Need by Carrie Jones

Need by Carrie Jones (Bloomsbury, hardcover, $16.99) is a YA story of romance and paranormal adventure.

Zara’s stepfather has just died and her mother has exiled her from Charleston, SC to live with her grandmother in Maine. On her first day in Maine, she sees the creepy guy she’s been seeing out of the corner of her eye ever since her dad died. With the help of some new friends, including sexy Nick, she learns that the stalker may be a pixie trying to make her his evil queen.

Jones has written several previous YA novels and she has a very readable and assured style. I think Need will be quite popular with fans of Melissa Marr and Stephenie Meyer.  

Check availability of Carrie Jones books at Fiction Addiction.

Seduction at Christmas Contest

Seduction at Christmas by Cathy Maxwell (Avon, paperback, $7.99) is a sweet Regency-era romance that ends with a Christmas wedding. Fiona Lachlan had a privileged upbringing in Scotland, but a series of family tragedies leave her penniless and alone in London trying to make ends meet as a seamstress. Desperation and a promise of 20 pounds lead Fiona to a chance meeting with Nick, Duke Holburn.

Nick is an inveterate gambler whose motto is “beware innocence”. Fiona is basically innocence incarnate. Needless to say, sparks soon fly between the two. I recommend this book for fans of Christina Dodd.

If you are interested in winning a free copy of A Seduction at Christmas please leave a comment on this article. I’ll pick a winner on November 7th. The author is also giving away signed bookplates while supplies last. Simply email her or visit www.cathymaxwell.com.

Tony Hillerman Has Died

Tony Hillerman, beloved mystery novelist, died on Sunday at the age of 83 due to pulmonary failure. Hillerman inspired a new mystery subgenre with his long-running Tribal Police series set among the Navajos of the Southwest. The series featured two detectives – Jim Chee and Joe Leaphorn — who began as separate characters and then later worked together on cases. 

Other authors following in Hillerman’s footsteps include Michael McGarrity, Aimee & David Thurlo, and Sandi Ault.

October Business Bookclub Wrapup

Fiction Addiction’s business bookclub met for its last meeting of the year last night to discuss The Google Story by Vise & Malseed (Random House, paperback, $14.00).

Though it was a small group, we all found the book entertaining and an easy read. The only complaint that half of us had was that the authors seemed too in love with Google and perhaps not as critical as they could have been. Personally, I found the events behind Google’s founding and meteorotic success just a little too fortuitous to learn any relevant business lessons from. After all, not all of us can be brilliant Sanford PhD candidates with great contacts…

The club will not meet again until January at which time we will be reading a yet-to-be-picked selection : )

Armageddon Conspiracy Signing Saturday, 10/25

SC author John Thompson will be signing copies of his debut thriller, Armageddon Conpsiracy (Harbor House, hardcover, $24.95) on Saturday, October 25th from 2-5pm.

My mom and I have both read Armageddon Conspiracy and find it to be a very readable, fast-paced thriller with likeable characters. It involves the unlikely alliance between a fundamentalist Christian sect and a radical Muslim terrorist group who each have their own reasons for wanting to kill the President of the United States. Our hero, Brent Lucas, has been set up as the fall guy and is in a race to clear his name and stop the terrorist plot. He’s aided by his ex-girlfriend, a cop who’s just been assigned to a terrorist task force.

The author’s 25 years of experience as a New York investment banker have been transformed into a very timely political and financial thriller:  The Wall Street financial shenanigans used to finance the terrorist’s scheme will probably not surprise anyone who has been following the news recently!

So, stop by and pick up a personalized copy of this fast-moving thriller and perhaps get the author’s thoughts on the recent Wall Street meltdown.

If you can’t make the event, you can reserve a personalized copy by emailing us in advance of the event.

Bookclub Party a Success!

Last night was our first-ever bookclub party. The idea behind the party was to help bookclub members learn about new books being published and make it easier for them to pick their reading selections (the earlier we get your lists the better   The party was well attended and all the participants seemed to enjoy getting access to new releases and not yet published books. We plan to turn the event into an annual one, so look for it again next October.

The unexpected hit of the party, though, was my mother’s punch. I wanted to have a nonalcoholic alternative to the wine we were serving, so my mom brought her pineapple-banana punch, which was a big crowd pleaser. As it turned out, this traditional Southern punch recipe was listed in one of the ARCs (advance reading copy) we had on hand for the forthcoming cookbook, The Cracker Kitchen by Janis Owens (Scribner, hardcover, $25.00, available 2/10/09).

The Longest Trip Home

The Longest Trip Home by John Grogan (William Morrow, hardcover, $27.95) is the bestselling author’s memoir of being raised by middle-class, devoutedly Catholic parents in an idyllic Detroit suburb. A born skeptic and troublemaker, John never really understood his parents’ deep religious faith. This schism intensified when he married a Protestant and then chose not to raise his children in the Catholic Church.

John’s childhood reminiscences are often hilarious, but it is his adult struggles to forge a religious identity separate from his parents without completely alienating them that many readers will identify most strongly with. 

The Longest Trip Home is a heartwarming book about loving your family despite your differences.

Check availability of John Grogan books at Fiction Addiction.

Serena

Serena by Ron Rash (Ecco, hardcover, $24.95) is a dark Southern Gothic tale of greed, corruption, and revenge set against the backdrop of the Western North Carolina mountains. It is 1929 and Serena Pemberton, daughter of a timberman and now wife to another, will let nothing stand in the way of her business ambitions. She overcomes rattlesnakes, the stock market crash, the nascent environmentalist movement, the betrayal by a business partner, and even her husband’s momentary weakness to power through and acheive her ends. Though compared to Lady Macbeth by other reviewers, Serena distinguishes herself by never wavering in her goals. Though one cannot sympathize with her methods, her unswerving determination and purity of focus is hypnotically compelling.

Check availability of Ron Rash’s books as Fiction Addiction.

The Secret Life of Bees in Theatres Soon

The Secret Life of Bees by Sue Monk Kidd has been a regional and national bestseller and is now coming the big screen! The movie will premiere in Charleston, SC on October 16th and then will officially release on October 17th. The film stars Dakota Fanning as Lily Owens, a 14-year-old girl haunted by the memory of her late mother. Click here to view the movie trailer.

Check availability of Sue Monk Kidd books at Fiction Addiction.

The White Mary by Kira Salak

As I was riding back from the SIBA trade show, I randomly reached into one of the many boxes of ARCs and signed books we had accrued and pulled out The White Mary by Kira Salak (Holt, hardcover, $25.00). I found this debut novel to be a very readable retelling of Heart of Darkness using a female war correspondent as the protagonist. For reasons of her own, Marika Vecera sets off on an arduous trek through the jungles of Papua New Guinea to learn whether the award-winning reporter who inspired her career, Robert Lewis, has faked his own suicide and is in fact still alive.

Salak’s experience as the first woman to traverse Papua New Guinea informs her narrative and gives it a wonderfully authentic feeling. I think The White Mary would be a great pick for bookclubs, anyone who enjoys literary adventure fiction, or perhaps even as an extracredit assignment for those studying Conrad. But be forewarned that the book contains some graphic scenes that may stick with you long after you’ve put it down.

Check availability of Kira Salak books at Fiction Addiction.