Saturdays at the Café

 

Saturdays at the Café is a weekly feature hosted here to talk about and discuss the books I’ve discovered during the past week, added to my shelf and am excited about reading. They may be new/scheduled releases I’ve seen on NetGalley, at the library, or from publishers or they may be older titles my friends have reviewed and shared on Goodreads or blogs.

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The author of the “suspenseful, chilling, unsettling, and creepy” (Mystery and Suspense Magazine) The Woman Outside My Door returns with another spine-tingling domestic thriller about a nanny whose new job working for the perfect family is not everything it seems.

Amy jumps at the opportunity when she’s offered a nannying job in picturesque West Cork. The assignment is for the friendly and welcoming Carroll family, whose stunning house is situated on a stretch of remote and rugged coastline overlooking the Atlantic Ocean. It’s the perfect chance for Amy to escape the suffocating city and the man who made her life hell.

With two adorable children to oversee, a pair of generous employers, and more freedom than she’s enjoyed in years, everything seems wonderful. So why can’t Amy shake a creeping sense of unease? Perhaps it’s the husband’s erratic behavior. Or the fact that she was never told about the reclusive teenage son whose bedroom is next to hers. Or maybe it’s the strange messages that somebody has been painting around the local village.

Quickly, it becomes clear that all is not well in the Carroll marriage, nor in their idyllic rural community. Whispered secrets and strange occurrences fill the breathtaking scenery with menace and, as the days pass, Amy learns that the refuge she has sought just might be the most dangerous place of all.

For fans of The Turn of the Key and The Safe Place, and from “a bright new voice in psychological thrillers” (Erin Kelly, USA TODAY bestselling author), this unpredictable page-turner will pull you in and won’t let go.

This showed up at my library a couple of weeks ago and my number finally came up. I’m such a sucker for nanny stories.

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New York Times bestselling author Chandler Baker’s Cutting Teeth is a witty, thrilling story of parental love that asks: is there anything a mother won’t do for her children?

At the Little Academy, mothers fret over their preschoolers, who have developed an unsettling medical syndrome. The children’s odd craving for blood is considered relatively benign (to everyone except their beleaguered moms) until a young teacher is found dead and the only potential witnesses are ten adorable 4-year-olds. Then it becomes clear that the police are looking at the children as not just witnesses, but also suspects…and they’re watching their mothers as well.

Darby, Mary Beth, and Freddie have very different parenting styles, though they’re united in their love for their children. They’re not thrilled about the biting episodes sweeping through the class, of course, and they’re coping to various degrees with the pressures of being a good mom, which suddenly seems to include, in addition to everything else, offering themselves up as sustenance.

Each of them was there at Little Academy the day of the murder, and as the police begin to look at them more closely, their children’s ability to bleed them dry is becoming not merely metaphorical. Exploring the standards society holds mothers to—along with the ones to which we hold ourselves—and the things no one ever tells you about becoming a parent, Cutting Teeth is a witty, original story of parental love that asks if there is anything a mother is not asked to sacrifice for their children.

This showed up at my library some time ago and I jumped in a fairly long queue because the story sounds unique and is narrated by January LaVoy. Thankfully, my number finally came up.

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Myron Bolitar and Windsor Horne Lockwood III​ reunite to find a dead man come back to life in this gripping thriller from the #1 New York Times bestselling author of I Will Find You.

Former basketball star Myron Bolitar has barely restarted his agency for sports stars and celebrities when two federal agents walk into his office, asking for answers. Assuming they want to talk about the highly publicized Callister murders—of which he and Win know nothing, other than what’s been saturating the news lately—he’s stunned when, instead, they demand to know where Greg Downing is.

Greg, a former NBA player-turned-beloved-coach, was an old client of Myron’s, one of his very first. The reason for Myron’s surprise is simple: Greg Downing died three years ago.

But according to these federal agents, Greg is still alive—and somehow involved in the Callister case.

Before his death, Greg made some strange money moves, but nothing about his reappearance makes any sense. As Myron and Win investigate, they’re also surprised to uncover a seemingly related case where someone was murdered. Then another. And another. Is Greg alive? And if he is, where is he? And ultimately, are they looking for Greg? Or are they looking for a dangerously clever serial killer?

Did a happy dance when I got the author’s newsletter announcing this new book in the Myron Bolitar series! It’s scheduled for release in May and is a library audiobook hopeful.

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The boy who couldn’t love and the girl who wouldn’t.

Ginny Murphy is a total guy’s girl. She’s always found friendships with boys easier to form and keep drama-free–as long as they don’t fall for her, and she doesn’t fall for them. She and her best guy friends have stuck to that. But then she meets Adrian Silvas, the only one who’s ever made her crave more, and Ginny begins to question her own rules.

Piece by piece, Ginny and Adrian begin to fall into something intoxicating, something dangerous. Ginny threatens to destroy the belief Adrian’s held ever since witnessing his own mother’s heartbreak: that love isn’t worth the risk. For Ginny, the stakes could be even higher. Letting Adrian get close could mean exposing a secret she’s long protected: her disordered eating.

Ginny isn’t looking to be saved by someone. But maybe she and Adrian can help each other–if they don’t destroy each other first.

Heartfelt and evocative, Guy’s Girl is a powerful story about true love, self-love, and growing up.

Thanks to Tessa @ Tessa Talks Books for changing my mind about this book. It’s a library audiobook hopeful.

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A phenomenal novel of resilience and survival from bestselling author of The Tattooist of Auschwitz, Heather Morris.

In the midst of World War II, an English musician, Norah Chambers, places her eight-year-old daughter Sally on a ship leaving Singapore, desperate to keep her safe from the Japanese army as they move down through the Pacific. Norah remains to care for her husband and elderly parents, knowing she may never see her child again.

Sister Nesta James, a Welsh Australian nurse, has enlisted to tend to Allied troops. But as Singapore falls to the Japanese she joins the terrified cargo of people, including the heartbroken Norah, crammed aboard the Vyner Brooke merchant ship. Only two days later, they are bombarded from the air off the coast of Indonesia, and in a matter of hours, the Vyner Brooke lies broken on the seabed.

After surviving a brutal 24 hours in the sea, Nesta and Norah reach the beaches of a remote island, only to be captured by the Japanese and held in one of their notorious POW camps. The camps are places of starvation and brutality, where disease runs rampant. Sisters in arms, Norah and Nesta fight side by side every day, helping whoever they can, and discovering in themselves and each other extraordinary reserves of courage, resourcefulness and determination.

Sisters under the Rising Sun is a story of women in war: a novel of sisterhood, bravery and friendship in the darkest of circumstances, from the multimillion-copy bestselling author of The Tattooist of Auschwitz, Cilka’s Journey and Three Sisters.

One of my trusted Goodreads friends raved about this story so I grabbed the audiobook as soon as it showed up at my library.

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From Jesmyn Ward—the two-time National Book Award winner, youngest winner of the Library of Congress Prize for Fiction, and MacArthur Fellow—comes a haunting masterpiece, sure to be an instant classic, about an enslaved girl in the years before the Civil War.

“‘Let us descend,’ the poet now began, ‘and enter this blind world.’” — Inferno, Dante Alighieri

Let Us Descend is a reimagining of American slavery, as beautifully rendered as it is heart-wrenching. Searching, harrowing, replete with transcendent love, the novel is a journey from the rice fields of the Carolinas to the slave markets of New Orleans and into the fearsome heart of a Louisiana sugar plantation.

Annis, sold south by the white enslaver who fathered her, is the reader’s guide through this hellscape. As she struggles through the miles-long march, Annis turns inward, seeking comfort from memories of her mother and stories of her African warrior grandmother. Throughout, she opens herself to a world beyond this world, one teeming with of earth and water, of myth and history; spirits who nurture and give, and those who manipulate and take. While Ward leads readers through the descent, this, her fourth novel, is ultimately a story of rebirth and reclamation.

From one of the most singularly brilliant and beloved writers of her generation, this miracle of a novel inscribes Black American grief and joy into the very land—the rich but unforgiving forests, swamps, and rivers of the American South. Let Us Descend is Jesmyn Ward’s most magnificent novel yet, a masterwork for the ages.

Another one of my trusted Goodreads friends wrote a compelling review of this story and while I’m not reading a lot of historical fiction lately, this one feels special. It’s also the November selection by Oprah’s Book Club. My library came through with the audiobook.

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A seemingly idyllic summer picnic ends in a macabre murder that echoes a pair of slayings fourteen years earlier in this riveting new historical mystery from the USA Today bestselling author of Who Cries for the Lost.

July 1815: The Prince Regent’s grandiose plans to celebrate Napoléon’s recent defeat at Waterloo are thrown into turmoil when Lady McInnis and her daughter Emma are found brutally murdered in Richmond Park, their bodies posed in a chilling imitation of the stone effigies once found atop medieval tombs. Bow Street magistrate Sir Henry Lovejoy immediately turns to his friend Sebastian St. Cyr, Viscount Devlin, for help with the investigation. For as Devlin discovers, Lovejoy’s own wife and daughter were also murdered in Richmond Park, their bodies posed in the same bizarre postures. A traumatized ex-soldier was hanged for their killings. So is London now confronting a malicious copyist? Or did Lovejoy help send an innocent man to the gallows?

Aided by his wife, Hero, who knew Lady McInnis from her work with poor orphans, Devlin finds himself exploring a host of unsavory characters from a vicious chimney sweep to a smiling but decidedly lethal baby farmer. Also coming under increasing scrutiny is Sir Ivo McInnis himself, along with a wounded Waterloo veteran—who may or may not have been Laura McInnis’s lover—and a charismatic young violinist who moonlights as a fencing master and may have formed a dangerous relationship with Emma. But when Sebastian’s investigation turns toward man about town Basil Rhodes, he quickly draws the fury of the Palace, for Rhodes is well known as the Regent’s favorite illegitimate son.

Then Lady McInnis’s young niece and nephew are targeted by the killer, and two more women are discovered murdered and arranged in similar postures. With his own life increasingly in danger, Sebastian finds himself drawn inexorably toward a conclusion far darker and more horrific than anything he could have imagined.

This is my most favorite historical mystery/fiction series so I swiftly submitted my NetGalley request for this 19th book as soon as one of my Goodreads group members announced that it was there. Fingers crossed 🤞 

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When you have their jobs, there’s no such thing as a peaceful vacation…

Sam and Nick are ready to get out of DC—and the White House—for a much-needed vacation to celebrate their second anniversary. Due to ongoing political pressures, they decide to scuttle their plans for a return to Bora Bora to stay closer to home at their favorite oceanfront house at Dewey Beach in Delaware. But before they can make their escape, Sam is summoned back to work to deal with yet another crisis in the ongoing investigation into former Lieutenant Stahl. Just when they think they’ve seen the full scope of his depravity, there is more. Sam leaves Gonzo, Freddie and the rest of the squad in charge of a new investigation of a murdered college student while Gigi and Cameron deal with the Internal Affairs Board and plot their strategy to deal with a lawsuit from the Patrick family. Meanwhile, Nick’s mother is working on a plea deal with an unexpected new advocate who wants her to reconcile with her estranged son.

As always for the first couple, nothing ever goes according to plan, but the chance to spend a week mostly alone is just what they needed until their children, family and friends join them for the final weekend at the beach.

It’s March in Dewey, and Sam and Nick are snuggling in front of the fire as they prepare to begin their third year of marriage.

I’m collecting the books in this spinoff series as I reread the first series with one of my Goodreads groups. It’s a library audiobook hopeful.

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What books did YOU add to your shelves this week?