BROWNELL LIBRARY NEW TITLES, JULY 2019 FICTION F AITKEN Aitken, Maureen. The patron saint of lost girls / Southeast Missouri State University Press, 2018 It's the Midwest in the 1970-80s, and Mary is growing up in Detroit, where the recession hits hard, and jobs are scarce. In a set of linked stories, Mary tries to conjure the spirits of protection to confront economic struggle, violence, addiction, and death. Mary moves to cities across the Midwest looking for work, all the while learning the healing power of dignity from the true patrons: her community of friends and family who teach her to love better, live fuller, and question power. F AKERS Akers, W. M. Westside: a novel / Harper Voyager, an imprint of HarperCollinsPublishers, 2019 A young detective who specializes in "tiny mysteries" finds herself at the center on Manhattan's Westside--a peculiar and dangerous neighborhood home to strange magic and stranger residents. F ANDREWS Andrews, Mary Kay. Sunset Beach / St. Martin's Press, 2019 Drue Campbell's life is adrift. Out of a job and down on her luck, life doesn't seem to be getting any better when her estranged father, Brice Campbell, a flamboyant personal injury attorney, shows up at her mother's funeral after a twenty-year absence. Worse, he's remarried -- to Drue's eighth grade frenemy, Wendy, now his office manager. And they're offering her a job. It seems like the job from hell, but the offer is sweetened by the news of her inheritance -- her grandparents' beach bungalow in the sleepy town of Sunset Beach, a charming but storm-damaged eyesore now surrounded by waterfront McMansions. With no other prospects, Drue begrudgingly joins the firm, spending her days screening out the grifters whose phone calls flood the law office. Working with Wendy is no picnic either. But when a suspicious death at an exclusive beach resort nearby exposes possible corruption at her father's firm, she goes from unwilling cubicle rat to unwitting investigator, and is drawn into a case that may - or may not - involve her father. With an office romance building, a decades- old missing persons case re-opened, and a cottage in rehab, one thing is for sure at Sunset Beach: there's a storm on the horizon. F ARENSON DICKMAN Arenson Dickman, Francie. Chuckerman makes a movie: a novel / She Writes Press, 2018 "Love matters a little, but luck matters more." The words of thirty-five-year-old David Melman's Jewish grandmother still haunt him. He’s scared to settle down. Instead, he dates twenty-something pop stars that he meets through his celebrity-branding business. But when his niece and nephew inform him that he's hit "rock bottom" with his latest inappropriate relationship, David realizes that change might be in order--so when his sister Marcy, with her own ulterior motive, pushes him to take a film-writing class taught by her friend Laurel, he agrees. Will writing a movie about a childhood visit to his grandparents in Florida, an unforgettable driving lesson, and a 1977 Cadillac bring David love? Luck? Or both? Alternating between David's present-day life and his past through his movie script, Chuckerman Makes a Movie is a romantic comedy blended with a comedic coming-of-age. F ARNETT Arnett, Kristen N. Mostly dead things: a novel / Tin House Books, 2019 Taking over her family's failing taxidermy shop in the wake of her father's suicide, grief- stricken Jessa-Lynn Morton pursues less-than-legal ways of generating income while struggling to figure out her place among her eccentric loved ones. F BALDACCI Baldacci, David. One good deed / Grand Central Publishing, 2019 It's 1949. When war veteran Aloysius Archer is released from Carderock Prison, he is sent to Poca City on parole with a short list of dos and a much longer list of donts: do report regularly to his parole officer, don't go to bars, certainly don't drink alcohol, do get a job -- and don't ever associate with loose women. The small town quickly proves more complicated and dangerous than Archer's years serving in the war or his time in jail. Within a single night, his search for gainful employment -- and a stiff drink -- leads him to a local bar, where he is hired for what seems like a simple job: to collect a debt owed to a powerful local businessman, Hank Pittleman. Soon Archer discovers that recovering the debt won't be so easy. The indebted man has a furious grudge against Hank and refuses to pay; Hank's clever mistress has her own designs on Archer; and both Hank and Archer's stern parole officer, Miss Crabtree, are keeping a sharp eye on him. When a murder takes place right under Archer's nose, police suspicions rise against the ex-convict, and Archer realizes that the crime could send him right back to prison... if he doesn't use every skill in his arsenal to track down the real killer. F BARNETT Barnett, Karen. Ever faithful: a vintage national parks novel / Waterbrook, 2019 "Vibrant historic Yellowstone National Park comes to life in this romantic mystery about a man hiding the truth, braving the west to become something more--and the woman who must confront his deception"-- F BECHARD Bechard, Deni Ellis. White: a novel / Milkweed Editions, 2018 "American journalist travels the Congo while writing an exposé• on corruption"-- F BELLE Belle, Kimberly. Dear wife / Park Row Books, 2019 "For nearly a year, Beth has been planning for this day. A day some people might call any other Wednesday, but Beth prefers to see it as her new beginning, one with a new look, new name, and a new city. Beth has given her plan significant thought, because one small slip and her violent husband will find her. A couple hundred miles away, Jeffrey returns home from a work trip to find his wife, Sabine, is missing. Wherever she is, she's taken almost nothing with her. Her abandoned car is the only evidence the police have, and all signs point to foul play. As the police search for leads, the case becomes more and more convoluted. Sabine's carefully laid plans for her future indicate trouble at home and a husband who would be better off with her gone. The detective on the case will stop at nothing to find out what happened and bring this missing woman home. Where is Sabine? And who is Beth? The only thing that's certain is that someone is lying and the truth won't stay buried for long."-- Publisher description. F BRIGGS Briggs, Patricia. Storm cursed / Ace, 2019 Mercy Thompson has opened her garage again and is trying to get back to normal. Of course, now that the Tri-Cities are viewed as neutral ground, all kinds of supernatural beings are heading her way. With her mate Adam Hauptman's firm involved in providing security to a top-secret meeting with the US government and the fae, Mercy is tapped to handle everything else--including reports of a strange witch in town. F CALLANAN Callanan, Liam. Paris by the book: a novel / Dutton, an imprint of Penguin Random House LLC, 2018 When eccentric novelist Robert Eady abruptly vanishes, he leaves behind his wife, Leah, their daughters, and, hidden in an unexpected spot, plane tickets to Paris. F CASPERS Caspers, Nona. The fifth woman / Sarabande Books, 2018 Years after Caspers’s unnamed narrator loses her first lover in a tragic accident, she finds herself wondering, "What did she want from me? What are the things that matter?" In vivid, richly detailed vignettes, the book tracks the cyclical nature of grief and remembrance across a life fractured by loss. At times dryly comical, at other times radiantly surreal, The Fifth Woman is a testament to the resurrecting power of memory and enduring love. F CHIANG Chiang, Ted. Exhalation / Alfred A. Knopf, 2019 This much-anticipated second collection of stories is signature Ted Chiang, full of revelatory ideas and deeply sympathetic characters. In "The Merchant and the Alchemist's Gate," a portal through time forces a fabric seller in ancient Baghdad to grapple with past mistakes and the temptation of second chances. In the epistolary "Exhalation," an alien scientist makes a shocking discovery with ramifications not just for his own people, but for all of reality. And in "The Lifecycle of Software Objects," a woman cares for an artificial intelligence over twenty years, elevating a faddish digital pet into what might be a true living being. Also included are two brand-new stories: "Omphalos" and "Anxiety Is the Dizziness of Freedom." In this fantastical and elegant collection, Ted Chiang wrestles with the oldest questions on earth-- What is the nature of the universe? What does it mean to be human?--and ones that no one else has even imagined. And, each in its own way, the stories prove that complex and thoughtful science fiction can rise to new heights of beauty, meaning, and compassion. F CLARE Clare, Kelli. Hidden: a novel / SparkPress, 2018 Desperate after discovering her family murdered, a small-town art teacher runs to England with a seductive foreigner in search of safety and answers in this award-winning romantic suspense. F COHEN Cohen, Tish. The summer we lost her: a novel / Gallery Books, 2019 "In the tradition of bestselling domestic fiction from such authors as Liane Moriarty, Jodi Picoult, and Anna Quindlen, a wrenching, deeply heartfelt novel about a husband and wife, a missing child, and the complicated family secrets that can derail even the best of marriages."- - F COLLINS Collins, Bridget.