Precious Author: Sapphire child-.., Claireece Precious Jones is an overweight, illiterate black teena ISBN: 0-307-57811-9

Audio CD Random House Audio

 Claireece Precious Jones endures unimaginable hardships in her young life. Abused by her mother, raped by her father, she grows up poor, angry, illiterate, fat, unloved and generally unnoticed. So what better way to learn about her than through her own, halting dialect. That is the device deployed in the first novel by poet and singer Sapphire. "Sometimes I wish I was not alive," Precious says. "But I don't know how to die. Ain' no plug to pull out. 'N no matter how bad I feel my heart don't stop beating and my eyes open in the morning." An intense story of adversity and the mechanisms to cope with it. Precious is now a major motion picture based on the novel

Mirror Mirror CD: A Novel Author: Maguire, Gregory Mcdonough, John ISBN: 0-06-176183-4

Audio CD HarperAudio

Maguire has a lock on clever, elaborate retellings of fairy tales, turning them inside out and couching them in tongue-in-cheek baroque prose. After his revisionist takes on Oz's Wicked Witch of the West (Wicked) and Cinderella's ugly stepsisters (Confessions of an Ugly Stepsister), he now tackles Snow White. The notorious Borgia habit of poisoning rivals inspired him to transplant the classic tale to 16th-century Tuscany, where Vicente de Nevada is an expatriate Spanish widower who lives with his daughter, the fair Bianca. Beholden to sinister Cesare Borgia and Cesare's sister (and perhaps lover) Lucrezia, Vicente is sent on what appears to be a fool's errand, to discover and steal from a Middle East monastery a branch of the Tree of Knowledge complete with three apples. When Bianca is 11, Cesare's attraction to her causes the envious Lucrezia to order a young hunter to murder her and deliver her heart in a casket. Bianca, of course, is spared and taken in by seven dwarfs. But this is not Disney; the dwarfs are boulders, stirred to life by Bianca's arrival ("a clothed, bearded obstinacy became slowly apparent"). Several years pass in surreal, dreamlike fashion, with Bianca tending to the dwarfs, who cavort stiffly and philosophize collectively. When Vicente returns successful, Lucrezia poisons an apple for her rival. Innocent Bianca's fate is gentle, but that of the corrupt Lucrezia, in brilliant Venice, is appropriately grotesque. Fairy tales in their original form are often brutal and disturbing; with his rich, idiosyncratic storytelling, Maguire restores the edge to an oft-told tale and imbues it with a strange, unsettling beauty.

The Given Day CD Author: Lehane, Dennis Boatman, Michael ISBN: 0-06-166151-1

Audio CD HarperAudio

 Set in Boston at the end of the First World War, New York Times bestselling author Dennis Lehane's long-awaited eighth novel unflinchingly captures the political and social unrest of a nation caught at the crossroads between past and future. Filled with a cast of unforgettable characters more richly drawn than any Lehane has ever created, The Given Day tells the story of two families--one black, one white--swept up in a maelstrom of revolutionaries and anarchists, immigrants and ward bosses, Brahmins and ordinary citizens, all engaged in a battle for survival and power. Beat cop Danny Coughlin, the son of one of the city's most beloved and powerful police captains, joins a burgeoning union movement and the hunt for violent radicals. Luther Laurence, on the run after a deadly confrontation with a crime boss in Tulsa, works for the Coughlin family and tries desperately to find his way home to his pregnant wife. Here, too, are some of the most influential figures of the era--Babe Ruth; Eugene O'Neill; leftist activist Jack Reed; NAACP founder W. E. B. DuBois; Mitchell Palmer, Woodrow Wilson's ruthless Red-chasing attorney general; cunning Massachusetts governor Calvin Coolidge; and an ambitious young Department of Justice lawyer named John Hoover. Coursing through some of the pivotal events of the time--including the Spanish Influenza pandemic--and culminating in the Boston Police Strike of 1919, The Given Day explores the crippling violence and irrepressible exuberance of a country at war with, and in the thrall of, itself. As Danny, Luther, and those around them struggle to define themselves in increasingly turbulent times, they gradually find family in one another and, together, ride a rising storm of hardship, deprivation, and hope that will change all their lives. “[An] engrossing epic. . . . A vision of redemption and a triumph of the human spirit.”

 

Deeper Than the Dead Deeper Than the Dead Author: Hoag, Tami Potter, Kirsten ISBN: 0-7393-6580-0 Category: American Mystery & Suspense Fiction Audio CD Random House Audio  Bestseller Hoag (Kill the Messenger) ventures into serial killer territory with results sure to please her many fans, though unresolved plot threads, both intentional and inadvertent, may put off veteran readers of the genre. One fall day in 1985 in Oak Knoll, Calif., fifth-grader Tommy Crane and his sidekick, Wendy Morgan, are fleeing the class bully, Dennis Farman, through a local park when Tommy stumbles over the head of a dead woman buried up to her neck. Two hours from Los Angeles, Oak Knoll is not the sort of town where major crime is a problem, but a serial killer is on the loose who's already murdered and tortured several women and has another on deck in his secret lair. Fifth-grade teacher Anne Navarre, who counsels Tommy and Wendy, is soon at the center of the investigation being led by a hunky FBI agent, Vince Leone. This is serial killer lite with Hoag's romance roots dictating both the prose style and the unveiling of the killer. The Wolf at the Door The Wolf at the Door Author: Higgins, Jack Page, Michael ISBN: 1-4418-1617-8 Category: English Mystery & Suspense Fiction Audio CD Brilliance Audio on CD Unabridged In bestseller Higgins's exciting 17th Sean Dillon thriller (after A Darker Place), Russian prime minister Vladimir Putin is behind a plot to kill Dillon and other members of the British prime minister's private intelligence army as payback for their being such a thorn in his side over the years. In London, Gen. Charles Ferguson, who's just left a late-night meeting of Commonwealth ministers, is walking toward his car when it explodes, killing his driver. In New York City, Maj. Harry Miller, who's in the U.S. to attend a U.N. meeting, goes for a stroll in Central Park, where he neatly turns the tables on a hired hit man. Extensive flashbacks explain how the attacks on each of the marked men evolved, with much space devoted to the chief assassin, Daniel Holley. Sizzle: A Novel Sizzle: A Novel Author: Garwood, Julie Denaker, Susan ISBN: 0-7393-5766-2 Category: American Light Romantic Fiction Audio CD Random House Audio  Whether it's exhilarating historical romance or spine-tingling contemporary suspense, #1 New York Times bestselling author Julie Garwood weaves magnificent stories of passion, adventure, and intrigue. Now she raises the heat and spices up the action with a sexy, smart, daring new heroine and a smoldering thriller that's classic Garwood--and pure Sizzle. Lyra Prescott, a Los Angeles film student, is closing in on graduation and facing important decisions about her future. She's already been offered a job at her hometown TV station, an opportunity that could ultimately launch her dream career as a film editor. But heading back home would also mean dealing with her overprotective brothers, social-climbing mother, and eccentric grandmother. Unsure of her future, Lyra dives into work on her final school assignment: a documentary transformed by a twist of fate into a real-life horror film. After she unwittingly captures a shocking crime on camera, a rash of mysterious, treacherous incidents convince Lyra that she's trapped in a sinister scenario headed for a violent ending. Running scared, she turns to her best friend, Sidney Buchanan, whose connections bring dauntless and devilishly handsome FBI agent Sam Kincaid into Lyra's life. As the noose of deadly intrigue tightens and the feelings between them deepen, Lyra and Sam must place their faith in each other's hands--and stand together against the malevolent forces about to break loose.   No one mixes life-and-death suspense with feverish desire better than Julie Garwood. In Sizzle she burns hotter and brighter than ever, keeping the action and passion blazing till the incredible, unforgettable end.   Not My Daughter Not My Daughter Author: Delinsky, Barbara Campbell, Cassandra ISBN: 0-7393-6952-0 Category: American Contemporary Fiction - Individual Authors + Audio CD Random House Audio  Kristin Hannah Reviews Not My Daughter Kristin Hannah is the New York Times bestselling author of 18 novels, including Firefly Lane, On Mystic Lake, Between Sisters, and True Colors. She is a former lawyer turned writer and is the mother of one son. She and her husband live in the Pacific Northwest and Hawaii. Read her exclusive Amazon guest review of Not My Daughter: In this compelling, ripped-from-the-headline offering from bestselling author Barbara Delinsky, three high school seniors make a pregnancy pact. Heightening the stakes, these aren't just any seniors--these are three popular, college-bound girls from good families. Set in an insular, tightly knit community in Maine, Not My Daughter explores the consequences of pact behavior on a small town, as well as the strain placed on mothers and daughters who find themselves in unfamiliar terrain. One of the pregnant teens is the daughter of the high school principal--a former teen mother herself--and the local school board is quick to assign blame. When the national media gets wind of the story, the principal's job is put in jeopardy, as is her standing in the community. Not My Daughter is a timely exploration of teen motherhood and the hard choices that sometimes have to be made in life. Heat Wave Heat Wave Author: Castle, Richard Heller, Johnny ISBN: 1-4001-1425-X Category: Crime & mystery Audio CD Tantor Media  The title character from ABC's hit television series Castle kicks off his new series of books featuring tough and sexy New York police detective Nikki Heat with a bang. About the Author Richard Castle is the author of numerous bestsellers, including the critically acclaimed Derrick Storm series. His first novel, In a Hail of Bullets, published while he was still in college, received the Nom DePlume Society's prestigious