A Gate at the Stairs by Lorrie Moore

A Gate at the Stairs is both hilarious and poignant. It is a coming of age story about Tassie Keltjin, a quirky farm girl starting college.  Her job as a nanny provides the backdrop for serious emotional and political issues.

The Lost German Slave Girl:the Extraordinary True Story of Sally Miller and Her Fight for Freedom in Old New Orleans by John Bailey.

Who was Sally Miller: was she Salomé Müller, a long-lost German immigrant girl enslaved by a Southern planter? Or was she really a light-skinned black woman, shrewd enough to exploit her only opportunity for freedom? Bailey (The White Diver of Broome) keeps us guessing until the end in this page-turning true courtroom drama of 19th-century New Orleans. Bailey opens the story in 1843, when a friend of the Schubers—a local family of German immigrants—discovered Miller outside her owner Louis Belmonti’s house. Struck by her remarkable resemblance to their late cousin Dorothea Müller, and unusual birthmarks exactly like her daughter Salomé’s, the Schubers claimed Sally as kin and set about trying to prove her identity as Salomé and obtain her freedom. Bailey elucidates as the complexities of 19th-century Louisiana slave law and the status of black women. Sally herself remains an enigma at the center of this highly engrossing tale.  (Starred review from Publishers Weekly.)

Cold Mountain, by Charles Frazier

Cold Mountain, Charles Frazier’s award-winning debut, is the story of one soldier’s journey back to his home and love in the Civil War-torn South.
Inman is a wounded soldier who walks away from the ravages of war and makes the perilous trip back to his loves, Ada and Cold Mountain. Ada, however, is struggling with her own journey and although less harrowing it is still as treacherous.
Follow Inman, Ada and the South as they try to come back together.

Chronic City by Jonathan Lethem

Chronic City is a sprawling story about two unlikely friends, Chase Insteadman and Perkus Tooth. Chase is a nonthreatening, once child star social drifter and Perkus is a underemployed, paranoid pot smoking critic. The friends wander in and out of powerful social circles exploring art, government, isolation and loneliness. The story is realistic, fantastic, and full of unsettling dark humor.

A Big Little Life: A Memoir of a Joyful Dog

Dean Koontz, a best-selling author of suspense thrillers that often include elements of horror, science fiction, mystery and satire, has changed courses with his new book.  
 A Big Little Life: a Memoir of a Joyful Dog is a tender and heartwarming tribute to his late golden retriever, Trixie.  Koontz writes about Trixie’s intelligence, sense of wonder and instinct, and the impact these qualities had on him and his wife Gerda.

Lost City of Z: A Tale of Deadly Obsession in the Amazon

A grand mystery by DAVID GRANN reaching back centuries. A sensational disappearance that made headlines around the world. A quest for truth that leads to death, madness, or disappearance for those who seek to solve it. The Lost City of Z is a blockbuster adventure narrative about what lies beneath the impenetrable jungle canopy of the Amazon. In 1925 Percy Fawcett ventured into the Amazon to find an ancient civilization, vowing to make one of the most important archaeological discoveries in history. Captivating the imagination of millions around the globe, Fawcett embarked with his twenty-one year old son, determined to prove that this ancient civilization—which he dubbed “Z”— existed. Fawcett’s fate—and the tantalizing clues he left behind about “Z” —became an obsession for hundreds who followed him into the unchartered wilderness. For decades scientists and adventurers have searched for evidence of Fawcett’s party and the lost City of Z. Countless have perished, been captured by tribes, or gone mad. As the author delved even deeper into the mystery surrounding Fawcett’s quest and the greater mystery of what lies within the Amazon, he found himself like the generations who preceded him drawn into the jungle’s “green hell”. By interweaving the great story of Fawcett with his own investigative escapades in South America and Britain, the author provides an in depth, captivating character study that has the relentless energy of a classic adventure tale. (Starred Review from Amazon and Publishers Weekly Magazine.)

A Prisoner of Birth, by Jeffrey Archer

Jeffrey Archer’s, A Prisoner of Birth, is a modern retelling of the Dumas’ classic, The Count of Monte Cristo.  Danny Cartwright is the victim of a miscarriage of justice and is sentenced to 22 years in Belmarsh, a maximum security prison. 

While in prison Danny undergoes a major transofrmation, thanks to his cellmate, Sir Nicholas Moncrieff.  Danny’s future seems bleak, but a series of events gives Danny the opportunity to clear his name, be with the love of his life, and extract revenge on those who took away everything he ever wanted.

Vanished, by Joseph Finder

Nick Heller is a fixer.  When he receives a frantic call from his nephew he’s on the next plane to D.C.  What he finds when he gets there is a whole lot of questions with very few answers.  Nick, however, digs into the questions until he finds the answers, and some he doesn’t like. 

Finder has created a character that is reminicient of Lee Child’s Jack Reacher.  If you like Jack give Nick a try.

Pharmakon by Dirk Wittenborn

Pharmakon is a big story filled with people  searching for “Big Ideas”.  Wittenborn has written a complex family saga about coming-of-age during the emergening 1950’s psycho-pharmacology movement that is still very much apart of the American culture.

Everything Matters by Ron Currie

A baby boy is born with the knowledge of the exact date and time that the world will end. He struggles to find meaning in his life as he lives with this great burden.  In an attempt to discover if anything matters he ultimately finds that everything matters.  Everything Matters is a unique novel that stays with the reader long after it is finished.