In the explosive second installment of the Clifford’s War series, Reed crafts another gripping and fast paced crime-and-intelligence thriller that plunges readers back into the world of P.I. Clifford Dee and his close knit team of investigators, as a nation-shaking murder leads them to uncover a criminal conspiracy fuelled by military and political interests. Along the way, Dee and his team face ruthless enemies, repeated assassination attempts, political corruption, and attempts to malign their legitimacy through false criminal charges. Still, nothing gets in the way of his team’s efforts to uncover what’s truly happening and bring the conspirators to justice.

The plot is quickly set in motion as Dee and his team are hired by a woman to spy on her senator husband, whom she believes is involved in an extramarital affair. While working the case, Sara and Daniel—two of the four members of Dee’s team—are shocked to witness the senator’s murder. Reed doesn’t let up on the jolts, as a series of political assassinations follow, including the murder of a former CIA agent who is Dee’s close associate. Meanwhile, Bailey, the IT expert, uncovers something sinister while investigating a second case, one concerning a rapper’s original music being leaked to another more famous musician. With strong pacing and clever revelations, these seemingly disparate elements come together seamlessly to form a complex and surprising—yet still believable—nexus of criminal activities.

Despite the tension and high stakes, the camaraderie and engaging banter among Dee’s team keeps the novel feeling human, and even hardened FBI agents have moments of vulnerability. Getting readers to care about the characters, of course, also serves to ramp up the suspense, especially when those Dee cares about face danger themselves—and he seems helpless to save them. Though sometimes a touch wordy, the action is clear and hard edged.

Takeaway: A well crafted, fast paced action thriller blending detective, espionage, and political genres.

Great for fans of: David Baldacci, William Tyree.

Production grades
Cover: A-
Design and typography: A
Illustrations: N/A
Editing: A
Marketing copy: A-

Click here for more about Clifford's War: Without End

The significance of collaboration and good group decisions is the central theme of this practical-minded guidebook to what it takes to find success in teams, boards, organizations, and other groups, public and private. A professional meeting facilitator, Freshley draws from his professional experiences to offer his insight into the many benefits of group decisions made through collaboration and cooperation, offering not just guidance on achieving group aims but also adjusting one’s thinking. Making the case that a good group decision is an investment in social equity, he urges readers to shift their focus from an individualistic perspective toward the good of the greater world and community. Though Freshley emphasizes examples of collaboration in workspaces, he also digs into global problems like climate change and the potential positive impact that good group decision making among nations and their citizens could have on the climate crisis.

Freshley’s approach is as much inspiring as it is thought-provoking. Through a variety of anecdotes, he encourages contemplation of the causes and consequences of readers’ actions—and how these actions affect others. Freshley dives deep into the question of why it’s difficult for individuals to make good group decisions, suggesting that this is because “the peace standard is really hard.” He offers the potent example of people preferring to quarrel with their neighbor rather than talk about a problem, driving home the point that a good group decision would benefit both the individual and the neighbor. After all, he notes, “it’s not us versus them, it’s just us.”

An engaging and informative read, Together We Decide is not just for leaders and managers, but for any individual who has a desire to contribute positively to their group, community, or team. Though repetitive at certain points, one can look past it because of the strong message Freshley is trying to communicate through these reiterations—the idea of togetherness.

Takeaway: This thought-provoking guidebook to effective collaboration gently challenges readers to think outside themselves.

Great for fans of: Cass R. Sunstein and Reid Hastie’s Wiser: Getting Beyond Groupthink to Make Groups Smarter, Steven Johnson’s Farsighted: How We Make the Decisions That Matter the Most.

Production grades
Cover: A-
Design and typography: A
Illustrations: N/A
Editing: A-
Marketing copy: A-

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At the end of the rainbow, Rink’s “Alpha Buddies”—cheery, anthropomorphized alphabet letters with big emotive eyes and ribbon-laced sneakers—meet to blow balloons (in the case of blue, bashful “Buddy B”), jump rope while telling jokes (that’s “Joker J”), and a host of other alliterative activities. The buddies romp in a vibrant fantasyland of palm trees and castles and verdant green, quick-stepping (that’s “Q-Tee”) or rocking out on guitar (meet “Red R”) and even, when alphabetically appropriate, crying, like “Cutie Pie C.” But the mood is mostly buoyant as Rink tours readers through the ABCs and introduces 26 Alpha Buddies, all “friends forever” who hold hands in Alpha Buddies Land—and also, as a closing photo of stuffed Alpha Buddies characters suggests, join together into words.

The fun of Rink’s first Alpha Buddies books comes not just from the beaming letter characters or the bright, inventive digital backdrops that are choc-a-bloc with endearing suns, fish, elephants, horses, and lacey-eyelashed hearts. That’s all memorable, of course, but what’s most powerfully engaging is the way the book’s alphabetical structure, allotting one text page and one full-page illustration for each letter, invites young readers to imagine along about the next letter’s activity or character name. Rink is generous in the number of elements included in each spread, so readers guessing kitten, kite, or kiss for K (full name: Kala K) will feel rewarded.

That spirit of playful abundance even enlivens the pages given to the alphabet’s final three letters, perennially linked, in alpha-books, to xylophones, yaks, and zebras. The X, Y, and Z pages likely won’t be favorites like U’s—“Ulla U” gets a unicorn, an umbrella, and the cutest smile in the book—but they exemplify Rink’s approach. Even when young readers have a good idea of what’s coming, Alpha Buddies Land gives them more than they might expect, with an emphasis on the darling. Even the vulture hanging out at a volcano is cute as a bug.

Takeaway: This lively alphabet book introduces 26 darling and inventive letter-based characters.

Great for fans of: Alethea Kontis’s AlphaOops, Maira Kalman’s What Pete Ate.

Production grades
Cover: A-
Design and typography: A-
Illustrations: A
Editing: A-
Marketing copy: A

Click here for more about Alpha Buddies Land

Petrie’s unique, upbeat picture book helps children explore how to gracefully let go of what is not meant for them as they grow up. The story follows a young hermit crab who has become too big for her shell and must find a new one to protect her soft, squishy tail from predators. One day she discovers the most “strikingly wonderful shell in the world,” which is adorned with colorful barnacles and anemones and stands out because of its swirly pattern. The crab knows she is lucky for having found the shell and loves to show it off—but soon she grows again, and she must make another difficult decision.

Because childhood is a time of such rapid change, kids will relate to the hermit crab’s plight—and while they may initially be rooting for her to keep her standout shell, they will likely soon recognize that letting it go is the only way for her to continue to grow and stay safe. Importantly, in Petrie’s empathetic book the crab is never shamed or criticized for wanting to hang on to her old home, which makes the message more accessible. The story also includes plenty of facts about hermit crabs and other sea creatures, which will appeal to both curious kids and adults.

Detailed and colorful, Petrie’s illustrations cleverly bring this story to life and allow kids to feel a sense of compassion for the hermit crab, which may be an unfamiliar creature to many. With long, pointy legs and antennae-like eyes, the crab is shown hiding from predators and scuttling along the ocean floor in a too-small shell before finding her lovely new one, surrounded by rocks, seaweed, and a trio of colorful fish. With her rhyming prose and obvious love of sea life, Petrie has created a playful and exciting underwater world that children will be eager to revisit.

Takeaway: In this upbeat picture book a hermit crab helps children explore how to let go and grow.

Great for fans of: Catherine Leblanc’s Too Big or Too Small, Barney Saltzberg’s Chengdu Can Do.

Production grades
Cover: A-
Design and typography: A
Illustrations: A
Editing: A-
Marketing copy: A

Click here for more about The Lucky Hermit Crab and Her Swirly New Shell

Stone’s polished nod to old Hollywood whisks readers back in time for a thrilling look at the filmmaking world of 1931, in the unsettled aftermath of the sound revolution. With only three days until production starts on the classic horror film Frankenstein, chaos stirs and threatens to shut down the project. Fiction and truth swirl together as Stone (The Strange Birth, Short Life, and Sudden Death of Justice Girl) digs into the backstage drama between Junior Laemmle, head of movie production at Universal Studios, and his father, Carl Laemmle, Sr., the studio's founder. As tension between these moguls grows, casting for Frankenstein’s monster hits a snag, leaving Junior scrambling to find a leading man while assuaging his father’s growing doubts about the film’s viability.

Stone’s crisp writing highlights the compelling turmoil between Junior and his father. Junior desperately wants to shift Universal Pictures into the future with compelling new films, while Carl seems rooted in the past and struggles to grasp his son’s vision. While this dynamic plays out in briskly paced scenes powered by crack dialogue, Stone also explores the lives and ambitions of a pair of creature-feature greats: Bela Lugosi’s ego as an established actor is skillfully contrasted with Boris Karloff’s struggles as an up-and-coming star. The fascinating glimpse into these actors’ lives highlights a delightful narrative for film buffs.

As in his previous novel, Stone demonstrates a clear dedication to and knowledge of cinema and Los Angeles itself, and his love and expertise for the milieu—and for the minds of actors and producers and studio heads—radiates from the pages. Stars like Mae Clarke and Clara Bow make cameos, while movies like The Jazz Singer and Murders in the Rue Morgue get special shoutouts, the details piecing together to form a dynamic tapestry of the movie business in an era of tumult. Classic Hollywood film buffs and historical fiction fans will enjoy this fascinating tale revolving around the passions and persistence it took to bring life to one of the movies’ greatest monsters.

Takeaway: A compelling novel of old Hollywood, Universal Pictures, and the 1931 Frankenstein film.

Great for fans of: Stewart O'Nan’s West of Sunset, Adriana Trigiani’s All the Stars in the Heavens.

Production grades
Cover: B+
Design and typography: A
Illustrations: N/A
Editing: A
Marketing copy: A

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Thompson (Torn) continues his Finding Forward series with the heart-rending story of Miles, a 15-year-old whose life is upended when his father is sentenced to prison. After accepting money from his boss in exchange for burning down the restaurant he works in, Miles’s father receives a long prison sentence—made worse by the fact that a fireman was seriously injured during the fire. Miles, already struggling in school, is heartbroken and can’t figure out where to turn with his father gone. When he sees his dreams of making the basketball team going up in smoke along with his family life, Miles has to find the personal strength to keep moving forward

Though Taken Away takes on challenging topics, Thompson does so with grace, eliciting both Miles’s emotional torment and eventual comeback in relatable and poignant language. As Miles walks readers through his fears of failure and immense grief, there are glimmering moments of hope that will inspire: his basketball coach never fails to deliver uplifting messages at just the right time (“You can do anything if you set your mind to it and work hard”), and Miles’s extra work in school eventually pays off. When he finally gets back on the team, he’s learned not to give up—even after failing to make the winning shot in his first game, a lesson that will resonate with readers facing their own natural self-doubt.

Thompson deliberately leaves the ending with loose ends to allow readers the opportunity to meld the story to their own experiences, though he deposits a hint of optimism that things may work out ok for Miles after all. Regardless, readers will be left with the knowledge that life can be tough, but giving up will only make it worse—and the solid advice that “Sometimes people seem hard on the outside. But that’s not how they are on the inside.”

Takeaway: The inspiring story of a teenage boy picking up the pieces after his father goes to prison.

Great for fans of: Ali Benjamin’s The Thing About Jellyfish, Rainbow Rowell’s Fangirl.

Production grades
Cover: A
Design and typography: A
Illustrations: N/A
Editing: A
Marketing copy: B

Click here for more about Taken Away

Glants’s beautifully written historical debut explores themes of identity and resistance at the start of Hitler’s regime. Fifteen-year-old Hans attends school in Berlin and sings in the city’s prestigious Youth Choir. His placid world changes when his history teacher appears in class in a brown shirt, yells “Heil, Hitler!” and proceeds to coach the students in Nazi propaganda. Hans’s friends join the Hitler Youth and begin mercilessly taunting Rebecca, a defiant Jewish student to whom Hans is drawn. When Hans learns his mother’s family has kept its own heritage a secret, and that he is half-Jewish, he’s thrust between two worlds, facing great danger and terrible choices.

Hans narrates from old age in 2021, but the bulk of his story takes place over the course of a few weeks in 1933, as the novel’s taut timeframe underscores the speed with which radical nationalism took root in Germany. With his friends pressuring him to demonstrate his patriotism, Hans stalls, choosing a dangerous path—a secret relationship with Rebecca. After the mysterious disappearance of a school official, Hans gets swept up in a book burning and a Hitler Youth initiation ceremony and must decide whether to defy his peers or follow them, becoming “the one that does nothing” to resist.

The leads are skillfully and vividly drawn, especially Hans and Rebecca, whose dialogue brims with both tenderness and tension. As history encircles him, Hans’s inner struggle feels palpable, and the mob mentality he attempts to fend off rings true. By the end of the story, all citizens must fill out a “racial form” declaring whether they are Aryan—and while Hans’s mother’s career is jeopardized, his father turns a profit buying the business of a Jew fleeing the country. Present-day Hans inserts brief, chilling notes on what eventually happens to the characters, and their gripping stories will stick with readers long after the last page.

Takeaway: The gripping story of a german teen, at the start of the Nazi regime, discovering he’s half-Jewish.

Great for fans of: Ben Elton’s Two Brothers, Mark Sullivan’s Beneath a Scarlet Sky.

Production grades
Cover: A
Design and typography: A
Illustrations: N/A
Editing: A-
Marketing copy: B+

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“Brace yourself,” advises the first words of the first letter in this pained yet hopeful epistolary novel, which finds Brown, the neuroscientist author of the Notes from a Dying Planet series, returning to his urgent subject, imminent ecological collapse. That suggestion applies to readers, who are in for an illuminating but harrowing ride, and to humanity itself, which Brown persuasively suggests is living on the brink after having done “nothing to avert the developing catastrophes of overpopulation, mass extinction, and global warming (which we called ‘OMG’).” That advice is directed, though, from a mother to her son, as The Birth of Adam collects heady missives that Laura, a neuroscientist herself, and a quartet of her lovers send to her son, Adam, from a grim possible future of eco-catastrophes and governments who take no steps to halt the planet’s destruction.

“It was perfectly clear how humans had reached this state of affairs, and it was perfectly clear how it was all going to end up,” writes Simon, one of the lovers. Blending personal narrative, dystopian speculative fiction, and the explanatory clarity of a first-rate science essayist, Simon’s lengthy letter exemplifies Brown’s project: it doesn’t just imagine a fallen future, it does the work to show how humanity got there, with special attention paid to the workings of the brain.

“Essentially,” Simon notes, after a dazzling passage digging into the neuroscience of Trumpism, “they’re not smart enough to realize they’re dumb.” The letters comprising the novel teems with insights about consciousness, the brain, AI, the environment, and life itself, plus incisive jokes, jolting revelations and connections, and flashes of love, pain, and deeply human earthiness: “I was a pelvis man. And she had a pelvis to die for,” notes David. While the lovers’ accounts of their relationships at times are touching, readers should not expect traditional plotting and pacing. These are scientists’ pained, illuminating meditations.

Takeaway: Octavia E. Butler’s Parable of the Sower, Paul Auster’s In the Country of Last Things.

Great for fans of: Illuminating letters from future scientists about how humanity let the Earth collapse.

Production grades
Cover: B-
Design and typography: A
Illustrations: N/A
Editing: A
Marketing copy: B+

Click here for more about The Birth of Adam

Layh draws on his thirty-plus years of experience working on Wall Street in his debut novel, as a widower remembers the romance with his high school girlfriend several decades before. When Wall Street trader Democedes “Dee” Felico meets Mary Jo Barnes, the potential new sales assistant at his firm, he is astounded at how much she looks like Beatrice “Bea” Sharpe, the girl who left him heartbroken when he was just 22. Meanwhile, back when Dee fell for Bea, their passion-filled relationship was intense and mutually satisfying despite Bea’s somewhat mercurial nature and Dee’s stress-filled life working in finance while still attending college. But their romance ended abruptly when Bea took off for San Francisco to see her parents.

Layh’s understanding of the cutthroat nature of working as a trader imbues the novel with intense realism, as his characters work their deals, speak their insider language, their thoughts shaped by their business. (“You know how traders are—always looking over their shoulders,” one character observes.)” His New York City pulses with traders’ competitiveness, but also jazz, romance, possibility, and the ups and downs of recent history. The story weaves through recent decades, carefully linking the events of Dee’s personal life to the bumptious era of the Vietnam War (“Vietnam… was a violent cartoon; an indoor/outdoor musical, sloshed in harsh Van Gogh colors, conducted by a spastic corpse”) and the dark days following September 11, 2001.

Readers will be drawn to the intense, intriguing plotline of the similarities between Mary Jo and Bea as well as Dee’s electric reflections on the evolution of his relationship with Bea amid the turmoil in their lives all those years back. Though Dee’s work involves concepts that may be unfamiliar to readers, what matters is always clear, and Layh’s expertly paced depiction of a city, an industry, and a man over decades is convincing and touching as it surges toward its magnetic ending.

Takeaway: A widowed Wall Street trader recalls the girl who broke his heart decades ago in this intense New York novel.

Great for fans of: Randy Susan Meyers’s The Widow of Wall Street, Gary Helms’s Doubled Down: A Novel of Wall Street in the 1970s.

Production grades
Cover: A
Design and typography: A
Illustrations: N/A
Editing: A-
Marketing copy: A

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Set among Iowa’s vividly evoked “flat farms and lines of windbreak trees” and “corn-rich fields and warm grassy smells,” Figel’s rangy, engaging 1960s-set debut novel centers on an ambitious Hawkeye named Dennis Spuhn, a young Marine fresh out of Vietnam and determined to open his own restaurant chain in his home state, but boasts an expansive cast of compelling local color. That includes a high-school wrestling champion turned holy man with divine healing powers; an artist desperate to escape her sister’s shadow; a copy editor discovering her ill health; and a womanizing vagabond with a penchant for traveling on his hands. Remarkably, Figel’s pleasantly paced story connects the lot of them, tying everything together by the time the story reaches its final pages—and the Missouri River dividing Iowa from Nebraska.

Hands Down pairs its story of coming-of-age in a time of societal upheaval with a series of character-rich vignettes worthy of Donald Harrington, all with a healthy dose of history thrown in as the tale unspools. As the war in Vietnam escalates, a group of draft dodgers has taken up residence on the outskirts of a small Iowa town; local politics complicate everything, of course, as does a bullying powerhouse of a lawyer and a developer’s plan for “small and shabby” housing.

Figel’s style is fast-paced and to the point, though the point, here, is usually his desire to catch the full blush of a moment, the drift of characters’ minds, the comic tenor of their talk, the ways things truly work, and how the sky on a sunny afternoon eventually yields a “great horizon of pink and orange.” Those moments and characters are the key to this journey of a novel, as Figel, adept at arcs and human surprises, brings rare empathy and understanding to the trials and triumphs of his people. The connections between them, when revealed, may elicit a-ha!s from readers.

Takeaway: This vivid novel of Iowa in the tumultuous 1960s bursts with empathy and character.

Great for fans of: Ken Babbs’s Cronies, Donald Harington.

Production grades
Cover: B
Design and typography: A
Illustrations: N/A
Editing: A-
Marketing copy: B

Click here for more about Hands Down

Moyer (Tragically Taken) stuns with a compassionate and unflinching examination of how to reconcile childhood physical and sexual trauma. The story is told from Army Major Marcia Thompson’s perspective as an adult, beginning with her resurfacing memories of a traumatic childhood that are triggered by the removal of her two adopted children from her home—all because Marcia expresses concern to their social worker about the children’s behaviors that indicate previous abuse. As she tries to come to terms with losing the children, Marcia is swept into her own past through flashbacks and nightmares that terrify her and concern her husband, Tony.

Readers will be absorbed by Marcia’s fight to heal as she slowly begins to spiral out of control, having emotional breakdowns and outbursts that threaten her stability. Her military service further hampers her recovery, as the family receives nearly constant transfer orders—and suffers from racism because they are Black. When they move to Colorado Springs, Marcia reluctantly starts therapy, allowing her the safety and security to work through her nightmares and begin freeing herself from her traumatic past, but the possibility of another relocation and the resistance of other family members to acknowledging her abuse leave her on the brink of devastation.

Moyer addresses many difficult topics, and while sexual assault as a child by a family member is the primary focus, issues of racism also are prevalent throughout. In skillful storytelling, Moyer illuminates the struggle that many abuse victims undergo when trying to find validation from family members—a struggle that both empowers Marcia and frustrates her recovery. Moyer’s writing illuminates the urgency of accepting help and highlights Marcia’s reliance on her faith, steps that eventually allow her to heal and lead a fulfilling life. Readers should be aware of several triggers, including traumatic and potentially uncomfortable scenes that may be difficult to read.

Takeaway: An arresting novel of a life spiraling out of control when a traumatic event triggers painful memories.

Great for fans of: Roxane Gay’s An Untamed State, Lidia Yuknavitch’s The Small Backs of Children.

Production grades
Cover: A-
Design and typography: A
Illustrations: N/A
Editing: A
Marketing copy: A

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Dedicated to “beautiful souls swallowed by darkness,” this striking collection from Xueyan joins sharply sculpted lines, a penchant for emotionally charged descriptions of nature and divinity, an urgent longing for connection, and a reverence for Christ, whom the poet imagines, in a verse of rhapsodic transformation, first carrying the poet “along the thorny path of blood and flame” while Xueyan is a butterfly on his holy shoulders. A poem like “Valley of the Shadow of Death” unites theme, form, and language: “Answer me: / Where is the valley of the shadow of death? // Is it in the shade /beneath the eternal suffering of the cross? // Or is it within the wrinkles of my mother’s face?”

The short, stinging “Cup,” meanwhile, suggests that love—which in many poems is a redemptive force linked to eternity—can at times feel in short supply: “You empty my cup / by filling / hers.” Xueyan wastes no words in these crisp, pared-down poems, though they’re not short on meaning, mystery, or power. The biblical themes often connect to ideas of perseverance, as “John the Divine” finds in the life of the Baptist of the Gospels the lesson “Passion as paddle / belief as boat.” “Parting: A Red Sea Love Story” at first seems tragicomic, as two fish who have fallen for each other are torn apart as a consequence of Moses’s parting of the Red Sea. But the final lines offer a haunting evocation of a love that endures.

Another potent theme is that of exile. “Wind” reveals its subject as ancient, the “howl of Adam and Eve,” expelled from the Garden, while “Strangers,” “You Did Not,” and other poems about lost or fleeting connection pack maximal feeling into a minimum of words. The sacred, the eternal, the ecstasy of intimacy: Xueyan binds all this together, in tight, gripping verse, writing “Every fleeting moment / we breathe and create together / is eternity.”

Takeaway: Richly emotional poems of faith, connection, and eternity.

Great for fans of: Luci Shaw, Mary Szybist.

Production grades
Cover: A-
Design and typography: A
Illustrations: N/A
Editing: A
Marketing copy: B

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Lama Rinzen’s ascent to nirvana continues in the second mystery in Ringel’s noir-meets-Tibetan-wisdom Lama Rinzen Series (following 49 Buddhas), following a Buddhist monk and the teacher Daidyal on cases that touch against realms beyond the material. Reincarnated into the body of a traveling doctor, this latest Rinzen finds her first night shift at Colorado’s venerable—and spooky—Humboldt Hospital starts off on a cold note when a snowstorm forces all but a few patients and staff to another facility. Rinzen finds her reception even chillier than the weather. But with a strange new illness spreading amongst the remaining patients, an even frostier reception for the victim of a blizzard-related car crash, and a young child longing to be with her mother, Rinzen finds more than her bedside manner tested.

As Rinzen navigates the mysteries of Humboldt Hospital, she questions her own progress, as each decision may help lead her to another level of enlightenment or to an eternity in her current station in the Realm of Hungry Ghosts. Between classic scenes of deduction, complex layers of truth and reality, and skillful red herrings, Ringel freshens up the tropes of mysteries by showing them to readers through the unique lens of this Buddhist detective. Each person the doctor meets offers more than just a body for a diagnosis or a clue towards a whodunnit. Instead, they reveal lives of joy, pain, and loss to be understood. That goes for the ghosts, too, who are sometimes “the lessons teachers fail to share.”

Ringel has crafted a fine gem of a story, one that’s satisfying as a mystery—his deft narrative sleight-of-hand results in revelations readers won’t see coming—and as something more, especially when, in the final pages, Rinzen’s knowledge is translated into wisdom. Ringel writes, “The informed explain what they know. The enlightened what they question.” Rinzen’s journey from informed to enlightened is one readers open to genre-expanding detective novels will enjoy.

Takeaway: This accomplished mystery finds a Buddhist monk reincarnated, sleuthing, and striving toward enlightenment.

Great for fans of: Eliot Pattison’s Shan series, Gay Hendricks and Tinker Lindsay’s Tenzing Norbu series.

Production grades
Cover: A
Design and typography: A
Illustrations: N/A
Editing: A-
Marketing copy: B+

Click here for more about Hidden Buddha

Centered on the life of an Irish American woman and family who persevere in the face of every hardship America could throw at them between the 1880s and the Great Depression, Price’s sweeping historical novel stands as an engaging story of grit, determination, and love, bringing fresh life to the memories of past generations’ with painstaking research and a novelist’s imaginative power. Price draws from the life of her own grandmother, the model for Kitty Flanagan, the “generous woman” (and eventual “bearcat”) that Kitty’s People follows, from hopscotching in LeClaire, Illinois, to a teen running the register at a market in St. Louis during the First World War, to facing personal tragedy and holding the family together at the height of the Roaring ‘20s and beyond.

The lives of Kitty and her people are bumptious, as early on scandal inspires a move to St. Louis, where they work in mills and as mechanics and bookkeepers, and also find some success, as father Moses, a planner and supervisor, helps build the 1904 World’s Fair. (Young Kitty screams “We’re rich!” when the family gets a car in 1907.) Eventually, they seize the opportunity of opening a grocery, all as they face wrenching travails: natural disasters, mental and physical health issues, a rowdy brother’s temptations toward a life of crime, tragedies personal and public, and even a literal wicked stepmother.

“The blood pumping through the marvelous mechanical heart of this new world is Irish,” Kitty’s father notes, early on, and both Kitty and Price’s love for this family, their lineage, and their era shines through a novel that at times emphasizes thoroughness over narrative momentum. But readers fascinated by Irish-American immigrant life will relish the telling as Kitty—whose people tilt between Mass and respectability on the one hand and Egan’s Rats and after-hour lid clubs on the other—perseveres toward a satisfyingly happy ending. The book is an act of love.

Takeaway: This historical novel, an act of love, digs into an extraordinary Irish-American woman’s life and family.

Great for fans of: Kerby Miller and Patricia Mulholland Miller’s Journey of Hope: The Story of Irish Immigration to America, Pamela Records’ Tied With Twine.

Production grades
Cover: A-
Design and typography: A
Illustrations: N/A
Editing: A
Marketing copy: A

Click here for more about KItty's People

"Years as a real estate agent doesn’t make you the best agent,” Presgraves declares. “The number of transactions you close on a yearly basis is what defines you." Her upbeat how-to guide/self-help book bursts with such advice as she chronicles the up and downs of achieving real success in real estate. Bermudez Presgraves shares her hard-won knowledge and experience, recounting her first introduction into the idea of getting into the business from her mother at 18, to studying to be a pastry chef and starting a marketing company before her multiple failed attempts at passing the real estate test, to becoming a Certified Luxury Home Marketing Specialist and a top-earning realtor, to what lessons readers can take from her history of big sales.

Presgraves recounts her struggles as a divorcee and a single mom breaking into the business after shying away from the idea for years. Presgraves's tone is inviting and personable, like having a sit-down chat with an old friend ready to impart their wisdom. Presgraves offers useful tips on how to get started, how to schedule your time wisely, and how to commit to an enterprise to ensure a higher success rate. Her anecdotes showcase Presgraves’s experience with buyers, sellers, and outworking others: a brand builder, she sends out 700 hot-pink letters per every eventual buyer, she notes. She demonstrates that though it may seem daunting to leap into the ever-changing real estate market, a focused and determined mindset, a willingness to stand out, and the drive to succeed can take one a long way.

Lovers of entrepreneurial success stories or readers interested in plunging into the business themselves will most benefit and enjoy this to-the-point, user-friendly guide that’s packed with tricks of the trade. Presgraves navigates the reader through the pitfalls, hardships, and victories that come with pursuing this career in a relatable, easy-to-follow way.

Takeaway: A how-to guide and upbeat memoir illuminating what it takes to succeed in real estate.

Great for fans of: Tatiana Londono’s Real Estate Unfiltered, Tom Hopkins’s Mastering the Art of Selling Real Estate.

Production grades
Cover: A
Design and typography: A
Illustrations: N/A
Editing: A
Marketing copy: A

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“You are a spark of the Divine on a scavenger hunt for experiences” Swan (The Indigo Journals) writes in this sweeping exploration of the path to emotional and spiritual freedom. Advocating for inner peace as life’s ultimate goal, she delves into achieving our true spiritual potential, offering her own model of personal healing, the Swan Method, to assist readers in recognizing their inherent ability to access happiness. Throughout the guide, Swan shares hands-on exercises to help implement her teaching, consistently emphasizing the paradox that “you are essentially perfect and yet a continuous work in progress.”

Readers new to enlightenment philosophies may feel overwhelmed at first, but Swan breaks down her method into three basic points: your present reality is a result of your past experiences; reaching your full potential is dependent on not identifying with past events or beliefs; and you have no control over your past. She urges readers to internalize “I-am-ness,” an understanding that who you are now is all that matters, and highlights two practices as fundamental to healing from past experiences. First: engaging in creative pursuits to keep you present-focused. Second: a daily meditation that she describes as “Anchoring in the Consciousness ‘I am’” to learn the “continuous state of simply being.”

Swan’s text is rich with insight, and her writing offers both much to reflect on and tools to encourage that reflection. She argues that our true nature is happiness and encourages readers to analyze the correlation between their desires and pain to understand that desire persuades us to seek fulfillment outside of ourselves—which, in turn, leads to dissatisfaction and sacrifices inner peace. Swan touches on enigmatic concepts—such as the principle of Primordial Matter and gunas (elements of nature) that shape the universe—but ultimately her teachings revolve around purifying the mind through intense self-awareness. This will appeal to readers seeking deep transformation and unafraid to dig in deeply.

Takeaway: An intricate, sometimes cosmic reflection on achieving spiritual potential.

Great for fans of: Deric J. Gorman’s What’s It Like To Be Enlightened?, Phillz Mah’s Enlightenment Now.

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