Alias Grace

      Margaret Atwood
     Alias Grace

In this astonishing tour de force, Margaret Atwood takes the reader back in time and into the life and mind of one of the most enigmatic and notorious women of the nineteenth century. In 1843, at the age of sixteen, servant girl Grace Marks was convicted for her part in the vicious murders of her employer and his mistress. Some believe Grace is innocent; others think her evil or insane. Grace herself claims to have no memory of the murders. As Dr. Simon Jordan – an expert in the burgeoning field of mental illness – tries to unlock her memory, what will he find? Was Grace a femme fatale – or a weak and unwilling victim of circumstances? Taut and compelling, penetrating and wise, *Alias Grace* is a beautifully crafted work of the imagination that vividly evokes time and place. The novel and its characters will continue to haunt the reader long after the final page.

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    The Dead Girls of Hysteria Hall

      Katie Alender
     The Dead Girls of Hysteria Hall

In this asylum, your mind plays tricks on you all the time… Delia’s new house isn’t just a house. Long ago, it was the Piven Institute for the Care and Correction of Troubled Females—an insane asylum nicknamed “Hysteria Hall.” However, many of the inmates were not insane, just defiant and strong willed. Kind of like Delia herself. But the house still wants to keep “troubled” girls locked away. So, in the most horrifying way, Delia gets trapped. And that’s when she learns that the house is also haunted. Ghost girls wander the halls in their old-fashioned nightgowns. A handsome ghost boy named Theo roams the grounds. Delia finds that all the spirits are unsettled and full of dark secrets. The house, as well, harbors shocking truths within its walls—truths that only Delia can uncover, and that may set her free. But she’ll need to act quickly, before the house’s power overtakes everything she loves. From master of suspense Katie Alender comes a riveting tale of twisted memories and betrayals, and the meaning of madness.

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    Turbo Twenty-Three

      Janet Evanovich
     Turbo Twenty-Three

In the heart of Trenton, N.J., a killer is out to make sure someone gets his just desserts. Larry Virgil skipped out on his latest court date after he was arrested for hijacking an eighteen-wheeler full of premium bourbon. Fortunately for bounty hunter Stephanie Plum, Larry is just stupid enough to attempt almost the exact same crime again. Only this time he flees the scene, leaving behind a freezer truck loaded with Bogart ice cream and a dead body—frozen solid and covered in chocolate and chopped pecans. As fate would have it, Stephanie’s mentor and occasional employer, Ranger, needs her to go undercover at the Bogart factory to find out who’s putting their employees on ice and sabotaging the business. It’s going to be hard for Stephanie to keep her hands off all that ice cream, and even harder for her to keep her hands off Ranger. It’s also going to be hard to explain to Trenton’s hottest cop, Joe Morelli, why she is spending late nights with Ranger, late nights with Lula and Randy Briggs—who are naked and afraid—and late nights keeping tabs on Grandma Mazur and her new fella. Stephanie Plum has a lot on her plate, but for a girl who claims to have “virtually no marketable skills,” these are the kinds of sweet assignments she does best.

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    The Secret of Chimneys

      Agatha Christie
     The Secret of Chimneys

What is The Secret of Chimneys? A young drifter finds out when a favor for a friend pulls him into the heart of a deadly conspiracy in this captivating classic from Agatha Christie. Little did Anthony Cade suspect that an errand for a friend would place him at the center of a deadly conspiracy. Drawn into a web of intrigue, he begins to realize that the simple favor has placed him in serious danger. As events unfold, the combined forces of Scotland Yard and the French Sûreté gradually converge on Chimneys, the great country estate that hides an amazing secret. . . .

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    The Crooked Staircase

      Dean Koontz
     The Crooked Staircase

"I could be dead tomorrow. Or something worse than dead." Jane Hawk knows she may be living on borrowed time. But as long as she's breathing, she'll never cease her one-woman war against the terrifying conspiracy that threatens the freedom--and free will--of millions. Battling the strange epidemic of murder-suicides that claimed Jane's husband, and is escalating across the country, has made the rogue FBI agent a wanted fugitive, relentlessly hunted not only by the government but by the secret cabal behind the plot. Deploying every resource their malign nexus of power and technology commands, Jane's enemies are determined to see her dead . . . or make her wish she was. Jane's ruthless pursuers can't stop her from drawing a bead on her prey: a cunning man with connections in high places, a twisted soul of unspeakable depths with an army of professional killers on call. Propelled by her righteous fury and implacable insistence on justice, Jane will make her way from southern California to the snow-swept slopes of Lake Tahoe to confront head-on the lethal forces arrayed against her. But nothing can prepare her for the chilling truth that awaits when she descends the crooked staircase to the dark and dreadful place where her long nightmare was born.

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    Judge & Jury

      James Patterson
     Judge & Jury

Andie DeGrasse, an aspiring actress and single mom, is not your typical juror. Hoping to get dismissed from the pool, she tells the judge that most of her legal knowledge comes from a bit part curling around the stripper's pole in The Sopranos. But she still ends up as juror number 11 in a landmark trial against a notorious mob boss. The judge is terrified of the defendant. The case quickly becomes the new Trial of the Century. Mafia don Dominic Cavello, known as the Electrician, is linked to hundreds of gruesome, unspeakable crimes. Senior FBI agent Nick Pellisante has been tracking him for years. He knows Cavello's power reaches far beyond the courtroom but the FBI's evidence against the ruthless killer is ironclad. Conviction is sure thing. So is the jury. As the jury is about to reach a verdict, the Electrician makes one devastating move that no one could have predicted. The entire nation is reeling, and Andie's world is shattered. For her, the hunt for the Electrician becomes personal, and she and Pellisante come together in an unbreakable bond: they exact justice - at any cost. The verdict: Run for your life.

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    Beyond This Place

      A. J. Cronin
     Beyond This Place

Paul Mathry, a student about to graduate and embark upon a teaching career, finds out that his father was convicted for murder, a secret that his mother had hidden from him since his childhood. Driven by an intense desire to see his father, Paul sets out to visit him in prison, only to find out that visitors are never allowed there. From there, he meets the primary witnesses in the case that convicted his father, not all of whom are supportive to Paul's cause. He encounters several dead ends but he persists, with the help of a store girl named Lena and a news reporter. His persistent campaign finally bears fruit. Rees Mathry, Paul's father, goes on appeal and is vindicated. The novel ends with Paul's father, a hardened, cynical man, seeing a fleeting hope for self-renewal and a purposeful life.

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    Hickory Dickory Dock

      Agatha Christie
     Hickory Dickory Dock

A most unusual series of crimes at a student hostel intrigues Inspector Hercule Poirot in Agatha Christie’s Hickory Dickory Dock, especially when a simple case of kleptomania paves the way to murder.**** Hercule Poirot doesn’t need all his detective skills to realize something is troubling his secretary, Miss Lemon—she has made three mistakes in a simple letter. It seems an outbreak of kleptomania at the student hostel in which her sister works is distracting his usually efficient assistant. Deciding that desperate times call for desperate measures, the great detective agrees to investigate. Unknown to Poirot, however, desperation is a motive he shares with a killer. . . . ** 

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    Vampire Academy: The Untold Stories

      Richelle Mead
     Vampire Academy: The Untold Stories

Only a true best friend can protect you from your immortal enemies . . . Lissa Dragomir is a Moroi princess: a mortal vampire with a rare gift for harnessing the earth's magic. She must be protected at all times from Strigoi; the fiercest vampires - the ones who never die. The powerful blend of human and vampire blood that flows through Rose Hathaway, Lissa's best friend, makes her a dhampir. Rose is dedicated to a dangerous life of protecting Lissa from the Strigoi, who are hell-bent on making Lissa one of them. After two years of freedom, Rose and Lissa are caught and dragged back to St. Vladimir's Academy, a school for vampire royalty and their guardians-to-be, hidden in the deep forests of Montana. But inside the iron gates, life is even more fraught with danger . . . and the Strigoi are always close by. Rose and Lissa must navigate their dangerous world, confront the temptations of forbidden love, and never once let their guard down, lest the evil undead make Lissa one of them forever . . .

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    Harry Bosch Novels, The: Volume 2

      Michael Connelly
     Harry Bosch Novels, The: Volume 2

The Last Coyote: LAPD homicide detective Harry Bosch is suspended from the force for attacking his commanding officer. Unable to remain idle, he investigates the long-unsolved murder of a Hollywood prostitute. Trunk Music: Harry returns to the force to investigate the murder of a movie producer with Mafia ties. Up against both the LAPD's organized crime unit and the mob, Harry follows the money trail to Las Vegas, where the case becomes personal. Angels Flight: The murder of a prominent African-American attorney who made his career suing the police for racism and brutality means that Harry's friends and associates have become suspects; and he must work closely with longtime enemies suspicious of his maverick ways to investigate them. Together for the first time, these three chilling, pulse-pounding novels chart the volatile, breakneck career of the sleuth the New York Post calls "the quintessential mystery book hero" and prove that "Michael Connelly's Harry Bosch novels are the most impressive body of work by any writer of crime thrillers now active" (Washington Post).

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    Out

      Natsuo Kirino
     Out

Natsuo Kirino's novel tells a story of random violence in the staid Tokyo suburbs, as a young mother who works a night shift making boxed lunches brutally strangles her deadbeat husband and then seeks the help of her co-workers to dispose of the body and cover up her crime. The ringleader of this cover-up, Masako Katori, emerges as the emotional heart of Out and as one of the shrewdest, most clear-eyed creations in recent fiction. Masako's own search for a way out of the straitjacket of a dead-end life leads her, too, to take drastic action. The complex yet riveting narrative seamlessly combines a convincing glimpse into the grimy world of Japan's yakuza with a brilliant portrayal of the psychology of a violent crime and the ensuing game of cat-and-mouse between seasoned detectives and a group of determined but inexperienced criminals. Kirino has mastered a Thelma and Louise kind of graveyard humor that illuminates her stunning evocation of the pressures and prejudices that drive women to extreme deeds and the friendship that bolsters them in the aftermath.

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    Underworld

      Greg Cox
     Underworld

Based on the screenplay by Danny McBride. DEADLY RIVALS FOR CENTURIES, DESTINY WILL BRING THEM TOGETHER. Vampires and werewolves. Sworn enemies for over nine hundred years, they have fought a secret war in the darkest shadows of the mortal world, pitting undead strength and cunning against feral rage and savagery. Now, in the hip Gothic streets of modern-day Budapest, the ancient conflict takes an unexpected new twist. Selene is a Death Dealer, a vampire warrior dedicated to the destruction of the hated lycans. Michael is a werewolf, an innocent American newly infected with the lupine curse. Against all reason and history, they find themselves drawn together even as the grisly inhuman war rushes toward its nightmarish climax. They have no idea of the power their unlikely union can unleash -- and of the terrifying secrets that will be revealed in the unearthly realm of... UNDERWORLD

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