Hello? Hello? Is this thing on? We may have to resort to carrier pigeon with this week's newsletter as the telephone poles out behind the store are being replaced this week. If everything gets dark and cold, we're going to assume it's a feature of our upgrade and not because—you know—a variety of less savory options. We hope the first part of the alleyway upgrade (don't get us started) will be done by the weekend. Just in time to show off all the new books that have come out this week. Including . . .
Well, we think this is a new James Patterson book. Doesn't he already have a series with numbers in the title? To confuse things even more, 3 Days to Live is actually a collection of novellas. The first—the titular 3 Days to Live—is written in collaboration with Duane Swierczynski, and it sounds an awful lot like a Kevin Costner film titled 3 Days to Kill. Funny little world, innit?
Anyway the other two have similar setups: some deal goes sideways, characters opt to blow everything up as a go-to plan, and things go Boom! Boom! Rat-a-tat-tat! As they do. Plan accordingly.
And speaking of things blowing up (What? It's our Valentine's Day newsletter; we're playing to our core demographic), Gregg Hurwitz is back with the newest Orphan X novel, The Last Orphan. The marketing tag is "everything changes and everything is at risk," which means you don't need to know what happened in the previous books and the plot will be fairly on-point. In The Last Orphan, Evan Smoak, the master assassin of this series, is caught between his principles and his life. You know which one he's going to choose, don't you? Things play out as you might imagine.
And speaking of assassins, here's a new fantasy novel from Sarah J. Maas. In fact, the whole series is coming out this week. The first one is called Throne of Glass and—wait a minute. We've seen these books before. Hang on.
<Runs over to shelves. Checks books. Checks other books. Runs back.>
You'll never believe this, but the Throne of Glass series is now classified as an Epic Fantasy Paranormal Romance series. Who'd thunk it? And they have fancy new covers! And fancy adult pricing!
So, yes, if you would prefer the YA covers (with YA pricing), you have about—<checks watch>—fifteen minutes to get yourself a set. After that, each book will be six dollars more.
Meanwhile, history writer Dan Jones is taking a turn at historical fiction with Essex Dogs. Set during the bloody days of the Hundred Years' War, Essex Dogs is the story of an unruly platoon of archers and men-at-arms who start their journey on the beaches of Normandy, and during that fateful July in 1346, they fight their way toward Crâecy. It's Band of Brothers meets Henry V!
Jones has written a handful of medieval history books that have been well received, and we expect that his foray into fiction will be eagerly gobbled up by fans of Bernard Cornwell and Ken Follett.
And speaking of historical narratives, Cat Jarman's River Kings: A New History of the Vikings from Scandanavia to the Silk Roads is out in paperback this week. Jarman, a bioarchaeologist specializing in Viking women, discovered a Carnelian bead in a Viking grave. It was an item that was out of place, and Jarman set off to discover how that bead may have ended up where it did. Along the way, she discovered that the Vikings may have had more contact with India than we previously knew. River Kings is a fascinating journey.
And speaking of interesting historical detective work, Mark Dawidziak's A Mystery of Mysteries examines the life and death of Edgar Allan Poe. Poe died on October 7th, 1849, in rather unusual circumstances, and there's always been a lot of speculation and conjecture about what happened during the three days prior to his death. Dawidziak looks past the caricature of the Godfather of Goth that Poe has been characterized with for the last 150 years and provides an engaging cold case reconstruction of the last few days of one of America's classic writers.
And speaking of deep research, Greta Thunberg's The Climate Book is out this week. Thunberg has gathered the wisdom of over one hundred experts, across dozens of disciplines, to provide us with a singular volume of knowledge that we need to address climate disaster.
You know. There's a subtle difference between "shift" and "change," and there's a distinctly not-so-subtle difference between "change" and "disaster," but here we are, you know?
Hey, here's a thing. We know very little about it, and we suspect that's part of the plan. It's called The Mysteries, and it's an illustrated fable about a kingdom that suffers from unexplained calamities. The king, hoping to save his land from destruction, sends out a bunch of knights to find out what's going on. Years later, one returns, and he has a tale to tell. It's an Arthurian search for the Siege Perilous, and it's illustrated by renowned caricaturist John Kascht and some dude named Bill Watterson.
Let's see . . . this Bill guy has done some other things, hasn't he? Let's click on this link here and pull up related products and . . .
Huh. How about that.
We're happy to take pre-orders, of course. Don't be the kids who missed out on this one.
You know, there was an exhibition catalog of Calvin and Hobbes a while back. The exhibit was at the Billy Ireland Cartoon Library and Museum at Ohio State University, and it collected a number of original pieces from Watterson's oeuvre. The best part was Watterson's commentary about each strip, which is a fascinating look into the creative process and the history of the strip. Highly recommended.
And M. C. Beaton is back this week. Well, R. W. Green is back. Beaton is, like that Western writer we like to harangue, no longer with us. But Green is continuing Beaton's Hamish Macbeth series, and this week, it's Death of a Traitor. This time around, Macbeth must investigate the disappearance of a neighbor no one liked, but when they disappear, well, someone has to find the body, right? Though, it might not be the corpse everyone anticipates . . .
And speaking of mysterious pasts, here is Roshani Chokshi's The Last Tale of the Flower Bride. It starts innocently enough: a man who believes in fairy tales marries a beautiful and mysterious woman. He's a scholar of myth; she's an heiress to a great fortune. Together, they fight crime—no, wait, that's not it. She's extracts a promise from her new husband—never pry into my past—which he dutifully observes until they must return to her childhood home, which is called the House of Dreams. Naturally, all bets are off with a place like that, right? And naturally, nothing is at it seems . . .
And speaking of unexpected things, here is Thomas Halliday's Otherlands, a curious journey to times and places that no longer exist. Halliday isn't here to merely catalogue that which has disappeared; rather, he's interested in exploring the interconnected nature of historical artifacts and species and how things appear, disappear, and seemingly find their way back again (albeit in a new form). We're talking the scope of deep time and the fragility of ecosystems, dear friends. The persistence of life, even in times of great change.
And with that, we are going to go check on the power poles out back. Hopefully, everything will be the same (except slightly different). The ravens will know, but then, they always do . . .
