November New Books

Zero Day by David Baldacci 10/31

And Zero Day is where it all begins....John Puller is a combat veteran and the best military investigator in the U.S. Army's Criminal Investigative Division. His father was an Army fighting legend, and his brother is serving a life sentence for treason in a federal military prison. Puller has an indomitable spirit and an unstoppable drive to find the truth.

Now, Puller is called out on a case in a remote, rural area in West Virginia coal country far from any military outpost. Someone has stumbled onto a brutal crime scene, a family slaughtered. The local homicide detective, a headstrong woman with personal demons of her own, joins forces with Puller in the investigation. As Puller digs through deception after deception, he realizes that absolutely nothing he's seen in this small town, and no one in it, are what they seem. Facing a potential conspiracy that reaches far beyond the hills of West Virginia, he is one man on the hunt for justice against an overwhelming force.

A Dark and Lonely Place by Edna Buchanan 11/8
John Ashley and Laura Upthegrove became the most notorious, colorful, and compelling figures in Florida’s violent outlaw history. This is their true story of prison breaks, bootlegging, bank robberies, and piracy on the high seas. Their sensual and dreamy saga of love, passion, and violence is juxtaposed with the taut and suspenseful story of their fictional descendants who share the same love and dangers a hundred years later.

In today’s Miami, Homicide Sergeant John Ashley investigates a millionaire’s spectacular murder and instantly recognizes a stunning model linked to the case as the girl who has haunted his dreams since childhood. Her name is Laura, and the lightning-fast attraction is supernaturally mutual.
The homicide case goes bad, Ashley is falsely accused of murder, and the new lovers go on the run as history repeats itself. The question is, how powerful is the past? Do the present-day renegades stand a chance? Does anyone? Can any of us with the outlaw patterns of violence and tragedy imprinted in our DNA ever break the cycle? Can we change our own destiny? Or must the end always be the same for dangerous people in dangerous times?

The Wedding Quilt by Jennifer Chiaverini 11/1
Sarah McClure arrived at Elm Creek Manor as a newlywed, never suspecting that her quilting lessons with master quilter Sylvia Bergstrom Compson would inspire the successful and enduring business Elm Creek Quilts, whose members have nurtured a circle of friendship spanning generations.


The Wedding Quilt opens as the wedding day of Sarah's daughter Caroline approaches. As Sarah has learned, a union celebrates not only the betrothed couple's passage into wedlock, but also the contributions of those who have made the bride and groom the unique people they are. Thus Sarah's thoughts are filled with brides of Elm Creek Manor past and present-the traditions they honored, the legacies they bequeathed, and the wedding quilts that contain their stories in every stitch.

A wedding quilt is a powerful metaphor: of sisterhood, of community, of hope for the future. The blocks in Caroline's wedding quilt will display the signatures of beloved guests. As the Elm Creek Quilters circulate amid the festive preparations with pens and fabric in hand, memories of the Manor-and of the women who have lived there, in happiness and in sorrow-spill forth, rendering a vivid pastiche of family, friendship, and love in all its varieties.


The Drop by Michael Connelly 11/28
Harry Bosch has been given three years before he must retire from the LAPD, and he wants cases more fiercely than ever. In one morning, he gets two.

DNA from a 1989 rape and murder matches a 29-year-old convicted rapist. Was he an eight-year-old killer or has something gone terribly wrong in the new Regional Crime Lab? The latter possibility could compromise all of the lab's DNA cases currently in court.Then Bosch and his partner are called to a death scene fraught with internal politics.

Councilman Irvin Irving's son jumped or was pushed from a window at the Chateau Marmont. Irving, Bosch's longtime nemesis, has demanded that Harry handle the investigation.Relentlessly pursuing both cases, Bosch makes two chilling discoveries: a killer operating unknown in the city for as many as three decades, and a political conspiracy that goes back into the dark history of the police department.


Prince of Ravenscar by Catherine Coulter 11/1
Nicholas Monroe, widowed "Prince of Ravenscar," is feeling pressure from his family to remarry. But the mysterious death of his first wife, Lily, still hangs over his head. Her brother, Richard, believes Nicholas is responsible for her death. When Richard finally confronts Nicholas, long-held secrets threaten to resurface-despite someone's desperate effort to keep them buried.







Micro by Michael Crichton 11/22
Three men are found dead in the locked second-floor office of a Honolulu building, with no sign of struggle except for the ultrafine, razor-sharp cuts covering their bodies. The only clue left behind is a tiny bladed robot, nearly invisible to the human eye.

In the lush forests of Oahu, groundbreaking technology has ushered in a revolutionary era of biological prospecting. Trillions of microorganisms, tens of thousands of bacteria species, are being discovered; they are feeding a search for priceless drugs and applications on a scale beyond anything previously imagined.

In Cambridge, Massachusetts, seven graduate students at the forefront of their fields are recruited by a pioneering microbiology start-up. Nanigen MicroTechnologies dispatches the group to a mysterious lab in Hawaii, where they are promised access to tools that will open a whole new scientific frontier.
But once in the Oahu rain forest, the scientists are thrust into a hostile wilderness that reveals profound and surprising dangers at every turn. Armed only with their knowledge of the natural world, they find themselves prey to a technology of radical and unbridled power. To survive, they must harness the inherent forces of nature itself.




Devil's Gate by Clive Cussler 11/14
A Japanese cargo ship cruises the eastern Atlantic near the Azores- when it bursts into flames. A gang of pirates speeds to take advantage of the disaster-when their boat explodes. What is happening in this part of the world?

As Kurt Austin, Joe Zavala, and the rest of the NUMA Special Assignments Team rush to investigate, they find themselves drawn into the extraordinary ambitions of an African dictator, the creation of a weapon of almost mythical power, and an unimaginably audacious plan to extort the world's major nations. The penalty for refusal? The destruction of their greatest cities. Filled with the high-stakes suspense and boundless invention unique to Cussler, Devil's Gate is one of the most thrilling novels yet from the grand master of adventure.



Coffin Man by James D. Doss 11/8
When Colorado rancher and part-time tribal investigator Charlie Moon gets a call from Wanda Naranjo, she’s panicked. Not only is her sink leaking, which Moon graciously fixes, but her sixteen-year-old daughter, Betty, has gone missing. For how long? Only a few hours, but she’s pregnant. So what about the father-to-be? It’s a good question and anybody’s guess. Betty has kept her lips sealed on the subject.

And that’s not all. Betty claimed to be going to see a school counselor on what turned out to be his day off. So was she running away or was she abducted? Moon’s best friend, Granite Creek Chief of Police Scott Parris, doesn’t believe any of it and suspects that Wanda tricked them into doing a little emergency plumbing. While it’s enough to make Parris’s blood boil, Moon can’t shake the feeling that some other foul play might be at work.

Come a Little Closer by Dorothy Garlock 11/23
America's Heartland, 1946. World War II has ended, and everyone is pursuing peacetime's bright promise with fresh energy and hope. Newly-arrived in a small Wisconsin town, Christina Tucker now dares to chase her long-cherished dreams: put her wartime nursing skills to use and reconnect with country life. But helping a shell-shocked veteran recover soon tests her determination and disturbs town memories best left buried. She has no choice but to turn to her patient's seemingly-irresponsible brother, Tyler Sutter. A restless ex-soldier, Tyler can't believe this pretty ladylike nurse can heal his family. Yet as Christina begins to understand Tyler's own fears, the two grow close, then closer still-as a terrible secret sparks one man's violent, vengeful spree. With both the guilty and innocent alike in harm's way, Tyler and Christina must face all their fears . . . or never live to see the future.

V is for Vengence by Sue Grafton 11/14
woman with a murky past who kills herself-or was it murder? A spoiled kid awash in gambling debt who thinks he can beat the system. A lovely woman whose life is about to splinter into a thousand fragments. A professional shoplifting ring working for the Mob, racking up millions from stolen goods. A wandering husband, rich and ruthless. A dirty cop so entrenched on the force he is immune to exposure. A sinister gangster, conscienceless and brutal. A lonely widower mourning the death of his lover, desperate for answers, which may be worse than the pain of his loss. A private detective, Kinsey Millhone, whose thirty-eighth-birthday gift is a punch in the face that leaves her with two black eyes and a busted nose.

And an elegant and powerful businessman whose dealings are definitely outside the law: the magus at the center of the web.

V: Victim. Violence. Vengeance.

11/22/63 by Stephen King 11/8
On November 22, 1963, three shots rang out in Dallas, President Kennedy died, and the world changed. What if you could change it back? Stephen King’s heart-stoppingly dramatic new novel is about a man who travels back in time to prevent the JFK assassination—a thousand page tour de force.

Following his massively successful novel Under the Dome, King sweeps readers back in time to another moment—a real life moment—when everything went wrong: the JFK assassination. And he introduces readers to a character who has the power to change the course of history.

Jake Epping is a thirty-five-year-old high school English teacher in Lisbon Falls, Maine, who makes extra money teaching adults in the GED program. He receives an essay from one of the students—a gruesome, harrowing first person story about the night 50 years ago when Harry Dunning’s father came home and killed his mother, his sister, and his brother with a hammer. Harry escaped with a smashed leg, as evidenced by his crooked walk.

Not much later, Jake’s friend Al, who runs the local diner, divulges a secret: his storeroom is a portal to 1958. He enlists Jake on an insane—and insanely possible—mission to try to prevent the Kennedy assassination. So begins Jake’s new life as George Amberson and his new world of Elvis and JFK, of big American cars and sock hops, of a troubled loner named Lee Harvey Oswald and a beautiful high school librarian named Sadie Dunhill, who becomes the love of Jake’s life—a life that transgresses all the normal rules of time.

Longing by Karen Kingsury 11/22
Longing, book three in the Bailey Flanigan Series, picks up where Learning ended. After a long and lonely silence from Cody Coleman, Bailey Flanigan becomes closer to her one-time Hollywood co-star, Brandon Paul. Nights on the town in New York City and long talks on the balcony of Brandon's Malibu Beach home make Bailey dizzy with new feelings and cause her to wonder if her days with Cody are over forever. Meanwhile, Cody's work coaching a small-town football team has brought him and his players national attention. In the midst of the celebration and success, Cody finds himself much closer to a woman who seems to better understand him and his new life. Even so, never does much time go by without Bailey and Cody experiencing deep feelings of longing for each other, longing both for the past and for answers before they can move forward. Will an unexpected loss be the turning point for Cody? Will Cody and Bailey find a way back together again for the first time in more than a year? And if they do, will their brief time together be enough to help them remember all they've been longing for?

Kill by Alex Cross 11/14
The President's son and daughter are abducted, and Detective Alex Cross is one of the first on the scene. But someone very high-up is using the FBI, Secret Service, and CIA to keep him off the case and in the dark.

A deadly contagion in the water supply cripples half of the capital, and Alex discovers that someone may be about to unleash the most devastating attack the United States has ever experienced.

As his window for solving both crimes narrows, Alex makes a desperate decision that goes against everything he believes--one that may alter the fate of the entire coun

Hotel Verdome by Danielle Steel 11/1
The hotel was old, run-down. But to Swiss-born Hugues Martin, a young, ambitious hotelier trained in the most illustrious European traditions, it is a rough diamond, tucked away on a quiet, perfectly situated Manhattan street. After begging and borrowing every penny he can scrape together, Hugues purchases the building—and transforms it into one of the world’s finest luxury hotels.

Under Hugues’s tireless, exacting supervision, the Hotel Vendôme is soon renowned for its elegance, its efficiency, its unparalleled service and discretion—the ideal New York refuge for the rich and famous, as well as a perfect home for Hugues’s beautiful young wife and their daughter. But when his wife runs off with a notorious rock star, Hugues is suddenly a single parent to four-year-old Heloise—who will grow up happily regardless, amid a fascinating milieu of celebrities, socialites, politicians, world travelers, and the countless hotel employees who all adore her.

Halloween Storytime week of October 24th

Some of the delightful costumes at the library during Halloween Storytime. See more pictures at:http://www.flickr.com/photos/kassonlibrary/

Mark Zahn and Edgar Allen Poe

The Friends of the Kasson Library are hosting their 2011-2012 season of Hot Reads for Cold Nights. They will feature six Monday evenings with southeast Minnesota authors, writers and even a person who inspired an illustrator to use him as a model for a character in a children Christmas book. Each event will be at the Kasson Public Library and starts at 7 pm. Friends will be serving refreshments.


Local author Mark Zahn kicked off October's Hot Reads by sharing his journey of developing, researching and publishing his book, Modern Poe: Vol. 1. There were about 40 people in attendance who were interested in how he chose to write about this great writer and poet.

November's Hot Reads will be on Monday, November 14th 7 pm and features area historian Michael Eckers who recaps this past summer's Civil War 150th anniversary and talks about the upcoming 150th anniversary of the Dakota Wars along the Minnesota River in 2012.

December's Hot Reads will be on Monday, December 12th 7 pm will feature West Concord resident Chad Winsell and how he was chosen as Santa Claus in the Peef Chrismas Bear stories

Steve Jobs Dies at 56

Here’s to the crazy ones. The misfits. The rebels. The troublemakers. The round pegs in the square holes. The ones who see things differently. They’re not fond of rules. And they have no respect for the status quo. You can quote them, disagree with them, glorify or vilify them. About the only thing you can’t do is ignore them. Because they change things. They push the human race forward. And while some may see them as the crazy ones, we see genius. Because the people who are crazy enough to think they can change the world, are the ones who do. - Steve Jobs

Steve Jobs was the light at the end of a very dark tunnel that existed in the early 80's and Steve Jobs made it easier to use computers for the common people. Computers were DOS driven and in my opinion very hard to navigate. The reality of using computers was a hostile, foreign world and the big companies were not going to change.

He was my hero and I LOVED my Apple computers when I worked in schools. I hated to give them up for another brand due to a change in jobs. He made the world a more beautiful place with his rainbow of colors for his Apple computers, iPod, the iPad, and the iPhone. I feel it is a much better world for having Steve Jobs in it and he and his genius will be sadly missed.

October New Book

As The Pig Turns by M.C. Beaton 10/11
Winter Parva is a “picturesque” (touristy) Cotswold village with gift shops, a medieval market hall, and thatched cottages. After a disappointing Christmas season, the parish council has decided to hold a special event in January, complete with old-fashioned costumes, morris dancing, and a pig roast on the village green.
Always one for a good roasting, Agatha Raisin organizes an outing to enjoy the merriment. The rotary spit turning over a bed of blazing charcoals is sure to please on this foggy and blistery evening. But as the fog lifts slightly, the sharp-eyed Agatha notices something peculiar about the pig: a tattoo of a heart with an arrow through it and the name Amy. “Stop!” she screams suddenly. “Pigs don’t have tattoos.”

The “pig,” in fact, is Gary Beech, a policeman not exactly beloved by the locals, including Agatha herself. Although Agatha has every intention of leaving matters to the police, everything changes when the Gary’s ex-wife, Amy, hires Agatha’s detective agency to investigate—and another murder ensues. With that provocation, how could any sleuth as vain and competitive (and secretly insecure) as Agatha do anything other than solve the case herself?



Murder Unleashed by Rita Mae Brown 10/4
Settling into ranch life outside Reno, Nevada, with her gregarious great-aunt Jeep Reed and Jeep’s German Shepherd, King, former Wall Street trader Mags doesn’t miss the cutthroat world of investment banking—because its destructive tentacles have reached westward to the Silver State. The foreclosure crisis has taken a huge bite out of the local real estate market, where rows of homes sit unsold and forsaken—but not empty.

A group of squatters, including desperate single mothers with children, are living under the radar in the houses on Reno’s Yolanda Street—without water or electricity. Big-hearted real estate broker Babs Gallagher enlists Jeep and Mags to start a community outreach program, but that means going up against uncaring utility companies, corrupt officials, ruthless politicians—and a merciless murderer. When a former banker is found brutally slain in one of the abandoned homes, the notion of “cutthroat business practices” takes on a whole new meaning.

Baxter, King, and some other canine detectives leave no bone of contention buried as they help their human charges untangle a string of murders rooted deep in the heart of Red Rock Valley’s prominent citizenry. Though Reno deputy—and Mags’s unofficial significant other—Pete Meadows uncovers evidence of blackmail, shady real estate ventures, and rumors of lost treasure, the killer seems to hold all the cards in a city of gambling and sin. Luckily, Mags, Jeep, and Babs still have a few tricks up their sleeves. As nefarious sexploits and backroom backstabbing reverberate throughout the county, the dogs are officially off the leash—and on the hunt for a killer. Along the way, they encounter curious coyotes, human kindness and treachery, and a long-buried stash of riches.




The Chocolate Castle Clue by Joanna Carl 10/4
Lee McKinney Woodyard discovers a dusty trophy inside TenHuis Chocolade that belongs to her aunt Nettie and her old high school singing group, the Pier-O-Ettes. It's a trophy that brings back terrible memories of an unsolved murder years ago.
Before Lee takes aim at the past, someone is murdered in the here and now. Lee needs to keep her eyes on the prize, hoping the trophy is a clue to finding the killer-before she's a target herself.





Skeleton Letters by Laura Child 10/4
Is nothing sacred? The last thing Carmela Bertrand and her friend Ava expected to bear witness to in St. Tristan's Church was a crime. But now a beloved member of their scrapbooking circle lies lifeless next to a smashed statue of St. Sebastien-and a mysterious hooded figure has absconded with an antique crucifix.

As Carmela and Ava are drawn deeper into New Orleans' French Quarter in search of the missing crucifix, they may need the help of more than a few patron saints. Because this is one killer they don't want to cross...



Lost December by Richard Richard Evans 11/1
As heir to the Crisp Copy Center fortune, Luke has it made---until he burns through his entire inheritance in just one year of partying. Ashamed to ask his famous father for help, he finds employment---and romance---as an entry-level clerk.








Kill Shot by Vince Flynn 11/1
For months, Mitch Rapp has been steadily working his way through a list of men, bullet by bullet. With each kill, the tangled network of monsters responsible for the slaughter of 270 civilians becomes increasingly clear. He is given his next target: a plump Libyan diplomat who is prone to drink and is currently in Paris without a single bodyguard.

Rapp finds him completely unprotected and asleep in his bed. With confidence in his well-honed skills and conviction of the man’s guilt, he easily sends a bullet into the man’s skull. But in the split second it takes the bullet to leave the silenced pistol, everything changes. The door to the hotel room is kicked open and gunfire erupts all around Rapp. In an instant the hunter has become the hunted. Rapp is left wounded and must flee for his life.

The next morning, the news breaks in Washington that Libya’s Oil Minister has been killed along with three innocent civilians and four unidentified men. The French authorities are certain that the gunman is wounded and on the loose in Paris. As the finger pointing begins, Rapp’s handlers have only one choice—deny any responsibility for the incident and pray that their newest secret weapon stays that way, avoiding capture and dying quietly. One person in the group, however, is not prone to leaving things to chance. Rapp has become a liability, and he absolutely cannot be allowed to be taken alive by the French authorities. But it will soon become clear that nothing is more dangerous than a wounded and cornered Mitch Rapp.



The Litigators by John Grisham 10/15
The partners at Finley & Figg—all two of them—often refer to themselves as “a boutique law firm.” Boutique, as in chic, selective, and prosperous. They are, of course, none of these things. What they are is a two-bit operation always in search of their big break, ambulance chasers who’ve been in the trenches much too long making way too little. Their specialties, so to speak, are quickie divorces and DUIs, with the occasional jackpot of an actual car wreck thrown in. After twenty plus years together, Oscar Finley and Wally Figg bicker like an old married couple but somehow continue to scratch out a half-decent living from their seedy bungalow offices in southwest Chicago.

And then change comes their way. More accurately, it stumbles in. David Zinc, a young but already burned-out attorney, walks away from his fast-track career at a fancy downtown firm, goes on a serious bender, and finds himself literally at the doorstep of our boutique firm. Once David sobers up and comes to grips with the fact that he’s suddenly unemployed, any job—even one with Finley & Figg—looks okay to him.

With their new associate on board, F&F is ready to tackle a really big case, a case that could make the partners rich without requiring them to actually practice much law. An extremely popular drug, Krayoxx, the number one cholesterol reducer for the dangerously overweight, produced by Varrick Labs, a giant pharmaceutical company with annual sales of $25 billion, has recently come under fire after several patients taking it have suffered heart attacks. Wally smells money.

A little online research confirms Wally’s suspicions—a huge plaintiffs’ firm in Florida is putting together a class action suit against Varrick. All Finley & Figg has to do is find a handful of people who have had heart attacks while taking Krayoxx, convince them to become clients, join the class action, and ride along to fame and fortune. With any luck, they won’t even have to enter a courtroom! It almost seems too good to be true. And it is


Bonnie by Iris Johansen 10/18
When Eve Duncan gave birth to her daughter, she experienced a love she never knew existed. Nothing would stand in the way of giving Bonnie a wonderful life---until the unthinkable happened and the seven-year-old vanished into thin air. Eve found herself in the throes of a nightmare from which there was no escape. But a new Eve emerged: a woman who would use her remarkable talent as a forensic sculptor to help others find closure in the face of tragedy. Now with the help of her beloved Joe Quinn and CIA agent Catherine Ling, Eve has come closer than ever to the truth. But the deeper she digs, the more she realizes that Bonnie’s father is a key player in solving this monstrous puzzle. And that Bonnie’s disappearance was not as random as everyone had always believed . . .

Gideon's Gift by Karen Kingsbury 10/10
Gideon Mercer, an eight-year-old leukemia patient, is hoping for a huge Christmas miracle. She does not wish that her parents will scrape together $50,000 for a life-saving bone marrow transplant for her. Nor does she want her dream Christmas with a light-filled tree and a truck for her little brother. Instead, Gideon hopes that the belligerent homeless man she met while her family worked in a food kitchen will believe in God. Five years prior, Earl Badgett lost his faith when his wife and daughter were killed in a car accident. Unable to go on, he took to the streets, hoping to die. An unexpected Christmas gift from Gideon brings God back into Earl's life with repercussions for both of them.

The Christmas Wedding by James Patterson 10/17
The tree is decorated, the cookies are baked, and the packages are wrapped, but the biggest celebration this Christmas is Gaby Summerhill's wedding. Since her husband died three years ago, Gaby's four children have drifted apart, each consumed by the turbulence of their own lives. They haven't celebrated Christmas together since their father's death, but when Gaby announces that she's getting married--and that the groom will remain a secret until the wedding day--she may finally be able to bring them home for the holidays.

A Christmas Homecoming by Anne Perry 10/25
In A Christmas Homecoming, a familiar face from the Charlotte and Thomas Pitt novels—Charlotte’s mother, Caroline—travels with her young husband, Joshua Fielding, and his theatrical troupe to Whitby, the Yorkshire fishing village where Dracula the vampire first touched English soil in the sensational novel named after him. Joshua has arranged to produce a stage adaptation of Dracula by the daughter of Whitby millionaire Charles Netheridge during the Christmas holiday, but after the disastrous first read-through of her amateurish script, only the fact that the company is depending on Netheridge’s financial backing for their spring tour keeps them at work.

As tempers flare and wind and snow swirl around Netheridge’s lonely hilltop mansion, a black-cloaked stranger emerges from the storm—an eerily opportune arrival, for this enigmatic figure, one Anton Ballin, turns out to be a theatrical genius. At the same time, a brooding evil makes itself felt. Instead of the theatrical triumph that Netheridge desired for his daughter, there is murder—shocking and terrifying.

Shock Wave by John Sanford 10/4
The superstore chain PyeMart has its sights set on a Minnesota river town, but two very angry groups want to stop it: local merchants, fearing for their businesses, and environmentalists, predicting ecological disaster. The protests don't seem to be slowing the project, though, until someone decides to take matters into his own hands.

The first bomb goes off on the top floor of PyeMart's headquarters. The second one explodes at the construction site itself. The blasts are meant to inflict maximum damage-and they do. Who's behind the bombs, and how far will they go? It's Virgil Flowers's job to find out . . . before more people get killed.

The Best of Me by Nicholas Sparks 10/11
In the fall of 1984, high school students Amanda Collier and Dawson Cole fell deeply, irrevocably in love. Though they were from opposite sides of the tracks, their love for one another seemed to defy the realities of life in the small town of Oriental, North Carolina. But as the summer of their senior year came to a close, unforeseen events would tear the young couple apart, setting them on radically divergent paths.

Now, twenty-five years later, Amanda and Dawson are summoned back to Oriental for a funeral. Neither has lived the life they imagined . . . and neither can forget the passionate first love that forever changed their lives. Forced to confront painful memories, the two former lovers soon realize that everything they thought they knew-about themselves and the dreams they held dear-was not as it seemed. And in the course of a single, searing weekend, they will ask of the living, and the dead: Can love truly rewrite the past?