Claire Cooke (Must Love Dogs) has built a brand writing light-hearted women's fiction blending kernels of the absurd and comedic in compulsively readable combinations. In Time Flies, she delivers again with the story of Melanie, a middle-aged (and recently divorced) metal sculptor with a highway driving phobia who is goaded by an old friend to attend their high school reunion in Massachusetts. 

Melanie, who had uprooted herself and her two sons to accommodate her husband's job years before, has no desire to leave suburban Atlanta and revisit the past. She is content to stay home and literally cut up her king-size marital bed with a chainsaw in order to harvest the springs inside for a new artistic creation. "I'm not famous, I didn't turn into a knockout, my husband left me," she tells her relentless friend. But when an old high school flame, Finn Miller, e-mails to ask if Melanie will be attending the reunion, their flirtatious correspondence--and the fact that Melanie doesn't exactly remember him--is enough to pique her interest and change her mind.

Hilarious potholes abound on the way to memory lane as Melanie journeys to Massachusetts, where she faces her fears while reconnecting with old friends dealing with their own life challenges. The pièce de résistance, however, is the reunion itself, as past and present riotously collide and give birth to an ending as heartfelt as it is hopeful. --Kathleen Gerard, blogger at Reading Between the Lines

Discover: In Cook's latest, a jilted middle-aged woman reluctantly attends her high school reunion and surprisingly discovers her future.

Like Anna, the heroine of The Lullaby of Polish Girls, Dagmara Dominczyk is the child of a Solidarity activist; she, too, immigrated to the U.S. from Poland at a young age, went to theater school and became an actress. But, if Dominczyk hasn't reached far for the foundations of this novel, she hasn't let the unreal tone of Hollywood destroy her sense of authenticity, either.

Anna begins taking annual summer trips to Kielce, Poland, at the dawn of puberty and is absorbed into a large group of friends to whom her American-ness is irresistible. Two of them become instant, intense confidantes: Justyna is the flirty rebel of the group; Kamila the self-deprecating scold. Early adulthood causes them to drift, what with Anna's budding career in film and television, Justyna's surprisingly happy marriage and Kamila's troubled one. But the murder of Justyna's husband causes each of the women to reevaluate their lives, drawing them back to Kielce and to the unbreakable connection they forged as girls.

This debut novel is a frank but loving character study of three young women who experience--in their hard-living Polish way--the universal pangs of love, sex and maturation. Dominczyk credits Judy Blume as an inspiration; indeed, The Lullaby of Polish Girls often feels like a Polish-flavored Summer Sisters. Like that book, it is an intimate tribute to female friendship--and, with Dominczyk's film background, well poised for a movie version. --Cherie Ann Parker, freelance journalist and book critic

Discover: A frank and loving character study of three friends, two Polish and one Polish-American, whose teenage friendship endures after adult love and loss.

Sinister from the outset, Mukoma Wa Ngugi's Black Star Nairobi opens in the thick interior of the Ngong forest, where an unknown corpse has been devoured by wild beasts, and detectives Ishmael and "O" share a joint while considering the body. The sequel to Nairobi Heat, Wa Ngugi's second novel takes place in Kenya's capital, where the private investigators strive to connect the corpse with a nearby hotel bombing. Despite their sobering occupation, the two men enjoy an amiable life outside of work. O's wife is close with Ishmael's girlfriend, and the four enjoy nights of banter and intellectual debate. Then a horrific incident makes their lives inseparable from their work, as their small case is tied to a network of international actors. 

Readers will recognize common thriller plot elements, such as white-collar corruption and a female computer hacker. What sets Wa Ngugi apart is his grasp of global politics--undoubtedly the outcome of having written a range of nonfiction pieces on the subject. In Black Star, the Kenyan presidential elections--divided along ethnic lines--occur alongside 2008's U.S. presidential primaries, in which Barack Obama is brought to the fore. These events hold particular significance to Ishmael, a Kenyan-American ex-policeman. While political issues drive the plot, it is ethical uncertainty that gives the novel its core. When one must kill to survive, is it possible to maintain a moral code? What distinguishes cop from criminal? And if a great justice is one's goal, can small injustices be committed along the way? --Annie Atherton, intern at Shelf Awareness

Discover: A Kenyan-American detective and his Kenyan partner take on a global network of criminals in the sequel to Nairobi Heat.

As Lost begins, 12-year-old Barney and his friends are concerned about the local killings of boys around their age in south London. They obsessively monitor a Facebook page named Missing Boys to see the latest updates on the police investigation. Someone who posts regularly seems to have info before the cops do, and Barney is startled one day when this mysterious person turns out to know personal details about him, too, including where he lives.

Detective Constable Lacey Flint lives next door to Barney and is on leave (following the events of S.J. Bolton's previous novel, Dead Scared). Lacey notices Barney is often left alone at night by his single dad, so she watches after the boy and sometimes keeps him company. She suspects he knows something about the murders that he's not telling her, and though she's not technically on the job, Lacey is determined to prevent Barney from being the killer's next victim.

Bolton is adroit at ratcheting up tension in a story that's hard to stop reading despite its creepiness and unsettling plot points. Lacey is difficult and abrasive, but more likable than if she were glossy or bland. The sexual chemistry between her and Detective Inspector Mark Joesbury is tantalizing and could use a bit more attention, but it's okay, too, if Bolton wants to keep fans in suspense for a little while longer. --Elyse Dinh-McCrillis, writer and editor blogging at Pop Culture Nerd

Discover: A creepy, suspenseful tale involving preteen boys being abducted and murdered in south London.

After a three-year absence, Jeffery Deaver's dynamic duo of crime scene investigators, Lincoln Rhyme and Amelia Sachs, return in The Kill Room, the 10th book in the series (following The Burning Wire), which addresses some of the most timely and controversial subjects the criminalists have ever dealt with. In an exciting and thoughtful examination of how far government can go, Deaver introduces a new government agency: NIOS, the National Intelligence and Operations Service.

Robert Moreno, born in the U.S., hates capitalism's exploitation of Latin and South America. When intelligence suggests he has ordered an attack on an oil company's headquarters in Miami, NIOS director Metzger orders a kill. Moreno is shot in his Bahamian suite from long range by a contract sharpshooter. The so-called attack, however, was nothing more than a "protest." An assistant district attorney asks Lincoln for help; she wants to prosecute Metzger (and the federal government) for murder.

Here's where the trademark Deaver narrative takes off. Chapters alternate between Rhyme and his task force versus his brilliant, sadistic nemesis--an assassin who loves to cook as much as he loves wielding his treasured knife, an expensive Kai Shun Premier with a nine-inch blade that he uses on animal and human flesh alike.

Deaver doesn't disappoint. Against a grave and complex legal backstory, he unwinds an elaborate narrative with believable, intriguing characters and fascinating CSI-like investigative aplomb. Even though the villain seems a bit too Hannibal Lecter-like, he's a worthy and intriguing adversary for the ever-brilliant Rhyme. --Tom Lavoie, former publisher

Discover: A compelling and provocative thriller ostensibly inspired by Anwar al-Awlaki and the controversy surrounding drone assassinations.

In today's supermarkets, farmer's markets and backyard gardens, one can find hundreds of varieties of vegetables and fruits grown for their high sweet, starch and fat contents and lack of bitterness. According to the extensive research compiled by Jo Robinson in Eating on the Wild Side, though, these varieties--distant relatives of the wild plants our hunter-gatherer ancestors forged for--are often less nutritious than those "bitter, tough, thick-skinned and seedy" wild fruits and vegetables we used to eat.

Many modern foods lack high levels of the phytonutrients that aid our ability to fight off diseases (including cancer and diabetes). Robinson's solution is to provide detailed information on more than 27 vegetables and two dozen fruits so consumers know exactly which type of plant packs the most nutrient-rich wallop. She discusses the origins of varieties, how to detect freshness and methods of storage that enhance the availability of the lycopene, resveratrol, anthocyanin and other bio-nutrients; she even offers a few recipes. From lettuce to legumes and apples to melons, summaries of the best produce to purchase provide quick reference points for shopping, storage and consumption.

"Most health experts agree that the healthiest diet is one that is high in fiber and low in sugar and rapidly digested carbohydrates," Robinson writes. Eating more fruits and vegetables is wise advice. This entertaining and informative guidebook shows us why it's true--and which types are the best to add to our diet. --Lee E. Cart, freelance writer and book reviewer

Discover: New research reveals the most nutrient-rich varieties of fruits and vegetables.

From the cliffhanger opening, Shohreh Aghdashloo's memoir leads readers from the red carpet of Oscar night 2004 back through the opulence of her Iranian childhood, the turmoil of revolution, her flight to the West and her acting career. The Alley of Love and Yellow Jasmines is one woman's straightforward account of the upheaval in Iran and her determination to overcome its impact on her life.

Blessed with security and love, Shohreh rejected her parents' hopes that she'd study medicine to follow her dream of acting. At 19, she married an artist who supported her goal. Their blissful days during the "Persian Spring," when Iran was thriving, ended with the rise of Khomeini. When her outspoken resistance to the Islamic revolution put her family in danger, she fled. (Eventually, she and her husband divorced; she would not return to Iran, and he would not leave.)

Shohreh's account of rebuilding her life in the West is matter-of-fact, but her tenacity to succeed and love for her country and family are striking. In Los Angeles, she works with and marries an Iranian playwright; together they stage successful performances to the acclaim of Iranian audiences. Meanwhile, she is a voice of Iran on a Farsi-language radio program, leading to TV roles, then movies and eventually her Oscar nomination for Best Supporting Actress in The House of Sand and Fog.

Shohreh also covers the political history of her beloved homeland, including a last-chapter summary of current Middle East politics and a plea for freedom in the region. --Cheryl Krocker McKeon, Book Passage, San Francisco

Discover: An Iran-to-Hollywood memoir of one woman's flight from the Middle East to rebuild her life in the U.S.

Of all the existing accounts of the Norman Conquest, the Bayeux Tapestry is at once one of the most vivid and one of the most ambiguous. Marc Morris's The Norman Conquest uses the tapestry as a starting point, addressing the ambiguities while losing none of the vivacity in its account of the pursuits of William the Conqueror and the events of 1066--creating fresh insight without oversimplifying the facts.

Morris, a medieval historian (A Great and Terrible King), begins not with 1066 and the Conquest itself, but with events leading up to that pivotal moment, portraying England as vulnerable to an arguably less-advanced Norman force despite the country's traditional strengths. Rather than retelling traditional narratives that place one side or the other as heroes and villains, Morris puts the historical record first, drawing out complex questions and highlighting the fact that what we do not know about the Conquest or its key players is as crucial to our current understanding as what we do know--and what we have surmised, theorized or simply made up in the centuries since.

The Norman Conquest vividly brings to life a major turning point in history, emphasizing the upheavals it wrought in English law, language and society--as well as other elements of English life that have remained for centuries the same. --Dani Alexis Ryskamp, blogger at The Book Cricket

Discover: An exciting and well-organized foray into the Norman Conquest, and the Anglo-Saxon England it overturned.

On any list of contemporary First Amendment experts, Floyd Abrams's name surely comes out on top. Since his participation in the 1971 Pentagon Papers case, Abrams has tackled free-speech crises at every level of litigation, from initial trials to hearings before the Supreme Court. Through his legal arguments, articles, speeches, debates and testimony, Abrams has played a key role in shaping American law as it pertains to free speech and has affected the treatment of free-speech rights outside the U.S. as well.

In Friend of the Court, Abrams compiles writings on the First Amendment and related issues that span his career. Among the topics tackled in the collection are national security, prior restraint, censorship and libel and slander. Although Abrams is an attorney and his writings often delve into the depths of legal arguments, many of the pieces included in the collection were created to be accessible to general audiences. And, although Abrams has refined his own position on the First Amendment over the years, a common thread links the decades of work presented here: the staunch belief that the First Amendment's free speech right, one of the most expansive such rights in the world, must be vigorously defended as essential to the preservation of all other rights and to the basic form of representative democracy promised by the Constitution. With characteristic clarity and verve, Abrams offers a clear vision of the purpose of the First Amendment and the crucial role it plays in our nation's discourse. --Dani Alexis Ryskamp, blogger at The Book Cricket

Discover: A collection of essays, speeches, articles and debates from one of the country's foremost First Amendment attorneys.

More than 95,000 Twitter followers can't be wrong. When aspiring comedy writer Charlie McDowell got some impossibly noisy and airheaded upstairs neighbors, he probably never imagined that poaching their vapid lines would make him an online celebrity. Several years and a flourishing Facebook page later, McDowell is now a star in his own right--and he owes it all to the constant stream of nonsense pouring through his woefully thin ceiling.

The two party girls living above McDowell repeatedly spew lines of such stupidity (they wonder how much gluten cost before it was free) that you have to wonder if he's making it all up. McDowell swears he's not and he has even held "listening parties" so others could witness the girls rapping about sex, fake boobs and the Tic Tac diet. While it's all very comical, there's also something creepy about someone profiting off of eavesdropping on a pair of innocent dunderheads. (And how in the world do these women not realize there's a popular feed being written by their very own words?)

What McDowell incorporates into Dear Girls Above Me, though, is a touching tale about his loneliness after being dumped by his girlfriend and how the conversations upstairs get him though. There's a great subplot where he tries to force his roommate out of the closet and butts heads with his nutty landlord. Ironically, McDowell's original fiction is way funnier and more poignant than anything being generated by the girls above him. --Natalie Papailiou, author of blog MILF: Mother I'd Like to Friend

Discover: A hilarious Twitter feed is transformed into a charming novel of love lost and identity gained.

This highly imaginative spin on the Brothers Grimm tales casts the ghost of Jacob Grimm in the role of godfather to a contemporary teenage boy.

Jacob Grimm does not understand why, upon his death, he was not immediately greeted by his brother, Wilhelm, whose death preceded his own. Instead, Jacob finds himself in a kind of purgatory for "those who are agitated and uneasy." In the village of Never Better, Jacob finds a calling in protecting 15-year-old Jeremy Johnson Johnson. Jacob narrates the novel, and Jeremy is his hero.

McNeal (co-author, with his wife, Laura McNeal, of Crooked, Crushed and Zipped) strikes an impressive balance between a small-town setting with modern amenities and a timeless quality in a society that predates cell phones and computers. Kids still play Monopoly and pull pranks, such as the one attractive and adventurous Ginger Boultinghouse convinces Jeremy to pull on the town's baker. Jeremy can hear ghosts, and McNeal exploits the comic possibilities. Jacob gives helpful hints to Jeremy on his exams and advice (which Jeremy often ignores, when it comes to Ginger). The author flaunts his bounty of Grimm facts when Jeremy chooses fairy tales as his specialty for the TV quiz show Uncommon Knowledge, and again at a much darker hour, when Jeremy, Ginger and another boy from town get kidnapped.

McNeal structures the novel like a fairy tale, and the overriding sense of danger lurking like a deep forest surrounding the village will keep readers on the edges of their seats. --Jennifer M. Brown, children's editor, Shelf Awareness

Discover: A 15-year-old befriended by the ghost of Jacob Grimm finds himself in a predicament to rival a Brothers Grimm tale.

In this YA thriller, Helen FitzGerald's (Amelia O'Donohue Is SO Not a Virgin) narrator is a 16-year-old living in an orphanage who, ironically, discovers she has a whole family when her birth mother dies.

Abigail Thom lives a hardscrabble existence in Scotland in an institution for orphans, whom she refers to as "Unloved Nobodies." Like many orphans, she's invented a fantasy mother in her head. That invention is shattered when she's informed that her birth mother is dead.

Her mother's effects contain a letter, a one-way ticket to the U.S., money--and a mystery. It turns out Abigail has a father and a sister she never knew in Los Angeles. Her mother's letter urges Abigail to find them and solve the mystery of her abandonment at birth, while also hinting there is a larger conspiracy dictating the course of all their lives. In L.A., Abigail quickly becomes close to her 18-year-old sister, Becky. Becky plays the role of the dilettante rich girl by day and takes part in an underground graffiti movement by night. The mystery hinted at in her mother's letter becomes intertwined with Becky's graffiti--and a murder. Abigail must untangle lies old and new in order to discover who she really is, and who her mother really was. --Jessica Bushore, former public librarian and freelance writer

Discover: A page-turning mystery featuring a smart heroine whose hard-won instinct for self-preservation becomes her salvation.

Through the eyes of 15-year-old narrator Chelsea Silver, Michelle Dalton (Sixteenth Summer) reassures teens that it's possible to experience grief and joy at the same time.

As Chelsea travels cross-country with her two older, more beautiful sisters, she wonders if she's the only one who misses her Granly so acutely. It's the first summer they're spending on Lake Michigan in Granly's home in Bluepointe without her. In her search for solitude, walking the town of Bluepointe, Chelsea discovers a bookstore--and 15-year-old Josh, who works there with his mother, the owner.

Chelsea gets a job waitressing next door to Dog Ear, the bookstore, and she feels closer to her sisters than ever. But then Josh starts feeling responsible for Dog Ear, and thinks he can't keep up with his work and keep Chelsea, too. In the process of making peace with her grief, Chelsea grows up and helps Josh do the same. She realizes she can honor her own happiness while still feeling sorrow for the hole Granly has left, and also that by pursuing her own happiness, she honors her grandmother, too. Both Chelsea and Josh do some growing up in this charming tale of a first crush. --Jennifer M. Brown, children's editor, Shelf Awareness

Discover: A fun beach read about a first crush.