Hot Titles Arriving Today
Tuesday is the traditional release day for major titles and several are hitting this week with fanfare.
Judy Blume seems to be having a great time promoting her title for adults, In the Unlikely Event (RH.Knopf; RH Audio; RH Large Print)
Stephen King’s Finders Keepers (S&S/Scribner; S&S Audio; Thorndike) is enjoying an appreciative reception, from the daily NYT (“One of the pleasures of Finders Keepers is watching Mr. King’s ways of making pages turn”) to USA Today (4 of 4 stars).
Other titles receiving attention:
Eight Hundred Grapes, Laura Dave, (S&S; S&S Audio)
A GalleyChat favorite in February. this is the LibraryReads #1 pick for June:
“Take your time and savor the family dynamics. Enjoy the romantic twists in this tale of a career-minded young woman circling back to her roots at a California winery. The appeal is broader than that of a romance since it delves into the complexities of various relationships — parent to parent, parents and children, even winery and owner. This is an excellent summer read!” — Joan Hipp, Florham Park Public Library, Florham Park, NJ
Saint Mazie, Jami Attenberg, (Hachette/Grand Central; Hachette Audio; OverDrive sample)
A favorite of Jen Dayton’s, Darien Public Library, she brought this one up during the Shout ‘n’ Share program at BEA. If you’ve read Attenberg’s first book, The Middlesteins, says Dayton, this one is quite different. Set in the Depression, it is inspired by a true story from Joseph Mitchell’s classic Up in the Old Hotel, of a woman who opened her NYC movie theater to those who needed a place to “feel human.”
It is an Amazon June spotlight pick, one of ten books on the Wall Street Journal‘s Summer Reading preview as well as one of Entertainment Weekly‘s 10 big fat beach reads to look out for this summer (it’s not THAT fat, it’s more of a middle weight at 356 pages).
Palace of
Treason, Jason Matthews, (S&S/Scribner; S&S Audio)
Profiled in the New York Times last week, Matthews a retired spy turned novelist. His first book Red Sparrow came out in 2013 and hit the USA Today best seller list at #101 for one week. Film rights were bought by Fox and a screenwriter was announced a year ago. This is the sequel.
The NYT describes both novels as “old school” and Matthews tells the interviewer, “A lot of new thrillers are written by people who have not lived the life, and a lot of them seem to be about a bipolar Agency guy, helped by his bipolar girlfriend, trying to chase a bipolar terrorist who has a briefcase nuke, and there’s 12 hours left to go. My book is all fiction, but it’s an amalgam of people I’ve known, of things I’ve done, of stuff I’ve lived.”
It’s featured in Entertainment Weekly‘s summer reading preview, USA Today’s 25 hot books for summer and an Indie Next pick.
The Sunlit Night, Rebecca Dinerstein, (Macmillan/Bloomsbury; OverDrive sample)
After reading so many stories in U.S. newspapers about the next hot book coming from the U.K., it’s refreshing to read this headline in The Telegraph, “The Latest Us Literary Sensation” applied to Dinerstein’s debut. It is also an Indie Next pick:
The endless daylight of a Norwegian summer is the perfect backdrop for this warm and quirky debut filled with unusual characters and situations, a setting that is real yet somehow out of time, visual and precise writing, emotional warmth, and faith in the healing power of love. This tale of Frances and Yasha, their families, and their companions during a transformative summer in perpetual Arctic light is a perfect read for fans of Nicole Krauss’ The History of Love or Bill Forsyth’s classic movie, Local Hero.” —Anmiryan Budner, Main Point Books, Bryn Mawr, PA
A Field Guide to Awkward Silences, Alexandra Petri, (Penguin/NAL; OverDrive sample)
Washington Post columnist Petri, says Dave Barry in the cover blurb, “is the funniest person in Washington. This is all the more impressive when you consider that Congress is also located there.” As proof, her column this week is titled, “Christian Grey’s perspective is the only thing that could make Fifty Shades of Grey worse.” This book is a memoir.
Eeny Meeny, M. J. Arlidge, (Penguin/NAL, trade pbk original; Penguin Audio; OverDrive sample)
One of the titles in our Penguin Debut Authors program, this thriller was mentioned at BEA’s Shout ‘n’ Share as “making you want to lock all your doors and windows.” It was recently optioned for a TV series.
Our spreadsheet of other notable titles arriving this week, with ordering information and alternate formats, EarlyWord New Title Radar, Week of June 1, 2015