This pragmatic debut from Tipler, a college admissions consultant, details how high schoolers can stand out during the college admissions process with strong personal and supplemental essays. The bulk of the guidance is devoted to crafting the personal essay, which Tipler suggests should present a narrative that ties the application together and focus on events from one’s high school years (“Admissions officers want to know about who you are now”). Describing how to tackle the most common supplemental essay topics, Tipler contends that “Why Our School essays” should explain why specific programs and opportunities make the university a good fit. Elsewhere, Tipler breaks down the application review process, noting that an admissions officer will read through one’s materials and then present them to the rest of the committee before the group votes on whether to admit the student. Exercises for brainstorming personal essay topics will help students get their creative juices flowing (one suggests choosing five words to describe oneself and recalling stories that demonstrate those qualities), and guidance on whether to discuss one’s racial background or use ChatGPT gives this an edge over older guides. (Tipler contends that though ChatGPT can be useful for generating ideas, no text should ever be copied directly from the site.) High schoolers will find this a boon. Agent: Karen Murgolo, Aevitas Creative Management. (June)

Reviewed on 05/24/2024 | Details & Permalink

McAlister takes readers on a reality show romp in her soapy third Marry Me, Juliet romance (after Can I Steal You for a Second?). Best friends Murray O’Connell and Lily Ong, both producers on a Bachelor-esque dating show, have orchestrated some of reality TV’s most memorable moments and brought together its best loved couples. But after Lily’s husband, Jeff, dies, she becomes hell-bent on blowing up her life, destroying both her reputation and her career by going on the show herself and playing the part of villain. As Lily schemes to shake things up among the contestants, Murray faces his own complicated feelings for Lily and how they play into the reality show story arc unfolding in front of them. McAlister makes room for some truly fraught emotional moments, particularly as Lily struggles with her longtime attraction to Murray, which predates her marriage and complicates her grieving process. The plot strikes a fine balance between showing how the sausage is made on reality TV and sensitively addressing love and loss. The central friends-to-lovers romance is complicated and sometimes tortured but always believable. This is an easy pick for the beach bag. (June)

Reviewed on 05/24/2024 | Details & Permalink

Allen (All or Nothing) takes readers inside the mind of a serial killer in this ambitious if ultimately disappointing thriller. The lead character, a Miami pizza delivery man who insists victims call him “Periwinkle” (he leaves the flowers at his crime scenes as a calling card) is introduced in the midst of slaughtering domestic abuser Eduardo Gomez in 2001. Like Dexter Morgan before him, Allen’s “hunter” operates under a strict moral code, only killing people he believes have violated the social contract—an adulterer, a crooked cop, a pedophile. As the hunter’s bodies pile up, police close in on him, but he continues to taunt them with phone calls. Meanwhile, he returns home after each murder to his children and argues with his pregnant wife about baby names, considering whether he might kill her, too. In flashbacks, Allen digs into the hunter’s difficult childhood, during which he was bullied for being overweight. Allen aims for something lyrical and elevated, and while he occasionally achieves a kind of hypnotic grace, the overall effect fails to make much of an impression. Ponderous prose (“Slow and joyless are the footfalls of Eduardo”) doesn’t help. Allen’s reach exceeds his grasp. Agent: Eleanor Jackson, Dunow, Carlson & Lerner Literary. (Apr.)

Reviewed on 05/24/2024 | Details & Permalink

British botanist Saffron Everleigh juggles research, romance, and murder in the diverting third installment of Khavari’s historical mystery series (after A Botanist’s Guide to Flowers and Fatalities). In 1923 London, Saffron has turned her back on the comforts of aristocratic life to work in a lab, where she’s routinely condescended to by her male colleagues. She harbors a crush on fellow scientist Alexander Ashton, whose brother, Adrian, has been named a suspect in the recent poisoning death of a Russian researcher. At Alexander’s urging, Saffron looks into the killing in hopes of clearing Adrian’s name. Meanwhile, she wards off the advances of Nick Hale, her best friend’s older brother who’s just arrived in the city. When one of the Russian scientist’s colleagues is also murdered, Saffron infiltrates the secretive lab where the pair worked and discovers that Alexander and Nick have been hiding crucial information from her all along. Though Khavari throws too many characters into the mix and the mystery’s momentum stalls in the middle, she brings everything together with a rewarding final act. It’s a solid entry in a dependable series. (June)

Reviewed on 05/24/2024 | Details & Permalink

Talty follows up Night of the Living Rez with a moving if muted novel about a middle-aged white man yearning to tell his birth daughter, who was raised on the Penobscot Reservation, that he’s her father. Charles Lamosway grew up on the reservation, too, and lived there until 1983, when he turned 18 and had to leave because he had no blood ties to the tribe. His mother, Louise, was allowed to remain on the reservation with his Penobscot stepfather, who helped Charles build a house across the river, where he slipped into alcoholism. In 1991, Charles unexpectedly had a daughter with his Penobscot friend Mary. After she married a Penobscot man named Roger, the couple and Charles agreed to put Roger’s name on the birth certificate, so the girl, Elizabeth, could be a citizen of the tribe. Now, Charles, who’s been sober for more than 20 years, wonders if revealing the truth to Elizabeth might enrich her life and his own. The central tension—will Charles tell Elizabeth or won’t he—is set up early and doesn’t fully develop, but there are plenty of touching moments, such as a brief meeting between Charles and Elizabeth before she’s old enough to remember. This has the humanity of Talty’s promising debut, but it doesn’t quite reach the same heights. Agent: Rebecca Friedman, Rebecca Friedman Literary. (June)

Reviewed on 05/24/2024 | Details & Permalink

In the alluring if diffuse latest from González (Difficult Light), a woman’s disappearance prompts bitterness, grief, and mordantly funny speculation from her loved ones. Julia, a wealthy and marginally well-known poet in Colombia, ends her fourth marriage when her husband, Raúl, is no longer able to feign respect for her poetry. After Julia marries another man, she goes missing. Raúl’s sister, Raquel, then finds poems on Julia’s blog about “murdering” her marriage to Raúl, and about Raúl “as well, murdered.” Reflecting on the irony that Julia is the one who’s gone missing, Raquel doubts she will be found, “much less found alive.” González leans into the macabre turn—chapters narrated by Julia suggest she might be speaking from beyond the grave (“My poetry was delicate and also complex, like the irises that bloomed around the borders of the flagstone patio at my ranch”), and Raquel jokes to Raúl that Julia might be a “zombie or something,” and that even in life “she was pretty braindead already.” The plot morphs into a noirish whodunit, which feels underdeveloped, as do the characters’ meditations on loss, but the acidic humor keep the pages turning. It’s worth a look. (June)

Reviewed on 05/24/2024 | Details & Permalink

This sweeping account from Pulitzer winner Taylor (American Republics) examines the Civil War in a wider North American context. America’s conflict forms the backbone of Taylor’s narrative—he moves through the war’s epochal events with striking conciseness—while his explorations of developments in Canada and Mexico reveal how the fates of all three nations were intertwined. After Mexico’s defeat in the 1846–1848 Mexican-American War, the country was “bitterly divided” between conservative and liberal factions and defenseless against regular incursions by American raiders. Meanwhile, Canadian leaders worked to bridge divisions between Francophone and Anglophone states in hopes of forming a confederation—eventually established in 1867—that would be “better prepared to resist American invasion,” a perceived likelihood at the time. Strife on the continent heightened further with the French invasion of Mexico in 1862 and the 1864 elections, which were riven with tension in all three countries, especially in Mexico, where the French held votes structured to prove that Mexicans welcomed French rule. Taylor trenchantly observes that the situation in Mexico further spurred America’s Unionists, who feared similar European incursion into their own divided country. He also provides fresh analysis of Mexican and Canadian leaders Benito Juárez and John A. Macdonald, liberals whom he credits with holding their countries together in the face of out of control conservative revanchism. This penetrating study is a must for Civil War history buffs. (May)

Reviewed on 05/24/2024 | Details & Permalink

A British war photographer travels to Cambodia seeking to escape a personal tragedy, only to become entangled in the region’s criminal underworld, in Herat’s ambitious debut. Joseph “Fearless” Nightingale, who is reeling from the death of his pregnant wife, heads out drinking with his longtime friend and travel companion, Alyosha, shortly after they arrive in Cambodia. Their night takes a perilous turn when Fearless is drugged by strangers, then left for dead. Song, an 18-year-old Cambodian woman enslaved at the apartment complex where Fearless is staying, discovers his limp body and nurses him back to health. Sensing that Fearless might help her and her twin sister, Sovanna, who is enslaved in a nearby villa, Song sneaks out of the complex and leaves behind a videotape for him, which offers evidence of a sex trafficking ring involving several international power brokers, including Alyosha. As Fearless figures out what to do next, Song frees Sovanna by setting her villa ablaze, triggering a violent retaliation that touches each of the novel’s main characters. Herat impresses on his first time out, with well-shaded characters and gripping suspense, though things start to feel overstuffed by the final act. Still, this is worth seeking out. (June)

Reviewed on 05/24/2024 | Details & Permalink

Velton (The Image of Her) spins an alluring story based on the historical Hungarian “blood countess” Erzsébet Báthory, who was accused in the 17th century of murdering hundreds of girls. In 1610, 15-year-old orphan Boróka goes to work for the countess at Č achtice Castle. Boróka, who was raised by a doctor and taught to read, but otherwise has no skills, is assigned to work in the laundry house. She befriends her seamstress roommate, Suzanna, who grows resentful when Boróka is picked to serve as a model for the countess’s portrait. According to Suzanna, the countess tortures the house’s servant girls in their quarters. Boróka chalks Suzanna’s accusations up to superstition, though her curiosity is piqued enough to snoop around the countess’s belongings, where she finds a journal describing how another noblewoman gave birth to an illegitimate daughter when she was 13. When the countess is charged with murdering hundreds of servants based on scant evidence, Boróka remains loyal. Revelations about the connections between Boróka, the countess, and the woman mentioned in the diary are unsurprising, but Velton’s riveting narrative vividly evokes the misogyny and paranoia of the era’s witch trials. Historical fiction fans will find plenty to enjoy. Agent: Jenny Bent, Bent Agency. (May)

Reviewed on 05/24/2024 | Details & Permalink

Kilroy’s gut-wrenching latest (after The Devil I Know) finds a mother, Soldier, recounting to her son, Sailor, the first few years of his life. The action moves fluidly between past and present, mimicking the out-of-time nature of early motherhood, and the immersive prose veers from lyrical (“The world rotated beneath us and we were the world”) to brutal (when Sailor was whining at six months old, Soldier screamed at him to “Shut the fuck up”). Soldier also expresses resentment toward men, including her husband, for never having to go through childbirth (“Tell me, men: when were you last split open from the inside?”). At times it can be difficult to distinguish between what actually happened and Soldier’s dark fantasies, such as her plan to abandon Sailor as an infant—but the novel builds to a gorgeous closing soliloquy, in which Soldier lays bare the confounding and heartbreaking reality of mothering. This is worth seeking out. (June)

Reviewed on 05/24/2024 | Details & Permalink