Despite hockey initially being an outlet mainly for his children, Charns recounts his wife's (he refers to her as Tucker throughout) compulsion to skate after watching their son brim with satisfaction from scoring a goal in a game. Tucker yearned for that same feeling, spurring her full-hearted commitment to the sport and kickstarting some healthy family competition. Charns, who started playing hockey in his 40s, comically shares his angst at losing to Tucker’s team alongside his respect for their shared family hobbies: “Play together, stay together” he writes. His love of the game is evident throughout, particularly when recounting his disappointment at the need to stop coaching his son’s team after a medical crisis.
Charns does more than sing hockey’s praises—he delves into the sometimes painful dynamics of his childhood (an alcoholic father and hypervigilant mother) and his own adult struggles with mental health, but touchingly circles back to how spirited competition on the ice has helped him find peace and healing. He sprinkles in welcome wit, including an aside on Mattel finally making a realistic hockey Barbie in 2020 and a pitch for women’s “constitutional right” to swear as much as men in the rink. Hockey fans will be delighted.
Takeaway: An entertaining tribute to the power of hockey as a path to peace and happiness.
Great for fans of: Jerry Hack’s Memoir of a Hockey Nobody, Angela Ruggiero’s Breaking the Ice.
Production grades
Cover: C
Design and typography: A-
Illustrations: N/A
Editing: B+
Marketing copy: A-
Born establishes this conflict and its players with convincing detail, briskly running down backstories on an international cast, while priming readers’ anticipation of the revelation of the prize that these competing spies and soldiers are willing to kill for. That prize: documents about a fortune “hidden outside Germany behind a web of front companies, banks and trusts,” set aside to fund the rise of a fourth Reich, and a list of the Reich’s “Circle of Friends,” which could still, all these decades later, destroy reputations around the globe. The action is raw and wrenching, which makes the chase all the more frightening.
On the run, Sara finds herself surprised at her own capabilities. Born’s accounts of her stealth-kills and trap setting are persuasively detailed; at times, the action occurs from the perspective of the men chasing her, edging toward survival-horror, with the hero as monster. That level of detail is consistent throughout the novel, occasionally slowing the narrative momentum, especially in the opening chapters. Dialogue is crisp throughout, though, and the story picks up speed once a former CIA agent discovers Sara might not be the traitor he’s been told. The brutal jungle survival adventure is memorable, but it’s the uneasy alliances and Sara’s climactic plan back in civilization that are Born’s most suspenseful inventions.
Takeaway: This brutal jungle thriller pits a woman who’s discovered Nazi secrets against pro killers.
Great for fans of: Wilbur Smith, Frederick Forsyth.
Production grades
Cover: B+
Design and typography: A-
Illustrations: N/A
Editing: A-
Marketing copy: B+
Gladden doesn’t sugarcoat the injustices perpetrated on Black Americans, especially Black men, (“The more melanin in the skin the more malaise and mayhem you can expect”), but believes that Eighties sitcoms such as Diff’rent Strokes heralded a new era of a world where Black and white kids could co-exist happily together. Gladden also invokes Rachel Dolezal and Dr. Jessica Krug as kindred spirits. Dolezal, the former president of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP)’s Spokane, WA, chapter, identified as a Black woman, while her race at birth was white; Krug, a white former George Washington associate professor, admitted to faking being Black and Puerto Rican.
Gladden’s evocative prose has a lyrical quality (“and I am warning you directly, Ronnie. Our identity can only continue to grate, rumble, and slip against each other for so long”), which will easily draw readers into the narrative and carry them through to the final page. A helpful resources section will help readers to gain a greater understanding about complex intersectional identity. Minor grammar and editing errors distract but don’t diminish the importance or power of the story and storytelling. Anyone hoping to gain insight into the experiences of a person whose outside doesn’t correlate to their inner identification will learn empathy in the author’s wise pages.
Takeaway: A thought-provoking account of complex intersectional identity experience.
Great for fans of: Jo Ivester’s Never a Girl, Always a Boy, Jazz Jennings’s Being Jazz: My Life as a (Transgender) Teen, Amy Ellis Nutt’s Becoming Nicole.
Production grades
Cover: B+
Design and typography: B+
Illustrations: N/A
Editing: B
Marketing copy: B

The Fear of Winter, the first in a series, leads readers down a twisted path of mystery and suspense. As Tom and the investigator’s team learn more about Megan’s drug use and the characters and encounters that go with it, Sterling’s richly detailed depictions of the underbelly of the illegal drug trade mesmerize with chilling authenticity—and with much welcome empathy, both for the daughter with shocking secrets and the father facing them at last. (Sterling’s memoir Teenage Degenerate offers an unflinching account of addiction.)
The darkness and cold of the Colorado winter is the perfect setting for the bleakness of the novel as Sterling examines what could make a young woman disappear and the unraveling of a marriage. Sterling hones in on Tom’s continued search for closure, hinting at the simmering undercurrent of hope which, along with his marriage, will likely be shattered if Tom learns that Megan is dead. Yet the aspect of the novel that will likely resonate most with readers is Tom’s consideration of all the things he wants to change about the past which would prevent the horrific events he now faces to learn what happened to his daughter.
Takeaway: A man desperate to find a missing daughter searches for hope in this tense novel.
Great for fans of: Jess Lourey’s The Quarry Girls, Thomas Fincham’s The Dead Daughter.
Production grades
Cover: A
Design and typography: A
Illustrations: N/A
Editing: A
Marketing copy: A
To read Casares’s poems is to take a dreamlike tour through Scotland, where every cobblestone in the street is charged with some unspeakable, ancient force that has compelled artists to create for millennia. Readers experience Scotland in Casares’s poems like a Celtic Shangri-La, yet it is not some sorrowless fantasyland. The verses certainly radiate with a nearly obsessive admiration for Scotland and its poets, but the grief therein is just as powerful, almost to a mystical extent, for the death of his heroes, Scotland’s lack of independence, and the temporality of poetry and life itself. In his poetry, however, Casares makes the sadness radiant and romantic—just one of the many jewels that make up “the most melancholy country in the world.”
Lovers of Scottish literary history and poetry in general will appreciate the poems chronicling Casares’s insomniac walks through Aberdeen, hearing Byron’s “voice among the voices of the people who walk past me” and the search for his idol’s unmarked Edinburgh resting place in “Thomas de Quincey’s Grave.” Casares’s spellbinding poems evoke the magic aura in his forebears' work, and he reminds readers that a poet’s legacy isn’t maintained simply by their verse—it’s by the people who read it.
Takeaway: An endearing and haunting homage in English and Spanish verse to Scotland and its poets.
Great for fans of: Robert Burns, Luis Cernuda
Production grades
Cover: B
Design and typography: A
Illustrations: N/A
Editing: A
Marketing copy: B+

Through gorgeous photos, illuminating research, lots of engaging individual stories, and even some cleverly anthropomorphized animals (including Lucinda the Monarch Butterfly and Pat the Pooper), Erickson illustrates how a healthy ecosystem works for nature and for humans. Erickson takes care to include stories of urban farms, such as Green Leaf Learning Farm in South Memphis, and to spell out how consumer choice can drive demand for regenerative agriculture, crucial steps in starting to bring change when “chemical fertilizer-intensive, input-intensive farming” takes up 99 percent of American cropland.
Although his urgency is clear, the primary note that Erickson strikes throughout the book is one of hope. The tools and techniques of regenerative agriculture may feel new (though they are deeply traditional) but they work, and work better than industrial agriculture. He makes a persuasive case that, in the long run, regenerative agriculture can even be more profitable than conventional agriculture. Erickson argues that what we need now is the courage and the hope to take bold steps for the health of humanity and the planet. Anyone interested in new directions for agriculture, as a consumer or farmer, will benefit from this well researched, carefully written and beautifully illustrated exploration.
Takeaway: This endorsement of regenerative agriculture will fascinate readers invested in the future of farming.
Great for fans of: John Kempf’s Quality Agriculture, Gabe Brown’s Dirt to Soil.
Production grades
Cover: A-
Design and typography: A
Illustrations: A
Editing: A
Marketing copy: B
Daily’s language is marvelously empathetic and draws the reader into the lives of the three major characters. The reader feels the helpless, debilitating misery—of the unhoused, of children of abusive fathers, of bereaved spouses and parents. The tension builds and the pacing stays taut up for much of the novel, up until the point where Marvin and the child, Michael, have a conversation in which the child quotes from scripture, thereby stepping out of a realist yet spiritual mode and into something more miraculous, as the “strange” child begins to feel very familiar (fast-healing wounds, frail body, luminous skin, fine, silky, golden hair).
Readers’ response to these developments, of course, might be a matter of faith. Daily’s portraiture of contemporary characters feeling for meaning in their lives is moving, and the possibility of Marvin healing, through the care and protection of a child, is so rich that readers invested in that story may resist the miracles and visions to come. Still, this empathetic and well-written novel about homelessness and coping with loss will strike a chord with believers.
Takeaway: This empathetic Christian novel centers on grief, the unhoused, and a miracle baby.
Great for fans of: Francine Rivers’s The Scarlet Thread, Karen Kingsbury’s Found.
Production grades
Cover: A
Design and typography: A
Illustrations: N/A
Editing: A
Marketing copy: A
The action starts quickly, with a heavily armed U.S.A. squad raiding a squalid den of beasts. “A hunched mountain of hair and muscle rattled with a frenzied growl,” Quintero writes, as his soldiers fire off rounds and sharp bursts of dialogue, their chatter—all tactics, jargon, and inside-joke camaraderie—as exciting as the firefight. Quintero is adept at mixing humor, tension, character, and inventive action into vivid scenes. Readers who love clever scares, splatter, and squad dialogue like “Bravo section move with me” will relish the team’s descent into forgotten tunnels beneath L.A. or its shivery exploration of an asylum where “a mountain of shadows writhed in the background.”
Also strong: team briefings, the unsettling sense that Ghost Squad might be betrayed at any moment, and the suspense of a “Scryer” reaching out into a demon’s essence to communicate. Quintero’s full-length debut is fast-paced almost to a fault, as at times its revelations and world-building might benefit from more discussion or time for readers to process. But the world of the story is rich and surprising, and Quintero ties the villains’ evil to Biblical apocrypha and urgent real-world issues. Most importantly, the scenes are strong, hair-raising, and driven by engaging characters.
Takeaway: This blend of horror and military action is splattery fun, full of demons and character.
Great for fans of: Myke Cole’s Shadow Ops series, Larry Correia’s Monster Hunter International.
Production grades
Cover: A-
Design and typography: A
Illustrations: N/A
Editing: A-
Marketing copy: A
Throughout, Baynes attempts to start a much-needed conversation about Africa. He condemns the “paternalistic and condescending attitude” that has surrounded the discourse on the continent and criticizes global ignorance of Africa’s history. Enemies of Africa connects contemporary problems with root historical causes, as Baynes argues, “The worst of Colonialism that continues to have the greatest impact was the partitioning of Africa in the 1800s at the Berlin conference.” He musters ample evidence, making the case that the territorial conflicts that still embroil the continent rise from arbitrary borders drawn across by European powers, with no regard to the continent’s many cultural, ecological, and historical communities.
The heart and soul of this book is the inequities that Africa has endured: its people that have been oppressed, its rivers that have been polluted, its resources that have been exploited. Baynes warns that progress made around the world by members of the African diaspora also is at risk due to these enemies “‘lying in wait for the black people of the world,” a stark contention that would benefit from more development. Enemies of Africa stands as a powerful starting place to help readers understand and empathize with the living, breathing land that is Africa.
Takeaway: A searing, persuasive introduction to historical injustices endured by Africa.
Great for fans of: Obianuju Ekeocha’s Target Africa, Walter Rodney’s How Europe Underdeveloped Africa.
Production grades
Cover: A
Design and typography: A
Illustrations: A-
Editing: A-
Marketing copy: A
With crisp prose and brisk character work, Hawkins reminds readers that danger can lurk close to home by setting his stories in a variety of familiar suburban locations such as a comic book store, the local mall, an office building, and typical neighborhood homes with secrets lurking behind closed doors. Throughout, visceral imagery brings the terror to life: readers will hear the “wet gurgle” and see the “blossom of brownish red” liquid spreading out. Killer opening lines such as “It was the blood that changed everything” make the twisted and ominous worlds inviting.
A broad array of horror is presented within Suburban Monsters. “Storms of the Present” is an intense body horror piece featuring a woman desperate to be thin. “Green Eyes” and “Moonrise Over Water with Sargassum” toy with the elements of nature, and for those suffering from coulrophobia, beware the creepy clown. At times, Hawkins dares to go darker than readers might be eager to follow; “Candle for the Birthday Boy” is somewhat punishing in its depiction of an overweight kid. Whatever the subgenre preference, Hawkins delivers nightmare fuel to readers brave enough to dive into this hair-raising collection.
Takeaway: Spine-chilling horror stories set in familiar locations with relatable characters.
Great for fans of: Kealan Patrick Burke’s Secret Faces, Alan Baxter’s Served Cold.
Production grades
Cover: A
Design and typography: A
Illustrations: N/A
Editing: A-
Marketing copy: A-

The mystery behind Daizon and Amia’s meeting looms large within the context of their budding romance, and their story contains all the elements of a compelling thriller. Memories come back to Amia piece by piece with the help of Daizon, their fellow Whole Me program members, and clinical psychologist Dr. Wolf. As each tantalizing puzzle piece clicks back into place for Amia, readers will find it increasingly hard to put the story down. Characterization is strong, dialogue is engaging, the clues are surprising, and the pace is swift.
What Crocker provides to readers is a classic story of a guy and girl falling in love made a few layers deeper by a sensitively handled—and often suspenseful—throughline of trauma and healing. Crocker makes it a point to discuss the hard but realistic journey that sufferers of PTSD must take through Amia’s assault and Daizon’s past in the military and rough parts of childhood. Crocker’s refusal to shy away from the truth of facing trauma humanizes the thriller elements, resulting in a storyline that will keep readers guessing … but also feeling.
Takeaway: Crocker spices a classic thriller with romance and sensitive treatment of trauma.
Great for fans of: Pamela Q. Fernandes’s Find Me in the Snow, Anastasia Zadeik’s Blurred Fates.
Production grades
Cover: A
Design and typography: A
Illustrations: N/A
Editing: A-
Marketing copy: A
But it’s four characters who drive the story. Will and Kal Spencer, on a hike in the forest as a much-needed bonding activity, and firefighters Lucas Bowden and Corby Jones. Bowden is haunted by the death of a former crew member, while Jones is a go-getter who understands her status as a woman out in the field means she has to prove herself. When the hikers go missing, amid the “big timber and towering mountains” of the Rogue River-Siskiyou National Forest, the firefighters are mobilized to find the missing hikers, though Jones senses that a drug problem may compromise Bowden.
Riha ramps up the tension when Kal and Will are separated and discover that the dangers they face aren’t all in nature, especially when a prisoner-firefighter proves not to have the hikers’ best interests at heart. The firefighters’ efforts at a rescue offer explosive, adrenaline-fueled action. A ground and air evacuation impossible because of the fire, and Bowden cleverly suggests they go by river, which proves another source of elemental danger—and white-knuckle adventure. The twists and obstacles keep coming, though the attention to detail, such as background information on wildfires and firefighting plus the backstories of a host of characters, means the story takes some time to heat up, but once this slow-burning thriller ignites it fully rages, and readers who love outdoor adventure will be caught up.
Takeaway: This white-knuckle rescue thriller offers a terrifying wildfire and rich procedural detail.
Great for fans of: Kurt Kamm, Andrew Pyper’s The Wildfire Season.
Production grades
Cover: B
Design and typography: A-
Illustrations: N/A
Editing: B+
Marketing copy: A

But no Atrium story is simple. Dolvia is a broiling cauldron of conflicts and interests, and Brianna's plans and actions send shock waves throughout worlds and lives. Among those are Kelly Osborn, who is of mixed blood and from a disgraced family, and Hershel Henry, an Australian journalist who is new to Dolvia, and gets to see more of Dolvia than he could have imagined. The different perspectives of these individuals who hop between worlds and don't quite feel at home anywhere accumulates into a panoramic view of Dolvia's intricate aspects and contradictions— a place of great blessing and misfortune, of abundance and scarcity, where telepathic lizards thrive and locally born people are ostracized.
Despite the wormholes, space travels, telepathic lizards, and the rest of its fascinating speculative elements, at its core The Body Politic is an anthropological story, committed to the illumination of culture and character. As is her wont, Atrium pays close attention, too, to women's lives. And though the abundance in the narrative can at times be overwhelming, just like a visit to Dolvia, it's also riveting.
Takeaway: Lovers of rich, thoughtful, culture-exploring SF will relish Atrium’s series.
Great for fans of: Ursula K. Le Guin, Sofia Samatar.
Production grades
Cover: A-
Design and typography: A
Illustrations: N/A
Editing: A
Marketing copy: A-
That’s the enticing setup of The Judges, a clever and incisive story that focuses heavily on Mary’s internal dialogue, inviting readers to come to know every little thought—and her own judgements on everything and everyone around her. From her deliberating the appropriate tip for a waiter who offers her free food to her considering how to handle her boundaries with a verbally abusive older brother, Matluck lays bare this engaging character’s complex everyday decision-making process, pointing the way for readers to ponder in their own lives.
Are the judges a manifestation of her inner doubts, some beyond-the-human tribunal, or something stranger still? Those questions fascinate, but Matluck’s interest is in Mary and her mind as she navigates the world. At times densely thoughtful, the novel probes why we make the decisions that we do, the storytelling laser-pointed focus on Mary’s inner turmoil, her rationalizations and running monologues when dealing with cashiers, family members, and even, to her astonishment, a young man who recognizes her for her artistry. Matluck explores rich questions but leaves many answers to readers to answer, guided by insights like “big decisions were nothing but a lot of small decisions piled on top of one another.”
Takeaway: A surprising novel of a pianist’s mind, a mysterious tribunal, and the ethics of everyday choices.
Great for fans of: Nicholson Baker, Michael Poore’s Reincarnation Blues.
Production grades
Cover: A
Design and typography: A
Illustrations: N/A
Editing: A
Marketing copy: B
Allen has a gift for characterizations, and best of all is Downs, who narrates the story in a sardonic first person, admits to clumsiness and knows when he’s outmatched. He's generally pessimistic, but he shows he's not as hard-bitten as he pretends: "People and their feelings were messy. That is why I avoided both religiously." Allen also does a wonderful job with the semi-adult Frankie. Downs sees this right away, and their relationship—prickly at first—comes across as warm and real. Even minor characters come to life in vibrant detail, such as Mamacita, for whom hot peppers solve all problems. The noirish, sometimes playful Raymond Chandler patter is often polished and memorable, though at times it comes on thick, and the plot gets convoluted, but the engaging cast and steady surprises nimbly carry the story.
Allen gets full marks for showing the part of Los Angeles that isn't Hollywood, where the gangs rule. We see Frankie's dilapidated neighborhood, whose downtrodden residents make attempts to beautify it: one owner was "either colorblind or spent way too much time and money at the local weed shop." In the end, Downs navigates through the neighborhood and its denizens to an ending that is both shocking and satisfying, leaving readers to hope for a sequel.
Takeaway: A down-on-his-luck PI finds that a scrappy teen may be his ticket to redemption.
Great for fans of: Robert B. Parker’s Night Passage, Benjamin Black’s The Silver Swan.
Production grades
Cover: A-
Design and typography: B+
Illustrations: N/A
Editing: A-
Marketing copy: B+
The best part of this surprisingly lighthearted tale is Emma’s sparkling personality, which makes reading this book feel like talking to a close friend. Emma may be the CEO of the E Club, but her medical conditions don’t define her—she’s smart, funny, and ambitious, declaring that she aspires to be “employed as an essayist.” She’s also capable, independent, and the best goalie on the soccer team, and she knows an impressive number of euphemisms for pooping, many of which she hilariously shares with her new doctor. Seeing that Emma is just a normal kid will help children with similar concerns look more closely at their own positive qualities.
The story is accompanied by Beech’s black-and-white illustrations, which are meant to look as though Emma could have sketched them herself. The pictures primarily show people and places from Emma’s life and imagination, such as Emma being carried on a palanquin and coining herself “the exalted empress of the enema empire” after she masters a new type of treatment for her constipation. Ultimately this book serves as a reminder that accidents are never a kid’s fault and that solutions do exist—but in the meantime, friendship and humor can help, too.
Takeaway: This entertaining, conversational story shows kids with enuresis and encopresis they’re not alone.
Great for fans of: Tracey J. Vessillo’s I Can’t, I Won’t, No Way!, Howard J. Bennett’s It Hurts When I Poop!.
Production grades
Cover: A
Design and typography: A
Illustrations: A
Editing: A
Marketing copy: A
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