The Secret Hour

The Secret Hour
Author: Scott Westerfeld
Publisher: Hachette UK
Total Pages: 188
Release: 2011-01-20
Genre: Juvenile Fiction
ISBN: 0748126767

As the new girl at Bixby High School, Jessica Day expected some unwelcome attention. What she didn't expect was to feel an instant connection to a stranger in the corridor . . . Who is this boy dressed in black? And why can she feel his eyes following her wherever she goes? The answers will have to wait until the sun goes down, for here in Bixby, midnight is the time for secrets; secrets that Jessica is going to find out, whether she wants to or not.

The Hour of Peril

The Hour of Peril
Author: Daniel Stashower
Publisher: Minotaur Books
Total Pages: 291
Release: 2013-01-29
Genre: History
ISBN: 1250023327

"It's history that reads like a race-against-the-clock thriller." —Harlan Coben Daniel Stashower, the two-time Edgar award–winning author of The Beautiful Cigar Girl, uncovers the riveting true story of the "Baltimore Plot," an audacious conspiracy to assassinate Abraham Lincoln on the eve of the Civil War in THE HOUR OF PERIL. In February of 1861, just days before he assumed the presidency, Abraham Lincoln faced a "clear and fully-matured" threat of assassination as he traveled by train from Springfield to Washington for his inauguration. Over a period of thirteen days the legendary detective Allan Pinkerton worked feverishly to detect and thwart the plot, assisted by a captivating young widow named Kate Warne, America's first female private eye. As Lincoln's train rolled inexorably toward "the seat of danger," Pinkerton struggled to unravel the ever-changing details of the murder plot, even as he contended with the intractability of Lincoln and his advisors, who refused to believe that the danger was real. With time running out Pinkerton took a desperate gamble, staking Lincoln's life—and the future of the nation—on a "perilous feint" that seemed to offer the only chance that Lincoln would survive to become president. Shrouded in secrecy—and, later, mired in controversy—the story of the "Baltimore Plot" is one of the great untold tales of the Civil War era, and Stashower has crafted this spellbinding historical narrative with the pace and urgency of a race-against-the-clock thriller. A Washington Post Notable Nonfiction Book of 2013 Winner of the 2014 Edgar Award for Best Fact Crime Winner of the 2013 Agatha Award for Best Nonfiction Winner of the 2014 Anthony Award for Best Critical or Non-fiction Work Winner of the 2014 Macavity Award for Best Nonfiction

Midnighters #3: Blue Noon

Midnighters #3: Blue Noon
Author: Scott Westerfeld
Publisher: Harper Collins
Total Pages: 388
Release: 2009-06-09
Genre: Young Adult Fiction
ISBN: 0061954667

The third and final book in New York Times bestselling author Scott Westerfeld’s Midnighters series. The five teenage Midnighters of Bixby, Oklahoma, thought they understood the secret midnight hour—until one morning when time freezes in the middle of the day. As they scramble for answers, the Midnighters discover that the walls between the secret hour and real time are crumbling. Soon the dark creatures will break through to feed at last . . . unless the Midnighters can find a way to stop them. From the acclaimed New York Times bestselling author of the Uglies series, coming soon as a major motion picture on Netflix!

The Distant Hours

The Distant Hours
Author: Kate Morton
Publisher: Simon and Schuster
Total Pages: 576
Release: 2011-07-12
Genre: Fiction
ISBN: 1439152799

A long-lost letter arriving at its destination fifty years after it was sent lures Edie Burchill to crumbling Milderhurst Castle, home of the three elderly Blythe sisters, where Edie's mother was sent to stay as a teenager during World War II.

Mr. Penumbra's 24-Hour Bookstore

Mr. Penumbra's 24-Hour Bookstore
Author: Robin Sloan
Publisher: Harper Collins
Total Pages: 301
Release: 2012-10-02
Genre: Fiction
ISBN: 1443415804

The Great Recession has shuffled Clay Jannon out of his life as a web-design drone, and serendipity, sheer curiosity and the ability to climb a ladder like a monkey have landed him a new gig working the night shift at Mr. Penumbra’s 24-Hour Bookstore. But Clay begins to realize that this store is even more curious than its name suggests. There are only a few customers, but they come in repeatedly and never seem to actually buy anything. Instead they “check out” impossibly obscure volumes from strange corners of the store, all according to some elaborate, long-standing arrangement with the gnomic Mr. Penumbra. The store must be a front for something larger, Clay concludes, and soon he has embarked on a complex analysis of the customers’ behaviour and roped his friends into helping him figure out just what’s going on. But once they take their findings to Mr. Penumbra, they discover the secrets extend far beyond the walls of the bookstore. Evoking both the fairy-tale charm of Haruki Murakami and the enthusiastic novel-of-ideas wizardry of Neal Stephenson or Umberto Eco, Mr. Penumbra’s 24-Hour Bookstore is exactly what it sounds like—an establishment you have to enter and will never want to leave.

The Wolf's Hour

The Wolf's Hour
Author: Robert McCammon
Publisher: Open Road Media
Total Pages: 769
Release: 2011-10-18
Genre: Fiction
ISBN: 1453231544

Master spy, Nazi hunter—and werewolf on the prowl—in occupied Paris: A classic of dark fantasy from a Bram Stoker Award—winning author. Allied Intelligence has been warned: A Nazi strategy designed to thwart the D-Day invasion is underway. A Russian émigré turned operative for the British Secret Service, Michael Gallatin has been brought out of retirement as a personal courier. His mission: Parachute into Nazi-occupied France, search out the informant under close watch by the Gestapo, and recover the vital information necessary to subvert the mysterious Nazi plan called Iron Fist. Fearlessly devoted to the challenge, Gallatin is the one agent uniquely qualified to meet it—he’s a werewolf. Now, as shifting as the shadows on the dangerous streets of Paris, a master spy is on the scent of unimaginable evil. But with the Normandy landings only hours away, it’s going to be a race against time. For Gallatin, caught in the dark heart of the Third Reich’s twisted death machine, there is only one way to succeed. He must unleash his own internal demons and redefine the meaning of the horror of war. From the award-winning author of Swan Song and Boy’s Life, this is a “powerful novel [that] fuses WWII espionage thriller and dark fantasy. Richly detailed, intricately plotted, fast-paced historical suspense is enhanced by McCammon’s unique take on the werewolf myth” (Publishers Weekly).

Magic Hour

Magic Hour
Author: Kristin Hannah
Publisher: Ballantine Books
Total Pages: 403
Release: 2006-02-28
Genre: Fiction
ISBN: 0345490932

From the #1 New York Times bestselling author of The Nightingale and The Great Alone comes an incandescent story about the resilience of the human spirit, the triumph of hope, and the meaning of home. In the rugged Pacific Northwest lies the Olympic National Forest—nearly a million acres of impenetrable darkness and impossible beauty. From deep within this old growth forest, a six-year-old girl appears. Speechless and alone, she offers no clue as to her identity, no hint of her past. Having retreated to her western Washington hometown after a scandal left her career in ruins, child psychiatrist Dr. Julia Cates is determined to free the extraordinary little girl she calls Alice from a prison of unimaginable fear and isolation. To reach her, Julia must discover the truth about Alice’s past—although doing so requires help from Julia’s estranged sister, a local police officer. The shocking facts of Alice’s life test the limits of Julia’s faith and strength, even as she struggles to make a home for Alice—and for herself. “One of [Kristin Hannah’s] most compelling and riveting novels.”—Booklist

The Secret Hours

The Secret Hours
Author: Santa Montefiore
Publisher: Simon & Schuster UK
Total Pages: 528
Release: 2020-04-14
Genre: Fiction
ISBN: 9781471187780

From internationally bestselling author Santa Montefiore, whose books have sold more than six million copies worldwide, comes The Secret Hours, a new story in the sweeping generational saga, The Deverill Trilogy, about the sister who left the family’s castle and never came back. Let the wind take me and the soft rain settle me into the Irish soil from where I came. And may my sins be forgiven. Faye Clayton is a dutiful wife and mother to three grown children. She’s not given to flights of fancy, but when her mother passes away, she begins to dream of a strange, yet familiar, castle set on rolling hills of grass and heather. When Faye learns that her mother has requested her ashes be scattered on the hills above a place called Castle Deverill in Ireland, she is shocked but intrigued. Her mother never spoke fondly of her childhood on a farm in Ireland, so why in death would she want to return to a castle Faye has never heard of? Against her husband’s wishes, Faye sets out for Ireland where she uncovers a heartbreaking story of love, prejudice, and lifelong secrets that have touched those closest to her. Spanning decades and continents, The Secret Hours is a poignant tale about the meaning of family, the power of forgiveness, and the ties we all have to the place we call home.

The Secret Book of Frida Kahlo

The Secret Book of Frida Kahlo
Author: F. G. Haghenbeck
Publisher: Simon and Schuster
Total Pages: 354
Release: 2012-09-25
Genre: Fiction
ISBN: 1451632843

One of Mexico’s most celebrated new novelists, F. G. Haghenbeck offers a beautifully written reimagining of Frida Kahlo’s fascinating life and loves. When several notebooks were recently discovered among Frida Kahlo’s belongings at her home in Coyoacán, Mexico City, acclaimed Mexican novelist F. G. Haghenbeck was inspired to write this beautifully wrought fictional account of her life. Haghenbeck imagines that, after Frida nearly died when a streetcar’s iron handrail pierced her abdomen during a traffic accident, she received one of the notebooks as a gift from her lover Tina Modotti. Frida called the notebook “The Hierba Santa Book” (The Sacred Herbs Book) and filled it with memories, ideas, and recipes. Haghenbeck takes readers on a magical ride through Frida’s passionate life: her long and tumultuous relationship with Diego Rivera, the development of her art, her complex personality, her hunger for experience, and her ardent feminism. This stunning narrative also details her remarkable relationships with Georgia O’Keeffe, Leon Trotsky, Nelson Rockefeller, Ernest Hemingway, John Dos Passos, Henry Miller, and Salvador Dalí. Combining rich, luscious prose with recipes from “The Hierba Santa Book,” Haghenbeck tells the extraordinary story of a woman whose life was as stunning a creation as her art.

The Hours / Mrs. Dalloway

The Hours / Mrs. Dalloway
Author: Michael Cunningham
Publisher: Picador
Total Pages: 295
Release: 2022-05-03
Genre: Fiction
ISBN: 1250852684

Michael Cunningham brings together his Pulitzer Prize–winning novel with the masterpiece that inspired it, Virginia Woolf’s Mrs. Dalloway. In The Hours, the acclaimed author Michael Cunningham draws inventively on the life and work of Virginia Woolf and the story of her novel, Mrs. Dalloway, to tell the story of a group of contemporary characters struggling with the conflicting claims of love and inheritance, hope and despair. In this edition, Cunningham brings his own Pulitzer Prize–winning novel together with Woolf’s masterpiece, which has long been hailed as a groundbreaking work of literary fiction and one of the finest novels written in English. The two novels, published side by side with a new introduction by Cunningham, display the extent of their affinity, and each illuminates new facets of the other in this joint volume. In his introduction, Cunningham re-creates the wonderment of his first encounter with Mrs. Dalloway at fifteen—as he writes, “I was lost. I was gone. I never recovered.” With this edition, Cunningham allows us to disappear into the world of Woolf and into his own brilliant mind.