Today's Deals 3/27

Today's Gold Box at Amazon is the Harry Potter Wizard's Collection: "This new limited and numbered 31-disc collection contains all eight "Harry Potter" movies on Blu-ray, DVD and UltraViolet Digital Copy and more than 37 hours of special features. Includes all previously released materials and more than 10 hours of new-to-disc bonus content, and 5 hours of never-before-seen material."

Amazon's Android Free App of the Day is Word Rush!.

Today is the last day to take advantage of this KSO/AL deal:

• 20 Kindle Books for $2

Today's Kindle Daily Deal is Monday Mornings: A Novel ($2.99), by Sanjay Gupta, MD [Hachette]. I've been watching the TV show based upon this and it is a bit different in it's focus (although there is some of the same drama going on that is common to all "doctor" shows).

Book Description
Every time surgeons operate, they're betting their skills are better than the brain tumor, the faulty heart valve, the fractured femur. Sometimes, they're wrong. At Chelsea General, surgeons answer for bad outcomes at the Morbidity and Mortality conference, known as M & M. This extraordinary peek behind the curtain into what is considered the most secretive meeting in all of medicine is the back drop for the entire book.

Monday Mornings, by Dr. Sanjay Gupta, follows the lives of five surgeons at Chelsea General as they push the limits of their abilities and confront their personal and professional failings, often in front of their peers at M & M. It is on Monday mornings that reflection and introspection occurs, usually in private. It is Monday Mornings that provides a unique look at the real method in which surgeons learn - through their mistakes. It is Monday Mornings when, if you're lucky, you have a chance at redemption.

Today's Kindle Romance Daily Deal is While He Was Away ($1.99), by Karen Schreck [Sourcebooks Fire].

Book Description
One year—he'll be gone for one year and then we'll be together again and everything will be back to the way it should be.

The day David left, I felt like my heart was breaking. Sure, any long–distance relationship is tough, but David was going to war—to fight, to protect, to put his life in danger. We can get through this, though. We'll talk, we'll email, we won't let anything come between us.

I can be on army girlfriend for one year. But will my sweet, soulful, funny David be the same person when he comes home? Will I? And what if he doesn't come home at all...?

Today's Kindle SciFi/Fantasy Daily Deal is The Amtrak Wars: First Family ($1.99), by Patrick Tilley [Bloomsbury Reader].

Book Description
After countless years of fighting - of pitting sophisticated technology against the primitive surface-dwelling people who seemed to possess supernatural powers - the Federation was still no nearer to ending the battle with the Mutes. But then a lone flier was hauled into one of its underground bunkers - a man whose very existence was a challenge to the all-pervading wisdom of the First Family. A man whose destiny would determine the future for both the Federation and the Mutes...

Z 2134 (£0.99 UK), by Sean Platt, is the Kindle Deal of the day for those in the UK (the US edition is $3.99/KLL Eligible). This was originally published as a Kindle Serial [47North].

Book Description
z 2134 is a thrilling new zombie serial in the spirit of 1984, The Walking Dead, and The Hunger Games, from the writers of the post-apocalyptic smash hit serial, Yesterday’s Gone.

It is the year 2134 in a dystopian America, following a series of zombie plagues which infected and decimated much of the world’s population starting 100 years ago.

Those left, formed six walled Cities throughout the continent, all under the rule of a totalitarian government which enforces strict control over its populace.

• You must obey your government.
• You must be a good citizen.
• You must be a productive citizen.
• You must not break the law.

Or The City Watch will find you and arrest you.

Jonah Lovecraft, a former Watcher, was arrested for the murder of his wife. And like most criminals, he has one chance at freedom — to participate in The Darwin Games, a televised survival show which pits two players from each city against one another in The Barrens, the uninhabited areas outside the City Walls.
He’ll also have to face another enemy — the zombies which still roam The Barrens.

As he fights for his freedom against impossible odds, his daughter, Anastasia, stumbles into people who have information about her father — information which will change her life forever.

But it will also put her in the crosshairs of her father’s enemies.

Everything Begins and Ends at the Kentucky Club ($2.99 Kindle, B&N), by Benjamin Alire Saenz, is the Nook Daily Find, price matched on Kindle.

Book Description
Winner of the 2013 PEN/Faulkner Award for Fiction!

Benjamin Alire Sáenz's stories reveal how all borders—real, imagined, sexual, human, the line between dark and light, addict and straight—entangle those who live on either side. Take, for instance, the Kentucky Club on Avenida Juárez two blocks south of the Rio Grande. It's a touchstone for each of Sáenz's stories. His characters walk by, they might go in for a drink or to score, or they might just stay there for a while and let their story be told. Sáenz knows that the Kentucky Club, like special watering holes in all cities, is the contrary to borders. It welcomes Spanish and English, Mexicans and gringos, poor and rich, gay and straight, drug addicts and drunks, laughter and sadness, and even despair. It's a place of rich history and good drinks and cold beer and a long polished mahogany bar. Some days it smells like piss. "I'm going home to the other side." That's a strange statement, but you hear it all the time at the Kentucky Club.

Benjamin Alire Sáenz is a highly regarded writer of fiction, poetry, and children's literature. Like these stories, his writing crosses borders and lands in our collective psyche. Poets & Writers Magazine named him one of the fifty most inspiring writers in the world. He's been a finalist for the Los Angeles Times Book Prize and PEN Center's prestigious award for young adult fiction. Sáenz is the chair of the creative writing department of University of Texas at El Paso.

Today's Kindle Kids Daily Deal is Monster High: Ghoulfriends Forever ($1.99), by Gitty Daneshvari [Hachette].

Book Description
Ghoulfriends Forever is a brand-new Monster High series, introducing three new monster characters. As new students, the trio must navigate the bewildering array of cute monster boys, established cliques, and monster-rific subjects like Mad Science, G-ogre-phy, and Physical Deaducation. As if that weren't hard enough, something strange and sinister seems to be happening at the school. Popular girls like Frankie Stein and Cleo de Nile are acting weird-and all signs point to everyone's new favorite teacher, Miss Sylphia Flapper. Can the new GFFs expose the fave as a fraud, or will they succumb to peer pressure?

Age Range: 8 and up

Bargain Book Roundup

Blood Song ($4.99 Kindle, B&N, Kobo), the first book in Anthony Ryan's Raven's Shadow series, is on the upper edge of the Bargain category, but is at a very good price for a recent release that Penguin has only printed in Hardcover, so far.

Book Description
From “a new master storyteller” comes the beginning of an epic fantasy saga of blood, honor, and destiny…

“The Sixth Order wields the sword of justice and smites the enemies of the Faith and the Realm.”

Vaelin Al Sorna was only a child of ten when his father left him at the iron gate of the Sixth Order. The Brothers of the Sixth Order are devoted to battle, and Vaelin will be trained and hardened to the austere, celibate, and dangerous life of a Warrior of the Faith. He has no family now save the Order.

Vaelin’s father was Battle Lord to King Janus, ruler of the unified realm. Vaelin’s rage at being deprived of his birthright and dropped at the doorstep of the Sixth Order like a foundling knows no bounds. He cherishes the memory of his mother, and what he will come to learn of her at the Order will confound him. His father, too, has motives that Vaelin will come to understand. But one truth overpowers all the rest: Vaelin Al Sorna is destined for a future he has yet to comprehend. A future that will alter not only the realm, but the world.

Rev It Up ($0.99 Kindle, B&N, Kobo), the third title in the Black Knights Inc. series by Julie Ann Walker [Sourcebooks Casablanca]. Looks like I have the first in the Hell on Wheels, from when it was a Daily Deal last October, but if you missed it, it's marked down to $4.99 right now, as is the second in the series, In Rides Trouble. If you are all caught up, then pre-order Thrill Ride, for delivery April 2.

Book Description
He Never Misses A Target

Jake "the Snake" Sommers earned his SEAL code name by striking quickly and quietly-and with lethal force. That's also how he broke Michelle Carter's heart. It was the only way to keep her safe-from himself. Four long years later, Jake is determined to get a second chance. But to steal back into Michelle's loving arms, Jake is going to have to prove he can take things slow. Real slow...

She Aims To Make Him Beg

Michelle Carter has never forgiven Jake for being so cliché as to "love her and leave her." But when her brother, head of the Black Knights elite ops agency, ticks off the wrong mobster, she must do the unimaginable: place her life in Jake's hands. No matter what they call him, this man is far from cold-blooded. And once he's wrapped around her heat, he'll never let her go...

Hunter's Rise ($1.99 Kindle, B&N, Kobo), the sixth Hunters novel by Shiloh Walker [Penguin]

Book Description
His past is a mystery, even to him-a werewolf with memories so lost in a fog that even the Hunter's healers cannot help him. More than a century ago, Toronto awakened on an unfamiliar street, naked and alone- and dogged by the unanswered questions of his enigmatic existence.

The vampire Sylvia is no Hunter. She's a mercenary who just barely skates this side of what the Hunters consider acceptable. All she wants is to hunt her quarry, and make a lot of money. Her newest prey is a devious killer. But her newest complication is of a more intimate sort: a blonde, blue-eyed werewolf who interferes with her plans in so many exquisite ways.

Miss Silver Comes to Stay ($1.99 Kindle, B&N), the sixteenth novel in the Miss Silver series by Patricia Wentworth [Open Road]

Book Description
On vacation in a tiny village, Miss Silver investigates a murder with a decades-old motive

The citizens of Melling are perfectly ordinary—exactly the sort one finds in just about every cozy English village—and to a certain person they might even appear boring. But to Miss Silver, people are always interesting. It has been some years since she gave up work as a governess to become a detective, and her interest in people has served her well. She comes to Melling on vacation—a long postponed visit to an old school chum—but Miss Silver’s business is murder, and her vacations never last long.

The town’s prodigal son has returned, wealthy and without nostalgia for the village of his birth. He intends to sell his manor house and be done with Melling forever. But Melling has not finished with him.

Burning Rose ($1.99 Kindle, B&N), by Shirley Kennett [Open Road], with the companion audiobook for $3.99.

Book Description
An environmental journalist stumbles into the deadly world of mega-corporations

Burning Rose is a gripping mystery from Shirley Kennett, author of the beloved PJ Gray series. The story follows Casey Washington, a freelance journalist with environmental convictions. When she lands a rare interview with Robert Gunner, CEO of World Power, a company building a controversial dam in the Amazon rainforest, she anticipates a personal triumph—only to have the story go terribly awry.

Heads of other big corporations start dying in gruesome fashion, at the hands of a mysterious group known as “The Six.” Washington’s investigative instinct kicks in but her search is not made any easier by her improbable attraction to the reclusive CEO Gunner. Burning Rose is an eco-thriller full of puzzles and high-gear action with global consequences.

Out Of Breath ($3.99 Kindle), the third title in Rebecca Donovan's Breathing YA series [Amazon Publishing and Penguin UK], can now be pre-ordered at half list price. The first in the series, Reason to Breathe, was briefly free last Spring, so picking up Barely Breathing would complete the series.

Book Description
Emma leaves Weslyn and everyone in it behind to attend Stanford University, just as she always intended. A shell of her former self, she is not the same girl. She is broken, and the only way that she’ll be whole again is through forgiveness. Emma must find a way to forgive herself and recognize her own worth before she can receive the love she deserves. This final installment will have readers holding their breath until the very last page.

Today's Deals 3/26

Today's Kindle Daily Deal is Burning Man ($1.99), by Alan Russell [Thomas & Mercer], with the companion audiobook also $1.99.

Book Description
LAPD cop Michael Gideon and his police dog partner Sirius became reluctant celebrities after capturing a notorious serial killer in the midst of an inferno. For their heroism, they were chosen to head up the newly formed Special Cases Unit. Now the duo tackles out-of-the-ordinary cases, anything deemed unusual or bizarre even by Hollyweird standards.

When a teenager is found crucified in a city park, Gideon and Sirius are handed the bizarre case. Confronting the gruesome tableau and having to work the case worsens Detective Gideon’s PTSD, a condition he has tried to hide from others. Gideon’s burns may have healed, but the fire haunts him still...in more ways than one.

Eerily prescient since that terrible night of the fire, Gideon has unusual insights into the crimes he investigates, a skill he and Sirius must learn to trust as much as they do each other if they are to solve—and survive—this case.

Today's Kindle Romance Daily Deal is Serendipity ($1.99), by Carly Phillips [Berkley (Penguin)], with the companion audiobook for $3.99.

Book Description
New York Times bestselling author Carly Phillips presents the first in a delightful new series about a quaint upstate New York town where love, fate and fortune are intertwined ...

Faith Harrington was the classic girl of privilege--until her father was convicted of running a Ponzi scheme and then her marriage crashed and burned.

Now Faith is back in her hometown, hoping for a fresh start. But her father's betrayal has rocked Serendipity - and not everyone is ready to welcome her with open arms. Then she runs into her teenage crush -- the dark, brooding Ethan Barron. Ethan, no stranger to scandal himself, never imagined he'd own the mansion on the hill, much less ever again come face to face with Faith--the princess he once kissed senseless. The chance meeting reignites the electric charge between them.

Still, when Ethan hires her to redecorate what was once her childhood home, Faith is sure that getting involved with the town's notorious bad boy will only lead to trouble. But her heart has other ideas. And so do the townspeople of Serendipity ...

Today's Kindle SciFi/Fantasy Daily Deal is Fireblood ($1.99), the first novel in Jeff Wheeler's new Whispers from Mirrowen series [47North], with the companion audiobook also $1.99. His Muirwood Trilogy was originally self-published (which is when I picked them up), then was optioned by 47North and republished in the current editions (and currently on sale for $2.99 apiece).

Book Description
Tyrus of Kenatos has made it his life’s work to banish the plagues that ravage the kingdoms. He believes the answer to ending the devastation lies in the Scourgelands. Yet, Tyrus’s first expedition into the cursed woods failed after being defeated by mysterious minions who stalked and killed most of his band.

Now a prisoner in his own tower, Tyrus has summoned his nephew Annon—a Druidecht possessing innate magic called the fireblood—on the guise of finding a hidden treasure with which to purchase his twin sister Hettie’s freedom. But in reality, Tyrus is using his niece and nephew, and their magic, as an opportunity to escape and resume his desperate mission. And to aid them, he has enlisted the warrior-monk Paedrin—who is almost as green as the siblings when it comes to traveling these troubled lands. The trio is determined, and along the way they grow to trust each other—and new additions to the group—in order to accomplish their missions…whether or not those missions are one and the same.

But the Arch-Rike—ruthless ruler of Kenatos—has learned of these plans, and has sent the fearsome Kishion to destroy all those that oppose him. Now Tyrus and his unwitting allies must face down not only the plague, but this new enemy—and fulfill their quest before a fresh horror is unleashed on the world…

The Kindle Deal of the day for those in the UK is three novels in the George Gently series by Alan Hunter for £0.99 each (~80% off).

In these three novels, a police man-hunt fails to find the husband of a brutally murdered woman--until he turns up in Gently's office; an international intrigue and a dark secret leave Gently juggling with a deadly conundrum; and when Gently pays a visit to the Highlands of Scotland there's blood in the heather and a murderer on the loose

Gently with the Ladies: Inspector George Gently #13 (Main/UK; US edition $7.89)

A police man-hunt fails to find the husband of a brutally murdered woman - until he turns up in Gently's office.The hunted man is, in fact, a far-distant relative of Gently and throws himself on the Chief Inspector's mercy. Gently will have none of it and is ready to hand the man over to his colleagues in charge of the investigation, but there are some intriguing elements to the case.The fact that the prime suspect had fled to be with his mistress and then taken to the open sea in a chartered yacht seems hugely incriminating. But the affluent and exotic lifestyle of the victim, whose apartment was designed for erotic pleasure with her lesbian lover, supports the accused man's protestations of innocence.

Gently Continental: Inspector George Gently #14 (Main/UK; US edition $9.31)

Good music, fine dining and comfortable surroundings - that's how the Hotel Continental is advertised. Fraud, blackmail, torture and murder - that's what it becomes famous for.The popular hotel on the English coast built its reputation on its Viennese cuisine and Austrian style but when one of the guests is found dead at the bottom of the nearby cliffs bearing the wounds of a man who has been systematically tortured, Gently brushes aside the hotel's facade of respectability.International intrigue and a dark secret that stretches from Nazi-occupied Austria across the Atlantic to the back streets of New York leave Gently juggling with a deadly conundrum.

Gently North-West; Inspector George Gently #15 (Main/UK; US edition $7.89)

There's blood in the heather and a murderer on the loose when Gently pays a quite visit to the Highlands of Scotland.Had Brenda Merryn not been such a stong-willed woman and had she not been so much in love with George Gently, driving all the way to Scotland for a holiday with Gently's sister and brother-in-law might have been a bit of a challenge. Spying on a heavily armed private army of nationalists, being held at gunpoint on the hillside, being held prisoner in a filthy outhouse and becoming involved in a murder would be unthinkable.For Gently, it's all in a day's work and his holiday is put on hold while he stalks a murderer in the mountains, with Brenda by his side.

White Heat ($0.99 Kindle, B&N), the first title in the Firefighters series by Jill Shalvis [Hachette], is the Nook Daily Find, price matched on Kindle. You can now pre-order the next two in the series: Blue Flame ($3.19) and Seeing Red ($3.99).

Book Description
Nothing is hotter than desire . . .

Raised as an army brat, bush pilot Lyndie Anderson has always been independent-and alone. Living only for her plane and the open sky, she eagerly rushes to help save the people of a small Mexican town from a raging wildfire. Yet when her cargo is a drop-dead gorgeous fireman, Lyndie suddenly feels a burning desire-one that may ground her for the first time in her life.

Firefighter Griffin Moore has been haunted by the loss of his crew in an Idaho inferno. Scarred by survivor's guilt, he became a recluse who hid himself away from working-or being close to anyone. But when his brother convinces him to volunteer for another fire, he encounters a brave, beautiful woman who sparks a simmering passion. Now in the hot, dangerous conflagration of the Mexican jungle, Griffin and Lyndie must discover a way to rescue a town-and a love that may save them . . .

Today's Kindle Kids Daily Deal is See You at Harry's ($2.99), by Jo Knowles [Candlewick], an Amazon Best Book of the Month from May, 2012. The companion audiobook is $3.99.

Book Description
Starting middle school brings all the usual challenges - until the unthinkable happens, and Fern and her family must find a way to heal. Twelve-year-old Fern feels invisible. It seems as though everyone in her family has better things to do than pay attention to her: Mom (when she's not meditating) helps Dad run the family restaurant; Sarah is taking a gap year after high school; and Holden pretends that Mom and Dad and everyone else doesn't know he's gay, even as he fends off bullies at school. Then there's Charlie: three years old, a "surprise" baby, the center of everyone's world. He's devoted to Fern, but he's annoying, too, always getting his way, always dirty, always commanding attention. If it wasn't for Ran, Fern's calm and positive best friend, there'd be nowhere to turn. Ran's mantra, "All will be well," is soothing in a way that nothing else seems to be. And when Ran says it, Fern can almost believe it's true. But then tragedy strikes- and Fern feels not only more alone than ever, but also responsible for the accident that has wrenched her family apart. All will not be well. Or at least all will never be the same.

Age Range: 10 and up

Bargain Book Roundup

The Last Chinese Chef ($2.99 Kindle, B&N), by Nicole Mones [Houghton Mifflin Harcourt]. The companion audiobook, which I already have, is only $3.99 via Audible. Be careful if you are searching for this one and not using the links, as there are two editions and only this one is on sale (too bad it is the Topaz format one).

Book Description
This alluring novel of friendship, love, and cuisine brings the best-selling author of Lost in Translation and A Cup of Light to one of the great Chinese subjects: food. As in her previous novels, Mones’s captivating story also brings into focus a changing China -- this time the hidden world of high culinary culture.

When Maggie McElroy, a widowed American food writer, learns of a Chinese paternity claim against her late husband’s estate, she has to go immediately to Beijing. She asks her magazine for time off, but her editor counters with an assignment: to profile the rising culinary star Sam Liang.

In China Maggie unties the knots of her husband’s past, finding out more than she expected about him and about herself. With Sam as her guide, she is also drawn deep into a world of food rooted in centuries of history and philosophy. To her surprise she begins to be transformed by the cuisine, by Sam’s family -- a querulous but loving pack of cooks and diners -- and most of all by Sam himself. The Last Chinese Chef is the exhilarating story of a woman regaining her soul in the most unexpected of places.

The House at Sea's End ($2.99 Kindle, B&N) and A Room Full of Bones ($2.99 Kindle, B&N), the third and fourth novels in the Ruth Galloway Mystery series by Elly Griffiths [Houghton Mifflin Harcourt]

The House at Sea's End

Just back from maternity leave, forensic archeologist Ruth is finding it hard to juggle motherhood and work when she is called in to investigate human bones that have surfaced on a remote Norfolk beach. The presence of DCI Harry Nelson, the married father of her daughter, does not help. The bones, six men with their arms bound, turn out date back to World War II, a desperate time on this stretch of coastland.

Home Guard veteran Archie Whitcliffe reveals the existence of a secret the old soldiers have vowed to protect with their lives. But then Archie is killed and a German journalist arrives, asking questions about Operation Lucifer, a plan to stop a German invasion, and a possible British war crime. What was Operation Lucifer? And who is prepared to kill to keep its secret?

A Room Full of Bones (companion audiobook $4.99)

Forensic archeologist Ruth Galloway investigates her most complicated case to date: two people affiliated with a museum housing aboriginal skulls succumb to a mysterious fever that later threatens the life of DCI Harry Nelson.

When Ruth Galloway arrives to supervise the opening of a coffin containing the bones of a medieval bishop, she finds the museum's curator lying dead on the floor. Soon the museum's wealthy owner lies dead in his stables, too.

These two deaths could be from natural causes, but when he is called in to investigate, Nelson isn't convinced, and it is only a matter of time before he and Ruth cross paths once more. When threatening letters come to light, events take an even more sinister turn. But as Ruth's friends become involved, where will her loyalties lie? As her convictions are tested, Ruth and Nelson must discover how Aboriginal skulls, drug smuggling, and the mystery of “The Dreaming” hold the answer to these deaths, as well as the keys to their own survival.

Beast Master's Planet ($9.99 Kindle, B&N, Kobo), an omnibus volume containing Andre Norton's Omnibus of Beast Master and Lord of Thunder, both in the Beastmaster series. Unlike the titles I highlighted on sale yesterday, this one is published by Macmillan and $5/title is a pretty good price for the set (individual titles are running around $8 apiece).

Book Description
In 1959 Andre Norton published The Beast Master, a fast-paced science fiction adventure that introduced to readers a new kind of hero, Hosteen Storm. Storm, a Navajo from the American southwest, served in the Planetary Confederacy forces as a Beast Master teamed with an African eagle, a meercat, and a dune cat.

Telepathically linked to his team animals, Storm served valiantly in the war that eventually defeated the alien Xiks, though victory could not prevent the aliens from destroying Earth. With his homeworld gone, Storm emigrated to the colonized frontier planet Arzor, where he would have to help fight a holdout Xik force that has brought the war to his adopted home.

In Lord of Thunder, Storm's beast master skills and animal partners are needed to unravel the mystery behind a huge gathering of the indigenous Norbies. Only Storm and his half-brother Logan Quade can penetrate the Norbies' clan secrets and discover what is behind the threat of an uprising that could destroy the tenuous peace between the colonists and the aliens who share their planet.

These two novels are science fiction adventure at its best. Here is exciting space opera full of colorful, absorbing SF action on an alien world, as only Andre Norton can write it.

At the publisher's request, this title is being sold without Digital Rights Management software (DRM) applied.

Beauty Dies ($1.99 Kindle, B&N), a Claire Conrad/Maggie Hill novel by Melodie Johnson Howe [MysteriousPress.com (Open Road)]

Book Description
A former supermodel takes a fatal tumble, and only the unlikely duo Claire and Maggie can say who pushed her....

Women like Cybella are not destined to survive their fifties. Her looks long gone, the ex-supermodel takes a leap down a stairwell—an apparent suicide that lands her on the front page one last time. Maggie Hill and her employer, the eccentrically brilliant detective Claire Conrad, are about to leave New York when a streetwalker named Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis Murphy barges into their hotel room, clutching a tape that she claims proves the model was murdered—a tawdry bit of pornography starring Jackie and Cybella’s daughter. Conrad is unimpressed, but Jackie gets her attention on her way out of the hotel, when an unseen killer stabs her to death in the street.

Discovering the truth behind the two murders will take Maggie and Claire on a trip to the ugliest corners of New York City, and show them that there is no back alley as dangerous as a high-fashion catwalk.

Shoveling Smoke: A Clay Parker Crime Novel ($1.99 Kindle, B&N), by Austin David [Chronicle Books]

Book Description
Reveling in outrageous shenanigans and hilariously off-kilter characters, Shoveling Smoke does for East Texas what Carl Hiaasen's novels do for South Florida. Burned-out corporate lawyer Clay Parker chucks it all and moves from Houston to a tiny firm in a dusty small town, searching for his lost integrity and a simpler life. Instead, he lands in the middle of a bungled fraud case defending the disreputable and downright nasty Bevo Rasmussen, accused of torching the stables housing his overinsured thoroughbreds. Immediately confronted with corrupt officials, crazed survivalists, an incompetent hit man, an emu, and a naked county clerk, along with an assortment of vengeful wives and great barbecue, Clay discovers that nothing is what it seems to be. By the end, our hero gets way more than he bargained for, justice (Texas-style) gets served, and the reader gets a laugh-out-loud first novel.

Beautiful Boy: A Father's Journey Through His Son's Addiction ($2.99 Kindle, B&N), by David Sheff [Houghton Mifflin Harcourt], one of Amazons Best of the Month, February 2008 picks, with the companion audiobook $3.99.

Book Description
What had happened to my beautiful boy? To our family? What did I do wrong? Those are the wrenching questions that haunted every moment of David Sheff’s journey through his son Nic’s addiction to drugs and tentative steps toward recovery. Before Nic Sheff became addicted to crystal meth, he was a charming boy, joyous and funny, a varsity athlete and honor student adored by his two younger siblings. After meth, he was a trembling wraith who lied, stole, and lived on the streets. David Sheff traces the first subtle warning signs: the denial, the 3 A.M. phone calls (is it Nic? the police? the hospital?), the rehabs. His preoccupation with Nic became an addiction in itself, and the obsessive worry and stress took a tremendous toll. But as a journalist, he instinctively researched every avenue of treatment that might save his son and refused to give up on Nic.

Beautiful Boy is a fiercely candid memoir that brings immediacy to the emotional rollercoaster of loving a child who seems beyond help.

The Patron Saint of Liars ($2.99 Kindle, B&N), by Ann Patchett [Houghton Mifflin Harcourt]

Book Description
Since her first publication in 1992, celebrated novelist Ann Patchett has crafted a number of elegant novels, garnering accolades and awards along the way. Now comes a beautiful reissue of the best-selling debut novel that launched her remarkable career.

St. Elizabeth's, a home for unwed mothers in Habit, Kentucky, usually harbors its residents for only a little while. Not so Rose Clinton, a beautiful, mysterious woman who comes to the home pregnant but not unwed, and stays. She plans to give up her child, thinking she cannot be the mother it needs. But when Cecilia is born, Rose makes a place for herself and her daughter amid St. Elizabeth's extended family of nuns and an ever-changing collection of pregnant teenage girls. Rose's past won't be kept away, though, even by St. Elizabeth's; she cannot remain untouched by what she has left behind, even as she cannot change who she has become in the leaving.

The Best Contemporary Women's Fiction: Six Novels ($13.20 Kindle, B&N, $14.89 Kobo - coupon eligible) combines the first novel listed above with five others, dropping the price to essentially $2.10 each. Authors included are Nicole Mones, Ann Patchett, Maggie O'Farrell, Jenna Blum, Elizabeth Benedict and Molly Gloss [Houghton Mifflin Harcourt]. You don't get access to the reduced price companion audiobooks with this volume, but some of the included titles are selling for ~$10 each, so it's a great deal for those that skip those, anyway.

Book Description
Best Contemporary Women’s Fiction: Six Novels includes works by some of the finest novelists of today.

Almost by Elizabeth Benedict chronicles the attempt of writer Sophy Chase to come to terms with the death of her almost ex-husband -- who may have committed suicide on the New England resort island where she left him just months before.

Those Who Save Us by Jenna Blum follows Trudy, a professor of German history, as she investigates her mother's past and the truth surrounding her life in Germany during WWII. Combining a passionate, doomed love story, a vivid evocation of life during the war, and a poignant mother/daughter drama, Those Who Save Us is a profound exploration of what we endure to survive and the legacy of shame.

The Hearts of Horses by Molly Gloss is a heartwarming, greatly satisfying story of a young woman with the rare talent of “gentling” wild horses and the unexpected and profound connections between people and animals.

The Last Chinese Chef by Nicole Mones takes readers inside the hidden world of elite cuisine in modern China through the story of an American food writer in Beijing. When recently widowed Maggie McElroy is called to China to settle a claim against her late husband’s estate, she is blindsided by the discovery that he may have led a double life.

The Vanishing Act of Esme Lennox by Maggie O’Farrell is a gothic, intricate tale of family secrets, lost lives, and the freedom brought by truth that will haunt you long past its final page.

The Magician’s Assistant by Ann Patchett tells the story of a secretive magician's death that sets in motion his partner's journey of self-discovery.

Diesel Daily Deal - Intimate Knowledge (E)

Intimate Knowledge ($4.99 $3.82 Kindle), a romantic suspense novel by Amanda Stevens [Harlequin Intrigue], is today's Deal of the "Day" at Diesel E-Books, where it's discounted to $0.80. (9 copies left).

Book Description

AN ACCIDENTAL RUN-IN?

A benign business trip to Mexico turns sinister when one man turns up dead and another—impossibly—returns in the flesh! Penelope Moon couldn't believe her eyes when she saw her fiancé, Simon Decker, a man who had been languishing in a coma for months, on board a passing yacht with a man who would die within hours. But this Simon wasn't the kindly accountant she'd fallen in love with, who knew her intimately as though he'd read a brief on her needs and desires. This man was altogether different. Tougher, stronger—sexier than she'd known. And she secretly liked it.

Soon Penelope found herself drawn into a deadly conspiracy involving an illegal pharmaceutical and border infiltration. More than just her wedding was at stake. But would her heart end up as collateral damage…?

Get the book from Diesel; be sure to check the sales price, as the Deal of the Day often sells out.