Spindown


Andy C.F. Crawford - 2018
    Medallion Honoree ***Cyrus Konami is the Chief Inspector on the first colony vessel, Aotea, to leave Earth's solar system. Deep within the machinery of the ship, a suspicious death upends the routine on board. Mysterious signals from deep space add to the confusion, along with a series of debilitating malfunctions.Cy and Lieutenant Beatriz Mattoso dig into the deceased crewman's background. The first signs point to a tragic accident. Ship scuttlebutt points to the deep-space signals -- is a mysterious force trying to prevent humanity from spreading into deep space? Or are the radical pacifists and cultural separatists who funded the journey somehow involved?With an increasingly uncooperative populace, a shocking assassination attempt, and a spaceship falling apart around them, Cy and Bea must unravel secrets that threaten the lives of thousands before it's too late...

H-17 The Morningstar Abduction


Jake Vickers - 2017
    The class of child genius Gabby Morningstar is interrupted by the news that her parents have been murdered. The detective assigned to the homicide then abducts her. Before Gabby can piece together her situation, she's sold to a mysterious group of individuals lurking off of an unmarked highway exit. Gabby's feral runaway sister, Nikki, will stop at nothing to find her.

The Replacement Chronicles


Harper Swan - 2016
     Two Lives… separated by millennia but nevertheless linked irrevocably. What possible link could Mark Hayek, an introverted twenty-first century research scientist, have to Raven, a young healer who lived during the late Pleistocene? It has everything to do with an injured Neanderthal man taken captive by Raven’s band while he and his brothers were hunting bison. After Raven heals the captive, he leaves for his tribe, and she tries to forget him as she struggles to remain within the band. But it’s not possible to stay when several band members make her life with the group untenable. Seeking the Neanderthal man she’d helped and facing her fear of being alone on the dangerous steppes, she begins crossing that grassy land—but a woman like Raven isn’t destined to be by herself for long. In the future, Mark Hayek is forced into making his own journey when his uncle dies in the Levant. His travels place him firmly in the footsteps of his Neanderthal and Early Modern Human ancestors, crossing the same ancient lands as he struggles against the fate a wayward kinsman has imposed. He’s been made a pawn in a cruel game, but when he encounters a woman being held prisoner in a cave, he seeks a way to save her. Help arrives for the pair, flowing from an unexpected, ancient source, igniting a struggle deep within Mark to accept that the illogical as well as the logical make up existence. Peoples come and go, one group replacing another over time, and echoes from ancient events have always affected the future, but Mark and Raven discover that in certain environments echoes are able to bounce back and forth, blurring their origins.

False Light


Eric Dezenhall - 2021
    After Fuse is asked to leave his paper pending a disciplinary investigation, he has plenty of time on his hands. So when his oldest friend approaches him for advice after the man’s daughter says she was sexually assaulted by her boss, a prominent media star, Fuse agrees to help. He gives his buddy the only options he feels are available: report the incident to the police and risk a huge “he said/she said” smear campaign against the girl, or plan something even better—revenge. As a journalist, Fuse has a colorful background investigating criminals, politicians, gangsters, drug lords, and all-around shysters—and knows plenty of shady sources—so he’s the perfect person to enact a complex (and ultimately, entertaining) plan to bring the popular media mogul down in the court of public opinion . . . and make him pay.

Sleep Martyrs


C.A. Wittman - 2019
    But navigating around their controlling stepfather and their aloof new siblings becomes the least of their worries.There is a vague sense of menace in their state of the art lavish smart home with its cutting edge calm technology. And something is not quite right with the bright, cheerful kids at Santomon’s private school where the girls are enrolled. Undergrads from prestigious universities and ivy-league colleges are vying for the coveted internships within Santomon Village. The mega-corporation is the darling of the tech world and a philanthropic superstar when it comes to awarding educational scholarships to low-income families who require rehabilitative services for their teens at Santomon’s troubled youth program called Salinger House.But not everyone is singing Santomon praises. A growing number of parents whose children have returned home from the program are voicing concerns that at first seem vague, while a social activist group called The Disruptors has been investigating a cash-for-kids scandal in South Dakota that involves Santomon. For Tori, she can feel that something ominous, something evil is afoot, and as her mother begins to have doubts about her marriage and there is talk of divorce, Tori yearns to return to Inglewood and the simple life they had. But her sister, Laila ‘s not so sure leaving the village will be easy because what she has discovered is a treacherous web of lies unfathomable in their scope. What Laila wonders is if they can get away from Santomon before it’s too late.

Goodbye for Now


Laurie Frankel - 2012
    Sometimes the end is just the beginning . . . Sam Elling works for an internet dating company, but he still can't get a date. So he creates an algorithm that will match you with your soul mate. Sam meets the love of his life, a coworker named Meredith, but he also gets fired when the company starts losing all their customers to Mr. and Ms. Right.When Meredith's grandmother, Livvie, dies suddenly, Sam uses his ample free time to create a computer program that will allow Meredith to have one last conversation with her grandmother. Mining from all her correspondence—email, Facebook, Skype, texts—Sam constructs a computer simulation of Livvie who can respond to email or video chat just as if she were still alive. It's not supernatural, it's computer science.Meredith loves it, and the couple begins to wonder if this is something that could help more people through their grief. And thus, the company RePose is born. The business takes off, but for every person who just wants to say good-bye, there is someone who can't let go. In the meantime, Sam and Meredith's affection for one another deepens into the kind of love that once tasted, you can't live without. But what if one of them suddenly had to? This entertaining novel, delivers a charming and bittersweet romance as well as a lump in the throat exploration of the nature of love, loss, and life (both real and computer simulated). Maybe nothing was meant to last forever, but then again, sometimes love takes on a life of its own.

The Color of Rock


Sandra Cavallo Miller - 2017
    Abby Wilmore, attempts to escape her past by starting over at the Grand Canyon Clinic. Silently battling her own health issues, Abby struggles with adjusting to the demands of this unique rural location. She encounters everything from squirrel bites to suicides to an office plagued by strong personalities. While tending to unprepared tourists, underserved locals, and her own mental trials, Abby finds herself entangled in an unexpected romance and trapped amidst a danger even more treacherous than the foreboding desert landscape.Sandra Cavallo Miller’s debut novel transports readers to the beautiful depths of Arizona and weaves an adventurous and heartwarming tale of the courage and strength it takes to overcome personal demons and to find love.

Tabula Rasa


Filip Forsberg - 2018
    An alien discovery in space with global repercussions.In a dystopian future, the earth is under strain due to natural disasters and accelerating pollution of the environment. On the coast of Madagascar, a ruthless corporate leader creates his own vision of the future in the shape of Tabula Rasa, a mega-complex inhabited by over a million people. Jonathan Jarl, a rookie agent for the Amber group, is on his first assignment and is assigned to retrieve the famous Nebra Sky disc that has been stolen. During the mission, he is faced with some of Tabula Rasas darkest secrets. Meanwhile, in orbit around the moon, a discovery is made that has potential implications for the entire human race but Tabula Rasa is doing everything in its powers to keep the discovery secret. In a lab within Tabula Rasa, an idealistic scientist decides to share the discovery with the world. She takes a fateful decision that puts her life on the line. Jonathan is thrown into a breakneck race for time and Tabula Rasa is the first thrilling installment about Jonathan Jarl and the Amber group.

Saabrina


Seth A. Cohen - 2015
    WHAT IF YOU'RE A SENTIENT SPACECRAFT who wants to be more than an intelligent weapon to implement government policy? Do you partner with another by-the-book sentinel like the one you just lost to your enemies or gamble on someone different, even if they are a middle-aged dad from a primitive world called Earth? And can you learn to work with him before your enemies kill billions? In Saabrina, book one of the Saabrina series, Saabrina, a small sentient spacecraft called a Saab (not the car from Sweden, but she can become one to blend in on Earth and anywhere else you’re expected to keep four wheels on the ground), gets a new partner, Bob Foxen, and maybe a start to something more.

An Assassin Is Born


Simon Harrak - 2018
    AND HE’S ABOUT TO BE UNLEASHED. Frederich Abel knows he’s not normal, but being adopted age seven by an elite soldier isn’t why. It lies deeper inside - a morbid, unhinged savagery. Invisible. Deadly.Luckily, his father helped him control it with a mixture of weapons, combat and survival training. Now, his father is dead, and the shadow has emerged stronger than ever. He flees in panic, ending up in cold, grimy Berlin.He’s on edge, until Ida’s scream through the rain pulls him into action. He’s forced to kill, unaware that the perpetrator had dangerous friends - powerful enough to tame world governments. It's time to decide; flee again, or face the darkness - both inside and out. ‘An Assassin Is Born’ is the intriguing origin story of Frederich Abel and the first book in the ‘Wrath Of Abel’ crime-action book series.

Deliberate Duplicity (Detective Sasha Frank Mysteries, #1)


David Rohlfing
    A complicated web of clues leaves Sasha and his team with more questions than answers: What's the killer's motive? And how are the victims connected to one another? As the story begins to unravel, the ordinarily calm and collected Sasha begins to feel the immense pressure of the case. Will he be able to solve the mystery before time runs out and bring justice to all who were affected?

Leftover Girl


C.C. Bolick - 2016
    At fifteen, she has adjusted to moving without notice and never fitting in, but everything changes with her adopted mom's hometown. There Jes falls for her mom's nephew, a love she hides when his betrayal leaves her isolated and driven to unravel the past.After Jes befriends a strange new student, she discovers an amazing secret: he's from another planet and searching for a missing girl who might be her. As Jes will learn, truth comes at a cost, but will she give up love to find out?

Fate of Perfection


K.F. Breene - 2017
    But her daughter inherits more than superior genetics…little Marie has a rare ability that the world has never seen, and her conglomerate, Moxidone, will stop at nothing to have sole possession of the child.Teamed with Ryker, the formidable master of security, Millicent must risk everything in a life-and-death struggle to tear her daughter away from the ruling force who wants to own them all. The odds are stacked against them, but Moxidone will learn that the pursuit of perfection comes at a perilous cost—and that love can’t be bought at any price.

FKA USA


Reed King - 2019
    Frank Baum’s The Wizard of Oz, Douglas Adams’s A Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, Cormac McCarthy’s The Road, and Ernie Cline’s Ready Player One.In Reed King’s wildly imaginative and possibly prescient debut, the United States has dissolved in the wake of environmental disasters and the catastrophic policies of its final president.It is 2085, and Truckee Wallace, a factory worker in Crunchtown 407 (formerly Little Rock, Arkansas, before the secessions), has no grand ambitions besides maybe, possibly, losing his virginity someday.But when Truckee is thrust unexpectedly into the spotlight he is tapped by the President for a sensitive political mission: to deliver a talking goat across the continent. The fate of the world depends upon it.The problem is—Truckee’s not sure it’s worth it.Joined on the road by an android who wants to be human and a former convict lobotomized in Texas, Truckee will navigate an environmentally depleted and lawless continent with devastating—and hilarious—parallels to our own, dodging body pickers and Elvis-worshippers and logo girls, body subbers, and VR addicts.Elvis-willing, he may even lose his virginity.FKA USA is the epic novel we’ve all been waiting for about the American end of times, with its unavoidable sense of being on the wrong end of the roller coaster ride. It is a masterwork of ambition, humor, and satire with the power to make us cry, despair, and laugh out loud all at once. It is a tour de force unlike anything else you will read this year.

Smash All the Windows


Jane Davis - 2018
    It will take courage to learn how to live again.‘An all-round triumph.’ John HudspithFor the families of the victims of the St Botolph and Old Billingsgate disaster, the undoing of a miscarriage of justice should be a cause for rejoicing. For more than thirteen years, the search for truth has eaten up everything. Marriages, families, health, careers and finances.Finally, the coroner has ruled that the crowd did not contribute to their own deaths. Finally, now that lies have been unravelled and hypocrisies exposed, they can all get back to their lives.If only it were that simple.Tapping into the issues of the day, Davis delivers a highly charged work of metafiction, a compelling testament to the human condition and the healing power of art. Written with immediacy, style and an overwhelming sense of empathy, Smash all the Windows will be enjoyed by readers of How to Paint a Dead Man by Sarah Hall and How to be Both by Ali Smith.