10/28: New at the library this week

Audiobooks

Suspect / Michael Robotham (unabridged; cassettes)
At forty-two, psychiatrist Joe O’Loughlin seems to have it all: a thriving practice, a beautiful wife, an adoring daughter. But Joe’s snug, happy world is crumbling. Recently diagnosed with Parkinson’s disease, he’s dreading the inevitable and all too palpable deterioration of his body and mind. Then, when the police ask for his help in solving the brutal murder of a woman they assume is a prostitute, he’s horrified to recognize the victim as a nurse he once worked with, and with whom he had a bit of a past. As Joe begins to suspect that one of his patients may be responsible, the police zero in on him.(read a sample chapter)

Mark Twain / Geoffrey C. Ward; Dayton Duncan; Ken Burns (unabridged; two copies: cassettes & CD)
A companion audiobook to the 4-hour PBS television series.
Using material from Twain’s works, diaries, and letters, Mark Twain follows the great writer/humorist/lecturer/people’s philosopher from the Hannibal, Missouri of his childhood, to the Europe and Middle East of his travels (and hilarious travel books); from his beginnings as a newspaperman to his storied life as (in his own words) “the most conspicuous man on the planet.”(read an exerpt)

The rise of Theodore Roosevelt / Edmund Morris (abridged; cassettes)
A biography published on the 100th anniversary of Theodore Roosevelt becoming president. (read a sample chapter)

The king of torts / John Grisham (unabridged; cassettes)
The office of the public defender is not known as a training ground for bright young litigators. Clay Carter has been there too long and, like most of his colleagues, dreams of a better job in a real firm. When he reluctantly takes the case of a young man charged with a random street killing, he assumes it is just another of the many senseless murders that hit D.C. every week.

As he digs into the background of his client, Clay stumbles on a conspiracy too horrible to believe. He suddenly finds himself in the middle of a complex case against one of the largest pharmaceutical companies in the world, looking at the kind of enormous settlement that would totally change his life—that would make him, almost overnight, the legal profession’s newest king of torts… (read an exerpt)

10/1: New at the library this week

Audiobooks

Undue influence / Steve Martini (unabridged; cassettes)
Paul Madriani is back in a complex web of murder and deceit — this time within his own family. His wife Nikki has just died of cancer. On her deathbed, Nikki made Paul promise to look after her younger sister, Laurel Vega, who is mired in a bitter child-custody battle with her ex-husband, a powerful state senator.

When Jack Vega’s new wife is found slain execution-style, Laurel becomes the prime suspect. Paul — remembering his promise to his wife — has no choice but to take Laurel’s case. But as he tries to mount a defense and probes deeper into the lives of those involved, he discovers a trail of betrayal and duplicity that hides the truth at every turn. (Paul Madriani Series #3)

For whom the bell tolls / Ernest Hemingway (unabridged; cassettes)
The story of Robert Jordan, a young American in the International Brigades, it tells of loyalty and courage, love and defeat, and the tragic death of an ideal.

Goodnight, Irene / Jan Burke (unabridged; cassettes)
For thirty-five years the identity of the dismembered woman found under the Las Piernas pier has remained a mystery. What secret did she take to her grave? Southern California reporter Irene Kelly has uncovered a maze of forensic records and confidential files that suggest a motive far more sinister than anyone imagined. The discovery has brought her close to Detective Frank Harriman, and closer still to exposing a killer who will resort to anything to keep his secrets buried — and Irene silenced forever.

2/16: New at the library this week

Books:

Undertow / Sydney Bauer — Christina Haynes is the teenage daughter of a popular US Senator, and when she drowns moments after a conversation at sea with her best friend’s mother, Boston Lawyer David Cavanaugh faces his toughest case to date.

Boom! : voices of the sixties : personal reflections on the ’60s and today / Tom Brokaw — The author takes us on a tour of the turbulent 1960s, blending his personal reflections with firsthand accounts from the people that lived through it. (read an sample chapter)

The sea of monsters / Rick Riordan — Percy Jackson’s seventh-grade year has been surprisingly quiet. Not a single monster has set foot on his New York prep-school campus. But when an innocent game of dodgeball among Percy and his classmates turns into a death match against an ugly gang of cannibal giants, things get . . . well, ugly. And the unexpected arrival of Percy’s friend Annabeth brings more bad news: the magical borders that protect Camp Half-Blood have been poisoned by a mysterious enemy, and unless a cure is found, the only safe haven for demigods will be destroyed. (Percy Jackson and the Olympians Series, #2; Age Range: 9 to 12)

2/2: New at the library this week

Audiobooks:

A wrinkle in time / Madeleine L’Engle — Meg Murry and her friends become involved with unearthly strangers and a search for Meg’s father, who disappeared while engaged in secret work for the government. (Age Range: 12 and up: Time Quartet Series, #1; read an sample chapter; casettes)

The Eyre affair / Jasper Fforde — When asked to summarize his creation is a single sentence, Jasper Fforde described it as “a literary detective thriller with romantic overtones, mad-inventor uncles, aunts trapped in Wordsworth poems, global multinationals, scheming evildoers, an excursion inside the novel Jane Eyre, dodos, knight-errant-time-traveling fathers, and the answer to the eternal question: Who really wrote Shakespeare’s plays?” (Thursday Next Series, #1; read an exerpt)

11/15: new at the library this week

Audiobooks:

• Blow fly / Patricia Daniels Cornwell — Dr. Kay Scarpetta is visiting Florida, hoping to get away from the pressures of her job. No such luck: down in the Sunshine State, she becomes involved in a terrifying international intrigue with ramifications that reach deep into Kay’s own life. (Kay Scarpetta Series, #12; cassette; read an exerpt)
• Bleachers / John Grisham — High school all-American Neely Crenshaw was probably the best quarterback ever to play for the legendary Messina Spartans. Fifteen years have gone by since those glory days, and Neely has come home to Messina to bury Coach Eddie Rake, the man who molded the Spartans into an unbeatable football dynasty. (cassette; read a sample chapter)
• Trace / Patricia Daniels Cornwell — Now freelancing from south Florida, Dr. Kay Scarpetta returns to Richmond, Virginia, the city that turned its back on her five years ago. Investigating the death of a young girl, she must follow the twisting leads and track the strange details in order to make the dead speak-and to reveal the sad truth that may be more than even she can bear. (Kay Scarpetta Series, #13; CD; read an exerpt)
• Post-mortem / Patricia Daniels Cornwell — Four women with nothing in common, united only in death. Four brutalized victims of a brilliant monster – a “Mr. Nobody”, moving undetected through a paralyzed city, leaving behind a gruesome trail of carnage . . . but few clues. With skilled hands, an unerring eye, and the latest advances in forensic research, an unrelenting female medical examiner – Kay Scarpetta – is determined to unmask a maniac. But someone is trying to sabotage Kay’s investigation from the inside. And worse yet, someone wants her dead . . . (Kay Scarpetta Series, #1; cassette; read an exerpt)
• The time traveler’s wife / Audrey Niffenegger — This is the remarkable story of Henry DeTamble, a dashing, adventuresome librarian who travels involuntarily through time, and Clare Abshire, an artist whose life takes a natural sequential course. Henry and Clare’s passionate love affair endures across a sea of time and captures the two lovers in an impossibly romantic trap (cassette; read a sample chapter)