New in August

"A captivating novel about two women, centuries apart, fighting to be heard -- one of whom may be the real author of Shakespeare's plays -- from the New York Times bestselling author of Wish You Were Here. As an undergraduate, Melina Green had a rare opportunity to have one of her first plays judged by famous theater critic Jasper Tolle, only to be publicly humiliated by a harsh and biased critique. Ten years later, her confidence as a playwright...

"A desperate bargain is broken... Constance Greene confronts Manhattan's most dangerous serial killer, Enoch Leng, bartering for her sister's life - but she is betrayed and turned away empty-handed, incandescent with rage. A clever trap is set... Unknown to Leng, Pendergast's brother, Diogenes, appears unexpectedly, offering to help - for mysterious reasons of his own. Disguised as a cleric, Diogenes establishes himself in New York's notorious Five...

"As New York Times bestseller Ann Cleeves's beloved Vera series explodes in popularity in print and on TV, this stunning eleventh book explores the web of secrets surrounding a young man's death. The man's body is found in the early morning light by a local dog walker in the park outside Rosebank, a home for troubled teens in the coastal village of Longwater. The victim is Josh, a staff member, who was due to work the previous night but never showed...

5 stars

A mysterious cargo plane, flanked by a squadron of Russia's most lethal fighters, has just taken off from a remote airbase. Closely monitored by the United States, no one inside the Pentagon has any idea where it's going or what it's carrying. A high-level Russian defector, a walking vault of secrets that could shatter the West, seeks asylum in Norway. Across the continent, in the heart of Paris, a lone French agent stumbles upon a conspiracy so explosive...

"The disappearance of a local politician's teenaged daughter is major news in Minnesota. As a huge manhunt is launched to find her, Cork O'Connor's grandson stumbles across the shallow grave of a young Ojibwe woman--but nobody seems that interested. Nobody, that is, except Cork and the newly formed Iron Lake Ojibwe Tribal Police. As Cork and the tribal officers dig into the circumstances of this mysterious and grim discovery, they uncover a connection...

"When procrastination puts him behind at college, Henry Turner knows he's going to have to work hard to stay captain of the hockey team. His friend, Halle Jacobs, an academic superstar, offers to help when she hears about Henry's struggle with the material. Too bad being a tutor could blow up her busy schedule. They just need to stick to their own rules and not fall in love"--

5 stars

"Sweeping across centuries, and stretching from Mesopotamia to London, this is an enchanting new novel by Booker Prize finalist Elif Shafak that conjures a trio of characters living in the shadow of one of the greatest epic poems (The Epic of Gilgamesh) of all time"--

"London: 1968. Liz Houghton is languishing as an obituary writer at a London newspaper when a young girl's disappearance captivates the city. If Liz can break the story, it's her way into the newsroom. She already has a scoop: her best friend Marisa is a police officer who is assigned to the case. Liz follows Marisa to Dorset, where they make another disturbing discovery. Twenty-five years ago, three girls disappeared while evacuating from London...

5 stars

"Years ago Alex Marks escaped to New York City for a fresh start. Now, aside from trips to her regular diner for coffee, she keeps to herself, gets her perfectly normal copywriting job done, and doesn't date. Her carefully cultivated world is upended when her childhood hero, Francis Keen, is brutally murdered. Francis was the woman behind the famous advice column, Dear Constance, and her words helped Alex through some of her darkest times. When Alex...