March New Books

Minding Frankie by Maeve Binchy 3/29
When a young alcoholic learns he has fathered a child with a dying woman, he must step into the role of father, protector, and provider to his infant daughter, Frankie, in a matter of weeks. Determined to succeed, though totally unprepared for his new responsibilities, Noel gets an essential assist from his visiting American cousin. Exercising her tremendous gifts of organization and insight, Emily cobbles together a neighborhood support system, featuring a few familiar faces from previous Binchy books. As everybody begins to mind Frankie, a suspicious social worker pokes her nose in where it doesn’t belong, attempting to dredge up any dirt she can on Noel and his slightly unorthodox network of babysitters.

Scones and Bones by Laura Childs 3/1
Theodosia Browning, proprietor of the city's Indigo Tea Shop (after 2010's The Teaberry Strangler). During the Heritage Society's Pirates and Plunder show, someone steals a diamond-embedded skull cup possibly fashioned from the skull of pirate Edward Teach (aka Blackbeard) right beneath the noses of Theo and Drayton Conneley, Theo's master tea blender. Even worse, the robber fatally stabs college kid Rob Commers, the society's history intern, and assaults Camilla Hodges, the society's office manager. While plucky Theo, her faithful shop employees, and CPD's Det. Burt Tidwell chase a nasty killer, Theo feels romantically torn between her boyfriend, chef Parker Scully, and an attractive newcomer, Max Scofield, a local museum's PR director.

The Jungle by Clive Cussler 3/8

Juan Cabrillo and his crew of mercenaries engage in one daring rescue operation after another with progressively higher stakes in Cussler's high-octane eighth Oregon Files novel (after The Silent Sea), his sixth collaboration with Du Brul. The rescue of a kidnap victim, an Indonesian teenage boy, from an Afghan village, yields a bonus in the form of MacD Lawless, a former U.S. Army Ranger, who proves of immediate value. Betrayals, more rescues, and escapes follow as one mysterious man seeks world domination using a discovery linked to 13th-century China. Cabrillo's handpicked team members, who operate from their state-of-the-art ship, the Oregon, are the only chance to stop a plot that threatens to bring the U.S. government to its knees.

Silent Mercy by Linda Fairstein 3/8
A decapitated woman, tortured and burned, is left on the steps of a Baptist church in Harlem. Another woman’s body, also tortured, is discovered at a different landmark house of worship. Legal eagle Alex Cooper and her partner, NYPD detective Mike Chapman, know the murders are connected but can’t figure out how. Before they get very far in their investigation, Alex runs afoul of a church official and is booted off the case. Not surprisingly, that doesn’t stop her. Her natural curiosity and dedication to the sex-crime victims she deals with lead her on a crazier-than-usual journey that begins at some venerable New York churches and ends on a deserted island with a grim past.

The Bone House by Brian Freeman 3/29
Hilary and Mark Bradley are trapped in a web of suspicion. Last year, accusations of a torrid affair with a student cost Mark his teaching job and made the young couple into outcasts in their remote island town off the Lake Michigan coast. Now another teenage girl is found dead on a deserted beach. . . and once again, Mark faces a hostile town convinced of his guilt.

Hilary Bradley is determined to prove that Mark is innocent, but she’s on a lonely, dangerous quest. Even when she discovers that the murdered girl was witness to a horrific crime years earlier, the police are certain she’s throwing up a smoke screen to protect her husband. Only a quirky detective named Cab Bolton seems willing to believe Hilary’s story.

Hilary and Cab soon find that people in this community are willing to kill to keep their secrets hidden—and to make sure Mark doesn’t get away with murder. And with each shocking revelation, even Hilary begins to wonder whether her husband is truly innocent.

Keep A Little Secret by Dorothy Garlock 3/21

As a child, Charlotte Tucker was raised in small town Minnesota where the only real company was the people who came to her aunt Louise's boarding house. Several years later, Charlotte is a young woman and thirsty to get out of her hometown and see the world. When a teaching position opens up in Oklahoma, she jumps at the opportunity to take a room on John Grant's ranch in Sawyer, a small town to the north, to begin her new career. She soon befriends Owen and Hannah Wallace, a brother and sister who have come from Colorado following the death of their mother. Abandoned at an early age by a father they never knew, they are set on revenge against the man who left them -- a man they believe is John Grant. As the summer heats up and a brutal storm wreaks havoc on the town, a secret is revealed that threatens to change Charlotte's life -- and her new friends -- forever.

Phantom Evil by Heather Graham 3/29
A secret government unit is formed under the oversight of Adam Harrison, famed paranormal investigator. The six members he's gathered know a little of the otherworldly—each has honed a psychic talent of their own.

Jackson Crow, part English, part Cheyenne, heads the group. Haunted by his experience with an ancestral ghost who saved his life as a child, and the recent murders of two previous teammates, Jackson can't tell if Adam's demoted him or given him an extraordinary opportunity. Despite his link to the realm of spirits, he's well aware that the living commit the most heinous crimes, with spiritualist charlatans existing merely to fool and seduce the unwary.

To counterbalance Jackson's careful skepticism, Adam Harrison has paired him with Angela Hawkins, a young woman who learned the painful lesson of loss at an early age. A police officer utilizing her paranormal intuition in Virginia, she already has her hands full. But Adam's call to New Orleans is strong.

The case: In a historic mansion in New Orleans's French Quarter, a senator's wife falls to her death from a balcony. Most think she jumped, distraught over the loss of her young son. Some say she was pushed. And yet others believe she was beckoned by the ghostly spirits that inhabit the house—once the site of a serial killer's grisly work.

Whether supernatural or all too human, crimes of passion, greed and desire will cast the pair into danger of losing their lives…and their immortal souls.

Dead By Midnight by Carolyn Hart 3/29
Annie Darling, proprietor of the Death on Demand mystery bookstore in South Carolina's Lowcountry, believes that the official conclusion of suicide of one of her employees, Pat Merridew, doesn't add up. Recently fired from her longtime position as receptionist for the law firm of Jamison, Jamison, & Brewster, Pat was taking odd, late-night excursions, and had planned an expensive cruise to Alaska that her economic situation wouldn't support. With the help of her husband, Max, Annie begins to nose around among lawyer Glen Jamison's family and associates. When Glen is shot dead, the evidence points to his sister, Elaine, but Annie and Max think that Elaine is protecting someone else and that the two deaths are connected.

Devious by Lisa Jackson 3/29
The crime scene at St. Marguerite’s cathedral in New Orleans is shocking, even to seasoned detectives like Rick Bentz and Reuben Montoya. A novice nun named Sister Camille has been found dressed in a yellowed bridal gown and viciously garroted, her body covered with an altar cloth. Valerie Houston is devastated by her sister’s death. For weeks, she’d begged Camille to leave St. Marguerite’s, where she seemed determined to live as some kind of martyr. But Camille had a knack for making bad choices — she joined the convent in part because she’d fallen for Val’s soon-to-be ex-husband, Slade. Convinced the police aren’t doing enough, Val begins to investigate. Slade, on a mission to repair their marriage, is determined to help her. But the deeper Val’s inquiries go, the more twisted the case becomes. St. Marguerite’s is far from the tranquil retreat many believe, and everyone, from handsome Father Frank O’Toole to the mysterious Mother Superior, has their own agenda. Despite their closeness, even Camille had a hidden life Val never suspected. But someone knew about Camille’s past — and Val’s, too. Now she has no choice but to catch a devious, depraved killer intent on purging St. Marguerite’s of all its sins — before she becomes the next victim…

Mystery by Jonathan Kellerman 3/29
Alex Delaware, the L.A. psychologist and crime-solver, returns to tackle another tricky case. A woman has been murdered, her body mutilated. Homicide detective Milo Sturgis, Delaware’s frequent partner, brings Alex into the case, hoping for some insight into the psychology of the killer. Alex is surprised to discover that the victim is familiar to him; Alex and his girlfriend saw her at a restaurant only hours before her death. But how can Alex and Milo expect to find any usable clues when the restaurant is now out of business? The Delaware series has been going since 1985, and it’s long since settled into a comfortable formula, which is just fine as far as fans are concerned. The books star a pair of engaging protagonists and, for the most part, are well plotted. In addition, Kellerman usually tosses in a couple of twists to keep readers on their toes.

The Saturday Big Tent Wedding Party by Alexander McCall Smith 3/22
At a remote cattle post south of Gaborone two cows have been killed, and Precious Ramotswe, Botswana’s No. 1 Lady Detective, is asked to investigate by a rather frightened and furtive gentleman. It is an intriguing problem with plenty of suspects—including, surprisingly, her own client.

To complicate matters, Mma Ramo-tswe is haunted by a vision of her dear old white van, and Grace Makutsi witnesses it as well. Is it the ghost of her old friend, or has it risen from the junkyard? In the meantime, one of Mr. J.L.B. Matekoni’s apprentices may have gotten a girl pregnant and, under pressure to marry her, has run away. Naturally, it is up to Precious to help sort things out. Add to the mix Violet Sephotho’s newly launched run for the Botswana Parliament and a pair of perfect wedding shoes—will wedding bells finally ring for Phuti Radiphuti and Grace Makutsi?

Toys by James Patterson 3/14
Hays Baker and his wife Lizbeth possess super-human strength, extraordinary intelligence, stunning looks, a sex life to die for, and two beautiful children. Of course they do--they're Elites, endowed at birth with the very best that the world can offer. The only problem in their perfect world: humans and their toys!

The one with the most toys--dies

The top operative for the Agency of Change, Hays has just won the fiercest battle of his career. He has been praised by the President, and is a national hero. But before he can savor his triumph, he receives an unbelievable shock that overturns everything he thought was true. Suddenly Hays is on the other side of the gun, forced to leave his perfect family and fight for his life.

Now a hunted fugitive, Hays is thrown into a life he never dreamed possible--fighting to save humans everywhere from extinction. He enlists all of his training to uncover the truth that will save millions of lives--maybe even his own.

Sing You Home by Jodi Picoult 3/1
When music therapist Zoe Baxter’s latest pregnancy ends in a stillbirth, her husband Max decides he can’t handle any more heartbreak and leaves her. As she picks up the pieces of her life, Zoe is surprised to find herself falling for a school counselor who happens to be a woman. While Zoe is finding happiness with Vanessa, Max falls off the wagon and is helped by a pastor from his brother’s evangelical church. Vanessa and Zoe wed in Massachusetts, and Vanessa offers to carry one of the fertilized embryos Zoe and Max stored. Excited by the prospect of being a mother, Zoe goes to Max to get him to release the embryos to her and is shocked when he instead sues her for custody of them, backed by his church. Told from the perspectives of all three major characters.