An eclectic selection, primarily from publisher HarperCollins.
Red-Headed Stepchild (
$0.99), the first title in the Sabina Kane series by Jaye Wells is one I'd definitely recommend. I've read the first three in the series and it looks like it's time to pick up a couple more titles soon, so I can catch up.
Book Description
In a world where being of mixed-blood is a major liability, Sabina Kane has the only profession fit for an outcast: assassin. But, her latest mission threatens the fragile peace between the vampire and mage races and Sabina must scramble to figure out which side she's on. She's never brought her work home with her---until now.
This time, it's personal.
You Are Next (
$0.99) is the first title in the
Karin Schaeffer series by Katia Lief; the third title,
Vanishing Girls, is also on sale, marked down to $3.99.
Book Description
He took everything . . . then came back for more.
Former Detective Karin Schaeffer has nothing left to live for after serial killer Martin Price destroys all she holds dear. Known as "The Domino Killer" because he leaves dominoes as a clue to his next victim, Price doesn't stop until an entire family is destroyed. Even when he's locked away in prison, the shadow he casts over Karin's life keeps her in constant darkness.
Then a policeman brings news to her door: Price has escaped. Karin knows where he's headed because of the message he left behind last time, scrawled in blood, on her bathroom mirror—
You are next.
But Karin Schaeffer refuses to run and hide. She feels no fear and has nothing left to lose. And so she waits. She won't stand by and let Price harm any more of her family. And she won't rest until she's put him back behind bars forever . . . or until one of them is dead.
Flatscreen (
$0.99), by Adam Wilson, was named one of Amazon's
Best Books of the Month, February 2012.
Book Description
Flatscreen tells the story of Eli Schwartz as he endures the loss of his home, the indifference of his parents, the success of his older brother, and the cruel and frequent dismissal of the opposite sex. He is a loser par excellence—pasty, soft, and high—who struggles to become a new person in a world where nothing is new.
Into this scene of apathy rolls Seymour J. Kahn. Former star of the small screen and current paraplegic sex addict, Kahn has purchased Eli’s old family home. The two begin a dangerous friendship, one that distracts from their circumstances but speeds their descent into utter debasement and, inevitably, YouTube stardom.
By story’s end, through unlikely acts of courage and kindness, roles will be reversed, reputations resurrected, and charges (hopefully) dropped. Adam Wilson writes mischief that moves the heart, and Flatscreen marks the wondrous debut of a truth-telling comic voice.
Dishwasher (
$0.99), by Pete Jordan
Book Description
Dishwasher is the true story of a man on a mission: to clean dirty dishes professionally in every state in America. Part adventure, part parody, and part miraculous journey of self-discovery, it is the unforgettable account of Pete Jordan's transformation from itinerant seeker into "Dishwasher Pete"—unlikely folk hero, writer, publisher of his own cult zine, and the ultimate professional dish dog—and how he gave it all up for love.
The Most Beautiful Walk in the World: A Pedestrian in Paris (
$0.99), by John Baxter
Book Description
Thrust into the unlikely role of professional "literary walking tour" guide, an expat writer provides the most irresistibly witty and revealing tour of Paris in years.
In this enchanting memoir, acclaimed author and long- time Paris resident John Baxter remembers his yearlong experience of giving "literary walking tours" through the city. Baxter sets off with unsuspecting tourists in tow on the trail of Paris's legendary artists and writers of the past. Along the way, he tells the history of Paris through a brilliant cast of characters: the favorite cafÉs of Ernest Hemingway, F. Scott Fitzgerald, and James Joyce; Pablo Picasso's underground Montmartre haunts; the bustling boulevards of the late-nineteenth-century flÂneurs; the secluded "Little Luxembourg" gardens beloved by Gertrude Stein; the alleys where revolutionaries plotted; and finally Baxter's own favorite walk near his home in Saint-Germain-des-PrÉs.
Paris, by custom and design, is a pedestrian's city—each block a revelation, every neighborhood a new feast for the senses, a place rich with history and romance at every turn. The Most Beautiful Walk in the World is your guide, par excellence, to the true, off-the-beaten-path heart of the City of Lights.
Drinking Closer to Home (
$0.99), by Jessica Anya Blau
Book Description
They say you can never really go home again. Adult siblings Anna, Portia, and Emery are about to discover just how true that is.
Nothing: A Memoir of Insomnia (
$0.99), by Blake Butler
Book Description
One of the most acclaimed young voices of his generation, Blake Butler now offers his first work of nonfiction: a deeply candid and wildly original look at the phenomenon of insomnia.
Invoking scientific data, historical anecdote, Internet obsession, and figures as diverse as Andy Warhol, Gilles Deleuze, John Cage, Anton LaVey, Jorge Luis Borges, Brian Eno, and Stephen King, Butler traces the tension between sleeping and conscious life. And he reaches deep into his own experience—from disturbing waking dreams, to his father’s struggles with dementia, to his own epic 129-hour bout of insomnia—to reveal the effect of sleeplessness on his imaginative landscape.
The result is an exhilarating exploration of dream and awareness, desperation and relief, consciousness and conscience—a fascinating maze-map of the borders between sleep and the waking world by one of today’s most talked-about writers.
Is the Internet Changing the Way You Think?: The Net's Impact on Our Minds and Future (
$0.99), by John Brockman;
This Will Change Everything by the same author is still on sale for 99 cents, also.
Book Description
How is the internet changing the way you think? That is one of the dominant questions of our time, one which affects almost every aspect of our life and future. And it's exactly what John Brockman, publisher of Edge.org, posed to more than 150 of the world's most influential minds. Brilliant, farsighted, and fascinating, Is the Internet Changing the Way You Think? is an essential guide to the Net-based world.
Seeds: One Man's Serendipitous Journey to Find the Trees That Inspired Famous American Writers from Faulkner to Kerouac, Welty to Wharton (
$0.99), by Richard Horan
Book Description
From the wooded road made of golden hemlock running past L. Frank Baum's childhood home to the lonely stump of Scout's oak in Harper Lee's Alabama, author Richard Horan gathers tree seeds—and stories—from the homes of America's most treasured authors. At once a heartfelt paean to literature and a wise, funny, and uplifting account of one man's reconnection with nature, Seeds celebrates Horan's triumphs and calamities on his quest to link trees with great writers—a delightfully original meditation on the nature of inspiration and a one-of-a-kind adventure into literature.
Die, My Love (
$0.99), by Kathryn Casey
Book Description
The day before Halloween 2004 was the last day on Earth for respected, well-liked college professor Fred Jablin. That morning, a neighbor discovered his body lying in a pool of blood in the driveway of Jablin's Virginia home. Police immediately turned their attentions to the victim's ex-wife, Piper, a petite, pretty Texas lawyer who had lost a bitter custody battle and would do anything to get her kids back. But Piper was in Houston, one thousand miles away, at the time of the slaying and couldn't possibly have been the killer . . . could she?
So began an investigation into one of the most bizarre cases Virginia and Texas law enforcement agencies had ever encountered: a twisted conspiracy of lies, rage, paranoia, manipulation, and savage murder that would ensnare an entire family—including two lethally close look-alike sisters—and reveal the shocking depravities possible when a dangerously disordered mind slips into madness.
Shattered: The True Story of a Mother's Love, a Husband's Betrayal, and a Cold-Blooded Texas Murder (
$0.99), by Kathryn Casey
Book Description
Hero, Husband, Father . . . Monster?
In Creekstone, Texas, a small, quiet suburb of Houston, football was king . . . and David Temple was a prince. A former high school and college gridiron star-turned-coach, he had a fairy-tale marriage to bright, vivacious Belinda Lucas, a teacher at the local high school who was so warm and popular her colleagues called her "The Sunshine Girl."
The fairy tale ended savagely on January 11, 1999, when Belinda's lifeless body was discovered in a closet. Her skull had been shattered by a shotgun blast at close range. She was eight months pregnant.
There was no damning evidence directly linking the brutal murder to husband David, who stood by emotionless and dry-eyed as police searched the crime scene. But a dogged eight-year investigation would expose a shocking history of cruelty and domination, infidelity and rage—ultimately resulting in an epic courtroom battle for the ages—as the scandalous truth was revealed about love betrayed and innocent lives . . . shattered.
Skinny (
$0.99), by Diana Spechler
Book Description
After her father’s death, twenty-six-year-old Gray Lachmann finds herself compulsively eating. Desperate to stop binging, she abandons her life in New York City for a job at a southern weight-loss camp. There, caught among the warring egos of her devious co-counselor,Sheena; the self-aggrandizing camp director, Lewis; his attractive assistant,Bennett; and a throng of combative teenage campers, she is confronted by a captivating mystery: her teenage half-sister, Eden, whom Gray never knew existed. Now, while unraveling her father’s lies, Gray must tackle her own self-deceptions and take control of her body and her life.
Visceral, poignant, and often wickedly funny, Skinny illuminates a young woman’s struggle to make sense of the link between hunger and emotion, and to make peace with her demons, her body, and herself.
Lean on Pete (
$0.99), by Willy Vlautin, has two editions, with the other (not from HarperCollins) listed at over $8.
Book Description
Fifteen-year-old Charley Thompson wants a home, food on the table, and a high school he can attend for more than part of a year. But as the son of a single father working in warehouses across the Pacific Northwest, Charley's been pretty much on his own. When tragic events leave him homeless weeks after their move to Portland, Oregon, Charley seeks refuge in the tack room of a run-down horse track. Charley's only comforts are his friendship with a failing racehorse named Lean on Pete and a photograph of his only known relative. In an increasingly desperate circumstance, Charley will head east, hoping to find his aunt who had once lived a thousand miles away in Wyoming—but the journey to find her will be a perilous one.
In Vlautin's third novel, Lean on Pete, he reveals the lives and choices of American youth like Charley Thompson who were failed by those meant to protect them and who were never allowed the chance to just be a kid.
