• Hardcover: 400 pages
• Publisher: Crown (April 24, 2012)

From the author of the acclaimed bestseller Sister comes a gripping, thrilling story of a mother who will do anything to protect her child.

The school was on fire, and Grace’s last memory is of trying to reach her daughter, Jenny, trapped inside the inferno.  While their bodies are frantically cared for by doctors, Grace and Jenny awaken in the hospital in a strange in-between state.  When they learn that someone purposefully set the fire, and Jenny may still be in grave danger from someone who wants her dead, Grace realizeds she may be the only one who can discover who might be responsible.  The police are looking at Adam, Jenny’s younger brother, who is struck mute by the horror he witnessed and can’t defend himself when he is accused of the arson.

But a mother will do anything to protect her children, and Grace will do whatever it takes to save Adam and Jenny and find out who committed the crime that rocked their lives.

“Lupton enters the highly charged ring where the best psychological detective writers spar, her hands raised in a victory clench…”–New York Times Book Review

About Rosamund Lupton

Rosamund Lupton lives with her husband and two sons in London.

For more information on Rosamund and her work, please visit her website, rosamundlupton.com, her Facebook page, or follow her on Twitter @Rosamundlupton.

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The One: The Life and Music of James Brown

• Hardcover: 464 pages
• Publisher: Gotham (March 15, 2012)

The definitive biography of James Brown, the Godfather of Soul, with fascinating findings on his life as a Civil Rights activist, an entrepreneur, and the most innovative musician of our time.

Playing 350 shows a year at his peak, with more than forty Billboard hits, James Brown was a dazzling showman who transformed American music. His life offstage was just as vibrant, but until now no biographer has delivered a complete profile. The One draws on interviews with more than 100 people who knew Brown personally or played with him professionally. Using these sources, award-winning writer RJ Smith draws a portrait of a man whose twisted and amazing life helps us to understand the music he made.

The One delves deeply into the story of a man who was raised in abject poverty in the segregated South but grew up to earn (and lose) several fortunes. Covering everything from Brown’s unconventional childhood (his aunt ran a bordello), to his role in the Black Power movement, which used “Say It Loud (I’m Black and Proud)” as its anthem, to his high-profile friendships, to his complicated family life, Smith’s meticulous research and sparkling prose blend biography with a cultural history of a pivotal era. At the heart of The One is Brown’s musical genius, as Smith traces the legend’s reinvention of funk, soul, R&B, and pop, and his evolution as an artist whose crucial influence spans at least 5 decades.

About R.J. Smith

RJ Smith has been a Senior Editor at Los Angeles magazine, a contributor to Blender, a columnist for the Village Voice, a staff writer for Spin, and has written for GQ, The New York Times Magazine, and Men’s Vogue.  His first book, The Great Black Way: LA in the 1940s and the Lost African-American Renaissance was a Los Angeles Times bestseller and recipient of a California Book Award.  He lives in Los Angeles.

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The Garden Intrigue

• Hardcover: 400 pages
• Publisher: Dutton Adult (February 16, 2012)

Just in time for the post-Valentine’s Day chocolate hangover, THE GARDEN INTRIGUE is the latest novel in the nationally bestselling Pink Carnation series by RITA Award winner Lauren Willig (Dutton, On sale: February 16, 2012). In this ninth installment, long-time readers and newcomers alike will be delighted to meet a character sure to become a fan favorite—a poet whose fervent ardor leads him to declare his feelings for the Pink Carnation in atrociously overwrought verse.

Lovable modern day grad student Eloise Kelly is back and on the trail of the Pink Carnation when she discovers a wretched poem among the papers of a code book. Poetry penned by the notorious fop Augustus Whittlesby for Jane Wooliston (aka the Pink Carnation)—Eloise can’t help but wonder; can anyone really be that bad of a poet? Or is something else hiding behind his putridly saccharine words? Back in 1804, New York born Paris socialite Emma Morris Delgardie doesn’t think so. She’s too busy sipping champagne to notice Whittlesby’s strange interest in a top-secret device Napoleon has commissioned. Unfortunately for Emma, she’s the poet’s entrée into the emperor’s inner circle. Fortunately for Augustus, this plucky American heroine could turn out to be his true muse.

Acclaim for Lauren Willig’s novels is as plentiful as her quirky and charming cast of characters: Marie Claire called her writing “History textbook meets Bridget Jones,” and Library Journal compared the series to “getting a plate of warm-from the oven chocolate chips cookies; it’s hard not to eat them all at once, but you want to savor each bite.”

The perfect addition to a much-beloved series, THE GARDEN INTRIGUE will leave readers clamoring for more of the spunky Eloise Kelly and the ever elusive Pink Carnation.

“As fresh and charming as its floral theme.”                                 

-Kirkus Reviews

“Enlightening and entertaining as always, and full of plenty of romance and intrigue.”                               

–Library Journal

“Readers will be pleased to see the spy who inspired the series in action and will enjoy the charming, witty rapport between Augustus and Emma.”

–Booklist

About Lauren Willig

Lauren Willig is the bestselling author of eight previous Pink Carnation novels. She received a graduate degree in English history from Harvard University and a J.D. from Harvard Law School, though she now writes full-time. Willig lives in New York City.

For more information about Lauren and her work, please visit her website, laurenwillig.com.

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Lauren Willig’s TLC Book Tours TOUR STOPS:

Thursday, February 16th:  Unabridged Chick

Friday, February 17th:  I’m Booking It

Monday, February 20th:  In the Hammock

Tuesday, February 21st:  A Fair Substitute for Heaven

Wednesday, February 22nd:  Book Reviews by Molly

Thursday, February 23rd:  Broken Teepee

Monday, February 27th:  Calico Critic

Tuesday, February 28th:  Stiletto Storytime

Wednesday, February 29th:  The Allure of Books

Thursday, March 1st:  Colloquium

Monday, March 5th:  The Bookworm

Tuesday, March 6th:  A Chick Who Reads

Wednesday, March 7th:  Library of Clean Reads

Monday, March 12th:  YA Book Nerd

Wednesday, March 14th:  Write Meg

Paperback: 368 pages

Publisher: Penguin (Non-Classics); 1 edition (December 27, 2011)

The phone rings. It’s your daughter. She’s been dead for four months. So begins Ian Hunt’s fight to get his daughter back. Hunt is a police dispatcher in the small East Texas town of Bulls Mouth. The call comes at the end of his shift, and it’s from his daughter, Maggie. Maggie, whose funeral he recently attended.

The call is cut-off by the man who snatched Maggie from her bedroom seven years ago. Up until that moment, the assumption was that Maggie had been murdered, but Ian has never given up hope of finding her. A basic description of the kidnapper is all Ian has to go on.

The trail leads to a local couple, but this is just the start of Ian’s battle to get his daughter back. What follows is a bullet-strewn cross-country chase along Interstate 10, from Texas to California.

An action-packed thriller whose East Texas setting evokes No Country for Old Men and whose story calls to mind that of Jaycee Dugard, THE DISPATCHER is sure to keep readers hooked until the very last page.

“Violent, vivid, and disturbing, The Dispatcher is a stomach churner. If you want a book that grabs you—almost chokes you—and won’t let go, this is it. But it should come with a warning label: Caution, a serious writer at work.”—Ridley Pearson, #1 New York Times bestselling author of Killer Summer

“The Dispatcher grabs the reader on page one and never lets go. It’s a classic yet bracingly contemporary story of kidnapping, violence, and a father’s ferocious courage.”—Jonathan Santlofer, author of Anatomy of Fear 

“A well-written, fast-paced book . . . along the order Quentin Tarantino, with a long and bloody trail to the end.” —Charlaine Harris, bestselling author of the Sookie Stackhouse series

About Ryan David Jahn

photo credit: Noel Bass

Ryan David Jahn won the Crime Writers Association debut novel prize for Good Neighbors (Penguin, 2011). He left school at sixteen to work in a record store and subsequently joined the army. Since 2004 he has worked in television and film. He grew up in Arizona, Texas, and California and recently moved from Los Angeles to Louisville, Kentucky, where he plans to set his next novel.

For more info about Ryan and his work, please visit his website, www.ryandavidjahn.com.

Ryan David Jahn’s TLC Book Tours TOUR STOPS:

Monday, February 13th:  Chaotic Compendiums

Tuesday, February 14th:  Ted Lehmann’s Bluegrass, Books, and Brainstorms

Thursday, February 16th:  A Bookworm’s World

Monday, February 20th:  Life in Review

Wednesday, February 22nd:  Reading on a Rainy Day

Wednesday, February 29th:  Dan’s Journal

Thursday, March 1st:  Wordsmithonia

Monday, March 5th:  Book Reviews by Elizabeth A. White

Tuesday, March 6th:  Man of La Book

Wednesday, March 7th:  Unabridged Chick

Thursday, March 8th:  Crime Fiction Lover

Monday, March 12th:  Book Addict Katie

Tuesday, March 13th:  The House of Crime and Mystery

Wednesday, March 14th:  A Library of My Own

Thursday, March 15th:  Mockingbird Hill Cottage

Monday, March 19th:  Raging Bibliomania

Wednesday, March 21st:  Fiction Addict

Walter’s Muse

• Publisher: Endicott & Hugh Books
• Publication date: 2/1/2012
• Pages: 285

It’s the first summer of her retirement and librarian Maggie Lewis is relishing the unfolding of sweet summer days on Vashon Island: walking on the beach, reading the classics, and kayaking. But in June when a sudden storm hits the island, Maggie’s summer becomes about as peaceful as navigating whitewater. Not only does her wealthy sister arrive uninvited with a startling announcement; but Maggie finds herself entangled with her new Baker’s Beach neighbor, Walter Hathaway. A famous children’s author and recovering alcoholic, Walter has a history with Maggie they would each like to forget. Delightfully told with humor and insight, Walter’s Muse is a page turner for romantics, writers, and the young at heart at any age.

“An exhilarating portrait of a woman in her prime…revives in all of us a lust for life, with its splendid twists and turns, gifts of love and friendship, and promises of more surprises to come.” –Nina Sankovitch, Huffington Post, author of Tolstoy and the Purple Chair

“For those who believe in second chances in love and life, Walter’s Muse provides a warm and engaging blueprint.  Okimoto’s loveably quirky characters become a reader’s friends and family.  I hated to finish the last page.”–Connie Burns, School LIbrary Journal, reviewer

“Brimming with wit and wisdom…a delightful celebration of mature love, sure to enchant fans of Major Pettigrew’s Last Stand!”–Juli Morser, Books by the Way

About Jean Davies Okimoto

Jean Davies Okimoto is an author and playwright whose books and short stories have been translated into Japanese, Italian, Chinese, German and Hebrew. She is the recipient  of numerous awards including Smithsonian Notable Book, the American LibraryAssociation Best Book for Young Adults, the Washington Governor’s Award and the International Reading Association Readers Choice Award. Her picture book, Blumpoe the Grumpoe Meets Arnold the Cat was adapted by Shelly Duvall for the HBO and Showtime television series “Bedtime Stories.” Her debut novel for adults The Love Ceiling was a season’s pick by the King County Library System, named to the ABA Indie Next Reading Group List and ebook Fiction Winner in the 2009 Indie Next Generation Awards. She has appeared on CNN, Oprah, and The Today Show. Jeanie began writing for adults when she and her husband Joe retired to Vashon Island in 2004 where they are visited by deer, a raccoon named George who is missing a tail and their six grandchildren.

For more information on Ms. Okimoto, please visit her website at www.jeandaviesokimoto.com.

Jean Davies Okimoto’s TLC Book Tours TOUR STOPS:

Monday, February 13th:  The Lost Entwife

Thursday, February 16th:  BookNAround

Monday, February 20th:  Luxury Reading

Tuesday, February 21st:  Joyfully Retired

Wednesday, February 22nd:  Book Dilettante

Monday, February 27th:  Library of Clean Reads

Tuesday, February 28th:  Colloquium

Thursday, March 1st:  Patricia’s Wisdom

Monday, March 5th:  Book Club Classics!

Wednesday, March 7th:  Words from the Heart

Monday, March 12th:  Great Imaginations

Wednesday, March 14th:  Simply Stacie

Thursday, March 22nd:  Under My Apple Tree

• Hardcover: 416 pages
• Publisher: Dutton Adult (February 21, 2012)

From New York Times bestselling author Jennifer Chiaverini, a powerful and dramatic Prohibition-era story that follows the fortunes of Rosa Diaz Barclay, a woman who plunges into the unknown for the safety of her children and the love of a good but flawed man.

As the nation grapples with the strictures of Prohibition, Rosa Barclay lives on a Southern California rye farm with her volatile husband, John, who has lately found another source of income far outside the federal purview.

Mother to eight children, Rosa mourns the loss of four who succumbed to the mysterious wasting disease that is now afflicting young Ana and Miguel. Two daughters born of another father are in perfect health. When an act of violence shatters Rosa’s resolve to maintain her increasingly dangerous existence, she flees with the children and her precious heirloom quilts to the mesa where she last saw her beloved mother alive.

As a flash flood traps them in a treacherous canyon, only one man is brave—or foolhardy—enough to come to their rescue: Lars Jorgenson, Rosa’s first love and the father of her healthy daughters. Together they escape to Berkeley, where a leading specialist offers their only hope of saving Ana and Miguel. Here in northern California, they create new identities to protect themselves from Rosa’s vengeful husband, the police who seek her for questioning, and the gangsters Lars reported to Prohibition agents—officers representing a department often as corrupt as the Mob itself. Ever mindful that his youthful alcoholism provoked Rosa to spurn him, Lars nevertheless supports Rosa’s daring plan to stake their futures on a struggling Sonoma Valley vineyard—despite the recent hardships of local winemakers whose honest labors at viticulture have, through no fault of their own, become illegal.

About Jennifer Chiaverini

JENNIFER CHIAVERINI is the author of the New York Times bestselling Elm Creek Quilt series, as well as five collections of quilt projects inspired by the novels.  A graduate of the University of Notre Dame and the University of Chicago, she lives with her husband and sons in Madison, Wisconsin.

Connect with Jennifer at her website, Elm Creek Quilts Online.

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Jennifer Chiaverini’s TLC Book Tours TOUR STOPS:

Monday, February 13th:  Peeking Between the Pages

Tuesday, February 14th:  2 Kids and Tired Book Reviews

Wednesday, February 15th:  Unabridged Chick

Thursday, February 16th:  Christian Historical Fiction

Monday, February 20th:  Angler’s Rest

Wednesday, February 22nd:  All Grown Up?

Thursday, February 23rd:  Brimful Curiosities

Friday, February 24th:  Amused by Books

Monday, February 27th:  Col Reads

Tuesday, February 28th:  Life in Review

Wednesday, February 29th:  Reflections of a Bookaholic

Thursday, March 1st:  Bloggin’ ‘Bout Books

Monday, March 5th:  A Chick Who Reads

Tuesday, March 6th:  Joyfully Retired

Wednesday, March 7th:  Colloquium 

Monday, March 12th:  Book Dilettante

Wednesday, March 14th:  A Cozy Reader’s Corner

Hardcover: 496 pages

Publisher: Random House (February 21, 2012)

The acclaimed author of The Dante Club reinvigorates the historical thriller. Matthew Pearl’s spellbinding new novel transports readers to tumultuous nineteenth-century Boston, where the word “technology” represents a bold and frightening new concept. The fight for the future will hinge on . . .

THE TECHNOLOGISTS

Boston, 1868. The Civil War may be over but a new war has begun, one between the past and the present, tradition and technology. On a former marshy wasteland, the daring Massachusetts Institute of Technology is rising, its mission to harness science for the benefit of all and to open the doors of opportunity to everyone of merit. But in Boston Harbor a fiery cataclysm throws commerce into chaos, as ships’ instruments spin inexplicably out of control. Soon after, another mysterious catastrophe devastates the heart of the city. Is it sabotage by scientific means or Nature revolting against man’s attempt to control it?

The shocking disasters cast a pall over M.I.T. and provoke assaults from all sides—rival Harvard, labor unions, and a sensationalistic press. With their first graduation and the very survival of their groundbreaking college now in doubt, a band of the Institute’s best and brightest students secretly come together to save innocent lives and track down the truth, armed with ingenuity and their unique scientific training.

Led by “charity scholar” Marcus Mansfield, a quiet Civil War veteran and one-time machinist struggling to find his footing in rarefied Boston society, the group is rounded out by irrepressible Robert Richards, the bluest of Beacon Hill bluebloods; Edwin Hoyt, class genius; and brilliant freshman Ellen Swallow, the Institute’s lone, ostracized female student. Working against their small secret society, from within and without, are the arrayed forces of a stratified culture determined to resist change at all costs and a dark mastermind bent on the utter destruction of the city.

Studded with suspense and soaked in the rich historical atmosphere for which its author is renowned, The Technologists is a dazzling journey into a dangerous world not so very far from our own, as the America we know today begins to shimmer into being.

“The Technologists combines everything I love in a thriller: fascinating history, science, and a frightening mystery that demands to be solved. Matthew Pearl is one of my must-read authors. He never fails to intrigue and thrill!”—Tess Gerritsen, author of The Silent Girl

“Fascinating, mesmerizing, and richly atmospheric, The Technologists is the best yet from a true master of the historical thriller. I loved this novel.”—Joseph Finder, New York Times bestselling author of Buried Secrets and Vanished

Photo credit: Sigrid-Estrada

About Matthew Pearl

Matthew Pearl is the New York Times bestselling author of The Dante Club, The Poe Shadow, and The Last Dickens. He is the editor of the Modern Library editions of Dante’s Inferno (translated by Henry Wordsworth Longfellow) and Edgar Allan Poe’s The Murders in the Rue Morgue: The Dupin Tales.

For more information on Matthew Pearl and his work, visit his website,  www.matthewpearl.com, and Facebook.  Watch the trailer for The Technologists HERE.

Matthew Pearl’s TLC Book Tours TOUR STOPS:

Monday, February 13th:  Book Chatter

Tuesday, February 14th:  Unabridged Chick

Thursday, February 16th:  The House of Crime and Mystery

Monday, February 20th:  Book Club Classics

Wednesday, February 22nd:  A Library of My Own

Friday, February 24th:  Jenn’s Bookshelves

Monday, February 27th:  Wandering Thoughts of a Scientific Housewife

Tuesday, February 28th:  Jen’s Book Thoughts

Wednesday, February 29th:  Man of La Book

Thursday, March 1st:  Book Addict Katie

Monday, March 5th:  Calico Critic

Wednesday, March 7th:  Annette’s Book Spot

Monday, March 12th:  S. Krishna’s Books

Wednesday, March 14th:  Wordsmithonia

Hardcover: 384 pages

Publisher: The Dial Press (March 20, 2012)

In Jennifer duBois’s mesmerizing and exquisitely rendered debut novel, a long-lost letter links two disparate characters, each searching for meaning against seemingly insurmountable odds.

In St. Petersburg, Russia, world chess champion Aleksandr Bezetov begins a quixotic quest. With his renowned Cold War–era tournaments behind him, Aleksandr has turned to politics, launching a dissident presidential campaign against Vladimir Putin. He knows he will not win—and that he is risking his life in the process—but a deeper conviction propels him forward. And in the same way that he cannot abandon his aims, he cannot erase the memory of a mysterious woman he loved in his youth.

In Cambridge, Massachusetts, thirty-year-old English lecturer Irina Ellison is on an improbable quest of her own. Certain she has inherited Huntington’s disease—the same cruel illness that ended her father’s life—she struggles with a sense of purpose. When Irina finds an old, photocopied letter her father had written to the young Aleksandr Bezetov, she makes a fateful decision. Her father had asked the Soviet chess prodigy a profound question—How does one proceed against a lost cause?—but never received an adequate reply. Leaving everything behind, Irina travels to Russia to find Bezetov and get an answer for her father, and for herself.

Spanning two continents and the dramatic sweep of history, A Partial History of Lost Causes reveals the stubbornness and splendor of the human will even in the most trying times. With uncommon perception and wit, Jennifer duBois explores the power of memory, the depths of human courage, and the endurance of love.

“Thrilling, thoughtful, strange, gorgeous, political, and deeply personal, Jennifer duBois’s A Partial History of Lost Causes is a terrific debut novel. In prose both brainy and beautiful, she follows her characters as they struggle to save each other. This is a book to get lost in.”—Elizabeth McCracken

“An amazing achievement—a braiding of historical, political, and personal, each strand illuminating the other. Wonderful characters, elusive glimpses of wisdom, and a gripping story that accelerates to just the right ending.”—Arthur Phillips

“Hilarious and heartbreaking and a triumph of the imagination. Jennifer duBois is too young to be this talented.  I wish I were her.”—Gary Shteyngart

About Jennifer duBois

Jennifer duBois is a recent graduate of the Iowa Writers’ Workshop and is currently completing a Wallace Stegner Fellowship at Stanford University. Originally from western Massachusetts, she lives in Northern California.

For more information on Jennifer and her work, please visit her website:  jennifer-dubois.com.

Jennifer duBois’s TLC Book Tours TOUR STOPS:

Monday, March 12th:  Book Snob

Wednesday, March 14th:  Bibliosue

Monday, March 19th:  Unabridged Chick

Tuesday, March 20th:  Broken Teepee

Wednesday, March 21st:  The Literate Housewife Review

Monday, March 26th:  Luxury Reading

Wednesday, March 28th:  Book Club Classics

Thursday, March 29th:  BookNAround

Monday, April 2nd:  Wandering Thoughts of a Scientific Housewife

Wednesday, April 4th:  Wordsmithonia

Thursday, April 5th:  She Treads Softly

Monday, April 9th: Coffee and a Book Chick

Wednesday, April 11th:  Jenny Loves to Read

Paperback: 328 pages

Publisher: The Momoir Project; First Trade Paper Edition edition (May 5, 2009)

Between Interruptions is a remarkable collection of original and heartfelt essays about the process of becoming a mother. Written by a wide range of mothers – from a Hollywood celebrity to an immigrant domestic worker, the book explores the transformative experiences in our journey as mothers. Provocative, honest and emotional, the stories focus on the impact motherhood has on our identity, sexuality, ambition and relationships. Laid bare in this collection are the vivd, gut-wrenching and exhilarating true confessions and secret longings of mothers across all ages, cultures and classes. Whether it’s a story about a journalist going to war and missing her baby, or a mother finding perfection in autism, or a mother struggling to breastfeed through post-partum depression, or a mother learning to let go of her dream to stay home with her children because she has to work, there’s a story in this collection for every mother.

About Cori Howard

Cori Howard is the founder of The Momoir Project, an online writing centre that offers memoir writing classes, workshops and workbooks. She’s also an award-winning journalist whose work in newspapers, magazines, TV and radio has taken her around the world. Her stories – many about motherhood – have appeared in publications including Reader’s Digest, Elle, The Independent, among many others. She lives in Vancouver, B.C. with her family.

Cori Howard’s TLC Book Tours TOUR STOPS:

Monday, January 2nd:  A Musing Reviews

Wednesday, January 4th:  Acting Balanced

Monday, January 9th:  Seaside Book Nook

Wednesday, January 11th:  Overstuffed

Monday, January 16th:  Juggling Life

Wednesday, January 18th:  Get Healthy with Heather

Monday, January 23rd:  Musings of a Bookish Kitty

Tuesday, January 24th:  From Tracie

Wednesday, January 25th:  Red Headed Book Child

Thursday, January 26th:  There’s a Book

TBD:  Just Another Mommy Blog

Enchantments

• Hardcover: 320 pages
• Publisher: Random House (March 6, 2012)