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Mystery The Silver Swan by Benjamin Black Published 2008 by Henry Holt & Company Hardcover, English. ISBN: 9780805081534 Find this book in our catalog. Jacket Notes: The inimitable Quirke--the irascible, formerly hard-drinking Dublin pathologist--returns in another spellbinding crime novel, in which a young woman's dubious suicide sets off a new string of hazards and deceptions. REVIEW: Publisher's Weekly 01/07/2008 In this stunning follow-up to 2007's Christine Falls, Black (pseudonym of Booker Prize-winner John Banville) spins a complex tale of murder and deception in 1950s Ireland. Pathologist Garret Quirke, surprised by a visit from a college acquaintance, Billy Hunt, is even more surprised when Billy begs Quirke not to perform an autopsy on his wife, Deirdre, whose naked body was recently retrieved from Dublin Bay. Though everything points to suicide, Quirke knows something's amiss and begins to retrace Deirdre's steps. Black expertly balances Quirke's investigation with chapters detailing Deidre's past, from her marriage to Billy to her shady business deal with Leslie White, an enigmatic Englishman who knew Deidre as Laura Swan, the proprietress of their joint venture, a beauty salon called the Silver Swan. As Quirke digs deeper, he discovers a web of lies and blackmail that threatens to envelop even his own estranged daughter, Phoebe. Laconic, stubborn Quirke makes an appealing hero as the pieces of this unsettling crime come together in a shocking conclusion. Author tour.(Mar.) Ice Trap by Kitty Sewell Published 2008 by Touchstone Books Hardcover, English. ISBN: 9781416539971 Find this book in our catalog. Jacket Notes: A richly atmospheric and internationally bestselling debut novel of suspense transports readers to the arctic Canadian wilderness, where a man makes one mistake but pays dearly for another. REVIEW: Publisher's Weekly 10/08/2007 At the start of Sewell's intriguing if uneven debut, Dafydd Woodruff, a surgeon in present-day Cardiff, Wales, receives a letter from a 13-year-old girl claiming to be his daughter and to have a twin brother. Flashback 14 years to Moose Creek, a tiny outpost in Canada's Northwest Territories, where Dafydd took a year-long post to clear his conscience after botching the surgery of a young boy in Wales. In that isolated community, Dafydd met Sheila Hailey, an acerbic head nurse, who would later accuse him of fathering her twins. Predictably, Dafydd returns to Moose Creek after learning that the DNA test he demanded proves he's the father of Sheila's children. In his bumbling efforts to unearth the truth about the past, the empathetic Dafydd stumbles on long-buried town secrets. Despite her unusual locale and a strong supporting cast, Sewell is less sure at creating suspense, often stretching out moments of little narrative importance and skimming over others that later prove vital. Still, readers will find this first novel, which was shortlisted for the CWA's New Blood Dagger Award, compulsively readable. (Feb.) Stalked by Brian Freeman Published 2008 by St. Martin's Minotaur Hardcover, English. ISBN: 9780312363277 Find this book in our catalog. Jacket Notes: From the bestselling author of "Immoral" comes a chilling new thriller. Lieutenant Jonathan Stride knows his partner Maggie Bei is in trouble when she reports a deadly crime on a bitter winter night. She's obviously hiding a terrible secret, and her silence only feeds suspicion. REVIEW: Publisher's Weekly 11/05/2007 In Freeman's chilling, atmospheric latest, Jonathan Stride returns from a Las Vegas stint (in Stripped) to head the major crimes detective bureau of his former Duluth, Minn., department. When the husband of Maggie Bei, Stride's former detective partner, is murdered, Maggie becomes the prime suspect, and Stride determines to clear her. Meanwhile, Dan Erickson, an ambitious Duluth county attorney, hires Stride's lover, PI Serena Dial (who returned with Stride from Vegas), to pay off a blackmailer. Freeman slowly weaves the cases together into a labyrinthine search for a serial killer. Following the anonymous predator as well as the cops, the reader is teased by the fiend's identity and hidden motives. The stalwart, intuitive Stride digs into the case's disparate elements, including the city's sexual underworld, and a terrified Serena runs into serious trouble. A strong narrative crammed with twists and studded with sex and violence; a mysterious, even mystical, sense of place; and a well-crafted set of characters and relationships make this one of Freeman's stronger crime thrillers. (Feb.) Now You See Him by Eli Gottlieb Published 2008 by William Morrow & Company Hardcover, English. ISBN: 9780061284649 Find this book in our catalog. Jacket Notes: The murder/suicide of celebrated writer Rob Castor and his girlfriend begins a wrenching and enthrallingly suspenseful story that mines the explosive terrains of love and paternity, marriage and family secrets, in this ambitious and thrilling novel that takes readers deep into the human psyche. REVIEW: Publisher's Weekly 12/10/2007 A mesmerizing blend of suspense and long-buried family secrets, Gottlieb's second novel (after 1997's The Boy Who Went Away) culminates in shocking revelations that rock a quiet upstate New York town. Nick Framingham is still reeling from the recent death of his childhood best friend, the writer Rob Castor, who committed suicide after killing his ex-girlfriend in Manhattan. Nick's own marriage to his college sweetheart, Lucy, begins to unravel as he struggles to understand what drove Rob to murder. Rekindling an old relationship with his first love, Belinda, Rob's volatile and beautiful sister, Nick begins to retrace not only Rob's last days but also their shared childhood, looking for clues to explain his friend's actions. Gottlieb skillfully ratchets up the suspense by doling out the details of Rob's death in bits and pieces, until everything falls into place in a startling conclusion that will rattle even the genre's most experienced readers. With his pitch-perfect dialogue and flawed yet empathetic characters, Gottlieb's sophomore effort should win him widespread recognition. (Feb.) The Sleeping Doll by Jeffery Deaver Published 2007 by Simon & Schuster Hardcover, English. ISBN: 9780743260947 Find this book in our catalog. Jacket Notes: Deaver is back with a dark and multilayered psychological thriller about a vicious killers escape from a California super-prison and the mysterious and deadly quest he embarks on once hes free. REVIEW: Publisher's Weekly 04/02/2007 Kathryn Dance, an investigator with the California Bureau of Investigation, returns from Deaver'sThe Cold Moon (where she was a secondary) in this post-prison break pulse-pounder. Dance is the lead cop handling the escape of psychopathic killer Daniel Pell, dubbed "Son of Manson" by the press for his "family" of young runaways and his most horrendous crime, the murders of computer engineer William Croyton, Croyton's wife and two of their three children. The only child left alive, nine-year-old Theresa, is known as the Sleeping Doll. Pell, charismatic and diabolically intelligent, continually eludes capture, but Dance, a specialist in interrogation and kinesics (or body language), is never more than a few suspenseful minutes behind. Dance is nicely detailed, and procedural scenes where she uses somatic cues to ferret out liars are fascinating. The book sags in its long middle, but toward the end Deaver digs into his bottomless bag of unexpected twists and turns, keeping readers wide-eyed with surprise, and leaving them looking forward to more of the perspicacious Dance.(June)