Book picks similar to
Excess: The Art of Treason by Mathias Frey
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Woman of the Dead
Bernhard Aichner - 2014
Hypnotic!' LISA GARDNERHow far would you go to avenge the one you love?Blum has a secret buried deep in her past.She thought she'd left the past behind.But then Mark, the man she loves, dies.His death looks like a hit-and-run. It isn't a hit-and-run. Mark has been killed by the men he was investigating.And then, suddenly, Blum rediscovers what she's capable of...KILL BILL meets DEXTER via THE GIRL WITH THE DRAGON TATTOO, WOMAN OF THE DEAD is a wild ride of a thriller where the first stage of grief is revenge. And revenge is a dish best served bloody.
The Boy Who Granted Dreams
Luca Di Fulvio - 2008
Ellis Island. Arriving off one of the many transatlantic freighters are Cetta Luminita and her illegitimate baby boy Natale, fleeing the poverty and violence of their Southern Italian hometown. Having sacrificed everything, and endured every possible shame, Cetta has but one wish: that her baby should be an American, and grow up with the freedom to decide his own destiny. As they alight, US Immigration officials give Natale a new name: Christmas. Growing up in the Lower East Side of New York with his mother, who works as a prostitute, Christmas is determined to be a success, whether a decent person or a gangster. The city is ruled by gangs from each community, Italian, Jewish and Irish, and survival is dependent on ruthlessness and strength. But Christmas has a vivid imagination, and an ability to tell stories that people want to believe...and thus is born his imaginary gang, the Diamond Dogs, which earns him respect within the ghetto. All this changes the day he saves the life of a rich Jewish girl Ruth, and despite their different backgrounds, he falls hopelessly in love with her. When circumstance tears them apart, Christmas vows that he will find her, by any means possible. A sweeping saga of love and hate set in the Roaring Twenties, The Boy Who Granted Dreams is the story of Christmas and Ruth; the story of the dawn of radio, Broadway and Hollywood; and above all, a story about believing in the power of dreams.
Retribution
Jilliane Hoffman - 2003
Townsend is a brilliant prosecutor known for keeping her cool even when trying the most horrific cases. The latest: an accused serial killer who savors cruelty and considers murder an art. But this case is different. C.J. recognizes the suspect. She knows what he's capable of. After all these years she still has the nightmares to prove it. Now she's walking a fine line between justice and revenge. Even C.J. isn't prepared for where it will take her.
SilverMoonLight
Marah Woolf - 2011
After the sudden death of her mother, she has no choice but to go and live with her Uncle and his family on the sleepy town of Portree on the Scottish Isle of Skye. The last thing she expects is to fall in love there. From the very first moment she meets Calum, his mysterious aura captivates her. He casts a spell on her, and even his seeming disinterest does little to change this. His contradictory behaviour only adds to his allure. But before long this fassade begins to crumble, and eventually even he gives in to his feelings. When he reveals his true identity to her one day, she flees from him. But it’s too late, for she has already fallen head over heels... A fantastical, mythical book for all fans of Twilight and Co -- without vampires and werewolves, but with many other fascinating creatures that anyone would love to encounter. Immerse yourself in the story of Emma and Calum.
The Terranauts
T. Coraghessan Boyle - 2016
As climate change threatens the earth, eight scientists, four men and four women dubbed the “Terranauts,” have been selected to live under glass in E2, a prototype of a possible off-earth colony. Their sealed, three-acre compound comprises five biomes—rainforest, savanna, desert, ocean and marsh—and enough wildlife, water, and vegetation to sustain them. Closely monitored by an all-seeing Mission Control, this New Eden is the brainchild of eco-visionary Jeremiah Reed, aka G.C.—“God the Creator”—for whom the project is both an adventure in scientific discovery and a momentous publicity stunt. In addition to their roles as medics, farmers, biologists, and survivalists, his young, strapping Terranauts must impress watchful visitors and a skeptical media curious to see if E2’s environment will somehow be compromised, forcing the Ecosphere’s seal to be broken—and ending the mission in failure. As the Terranauts face increased scrutiny and a host of disasters, both natural and of their own making, their mantra: “Nothing in, nothing out,” becomes a dangerously ferocious rallying cry.Told through three distinct narrators—Dawn Chapman, the mission’s pretty young ecologist; Linda Ryu, her bitter, scheming best friend passed over for E2; and Ramsay Roothorp, E2’s sexually irrepressible Wildman—The Terranauts brings to life an electrifying, pressured world in which connected lives are uncontrollably pushed to the breaking point. With characteristic humor and acerbic wit, T. C. Boyle indelibly inhabits the perspectives of the various players in this survivalist game, probing their motivations and illuminating their integrity and fragility to illustrate the inherent fallibility of human nature itself.
Honeymoon in Paris
Jojo Moyes - 2012
Sophie, a provincial girl, is swept up in the glamour of Belle poque Paris but discovers that loving a feted artist like Edouard brings undreamt of complications. Following in Sophie's footsteps a hundred years later, Liv, after a whirlwind romance, finds her Parisian honeymoon is not quite the romantic getaway she had been hoping for...This enthralling self-contained story will have you falling in love with Liv and Sophie, and with Paris then and now, and it is the perfect appetizer for the The Girl You Left Behind, a spellbinding story of love, devotion and passion in the hardest of times.
The Chemistry of Death
Simon Beckett - 2006
Working as a simple country doctor, seeing his lost wife and daughter only in his dreams, David struggles to remain uninvolved when the corpse of a woman is found in the woods, a macabre sign from her killer decorating her body. In one horrifying instant, the quiet summer countryside that had been David’s refuge has turned malevolent—and suddenly there is no place to hide.The village of Manham is tight-knit, far from the beaten path. As a newcomer, Dr. Hunter is immediately a suspect. Once an expert in analyzing human remains, he reluctantly joins the police investigation—and when another woman disappears, it soon becomes personal. Because this time she is someone David knows, someone who has managed to penetrate the icy barrier around his heart. With a killer’s bizarre and twisted methods screaming out to him, with a brooding countryside beset with suspicion, David can feel the darkness gathering around him. For as the clock ticks down on a young woman’s life, David must follow a macabre trail of clues—all the way to its final, horrifying conclusion.
Genocide of One
Kazuaki Takano - 2011
During a briefing in Washington D.C., the President is informed of a threat to national security: a three-year-old boy named Akili, who is already the smartest being on the planet. Representing the next step in human evolution, Akili can perceive patterns and predict future events better than most supercomputers, and is capable of manipulating grand-scale events like pieces on a chess board. And yet, for all that power, Akili has the emotional maturity of a child -- which might make him the most dangerous threat humanity has ever faced. An American soldier, Jonathan Yeager, leads an international team of elite operatives deep into the heart of the Congolese jungle under Presidential orders to destroy this threat to humanity before Akili's full potential can be realized. But Yeager has a very sick child, and Akili's advanced knowledge of all things, medicine included, may be Yeager's only hope for saving his son's life. Soon Yeager finds himself caught between following his orders and saving a creature with a hidden agenda, who plans to either save humanity as we know it -- or destroy it.
The Book With No Name
Anonymous - 2006
This would all be quite ordinary in those rough streets, except that Jensen is the Chief Detective of Supernatural Investigations. The breakneck plot centers around a mysterious blue stone
—
The Eye of the Moon—and the men and women who all want to get their hands on it: a mass murderer with a drinking problem, a hit man who thinks he's Elvis, and a pair of monks among them. Add in the local crime baron, an amnesiac woman who's just emerged from a five-year coma, a gypsy fortune teller, and a hapless hotel porter, and the plot thickens fast. Most importantly, how do all these people come to be linked to the strange book with no name? This is the anonymous, ancient book that no one seems to have survived reading. Everyone who has ever read it has been murdered. What can this mean?
Begin Again
Mona Kasten - 2016
She breaks them all.A new start. It's the only thing keeping Allie Harper going, when she packs up her life and moves across the country to Woodshill, Oregon. She's about to start college, desperate to leave the ghosts of her past behind her. Even if that means never talking to her parents again.Now the hard part - finding an apartment before classes start. Just when it seems she'll have to live out of her car, Allie visits one more place. It's beautiful. With one exception: can she stand being roommates with campus bad boy Kaden White? Sure, Kaden is sexy with his tattoos and careless attitude, but he's also an arrogant jerk. With nowhere else to go, Allie moves in.The first thing Kaden does is make a set of rules. Either Allie obeys, or she's out:1. Don't talk about your girl problems.2. Keep your mouth shut if I bring someone home.3. We will NEVER hook up.Easy enough, thinks Allie. Who would want to get involved with a brute like Kaden? But the more she gets to know him, the more she sees beyond his gruff facade. He, too, is harboring some painful secrets. For Kaden and Allie, it gets harder and harder to ignore the sparks between them. And the lines between the rules start to blur-Begin Again is a beautiful romance that shows us just how possible it is to start over. To find freedom in heartbreak and love in the most unlikely places.
Shadow Prowler
Alexey Pehov - 2002
An army is gathering: giants, ogres and other creatures joining forces from across the Desolate Lands, united for the first time in history under one black banner. By the spring, or perhaps sooner, the Nameless One and his forces will be at the walls of the great city of Avendoom.
The Trap
Melanie Raabe - 2015
Haunted by the unsolved murder of her younger sister--who she discovered in a pool of blood--and the face of the man she saw fleeing the scene, Linda's hermit existence helps her cope with debilitating anxiety. But the sanctity of her oasis is shattered when she sees her sister's murderer on television. Hobbled by years of isolation, Linda resolves to use the plot of her next novel to lay an irresistible trap for the man. As the plan is set in motion and the past comes rushing back, Linda's memories -- and her very sanity -- are called into question. Is this man a heartless killer or merely a helpless victim?
Fünf
Ursula Poznanski - 2012
A dismembered handN47° 48.022 E013° 10.910 Two severed earsN47° 26.195 E013° 12.523 A mutilated corpseA woman is found murdered. Tattooed on her feet is a strange combination of numbers and letters.Map co-ordinates. The start of a sinister treasure hunt by a twisted killer.Detective Beatrice Kaspary must risk all she has to uncover the killer in a terrifying game of cat-and-mouse
The Brightest Stars
Anna Todd - 2018
And like anyone who has grown up around an army base, she knows the background noise that follows a soldier home from war. That's why she's forging her own quiet life in her own little house. But she hasn't turned her back on her family. She's the glue that holds them together-when her father is deployed, when her brother, Austin, has another brush with the law.Karina knows that she has to look after herself, that she can't always fix what's broken. But when Austin's behavior worsens and her father's reactions grow more extreme, Karina feels her own edges beginning to fray. That's when she meets him-a closed book she's desperate to open.At just twenty, Kael is a handsome, brooding soldier struggling with the aftermath of two tours in Afghanistan. He's emotionally damaged and closed off. Quiet doesn't begin to describe him. But as Karina gets used to his stable presence, she finds it hard to ignore the way he makes her feel. In their time together, she finds the stillness she has always wanted and never found. She lets down her guard. And she lets herself fill in the blanks about this mysterious man.But illusions quickly made are quickly shattered. That's when Karina has to find her own courage-to untangle the truth from the lies, and decide what she's going to do about it.A riveting story about love and lies, The Brightest Stars will stay with you long after the last page has been turned.
Measuring the World
Daniel Kehlmann - 2005
One of them, the Prussian aristocrat Alexander von Humboldt, negotiates savanna and jungle, travels down the Orinoco, tastes poisons, climbs the highest mountain known to man, counts head lice, and explores every hole in the ground. The other, the barely socialized mathematician and astronomer Carl Friedrich Gauss, does not even need to leave his home in Göttingen to prove that space is curved. He can run prime numbers in his head. He cannot imagine a life without women, yet he jumps out of bed on his wedding night to jot down a mathematical formula. Von Humboldt is known to history as the Second Columbus. Gauss is recognized as the greatest mathematical brain since Newton. Terrifyingly famous and more than eccentric in their old age, the two meet in Berlin in 1828. Gauss has hardly climbed out of his carriage before both men are embroiled in the political turmoil sweeping through Germany after Napoleon’s fall.Already a huge best seller in Germany, Measuring the World marks the debut of a glorious new talent on the international scene.