debated (well, since 2007): Which is better, the zombie or the unicorn? Finally, this argument will be decided. Zombies are lovers and fierce warriors, hunters of the living and just plain cool. Unicorns are sparkly, pastel, and fart rainbows. But theyre also arbiters of justice, healers and vicious man-killers. Ultimately, the decision rests with you'which side are you on?

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All Clear by Connie Willis

Blurb: In Blackout, award-winning author Connie Willis returned to the time-traveling future of 2060'the setting for several of her most celebrated works'and sent three Oxford historians to World War II England: Michael Davies, intent on observing heroism during the Miracle of Dunkirk; Merope Ward, studying children evacuated from London; and Polly Churchill, posing as a shopgirl in the middle of the Blitz. But when the three become unexpectedly trapped in 1940, they struggle not only to find their way home but to survive as Hitler's bombers attempt to pummel London into submission. Now the situation has grown even more dire. Small discrepancies in the historical record seem to indicate that one or all of them have somehow affected the past, changing the outcome of the war. The belief that the past can be observed but never altered has always been a core belief of time-travel theory'but suddenly it seems that the theory is horribly, tragically wrong. Meanwhile, in 2060 Oxford, the historians' supervisor, Mr. Dunworthy, and seventeen-year-old Colin Templer, who nurses a powerful crush on Polly, are engaged in a frantic and seemingly impossible struggle of their own'to find three missing needles in the haystack of history. Told with compassion, humor, and an artistry both uplifting and devastating, All Clear is more than just the triumphant culmination of the adventure that began with Blackout. It's Connie Willis's most humane, heartfelt novel yet'a clear-eyed celebration of faith, love, and the quiet, ordinary acts of heroism and sacrifice too often overlooked by history.

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Italian Shoes by Henning Mankell

Living on a tiny island entirely surrounded by ice during the long winter months, Fredrik Welin is so lost to the world that he cuts a hole in the ice every morning and lowers himself into the freezing water to remind himself that he is alive. Haunted by memories of the terrible mistake that drove him to abandon a successful career as a surgeon, he lives in a stasis so complete an anthill grows undisturbed in his living room. Then an unexpected visitor alters his life completely: Harriet, whom he inexplicably abandoned in the midst of their youthful romance, turns up decades after they last saw each other and demands that Fredrik fulfill an old promise and take her to the forest pool he visited as a youth. Thus begins their eccentric, elegiac journey, leading to undreamt-of connections.

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Driving on a Rim by Thomas McGuane

BlurbL The unforgettable voyager of this dark picaresque is I. B. 'Berl' Pickett, M.D., whose die was probably cast the moment his mother thought to name him after Irving Berlin. Other insults piled on apace thereafter: the spasms of Pentecostal Sunday worship; the social debilitation of following his parents' itinerant rug-shampooing business; the erotic initiation at the hands of his aunt. It's hard to imagine what would have become of him had he not gone to medical school, thanks to the surrogate fathering of a local physician and bird-hunting loner. But there must be meaning to existence beyond professional accreditation, and though scantly equipped, Berl Pickett has been on a mission to find it, despite being charged with negligent homicide in the death of his former lover, a business that lays bare the true benefits of small-town living. Fortunately, Berl will find deliverance in work and in the few human connections he has made, wittingly or not, over the years. The Montana landscape, too, will furnish, if not a certifiable epiphany, at least a semi-spiritual awakening for the inglorious hero of Thomas McGuane's hilarious and profound illumination of the threads by which we are all hanging.

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Forbidden Places by Penny Vincenzi

Blurb: In 1941 Graces husband Charles is posted missing, presumed dead. When the war ends, Grace builds a new life, finds a new love and plans to get married again. But Charles returns, wanting to reclaim his wife. Grace now has to choose between the man she loves and the husband she thinks she doesnt.

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Forge by Laurie Halse Anderson

Blurb: In this compelling sequel to Chains, a National Book Award Finalist and winner of the Scott ODell Award for Historical Fiction, acclaimed author Laurie Halse Anderson shifts perspective from Isabel to Curzon and brings to the page the tale of what it takes for runaway slaves to forge their own paths in a world of obstacles'and in the midst of the American Revolution.' The Patriot Army was shaped and strengthened by the desperate circumstances of the Valley Forge winter. This is where Curzon the boy becomes Curzon the young man. In addition to the hardships of soldiering, he lives with the fear of discovery, for he is an escaped slave passing for free. And then there is Isabel, who is also at Valley Forge'against her will. She and Curzon have to sort out the tangled threads of their friendship while figuring out what stands between the two of them and true freedom.

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Too Many Murders by Colleen McCullough

Blurb: The year is 1967 and the world teeters on the brink of nuclear holocaust as the Cold War goes relentlessly on. On a beautiful spring day in the little city of Holloman, Connecticut, chief of detectives Carmine Delmonico walks into the prestigious Chubb University halls to be greeted by a limp corpse ensconced in a bear trap, all traces of life drained from it. And this is just the beginning. Twelve murders have taken place in one day and suddenly Carmine has more pressing matters on his hands than finding a name for his newborn son. Supported by his detective sergeants, and new team member the meticulous Delia Carstairs Delmonico embarks on what look likes an unsolvable mystery. All the murders are different. Are they dealing with one killer or many? And if twelve murders were not enough, Carmine soon finds himself pitted against the mysterious spy, Ulysses who is giving local arms giant Cornucopias military secrets to the Russians. Are the murders and espionage different cases, or are they somehow linked?

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Crossers by Philip Caputo

Blurb: From the acclaimed author of Acts of Faith , a blistering new novel about the brutality and beauty of life on the Arizona-Mexico border and about the unyielding power of the past to shape our lives. Taking us from the turn of the twentieth century to our present day, from the impoverished streets of rural Mexico to the manicured lawns of suburban Connecticut, from the hot and dusty air of an isolated ranch to New York City in the wake of 9/11, Caputo gives us an impeccably crafted story about three generations of an Arizona family forced to confront the violence and loss that have become its inheritance.

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The Terminal State by Jeff Somers

Blurb: Avery Cates is in better shape than ever with the top-class augments the armys fitted him with. Pity hes no more than a puppet then, because theyve also got a remote that can fry his brain at any second. And now a corrupt colonel is selling his controls to the highest bidder. Avery has visions of escape and bloody revenge until he realises just whos bought him. Because the highest bidder is Canny Orel himself, Averys oldest enemy. And as the System slides into chaos, Canny wants Cates to do one last job. Avery just needs one chance to get back at the old gunner but this time, its Canny whos holding all the cards.

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The Spirit Thief by Rachel Aaron (our review forthcoming)

Blurb: Eli Monpress is talented. Hes charming. And hes a thief. But not just any thief. Hes the greatest thief of the age and hes also a wizard. And with the help of his partners a swordsman with the most powerful magic sword in the world but no magical ability of his own, and a demonseed who can step through shadows and punch through walls hes going to put his plan into effect. The first step is to increase the size of the bounty on his head, so hell need to steal some big things. But hell start small for now. Hell just steal something that no one will miss at least for a while. Like a king.

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The Scarletti Curse by Christine Feehan

Blurb: THE BEAST Strange, twisted carvings and hideous gargoyles adorn the palazzo of the great Scarletti family. But a still more fearful secret lurks within its storm-tossed turrets. For every bride who enters its forbidding walls is doomed to leave in a casket. THE BRIDE Mystical and unfettered, Nicoletta has no terror of ancient curses and no fear of marriage until she looks into the dark mesmerising eyes of Don Scarletti. She had sworn no man would command her, had thought her gift of healing set her apart, but his is the right to choose a bride from among his people. And he has chosen her. THE BARGAIN Compelled by duty, drawn by desire, she gives her body into his keeping, and prays the powerful, tormented don will be her hearts destiny, and not her souls demise.

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Full Dark, No Stars by Stephen King

Blurb: I believe there is another man inside every man, a stranger writes Wilfred Leland James in the early pages of the riveting confession that makes up 1922, the first in this pitch-black quartet of mesmerising tales from Stephen King, linked by the theme of retribution. For James, that stranger is awakened when his wife Arlette proposes selling off the family homestead and moving to Omaha, setting in motion a gruesome train of murder and madness. In Big Driver, a cozy-mystery writer named Tess encounters the stranger is along a back road in Massachusetts when she takes a shortcut home after a book-club engagement. Violated and left for dead, Tess plots a revenge that will bring her face to face with another stranger: the one inside herself. Fair Extension, the shortest of these tales, is perhaps the nastiest and certainly the funniest. Making a deal with the devil not only saves Harry Streeter from a fatal cancer but provides rich recompense for a lifetime of resentment. When her husband of more than twenty years is away on one of his business trips, Darcy Anderson looks for batteries in the garage. Her toe knocks up against a box under a worktable and she discovers the stranger inside her husband. Its a horrifying discovery, rendered with bristling intensity, and it definitively ends A Good Marriage. Like DIFFERENT SEASONS and FOUR PAST MIDNIGHT, which generated such enduring hit films as The Shawshank Redemption and Stand by Me, FULL DARK, NO STARS proves Stephen King a master of the long story form.

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Bury your Dead by Louise Penny

Blurb: It is Winter Carnival in Quebec City, bitterly cold and surpassingly beautiful.'Chief Inspector Armand Gamache has come not to celebrate but to'recover from an investigation gone hauntingly wrong.'But violent death is inescapable, even in the'seemingly peaceful'Literary and Historical Societywhere an obsessive historians search'for the missing remains of the founder of Quebec ends bizarrely in murder. Injured himself and in need of rest, Gamache cannot walk away from a crime that threatens to'ignite long-smoldering tensions between the English and the French. Meanwhile,'he'receives letter after letter from the village of Three Pines, where beloved Bistro owner Olivier was recently convicted of murder. It doesnt make sense, Oliviers partner writes every day.'He didnt do it, you know.'Despite the overwhelming'case against Olivier, Gamache sends his deputy back to Three Pines to'make sure that nothing was overlooked. Through it all, in his painstaking quest for justice, Gamache must relive the terrible events that killed one of his men before he can begin to bury his dead.

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The Track of Sand by Andrea Camilleri

Blurb: Inspector Salvatore Montalbano wakes from strange dreams to find a gruesomely bludgeoned horse carcass in front of his seaside home. When his men came to investigate, the carcass has disappeared, leaving only a trail in the sand. Then his home is ransacked and the inspector is certain that the crimes are linked. As he negotiates both the glittering underworld of horseracing and the Mafias connection to it, Montalbano is aided by his illiterate housekeeper, Adelina, and a Proustian memory of linguate fritte. Longtime fans and new readers alike will be charmed by Montalbanos blend of unorthodox methods, melancholy self-reflection, and love of good food.

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The Thousand by Kevin Guilfoile

Blurb: In 530 B.C., a mysterious ship appeared off the rainy shores of Croton, in what is now Italy. After three days the skies finally cleared and a man disembarked to address the curious and frightened crowd that had gathered along the wet sands. He called himself Pythagoras. Exactly what he said that day is unknown, but a thousand men and women abandoned their lives and families to follow him. They became a community. A school. A cult dedicated to the search for a mathematical theory of everything. Although Pythagoras would die years later, following a bloody purge, his disciples would influence Western philosophy, science, and mathematics for all time. Chicago, the present day. Canada Gold, a girl both gifted and burdened by uncanny mental abilities, is putting her skills to questionable use in the casinos and courthouses of Las Vegas when she finds herself drawn back to the city in which her father, the renowned composer Solomon Gold, was killed while composing his magnum opus. Beautiful, brilliant, troubled, Canada has never heard of the Thousand, a clandestine group of powerful individuals safeguarding and exploiting the secret teachings of Pythagoras. But as she struggles to understand her father's unsolved murder, she finds herself caught in the violence erupting between members of the fractured ancient cult while she is relentlessly pursued by those who want to use her, those who want to kill her, and the one person who wants to save her. In an irresistibly ambitious novel that fuses historical fact with contemporary suspense, Kevin Guilfoile delivers an erudite, propulsively entertaining thriller that seamlessly traverses the realms of math, science, music, and philosophy. The Thousand is ringing confirmation of Guilfoile's enormous talent.