Dark Invasion
1915: Germany’s Secret War and the Hunt for the First Terrorist Cell in America
by Howard Blum (Harper)
In the summer of 1914, NYC cop Tom Tunney thought his worst problem was petty gang rivals — until he was assigned to stop WW1 German spies from unleashing a campaign of terror. Blum briefs us on early homeland security with tales of German terrorists, including military officers, a germ-warfare expert, a Harvard prof and a document forger. Plus, how justice was served.
The Good Luck of Right Now
by Matthew Quick (Harper)
From the author of “The Silver Linings Playbook,” comes this new novel about family, friendship . . . and Richard Gere. Thirty-eight-year-old Bartholomew Neil still lives with his mother, and when she dies, he is lost — until he discovers a “Free Tibet” letter from Richard Gere hidden in her underwear drawer. After a series of letters to the actor bring no epiphany, Bartholemew heads in another direction: With a rag-tag team of pals and a rented Ford Focus, he drives to Canada to find the meaning of life — not to mention his biological father. Do we feel another Bradley Cooper/Jennifer Lawrence movie coming?
She’s Leaving Home
by William Shaw (Mulholland Books)
It’s been a hard day’s night for Paddy Breen, a London detective working near the Beatles’ Abbey Road studios in 1968. In the first volume of a planned trilogy, a dead groupie is found close to the studio, and Breen and his partner, Helen Tozer, are on the case. A wild chase through the streets of mod-era London ensues, including a trip down George Harrison’s driveway to a glamorous model’s country estate. Meanwhile old-fashioned Breen tries to find his place in a new England, where Elizabeth may be queen but the Beatles reign.
The Race Underground
Boston, New York, and the Incredible Rivalry That Built America’s First Subway
by Doug Most (St. Martin’s Press)
Before last week’s back-to-back snowstorms, there was the great blizzard of 1888. With New York City at a halt, explains journalist Most, the influential Whitney brothers of NYC and Boston dreamed of a city subway system to beat bad weather. But each brother wanted his own city to be the first to finish its subway: And so the great Boston-New York subway race was on. Makes today’s Yankees-Red Sox rivalry seem tame by comparison.
The Martian
by Andy Weir (Crown)
Sandra Bullock isn’t the only one to get lost in space. Mark Watney, the Neil Armstrong of Mars in Weir’s debut novel, gets left behind when, believing he is dead, his fellow astronauts are forced to flee the Red Planet for home. He’s got limited supplies, but as an astronaut/botanist he’s got the smarts to make a go of things. We like that he plants some potatoes, becoming Mars’ first farmer. A space thriller with real science made understandable.