Bookreporter

5 days ago | bookreporter.com | Jennifer E. Smith

When the Endicott siblings were kids, their lives were nothing if not chaotic. Their mom, Frankie, left the family when they were all still young, and their dad had to work extra hard to provide for the four children on his own. As a result, the Endicotts grew almost inseparable. Oldest sister Gemma became a de facto mother figure to her younger siblings. Connor retreated into his books and writing. The twins, Roddy and Jude, seemed so close they could practically be one person.

6 days ago | bookreporter.com | David Baldacci

“Only the dead have seen the end of war.” — George SantayanaThis sobering quote opens David Baldacci’s latest novel, STRANGERS IN TIME, a stand-alone title set in Great Britain during the Blitz of WWII that so devastated London and the surrounding areas. Our protagonist is 14-year-old Charlie Matters, who lost his parents and grandfather to the horrors of the war. He now lives with his grandmother amidst the rubble-filled neighborhood where he grew up.

1 week ago | bookreporter.com | Jennifer Weiner

Jennifer Weiner draws us into her latest novel with a mysterious event in the past, as she introduces us to two estranged sisters and the daughter who ultimately brings them together again. In THE GRIFFIN SISTERS’ GREATEST HITS, we meet Zoe and Cassie Grossberg, two sisters who could not be more unlike each other. Pretty and vivacious, Zoe always knows just what to wear, what to say, and how to make friends. Cassie, on the other hand, is homely, shy and insecure, and her only joy is making music.

1 week ago | bookreporter.com | Emma Pattee

Sometimes pieces of writing just stick with you. The one that comes back to me at odd times (especially since I moved to the West Coast a few years ago) is Kathryn Schulz’s 2015 New Yorker article entitled “The Really Big One.” In it, she spells out in disturbing detail the likely effects of a massive earthquake in the Pacific Northwest that is frighteningly likely to occur in our lifetimes. Apparently, I’m not alone in the impact that article has had on me.

2 weeks ago | bookreporter.com | John Scalzi

WHEN THE MOON HITS YOUR EYE is not science fiction. There, I said it. It looks like science fiction. The cover is mostly black, with futuristic sans-serif lettering, an astronaut cavorting on the moon, and craters (they’re actually the holes in Swiss cheese). The book is about the moon suddenly, inexplicably and miraculously turning into cheese…or a cheese-like substance. Nobody at NASA is willing to go out on a limb and say that for sure.