John Staughton, Senior Reviewer

A slow-burning mystery with a stellar lead sleuth, The Silent Pines by Curtis Myer is a pastoral thriller with an ominous edge. In a rural Oregon town plagued by a rash of violent murders, newly arrived Sienna Kelly is quickly pulled into the suspicions and intrigue of a community on the edge. Her seemingly perfect yet frequently absent husband, Vince, busy with his nascent newspaper business, leaves Sienna plenty of time to let her natural curiosity and investigative skills run wild, right into the suffocating crosshairs of a sociopathic killer. Transcending standard mystery tropes and elevating timely themes of small-town […]

A sensational collection of genre-defying stories, The Man Who by Thom Cree is a meticulously written work of prose, echoing Faulkner and Hemingway in each story’s poetry and ambition. Trauma begetting revenge, wartime espionage, vigilante justice in forgotten places, and the seething tension of cultural clashes make this striking collection a suspenseful thrill. Savagely intimate, these stories and the subsequent spycraft novella are unpredictable slices of layered emotion, violence, conspiracy, and closure, commanding readers’ attention with every acrobatic line.

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Drawing readers into one man’s decade of “senseless adventure,” Hayden Thompson paints a stunning European portrait of leisure and boundless curiosity in Marvelous Days. A newly retired expat in search of fresh purpose, Kevin embraces his wanderlust and embarks on a sunset chapter of travel and discovery. Rich in allusion and detailed explorations of the French countryside, Germany’s cities, and the Mediterranean coast, this reads like a travelogue, memoir, and cultural exposé rolled into one insightful narrative. For any aging wanderer who feels hesitant to make the leap into the wilds of travel, this contemporary novel is a sensitive, sensible, […]

A lyrical and unflinching dive into a radical childhood, Naked Girl by Janna Brooke Wallack is an emotive novel about the meaning of home when it is fleeting and ephemeral. Jackson is an enigmatic whirlwind of a father more interested in leading a coastal commune than raising two children, which leads Siddhi and Sienna to form a profoundly independent sibling bond. Taking readers across oceans and friendships and wild years of formative exposure, Wallack’s prose is alive with the open-eyed curiosity of youth. Navigating clashes of belief and morality, as well as the storms of sex, fidelity, religion, and “traditional” […]

Author Ray Marcuss challenges the lines of mortality, sanity and connection in The House of Laurel Lake, an emotionally charged novella about losing yourself and finding a way back. A career-ending event sends a detective into a new chapter of his life, but his respite in Florida with his niece is interrupted by a ghostly obsession that drives him to the edge of madness. Tightly packed with detail and elevated with an uncertain edge of the supernatural, this multilayered tale of tragic romance is a compelling tangle of complex emotions until the very last line.

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Someone is manipulating the free will of powerful Spellbinders in From the Ashes by Shari Marshall, the thrilling third installment of the magical Ember Files series. Still reeling from the death of his twin, Kyson Adelgrief lusts for blood and vengeance against the Influencers, forcing them to embark on an offensive rescue mission, but he may not be the only threat in the shadows. Continuing to balance creative fantasy with tense relationship-building among the uniquely gifted but relatable protagonists, Marshall’s whip-smart writing and sinister themes make this novel a gripping addition to a wickedly creative and superbly plotted saga.[…]