An honest lie

Rainy, the protagonist of this initially slow-moving suspense novel from Fisher (The Wrong Family), has moved from New York City, where she was a successful sculptor, to Washington State to be with her boyfriend, Grant. She has spent a year, largely in vain, trying to make friends with the wives of Grant's buddies. When "the girls" suggest a trip to Las Vegas, Rainy balks, thinking: "Worst idea ever.... This trip, this gaudy, neon-crusted city--these women!" She finally agrees to go after repeated entreaties from Grant. The trip reveals repressed resentments among the women and stirs up disturbing memories from Rainy's early life in a commune near Las Vegas. When Rainy receives a text message telling her that one of her traveling companions has been kidnapped, she knows that her past has caught up with her and is ready for action. Flashbacks detailing Rainy's life as a young teen some 15 years earlier in a cult run by a messiah-like leader fuel the sense of menace and set up the book's exhilarating, action-packed finale. Readers will cheer as Rainey risks everything to bring down the man who stole her childhood. Fisher delivers the goods. Agent: Jane Dystel, Dystel, Goderich & Bourret. (Apr.)

Baldacci sends private investigator and ex-World War II veteran Aloysius Archer to Los Angeles—that is, Dream Town—for another dangerous case (one million copy first printing). Having crafted two Sam and Remi Fargo adventures with the late Cussler (Pirate and The Romanov Ransom), former California law enforcement officer Burcell takes the daring duo on another far-flung adventure in Clive Cussler's The Serpent's Eye (originally scheduled for Sept. 2021). In the New York Times best-selling Fisher's An Honest Lie, Rainy has been hiding out from her bad-news past atop a remote, fog-cloaked mountain but decides to risk a trip to Las Vegas with some friends, where one of them is trapped by a killer as bait to lure Rainy (10,000-copy hardcover and 200,000-copy paperback first printing). One Crimson Summer, thanks to mega-best-selling Graham, Florida Department of Law Enforcement agent Amy Larson is sent a toy red horse—a sign that she and FBI agent Hunter Forrest didn't wipe out the Doomsday cult that's about to fight a bloody turf war in northern Florida with several South American cartels (75,000-copy first printing). In best-selling Secrets of Midwives author Hepworth's latest, Tully and Rachel have every reason to resent The Younger Wife who's coming on the scene; their father is still married to their mother, now in a care facility for dementia, but plans to divorce her—which leads to the spilling of numerous toxic secrets (250,000-copy first printing). In the latest from the New York Times best-selling Pinborough, has-it-all heroine Emma Averell is beginning to suffer from Insomnia, which she fears may presage a descent into the insanity that destroyed her own mother's life (75,000-copy first printing). In the best-selling, award-winning Reich's Once a Thief, Simon Riske must prove that the Ferrari he's restored and sold for nine figures is not a fake, which brings him in contact with Anna Bildt, whose Swiss banker father has been blown up by a car bomb (75,000-copy first printing). In Rollins's Kingdom of Bones, postponed from March and September 2021, humans have become dullards while flora and fauna are suddenly ascendant; perhaps evolutionary forces have spun out of control, but it could be some fiendish plan (250,000-copy first printing). Letty Davenport, the smart, stubborn daughter of Sandford standby Lucas Davenport, becomes The Investigator, sent by her U.S. senator boss to figure out who's profiting from the theft of Texas crude oil—and why.

Rainy, the protagonist of this initially slow-moving suspense novel from Fisher (The Wrong Family), has moved from New York City, where she was a successful sculptor, to Washington State to be with her boyfriend, Grant. She has spent a year, largely in vain, trying to make friends with the wives of Grant's buddies. When "the girls" suggest a trip to Las Vegas, Rainy balks, thinking: "Worst idea ever.... This trip, this gaudy, neon-crusted city—these women!" She finally agrees to go after repeated entreaties from Grant. The trip reveals repressed resentments among the women and stirs up disturbing memories from Rainy's early life in a commune near Las Vegas. When Rainy receives a text message telling her that one of her traveling companions has been kidnapped, she knows that her past has caught up with her and is ready for action. Flashbacks detailing Rainy's life as a young teen some 15 years earlier in a cult run by a messiah-like leader fuel the sense of menace and set up the book's exhilarating, action-packed finale. Readers will cheer as Rainey risks everything to bring down the man who stole her childhood. Fisher delivers the goods. Agent: Jane Dystel, Dystel, Goderich & Bourret. (Apr.)