From one of America's best-loved storytellers - the author of the #1 New York Times bestseller WHERE THE HEART IS - comes a tale of a small Oklahoma town and the mystery that has haunted its residents for years. In 1972, windswept DeClare, Oklahoma, was consumed by the murder of a young mother, Gaylene Harjo, and the disappearance of her baby, Nicky Jack. When the child's pajama bottoms were discovered on the banks of Willow Creek, everyone feared that he, too, had been killed, although his body was never found.Nearly thirty years later, Nicky Jack mysteriously returns to DeClare, shocking the town and stirring up long-buried memories. But what he discovers about the night he vanished is more astonishing than he or anyone could have imagine. Piece by piece, what emerges is a story of dashed hopes, desperate love, and a secret that still cries out for justice...and redemption.From BooklistA man's desperate search for his identity drives this riveting offering from the author of best-sellers Where the Heart Is (1995) and The Honk and Holler Opening Soon (1998). No one in sleepy DeClare, Oklahoma, has forgotten the 1972 murder of pretty Cherokee Gaylene Harjo and the abduction of her infant son, Nicky Jack. Hard-nosed deputy sheriff Oliver "O Boy" Daniels pinned the blame on local preacher Joe Dawson, but few in town believed the kindly Joe was capable of such an act. Powerful emotions resurface 30 years later, when Nicky Jack, adopted and raised by a rich couple in Beverly Hills, mysteriously reappears, determined to learn about his mother and the circumstances surrounding her death. Veteran short-story writer Letts peppers her prose with a cast of quirky characters, including a quartet of nosy, domino-playing senior citizens and a perky pool-hall owner who bakes peanut-butter pies. Readers of Sue Miller and Wally Lamb are sure to embrace this memorable tale of love, loss, humanity, and hope. Allison BlockCopyright © American Library Association. All rights reservedReview'A great story...a little bit of mystery, a small piece of romance, and a whole lot of Billie Letts's special touch' - Oklahoman 'Letts's writing shines.' - San Francisco Examiner-Chronicle 'Riveting... powerful... readers are sure to embrace this memorable tale of love, loss, humanity, and hope.' - Booklist Views: 34
In this near future sci-fi, a college professor's dream of discovering a parallel Earth is in jeopardy when an astronomical phenomenon sends a trio of research students scrambling to unravel its mystery. Their only hope to answer all of its questions lies in a pair of unlikely astronauts who risk everything to learn more about the galaxy in which they live. Views: 34
Sister and brother duo Lily and Robert Brewster may not have a penny to their names, but at least they're in good company -- times couldn't be tougher in the Hudson River Valley during the Great Depression, and even the much-revered chief of police has abandoned his boardinghouse. The poor town has been stripped of its post office, too. Now mail gets dumped off the trains steaming along the Hudson River, and people have to rummage through the bags to find their letters and packages. When a shocked Robert discovers a group of gossipy old women snooping through other people's mail -- even threatening to destroy it! -- he knows something must be done. Perhaps he could hire the kindly train porter, who recently helped haul bags for a young widow and her newly arrived German grandfather, to sort through the mail in an orderly (and private) fashion? But when the porter is found dead, and a red swastika is found painted on the pretty widow's grandfather's shop window, Robert knows that something much deeper, and much darker, is happening in his sleepy little town. Even back at Grace and Favor, where Lily and Robert live, things are falling apart. The Harbinger brothers -- Voorburg's favorite handymen, who've been hired to work on the mansion's grounds -- have just unearthed a very, very old skeleton -- right in the Brewsters' front yard! Could the two murders be related? It's up to Lily and Robert to find out the truth before their quiet community is torn apart by hatred, secrets, and a killer who may have set his sights on Grace and Favor. . . Views: 34
Ginny Matthews had a six-foot-one-inch, compelling reason to stay away
from Gold Peak, Oregon: A long and lean cowboy by the name of Cully
Black.
But when her beloved foster parents were brutally murdered, Ginny knew
she had no choice but to return. Facing her past -- and long-buried
feelings for the handsome sheriff who still owned her heart -- was
harder than she'd anticipated. The long months of hiding had taken their
toll and Ginny could feel a presence lurking in the shadows. Watching.
Waiting. And soon, she became a killer's next target. She'd have to once
again place her trust in Cully, the only man who could keep her alive.
But was his protective embrace part of his official duty...or something
more? Views: 34
New York mystery editor Claire Rawlings spends her days scrutinizing the motives and methods of fictitious criminals—but her precocious thirteen-year-old friend Meredith Lawrence has a keen eye for the cold, hard facts of crime. So when Meredith comes to New York to visit, the two mystery buffs put their heads together to sleuth out the truth about a real-life murder. When Claire's star author, the ferociously flirtatious Blanche Dubois, is found dead after eating a poisoned apple, there's no shortage of suspects. Many who knew her were jealous of her success—and just as many were put off by her haughty, demanding demeanor. With the help of a city detective, Claire and Meredith question Blanche's friends, colleagues, and relatives—and discover that even in the Big Apple, the world of murder is a very small world indeed."Who Killed Blanche Dubois is an absolutely delightful and wonderfully clued story ... captures the reader's imagination." —... Views: 34
Featuring friendship, school, family, and a diverse community, these early illustrated chapter books from James Preller have it all. Got a mystery to solve? Jigsaw Jones is on the case. Eddie Becker has the idea of a lifetime, and creates plans for what he promises is going to be a million-dollar invention. Then the plans get stolen. Worst of all, after Jigsaw does some digging, he suspects the principal may be the thief! Now Jigsaw has to invent a gadget of his own to find out the truth. James Preller's wry, witty, Jigsaw Jones books are once again available to inspire the next generation of young readers, featuring both new titles and classroom classics! This title has Common Core connections. Views: 34
As a detective on the mean streets of Detroit, Amos Walker has to make friends in low places. It’s part of the job. So when the incredibly successful madam Beryl Garnet needs somebody to fulfill her last dying wish, she turns to Walker. She hasn’t seen her son in a long, long time, and wants him to have her ashes when she’s gone just to let him know she hasn’t forgotten about him. Walker obliges her.Walker finds Garnet’s son, Delwayne, a Vietnam War protestor who has been living in Canada since the 1960s, and hands over his mother’s ashes. When Walker returns to Detroit, he is surprised to learn that Delwayne is dead and he, Walker, is the prime suspect.To clear his name, Walker must find the murderer. In the process he discovers another murder, of a prizefighter from the 1940s…Curtis Smallwood, Delwayne’s father. Walker knows he has his work cut out for him when he discovers that the two murders, fifty-three years apart, were committed with the very same gun. Views: 34
When all the cards are wild, there are only three things to do: Lay 'em...play 'em...or slay 'em.When the hardened Apache scout called Deuces is court-martialed for cold-blooded murder, he's sentenced to hang. But an appeal saves him from the noose -- and he manages to escape on his way to prison in Texas. Relentless U.S. Marshal Burt Green is charged with finding the killer. Riding with a one-eyed Apache tracker, Burt hunts the elusive fugitive from Texas to the deep Southwest, where Deuces takes control of a band of renegade Apache and launches a reign of terror throughout the territory.Against an enemy as deadly as he is cunning, outgunned in the middle of a hellish land, Burt Green must face down Deuces in a war between the lawful and the lawless. A war from which only one man can walk away.... Views: 34
From Publishers WeeklyIn this sequel to A Singular Hostage, native Bostonian and Muslim convert Ali continues the saga of Marianna Givens, a young Englishwoman living in 19th-century India. Though competently written and often entertaining, the novel feels like exoticism cloaked as historical fiction (the prologue delivers a taste of what's to come: in Calcutta, Marianna encounters a Hindu soothsayer who points his "authoritative, brown hand away from the crowd" and tells her that her "path lies to the northwest" and that she "must return there to find [her] destiny"). Marianna casts her lot with the Sufi family of Shaikh Waliullah as she marries his son, the Punjabi courtier, Hassan Ali Khan. She flees to Calcutta with Hassan's infant son, Saboor, to protect him from the opium-addicted Maharajah of Punjab. After two years in exile, Marianna travels back to Lahore to give Saboor to his father, divorce Hassan and return to respectable British society. Ali convincingly captures both Victorian-era Punjabi and British court culture, and her description of the conniving ineptitude of the British as they travel across the subcontinent humanizes them. Upon arriving in Lahore, the traveling party finds itself caught between warring Punjabi factions. The conclusion, in which Marianna predictably displays a redemptive heroism, sets up for the final book in this trilogy, slated for release in 2005. Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. From School Library JournalAdult/High School–In this sequel to A Singular Hostage (Bantam, 2002), Mariana Givens, a tempestuous Englishwoman, is sent to India to find a husband from the surfeit of bachelor British officers there. Two years have passed since her disastrous first visit, when her reputation was ruined by her marriage to a wealthy Punjabi, Hassan. She is devoted to his son Saboor, whom she rescued from kidnappers and has been sheltering. The revelation that the marriage was never consummated affords Mariana the chance to restore her good name: once in Lahore she can return Saboor to his father, request a divorce, and proceed to Afghanistan with her aunt and uncle and the rest of the British entourage. But she again falls under the spell of Hassan and his family, and decides to stay with him. Amid fighting following the death of the maharajah, Mariana goes to tell her aunt and uncle of her decision and returns to find him gravely wounded. This mid-19th-century adventure story contrasts the richness of Islam and its strict laws regarding women with the equally rigid societal norms of privileged, upper-class British. The characters and their actions illustrate the barriers between cultures and the difficulty of establishing trust among peoples with different worldviews. The engaging ending suggests another installment to come.–Molly Connally, Chantilly Regional Library, VA Views: 34
Chief Warrant Officer Dave Riley and his team of Green Berets are summoned to perform "damage control" at a laboratory in Tennessee where top-secret research is made possible through funds granted by the Pentagon's "Black Budget." The scenario: "SYNBATs" (Synthetic Battle forms) have escaped the lab, and Riley's A-team must scour the hills of Western Tennessee to retrieve these bio-engineered genetic forms before they prove to be catastrophic. But when the men discover a bloody trail that leads them to the heart of urban Chicago, they are faced with unimaginable conditions. The "Black Projects" are never discussed but their existence is about to rock society. And the Green Berets witness how deadly their own forces can be. Views: 33
At one time, nothing had been able to quench Jeremy Blackstone's insatiable hunger for luscious Tricia Parker. He'd lived for their passion-filled encounters even though they were from such different worlds. Then ugly accusations of her betrayal ripped them apart....Years later Tricia had come home to help her grandfather, not to rekindle her affair with Blackstone. But Jeremy was injured and needed her nursing skills. Staying by Jeremy's bedside and seeing to his most intimate needs stirred a sensuous yearning in Tricia she couldn't control. Like déjà vu, the magnetic closeness they once shared ignited an irresistible attraction that inexorably pulled them together...again. Views: 33
