Beach Road
by James Patterson
Published 2006 by Little Brown and Company

Hardcover, English. ISBN: 0316159786

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Jacket Notes:

Down-and-out Montauk lawyer Tom Dunleavy's ship finally comes in when he's hired to defend a local man accused of the triple murder that has the East Hampton world in an uproar.

REVIEW: Publisher's Weekly 03/27/2006

Bestseller Patterson shows signs of having gone to the well too often in this slapdash collaboration with de Jonge, his coauthor onThe Beach House (2002). Tom Dunleavy, a former professional basketball player and local East Hampton legend, is getting by as an underworked and unmotivated attorney. His sports glory days and his one true love are long in the past, but he gets second chances at personal and professional redemption when three locals are gunned down, apparently in the aftermath of racial tensions arising from a heated pickup game of hoops. The police seize on Dante Halleyville, the country's best high school star, as their suspect, and Dunleavy must dust off his old courtroom skills and enlist his lost love, Kate Costello, as his partner. Patterson readers know to expect a surprise ending, but he leaves too few possibilities for many to be genuinely fooled. Fans can only hope that Patterson soon returns to the level he achieved with his Alex Cross series.(May)

Two Little Girls in Blue
by Mary Higgins Clark
Published 2006 by Simon & Schuster

Hardcover, English. ISBN: 0743264908

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Jacket Notes:

In her spellbinding new thriller, world-renowned suspense writer Mary Higgins Clark weaves the mysteries of telepathy into the story of a mother's search for a kidnapped child.

REVIEW: Publisher's Weekly 02/27/2006

Bestseller Clark is at her best when writing of crime against children, as shown in this chilling tale of kidnapping, murder and telepathy. Before leaving for a black-tie affair in New York City, Margaret and Steve Frawley celebrate the third birthday of their twin girls, Kathy and Kelly, with a party at their new home in Ridgefield, Conn. Later that night, when Margaret can't reach the babysitter, she contacts the Ridgefield police. The frantic couple return home to find the children missing and a ransom note demanding $8 million. Though the Frawleys meet all the conditions, only Kelly turns up in a car along with a dead driver and a suicide note saying that Kathy has died. But Kelly's telepathic messages from her sister keep telling her differently, and Margaret won't give up hope. Even the most skeptical law enforcement officers and the FBI, who pursue suspects from New York to Cape Cod, begin to believe Kelly is on to something. Clues from ordinary people lead to a riveting conclusion. Rivaling Clark's debut-Where Are the Children- -this suspense thriller is certain to send terror into the heart of any parent.(Apr.)

Dead Watch
by John Sandford
Published 2006 by Putnam Publishing Group

Hardcover, English. ISBN: 0399153543

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Jacket Notes:

From the author of the #1 bestselling Prey novels comes an extraordinary story of murder, passion, and deadly ambition--a political thriller like no other.

REVIEW: Publisher's Weekly 03/13/2006

When Lincoln Bowe, a controversial Republican ex-senator, disappears at the start of this fast-paced thriller from bestseller Sandford (Broken Prey ), the White House puts Jacob Winter, a veteran political operative with "an uncanny ability to navigate the world of bureaucracy," on the case. Bowe vanished shortly after making a fiery speech denouncing a rival, Arlo Goodman, the governor of Virginia and a demagogue who heads a volunteer militia group known as the Watchmen. When Bowe's burnt and headless corpse turns up, Winter is under even more pressure to discover those behind his murder. Aided by the dead man's attractive and possibly duplicitous widow, Madison, the fixer follows a trail of corpses and deception that suggests the killing may have been a staged piece of theater intended to derail Goodman's ascent to the presidency. Readers interested in a quick diverting romp without much gravitas will enjoy this, but serious Beltway fiction junkies might prefer their political thrillers to be a little more plausible.500,000 announced first printing. (May)

Digging to America
by Anne Tyler
Published 2006 by Alfred A. Knopf

Hardcover, English. ISBN: 0307263940

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Jacket Notes:

This luminous novel brims with tender observations about what it is to be an American, and about Iranian-born Maryam Yazdam, who after 35 years in this country must finally come to terms with her "outsiderness."

REVIEW: Publisher's Weekly 02/27/2006

Tyler (Breathing Lessons ) encompasses the collision of cultures without losing her sharp focus on the daily dramas of modern family life in her 17th novel. When Bitsy and Brad Donaldson and Sami and Ziba Yazdan both adopt Korean infant girls, their chance encounter at the Baltimore airport the day their daughters arrive marks the start of a long, intense if sometimes awkward friendship. Sami's mother, Maryam Yazdan, who carefully preserves her exotic "outsiderness" despite having emigrated from Iran almost 40 years earlier, is frequently perplexed by her son and daughter-in-law's ongoing relationship with the loud, opinionated, unapologetically American Donaldsons. When Bitsy's recently widowed father, Dave, endearingly falls in love with Maryam, she must come to terms with what it means to be part of a culture and a country. Stretching from the babies' arrival in 1997 until 2004, the novel is punctuated by each year's Arrival Party, a tradition manufactured and comically upheld by Bitsy; the annual festivities gradually reveal the families' evolving connections. Though the novel's perspective shifts among characters, Maryam is at the narrative and emotional heart of the touching, humorous story, as she reluctantly realizes that there may be a place in her heart for new friends, new loves and her new country after all.(May 9)