The Art of Racing in the Rain
by Garth Stein
Published 2008 by Harper

Hardcover, English. ISBN: 9780061537936

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Meet Enzo, the unforgettable canine narrator of this bittersweet and transformative story of family, love, loyalty, and hope. Enzo is a philosopher with a nearly human soul, and he's gained a wealth of knowledge from hours spent in front of the TV.

REVIEW: Publisher's Weekly 01/28/2008

If you've ever wondered what your dog is thinking, Stein's third novel offers an answer. Enzo is a lab terrier mix plucked from a farm outside Seattle to ride shotgun with race car driver Denny Swift as he pursues success on the track and off. Denny meets and marries Eve, has a daughter, Zoë, and risks his savings and his life to make it on the professional racing circuit. Enzo, frustrated by his inability to speak and his lack of opposable thumbs, watches Denny's old racing videos, coins koanlike aphorisms that apply to both driving and life, and hopes for the day when his life as a dog will be over and he can be reborn a man. When Denny hits an extended rough patch, Enzo remains his most steadfast if silent supporter. Enzo is a reliable companion and a likable enough narrator, though the string of Denny's bad luck stories strains believability. Much like Denny, however, Stein is able to salvage some dignity from the over-the-top drama. (May)

Fearless Fourteen
by Janet Evanovich
Published 2008 by St. Martin's Press

Hardcover, English. ISBN: 9780312349516

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The #1 blockbuster bestselling phenomenon continues in the 14th Stephanie Plum adventure.

REVIEW: Publisher's Weekly 05/19/2008

New Jersey bounty hunter Stephanie Plum finds herself saddled with the teenage son of Loretta Rizzi, her latest skip, at the start of one of the less cohesive entries in Evanovich's bestselling series (Lean Mean Thirteen, etc.). When Mario "Zook" Rizzi and his obsession with the online role-playing game "Minionfire" become too much for Stephanie to handle, the pair camp out at Trenton cop Joe Morelli's house. Stephanie also takes a job with the mysterious Ranger, helping him "babysit" Brenda, a fading music star in town for a concert. After Loretta is kidnapped, Stephanie and Morelli discover that to ensure Loretta's safety, they'll have to find the $9 million that disappeared after a bank robbery committed by Loretta's recently paroled brother, Dom. A mild-mannered stalker and the upcoming nuptials of Stephanie's colleague Lula to Ranger's right-hand man, Tank, add to the crazy fun. Despite a number of unresolved subplots, this Plum adventure won't disappoint those looking for the perfect summer beach read. (June)

The Story of Edgar Sawtelle
by David Wroblewski
Published 2008 by Ecco

Hardcover, English. ISBN: 9780061374227

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This riveting saga of an American family captures the deep and ancient alliance between humans and dogs, and the power of fate through one boy's epic journey into the wild.

REVIEW: Publisher's Weekly 02/18/2008

A literary thriller with commercial legs, this stunning debut is bound to be a bestseller. In the backwoods of Wisconsin, the Sawtelle family-Gar, Trudy and their young son, Edgar-carry on the family business of breeding and training dogs. Edgar, born mute, has developed a special relationship and a unique means of communicating with Almondine, one of the Sawtelle dogs, a fictional breed distinguished by personality, temperament and the dogs' ability to intuit commands and to make decisions. Raising them is an arduous life, but a satisfying one for the family until Gar's brother, Claude, a mystifying mixture of charm and menace, arrives. When Gar unexpectedly dies, mute Edgar cannot summon help via the telephone. His guilt and grief give way to the realization that his father was murdered; here, the resemblance to Hamlet resonates. After another gut-wrenching tragedy, Edgar goes on the run, accompanied by three loyal dogs. His quest for safety and succor provides a classic coming-of-age story with an ironic twist. Sustained by a momentum that has the crushing inevitability of fate, the propulsive narrative will have readers sucked in all the way through the breathtaking final scenes. (June)

Swan Peak
by James Lee Burke
Published 2008 by Simon & Schuster

Hardcover, English. ISBN: 9781416548522

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Jacket Notes:

Detective Dave Robicheaux returns in another adventure--only this time, he travels from New Iberia Parish to the wilds of Montana.

REVIEW: Publisher's Weekly 05/19/2008

Dave Robicheaux and his former partner, Clete Purcel, find trouble in western Montana in bestseller Burke's fine 17th novel to feature the New Iberia, La., sheriff's deputy (after Tin Roof Blowdown). When two security men for Texas oil millionaire Ridley Wellstone deliberately drive over Clete's fishing gear after Clete inadvertently fishes on Wellstone's private land, Clete recognizes one of them as a former associate of a mob boss who died in a plane crash years before. Soon afterward, a University of Montana coed and her boyfriend are murdered near the home where Dave and Clete are staying. Then an escaped convict from Texas turns up, pursued by a vengeful prison guard determined to return him to prison. Lyrical passages describing the Montana landscape contrast with the subtle but intense way Burke depicts the violence and perversity lurking in his characters' hearts. But despite all the nastiness, love and redemption retain the power to heal some very wounded souls in a surprising denouement. (July)

The Garden of Last Days
by Andre, III Dubus
Published 2008 by W. W. Norton & Company

Hardcover, English. ISBN: 9780393041651

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Jacket Notes:

From the author of the "New York Times" bestseller and Oprah's Book Club selection "House of Sand and Fog" comes a new painful, page-turning novel that seizes the reader by the throat.

REVIEW: Publisher's Weekly 03/17/2008

Dubus's ambitious if uneven follow-up to House of Sand and Fog begins shortly before 9/11 with stripper April taking her three-year-old daughter, Franny, to work after the babysitter flakes at the last minute. Though she leaves Franny with the club's house mother and intends to keep tabs on her, April's distracted on the floor by Bassam, a Muslim who's in Florida to take flying lessons and (like one of the real 9/11 hijackers) spends early September 2001 throwing around money and living lasciviously. Meanwhile, AJ, a down-on-his-luck local, lingers in the parking lot after getting thrown out for touching a dancer. The slow-starting plot splinters once Franny wanders outside and disappears. Soon, AJ's wanted for kidnapping, April's run through the social service wringers as an unfit parent, and the murky particulars of Bassam's mission come into sharp focus as he struggles with his religious convictions. Dubus gives the breath of life to most of his characters (Bassam-not so much), though the narrative has a mechanical feeling, partially owing to the narrow emotional register Dubus works in: doom and desperation are in plentiful supply from page one, and as the novel fades to black, the reader's left with a roster of sadder-but-wiser Americans to contemplate. (June)

What Happened: Inside the Bush White House and Washington's Culture of Deception
by Scott McClellan
Published 2008 by PublicAffairs

Hardcover, English. ISBN: 9781586485566

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With unprecedented candor, one of George W. Bush's closest aides takes readers behind the scenes of the Bush presidency and discusses what exactly happened to take it off course.

When You Are Engulfed in Flames
by David Sedaris
Published 2008 by Little Brown and Company

Hardcover, English. ISBN: 9780316143479

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In essay after essay, Sedaris proceeds from bizarre conundrums of daily life to the most deeply resonant human truths. Culminating in a brilliant account of his venture to Tokyo in order to quit smoking, his sixth essay collection is a new masterpiece of comic writing.

REVIEW: Publisher's Weekly 04/28/2008

Sedaris, king of the poignantly absurd, triumphs in this sixth essay collection (after 2004's Dress Your Family in Corduroy and Denim). There is less focus here on the Sedaris clan as a whole, though the various members make memorable and often hilarious appearances. In "The Understudy," the Sedaris siblings band together to battle the odious babysitter Mrs. Peacock, while in "Town and Country," Sedaris and sister Amy discuss what their father would be most offended to find on his daughter's coffee-table (hint: The Joy of Sex comes in a distant second). Leaving America behind, Sedaris also regales readers with his experiences around the globe, from sitting in a Parisian doctor's office wearing only his underwear in "In the Waiting Room" to warding off birds in the French countryside with record albums in "Aerial." In the collection's longest essay, "The Smoking Section," Sedaris recounts his three-month stay in Tokyo, where he successfully quits smoking and unsuccessfully attempts to learn Japanese. Sedaris records in "Buddy, Can You Spare a Tie?" his more glaring mistakes in life, but he should be satisfied with the knowledge that this latest endeavor is anything but. (June)

Helen Mirren: In the Frame: My Life in Words and Pictures
by Helen Mirren
Published 2008 by Atria Books

Hardcover, English. ISBN: 9781416567608

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Mirren has been an internationally acclaimed, award-winning actress for more than 40 years. This beautifully illustrated memoir is an account of an extraordinary talent and a life well lived. Full-color photographs throughout.

The Prince of Frogtown
by Rick Bragg
Published 2008 by Knopf Publishing Group

Hardcover, English. ISBN: 9781400040407

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In this final volume of the memoir that began with "All Over but the Shoutin'" and continued in "Ava's Man," Bragg closes his circle of family stories with an unforgettable tale about fathers and sons.

REVIEW: Publisher's Weekly 03/03/2008

Bragg (All Over but the Shoutin') continues to mine his East Alabama family history for stories, this time focusing on the life of his alcoholic father. Unlike his previous two memoirs, Bragg merges his father's history of severe hardships and simple joys with a tale from the present: his own relationship with his 10-year-old stepson. Bragg crafts flowing sentences that vividly describe the southern Appalachian landscape and ways of life both old and new. The title comes from his father, who grew up in the mill village in Jacksonville, Ala., a dirt-poor neighborhood known as Frogtown, a place where they didn't bother to name the streets, but simply assigned letters. His father's story walks the line between humorous and heartbreaking, mixing tales of tipping over outhouses as a child and stealing an alligator from a roadside show in Florida with the stark tragedies of drunkenness, brawling, dog fighting, chain gangs, meanness and his early death from tuberculosis. Juxtaposed with vignettes about Bragg's stepson, this memoir has great perspective as the reader sees Bragg, the son of a dysfunctional father who grew up very poor, grapple with becoming the father of a modern-day mama's boy. This book, much like his previous two memoirs, is lush with narratives about manhood, fathers and sons, families and the changing face of the rural South. (May)

The Monster of Florence
by Douglas J. Preston
Published 2008 by Grand Central Publishing

Hardcover, English. ISBN: 9780446581196

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Jacket Notes:

In the nonfiction tradition of John Berendt ("Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil"), "New York Times"-bestselling author Preston presents a gripping account of crime and punishment in the lush hills surrounding Florence, Italy.

REVIEW: Publisher's Weekly 04/07/2008

United in their obsession with a grisly Italian serial murder case almost three decades old, thriller writer Preston (coauthor, Brimstone) and Italian crime reporter Spezi seek to uncover the identity of a vicious serial killer in this chilling true crime saga. The murders took place outside of Florence where Preston had moved with his family. From 1974 to 1985, seven pairs of lovers parked in their cars in secluded areas were brutally killed. With all of the chief suspects acquitted or released from prison on appeal, the authors began to snoop around, although witnesses had died and evidence was missing. Preston and Spezi's sleuthing continued until ruthless prosecutors turned on the nosy pair, jailing Spezi and grilling Preston for obstructing justice. Only when Dateline NBCbecame involved in the maze of mutilated bodies and police miscues was the authors' hard work rewarded. This suspenseful procedural reveals much about the dogged writing team as well as the motives of the killers. Better than some overheated noir mysteries, this bit of real-life Florence bloodletting makes you sweat and think, and presses relentlessly on the nerves. (June 11)