Month: February 2018

The Onion Skewers the True Crime Podcast

Post author By Jamie Canaves
Post date February 20, 2018

Hello fellow mystery fans! If you will be in NY on the 28th (currently wishing I still lived there–remembers it’s cold, forgets wish) Megan Abbott and Patton Oswalt will be at St. Ann’s Church in Brooklyn Heights presenting Michelle McNamara’s true crime I’ll Be Gone in the Dark. (To buy tickets) No, you’re crying already!

Sponsored by Flatiron Books

My name is Amber Reynolds. There are three things you should know about me:

I’m in a coma.
My husband doesn’t love me anymore.
Sometimes I lie.

Walter Mosley Has a New Novel and I Hope It Becomes a Series (Trigger Warning: rape)

cover image: black and white photo of man standing at railing staring out to sea with title in yellow letters Down the River Unto the Sea by Walter Mosley: Joe King Oliver was an NYPD cop until he was accused of rape and went to jail. Years later, after being released, his life now basically revolves around his PI work and his teenage daughter who helps out in his office. King finds himself needing to solve two cases: his own, after the woman who accused him of rape sends him an apology (this does not go down the route of women are psycho and vindictive so they falsely accuse); trying to find justice for a journalist convicted of killing two cops. As always, Mosley does a great job navigating between law and justice, and exposing racism–my favorite part of the book though was King’s relationship with his daughter and her character. I hope if this is the beginning of this series that we get to see a lot more of that. (If you’ve never read Mosley before and are overwhelmed by his immense catalog, here’s a Reading Pathways.)

Good Ol’ Fashion Detective Work to Catch the Killer! (Trigger Warnings: child murder/ suicide)

cover image: a foggy image of the Golden Gate Bridge with purple pink sky A Grave Talent (Kate Martinelli, #1) by Laurie R. King: Recently promoted to Homicide Detective, Kate Martinelli is paired with veteran Al Hawkins on a difficult case: a string of child murders. The case only gets more complicated once they think they’ve got a huge break in the case in finding a once convicted child murderer hiding out in a small community outside San Francisco. This is really my favorite type of mystery: psychology and human behavior are explored; the detectives are interesting with great chemistry (not romantic in nature, Martinelli is a lesbian); the clues slowly build up; there’s an “obsession”– in this case painting. I was left wanting to immediately grab the next in the series and I really enjoyed Alyssa Bresnahan’s calm, smooth narration on the audiobook.

Links:

If a giveaway for $500 of Penguin clothbound classics sounds amazing to you then head on over to Book Riot’s Instagram to enter!

Rincey and Katie talk about suspenseful romance novels on the latest Read or Dead.

Amazon’s Bosch series (adapted from Michael Connely‘s novels) has been renewed for a 5th season and here’s the trailer for season 4 which premieres April 13th.

Alicia Vikander will star in the thriller adaptation of Karen Dionne’s The Marsh King’s Daughter.

The true crime podcast Criminal is doing a six-part series This Is Love which started on Valentine’s Day.

Another book (McMafia: A Journey Through the Global Criminal Underworld by Misha Glenny) saw a huge jump in sales thanks to a popular adaptation: The real McMasterminds behind McMafia: The BBC thriller isn’t just must-see TV, it’s a scarily realistic portrayal of international crime – and these are the villains it’s based on.

The Onion onioned: the ‘Onion’ skewers the true-crime podcast.

I don’t necessarily agree with all the points, but I’ve been thinking about this one a bit: Why Our True Crime Obsession is Bad For Society. ( My Friend Dahmer didn’t read like an obsession about the serial killer so much as a look at the time before he began killing, showing so many ways in which help was never offered or even attempted. And I think there is a lot of bad work regarding true crime but I think there needs to be a space to study how our society creates problems in order to do the work of doing better.)

Suspenseful Noir (Trigger Warnings: domestic abuse/ rape)

Sunburn cover image: partial photograph of young white woman's half face and shoulder wearing sunglasses Sunburn by Laura Lippman: I kind of want to just say that if you’re a fan of the exploration of the “unlikable woman” and Megan Abbott, go read this without knowing anything about it. But here’s more info: Polly leaves her husband and child for good, without any notice, while on vacation. While debating her next life move she takes a job as a waitress in a small Delaware town. That’s where she meets Adam, who’s passing through. But soon their lives begin to meld, which really isn’t great for a woman trying to reveal as little about herself as possible. The suspense grows from all that we realize we don’t know about characters with the little reveals we get… (Susan Bennett narrates the audiobook in a calm, slightly monotone-ish voice which is exactly the voice I’d heard when reading the book.)

Kindle Deals:

cover image: darkish beige background with a teen girl standing next to a chair Allegedly by Tiffany D. Jackson is $1.99 (review)

Dragon Bones (Red Princess #3) by Lisa See is $1.99 (The last book in this trilogy that pairs an American lawyer with a Chinese lawyer who met while studying in the U.S.)

Browse all the books recommended in Unusual Suspects previous newsletters on this shelf. And if you like to put a pin in things here’s an Unusual Suspects board.

Until next time, keep investigating! And in the meantime come talk books with me on Twitter, Instagram, and Litsy–you can find me under Jamie Canaves.

In The Club

In The Club Feb 21

Post author By Jenn Northington
Post date February 20, 2018

Welcome back to In The Club, a newsletter of resources to keep your book group well-met and well-read. Let’s dive in.

This newsletter is sponsored by Penguin Random House Audio.

Love is in the air when you play an audiobook. Find your perfect match for your next Galentines Day book club pick with some great listening suggestions. Get started at PenguinRandomHouseAudio.com/bookclub.

Instagram giveaway alert! Want a shot at completing your classics collection? You could win $500 in clothbound Penguin Classics; may the odds be ever in your favor.

Get techy: What better place than book club to explore the many nuances of the tech world, and women’s role in it? Here are 5 books about women in tech (cosign on Reset by Ellen Pao, there’s a ton of discussion fodder in that).

For your Read Harder challenge: Our recommendation posts continue, this time with books about social science, and YA/MG series suggestions!

Speaking of YA: If you wanted to break away from Gone Girl comps but still love a good crime story, how about some YA thrillers? (Big fan of Liar over here.)

Speaking further of YA and relevant to those looking forward to the film adaptation of A Wrinkle in Time, here are some mixed race YA heroines.

Who’s nostalgic for the 90s? (Raises hand.) Here are books for us! And Gabrielle Union’s We’re Going To Need More Wine is great for so many reasons in addition to hearing about the set of 10 Things — she’s not afraid to be messy and complicated on the page. Note: trigger warning for discussion of rape.

Dark books for the dark of winter: If you want to lean into the bleakness of February/March, we’ve got some picks for you — and in translation, no less.

Speaking of dark, you can get even more atmospheric with these gothic winter tales.

A new favorite and an interview: We’re all in love with new all-ages graphic novel The Prince and the Dressmaker, and Jen Wang sat down with us to talk about gender expression, fashion, illustration, and more. Interviews are one of my favorite discussion-starters for book club, especially with a book that might seem very simple on the surface!

And that’s a wrap: Happy discussing! If you’re interested in more science fiction and fantasy talk, you can catch me and my co-host Sharifah on the SFF Yeah! podcast. For many many more book recommendations (including the occasional book club question!) you can find me on the Get Booked podcast with the inimitable Amanda.

Your fellow booknerd,
Jenn

More Resources:
– Our Book Group In A Box guide
– List your group on the Book Group Resources page

Giveaways

Win a BLACK PANTHER Prize Pack!

Post author By Jeff O'Neal
Post date February 20, 2018

To celebrate the release of the Black Panther movie, we’re giving away this bundle of Black Panther goodies! It includes Marvel’s Ultimate Guide to Black Panther, the first three volumes of the Black Panther comics, and a Black Panther Funko!

Go here to enter, or just click the prize photo below. Good luck!

The Stack

022018-WhiteSand-The-Stack

Post author By Natalia Heroux
Post date February 20, 2018

Today’s The Stack is sponsored by Dynamite Entertainment.

Following the loss of most of his colleagues in a violent ambush, Kenton has become Lord Mastrell of the few remaining Sand Masters, magicians who can manipulate sand to do their bidding. With the ruling council poised against him, the hot-headed Kenton must become a diplomat to have any hope of preventing the eradication of his people forever. However, there’s another complication: assassins are coming for him from all directions, and Kenton’s only true ally is Khriss, a visitor from the other side of the planet who has an agenda of her own to pursue.

Riot Rundown TestRiotRundown

022018-TheBirthdayGirl-Riot-Rundown

Post author By Devin Service
Post date February 20, 2018

Today’s Riot Rundown is sponsored by The Birthday Girl by Sue Fortin.

Four friends. A party to die for. One killer surprise.

As birthday girl Joanne turns forty, no one wants to celebrate her special day, or play along with her idea of a fun party – a weekend away in a cozy cottage in the woods. But as her friends reluctantly gather round her it quickly becomes clear that there is more to Joanne’s birthday weekend, because Joanne is planning to reveal a secret that one of her friends is hiding… A beautiful cottage in the middle of the countryside sounds idyllic – until no one can hear your cries for help. And when Joanne’s party turns into a murder scene, one of the party guests must be the killer. As secrets unravel, the rest of Jo’s friends face a race against time to discover the murderer, before they are next on the killer’s guest list…

Today In Books

Women Better Represented in Victorian Novels than Modern: Today in Books

Post author By Sharifah Williams
Post date February 19, 2018

This edition of Today in Books is sponsored by Penguin Random House Audio.

Women Better Represented In Victorian Novels Than Modern

An analysis from the universities of Illinois and California at Berkeley has revealed a decline in the prominence of female characters in literature across the two centuries. Using an algorithm to examine 104,000 works of fiction dating from 1780 to 2007, the academics also found a decline in the number of books written by women in the first half of the 20th century, and that women in novels have tended to “feel,” while men “get.” They speculated that the drop in female authors could be due to the increasing desirability of novel-writing as a profession for male writers.

The FBI’s War On Black-Owned Bookstores

The Atlantic examined the FBI’s war on black-owned bookstores, where Former Director of the FBI J. Edgar Hoover focused his sights on an “increase in the establishment of black extremist bookstores which represent propaganda outlets for revolutionary and hate publications and culture centers for extremism.” His directive ordered Bureau offices to locate, identify, and investigate “black extremist and/or African-type” bookstores. He also wanted the Bureau to convince African American citizens to spy on these stores by posing as customers or activists.

Copies of Mary Shelley’s Original Frankenstein Text Will Be Published

A facsimile of the two large notebooks in which Shelley wrote the draft of Frankenstein over nine months will be published to mark the 200th anniversary of the novel’s first release. Complete with revisions, the publication aims “to give the impression to readers that they are holding the original – so you have the feeling the author gave you the notebooks,” according to Jessica Nelson of SP Books. The publisher will release the manuscript in a limited run of 1,000 copies on March 15.

And don’t forget to head over to our Instagram account to enter to win $500 of Penguin Clothbound classics!

New Books

True Love at Bingo, Strange Births, and More New Books

Post author By Liberty Hardy
Post date February 19, 2018

Happy Tuesday! Did you get the day off yesterday? Me either. But every day is still a great day when you get to read books after you’re done your work! I hope you’re all reading something amazing. I have a few awesome books for you below and you can hear about several more great titles on this week’s episode of the All the Books! Jenn and I talked about a few amazing books we loved, including Sunburn, Eloquent Rage, Dreadful Young Ladies, and more.

OOOOOO! And this is awesome: be sure to head over to our Instagram account to enter to win $500 of Penguin Clothbound classics!

Sexual Harassment in Romance

Post author By Jessica Pryde
Post date February 19, 2018

Welcome back, KBers!

There were some interesting thinkpieces going around last week. I’d rather read this over and over.

Also, I missed this one last week. There are some great moments discussed here.

Sponsored by Fierce Reads

When star soccer player Peyton Rios receives an offer from her first-choice college, senior year starts off exactly as planned. But when Peyton uncovers her boyfriend’s dark secret, she confronts him—and finds herself falling down a flight of stairs. Peyton’s knee—and maybe her dream of going pro—is shattered. Everyone is talking: Was she pushed, or did she fall? Peyton knows the truth, even if no one believes her.

With her future on the line, Peyton goes to stay with her uncle in a small Tennessee town to focus on her recovery. Dating is the last thing on her mind—until she meets sweet, sexy Owen Law. But Peyton doesn’t trust her heart, especially when she senses that Owen is hiding something. When their secrets are finally exposed, Peyton has to decide if love is worth fighting for.

More missed coverage last week – RT had a chat with Beverly Jenkins about Deadly Sexy and positive representation.

The issue of sexual harassment in publishing has been picking up like a tumbleweed, and we’ve been talking about it in romance, too. Here’s a good thread about romance conventions.

I am in complete support of everything said here.

Oh, dear.

Consent is sexy. Don’t let anyone ever tell you differently.

Ooh, Cat Sebastian on writing queer romance. We’ve all had that discussion of what it means that women write the majority of M/M romance, but we can also agree that Sebastian writes amazing books.

Have you read any Penny Reid yet? She’s not for everyone, but I love her Winston Brothers.

Jen at The Book Queen wrote a long, hard piece about miscarriages in romance.

There’s been some commentary recently about “dark romance” that redeems characters with deplorable pasts. It came in part from USA Today coverage of a novel featuring a hero who was Stasi. As the author of a series that builds more and more justice into a horrible world, Bree has a good point of view and good words in response.

Deals

Renfester gets flung into 15th Century Scotland? Yes, please. True to the Highlander by Barbara Longley is 2 dollars.

The Immortal Collection by Eva García Sáenz is 99 cents. I’ll admit to being super intrigued.

Lynsay Sands’ Immortally Yours is 1.99. It’s pretty late in the Argeneau series, but that one is fun to jump into anywhere.

Over on Book Riot

Author Fulgani Kuthari dropped in to talk about Indian romance and the Desi HEA.

We seriously can’t stop talking about figure skating romances. Jessica Avery has compiled a good list (and there are a couple more in the comments).

Kristan Higgins recommended reading a romance on Valentine’s Day. I mean, I’d recommend that every day, but I get what she’s saying 😉

We’re still having a giveaway! Check it out on Instagram.

Recs!

Like most of the world, I was excited to see Black Panther this weekend. A couple years ago, an entire production filmed a super busy action flick, then turned around and took some time after wrap to make a beautiful rendition of Macbeth.

I wish this book had been published just a little before now, just so Ryan Coogler and crew might have been inclined to do something similar. Because it needs to be filmed. It was written to be the next romantic comedy.

A Princess in Theory
Alyssa Cole

If the dedication doesn’t wrap around your heart and warm it from the inside, the first paragraph will make you cackle and keep reading. You know those spam emails that are definitely not a thing anymore but still live as the most prominent type: the Nigerian Prince In Need. Well, Naledi has been getting emails from the same person from some random African country, determined that she is the betrothed of the crown prince. Ledi doesn’t have time for games; she just wants to finish grad school and move on with her career. But Thabiso is determined to find the woman whose parents absconded with her when she was only a child, setting his life completely on its side. A misapprehension at one of Ledi’s jobs leads to Thabiso becoming Jamal, just another guy who need work in New York. The two build an easy rapport as Thabiso-Jamal works his way through Naledi’s skillfully crafted emotional walls, but his efforts to reveal his true self are constantly thwarted. Time spent as a normal person is life changing for a prince, however, especially as he strives to be a better person for his would-be princess.

From start to finish, this book is nearly perfection. Personally, I did not give this book five stars, just based on the fact that I am wary of deception between heroes and heroines, even if the deceiver has a logical reason for it (or goes along with a misplaced identity). But as a book, it has all the things you might look for in a romance: excellent supporting characters, natural personal growth, excellent worldbuilding, and a pair of people you can’t help but root for, even if you want to commit violence upon them.

Have you put this book on preorder yet? You should. You’re going to want to read it immediately. And if you watch Black Panther first, you’ll have the lovely experience of reading with Chadwick Boseman and Lupita Nyong’o in mind. Or at least with their voices in your head.

One thing that I’ve been thinking about since reading A Princess in Theory and seeing Black Panther is Afrofuturism. There is a wealth of Afrofuturist literature about at the moment, and everything that I have read is pretty fantastic.

BUT.

I want some Afrofuturist romance. Not just Afrofuturism with a romantic element, but a story in which the central plot is multiple people falling in love and having an emotionally satisfactory ending. Have you read any? Tell me!

If you want to look at some interesting spec-fic romance by black authors who were influenced by the Afrofuturist tradition, here are some worth having a look:

Radio Silence by Alyssa Cole – Post-apocalyptic, first in a series

Chained by Elise Marion – Medieval fantasy, first in a series

To Find You by Cerece Rennie Murphy – Soulmate romance, standalone

And while it’s not out for several months, keep an eye out for Song of Blood and Stone by L. Penelope.

New and Upcoming Releases

Baby Daddy by Kendall Ryan

One and Only by Jenny Holiday

Midsummer Delights by Eloisa James

Hello Stranger by Lisa Kleypas

Best Laid Plans by Brenda Jackson

As usual, catch me on Twitter @jessisreading or Instagram @jess_is_reading, or send me an email at jessica@riotnewmedia.com if you’ve got feedback or just want to say hi!

Giveaways

Win a Copy of BRING OUT THE DOG by Will Mackin!

Post author By Jeff O'Neal
Post date February 19, 2018

We have 10 copies of Bring Out the Dog by Will Mackin to give away to 10 Riot readers!

Here’s what it’s all about:

“A near-miraculous, brilliant debut.”—George Saunders

The eleven stories in Will Mackin’s mesmerizing debut collection draw from his many deployments with a special operations task force in Iraq and Afghanistan. They began as notes he jotted on the inside of his forearm in grease pencil and, later, as bullet points on the torn-off flap of an MRE kit. Years later, he used those journals to write this book. Told without a trace of false bravado and with a keen sense of the absurd, Bring Out the Dog manages to capture the tragedy and heroism, the degradation and exultation, in the smallest details of war.

Go here to enter for a chance to win, or just click the cover image below:

Today In Books

Barnes & Noble Guts Full-Time Staff: Today in Books for February 18th, 2018

Post author By Jeff O'Neal
Post date February 18, 2018

Today in Books is sponsored today by Blackstone Publishing:

Ominous Layoffs Come to Every Barnes & Noble Location

In what seems like the most drastic move yet, Barnes & Noble this week laid off almost all of the full-time employees at its 781 North American stores. In a cost-cutting measure that will save $40 million per year, head cashiers, receiving managers, and department leads all were laid off with minimal severance and no warning. Can Barnes & Noble survive as a stripped down version of its former self? Did it have any other choice even?

Random House Drops James Dashner, author of the Maze Runner Series

After a series of allegations of sexual harassment, James Dashner was dropped by his publisher, Penguin Random House. In a statement, the world’s largest trade publisher said that it would not be publishing anymore of his books, though presumably they will continue to sell and reprint his already released and hugely popular Maze Runner series.

Pop-Up Bookstore Selling Only Books by Women Coming to London

From March 5-9, Random House is putting together Like A Woman, a pop-up bookshop and event series featuring only books by women and women speakers. The event coincides with International Women’s Day and all proceeds from books sold at Like a Woman will go to Solace Women’s Aid, a charitable organization supporting victims of domestic violence.