Twenty-four years after the publication of her first short story in the New Yorker, Katherine Heiny's (Single, Carefree, Mellow) debut novel finally has made its way into the world, and the wait has been worth it. Standard Deviation is a winning effort that smartly examines the ties that bind in even the most unlikely of marriages.

Set in the affluent territory of New York's Upper West Side, Heiny's novel focuses on the pairing of venture capitalist Graham Cavanaugh and his wife, Audra Daltry, a freelance graphic designer 12 years his junior. Their affair ended Graham's marriage to corporate lawyer Elspeth Osbourne, a woman as orderly in the conduct of her life as Audra is free-spirited in hers. That striking difference leads to the novel's principal motifs: Graham's persistent speculation on the vagaries of romantic attraction that caused him to wed two such different women, and his hope that, despite the fatal wound he inflicted on his marriage to Elspeth, "maybe they could be successful friends."

Graham and Audra also must deal with the challenge of their 10-year-old son Matthew's Asperger's syndrome, a subject Heiny portrays with an understated realism. Her gift for quick-witted dialogue displays the skill of an observational comic. She applies that same talent to concise descriptions of her characters, as when Graham pictures Elspeth and her new partner, Bentrup, as "an entirely platonic couple like Bert and Ernie."

With its assortment of quirky characters who stumble through life even as, to all outward appearances, many of them should have it mastered, Standard Deviation offers intelligent but gentle domestic comedy. --Harvey Freedenberg, attorney and freelance reviewer

Debut author Jem Lester draws on his experience parenting an autistic child in this novel of a father willing to break his own heart to improve his son's life.

Ben Jewell would do anything for his 10-year-old son, Jonah, even agree to fake a separation from his wife, Emma, and move in with his grouchy father, Georg, a Jewish Hungarian immigrant. Emma, a barrister, thinks the ruse could create an impression of instability at home and give them a better chance of proving autistic, non-verbal Jonah belongs at Highgrove Manor, a top-flight government-funded boarding school for autistic youth. However, after the move, Emma suddenly has endless excuses not to see Ben and Jonah. Taciturn Georg turns into a chatterbox with Jonah, spilling forth the family history he's always summarized for Ben as "gassed by the Nazis" and no more. Unmoored, Ben obsesses about Emma, drinks too much, and lets the family catering business slide downhill. As the tribunal approaches, though, Ben must pull himself together to ensure a better future for his son.

While many authors tend to focus on high-functioning autistic characters, Lester shows the other side of parenting a child with special needs, including all the frustration, dirty diapers and sleepless nights. For all his failings, Ben still earns the reader's respect and sympathy for his unwavering commitment to Jonah and his ability to accept his son for who he is. Blunt and big-hearted, Shtum contemplates the challenge of understanding those closest to us and the joy of connection. --Jaclyn Fulwood, blogger at Infinite Reads

Emma Smith-Stevens, creative writing instructor for the Bard Prison Initiative, introduces the nameless protagonist of her inventive debut novel, The Australian, as a young man living a freewheeling existence in Melbourne. Paying for college by posing with tourists while dressed as Superman, he believes he is destined for greatness, and despite haphazard enthusiasm, the Australian immigrates to New York to become a rich man. His winding path suffers failed turns--as a Wall Street trader, "venture capitalist," club owner and parkour competitor. He soon meets and marries Fiona, ultimately becoming a stay-at-home parent to their son.

Rudderless despite his family, the Australian returns to Melbourne hoping to find some ballast by coming to terms with his mother and investigating the legend of the father he never knew. Eventually he discovers that becoming the man he wants to be is a less clear journey than the one to riches.

A slice-of-life in six acts covering a dozen years, The Australian is an astute, often satirical look at self-actualization and what it means to be a man, partner, father and son. Smith-Stevens writes in a marvelously voyeuristic style, as if watching a lab rat from on high. The Australian can be shallow and clueless, but Smith-Stevens deftly avoids the potential for disconnect by injecting humor and insight into the human condition. The nameless man, both hero and no-hoper, is a poignant and pointed reflection of the imperfections that vex us all. --Lauren O'Brien of Malcolm Avenue Review

When 12-year-old Irina moves with her artist father and writer mother from Brooklyn to Broken River, a small and dying town in upstate New York, she's partially aware that the relocation has something to do with her father's infidelity. As her parents work through their drama, the precocious young girl passes the time by researching her new town and large home, discovering it to be the site of a gruesome double-murder 10 years earlier, one in which the murdered couple's daughter was never found. When a young woman arrives in town, Irena is convinced she's the daughter of the murdered couple and convinces her parents to let the woman babysit. Meanwhile, her father continues an affair and her mother fears she's dying of cancer. Each of their worries, some real and some imagined, twist together toward a riveting climax that changes their lives forever.

Broken River, J. Robert Lennon's eighth novel, is a darkly hilarious examination of human behavior. Shifting from varying viewpoints--a young girl, a philandering middle-aged artist, a wildly talented writer, a down-and-out small-town criminal and a disembodied narrator (referred to self-referentially throughout as the Observer)--this literary psychological thriller gets at the root of motivation, whether it's to kill or love or even forgive. The characters are so richly developed they resonate as someone familiar--and that's what makes this wonderfully absorbing novel equally funny, terrifying and heartbreaking. --Amy Brady, freelance writer and editor

Nigerian author Leye Adenle introduces fans of crime fiction to the staggeringly corrupt city of Lagos in his debut novel, Easy Motion Tourist. In a spare style reminiscent of Raymond Chandler, Guy Collins, an inexperienced British journalist new to Lagos, navigates the city. His misadventures begin abruptly when he stumbles upon a horrible crime: the all-too-real phenomenon of ritual killing, a gruesome practice involving the removal of human body parts in order to perform black magic. When he's arrested and interrogated by local police, he's acquainted with the brand of rough justice that leads many Nigerians to be "as scared of their police as they were of killers."

Collins is also introduced to Amaka, a cross between a vigilante and a guardian angel, who tries her best to look after the working girls of Lagos and get revenge on the men who abuse them. She springs Collins from jail and the two of them embark on a dangerous mission to find out who's responsible for the ritual murders.

For a short novel, Easy Motion Tourist is packed with feuding killers, prostitutes, police officers and the opulently wealthy inhabitants of Victoria Island--a city-within-the-city that serves as a reminder of the metropolis's incredible inequality as well as the main source of the police's funding. Adenle is skilled at evoking a sense of spontaneity and chaos even as he carefully orchestrates the action. The novel is a wild read, surging back and forth from seedy underbellies to the equally threatening halls of wealth and power with uncompromising speed. --Hank Stephenson, bookseller, Flyleaf Books, Chapel Hill, N.C.

Writer and filmmaker Sara Kenney has teamed up with artist John Watkiss to create a fast-paced dystopian drama in which politicians control the medical fates of its citizenry. Surgeon X collects the first six issues of the chilling and urgent graphic series that plays against the troubled backdrop of modern times.

In 2036 London, policymakers debate antibiotics rationing in the aftermath of illnesses that have killed off nine million people. This sparks riots that pit wealthy right-wing extremists against the populace. Meanwhile, surgeon Rosa Scott quits her job at a local hospital over the disputed treatment of a seriously ill victim and her belief that "doctors should be in charge of antibiotics, not the 'Preservation Bureau.' " Together with her psychotic brother, Lewis, Rosa starts a renegade surgical practice that earns her the sobriquet Surgeon X and the scrutiny of Scotland Yard. Meanwhile, she and her family (including microbiologist twin Martha and their estranged father, John, doctor to the rich) work to solve their mother's murder. As the Scotts scurry to find new sources of antibiotics, Rosa must also grapple with her increasingly conflicted roles as a doctor and a political activist: "Extreme circumstances call for extreme medicine."

Kenney's first stab at comics shows her feeling her way around the medium in the first two chapters, but once she finds her stride, the result is a compelling story full of surprising turns and twists. Watkiss's art, particularly the close-ups, move the text seamlessly from panel to panel, conveying the bleakness of Rosa's journey with emotional resonance. Surgeon X is an intelligent and visceral work, an impressive comic that addresses many modern concerns. --Nancy Powell, freelance writer and technical consultant

Annemarie Ahearn didn't always want to live in Maine, where for generations her family has owned a blueberry farm. She dreaded childhood visits to the state, with its rocky beaches and rolling fog. But for Ahearn, Maine eventually became home, and in her family's barn on Maine's coast she founded her cooking school, Salt Water Farm.

In Full Moon Suppers at Salt Water Farm: Recipes from Land and Sea, Ahearn shares her favorite recipes from monthly dinners she hosts the night of each full moon, plus advice to keep both guests and chef happy, such as "every meal should begin with a well-made drink." Her first recipe is for a simple vodka martini. What follows for the January moon is considerably less simple: sea urchin butter on toasts; potato gnocchi with lobster, cream and tarragon; roasted beets with citrus, horseradish yogurt and toasted hazelnuts; poached codfish with green olives, fennel, saffron and tomato conserva; and cinnamon rice pudding with Cara Cara oranges, Medjool dates and wildflower honey.

Every moon yields similarly sumptuous feasts, plus useful tips like how best to open a pomegranate or make perfect tart dough. For a sauce to accompany haddock fritters, Ahearn edifies the less capable with another trick: "You can cheat by adding a spoonful of store-bought mayonnaise."

Reverence permeates Ahearn's writing on the fruits of nature and the roles of those involved in food's journey onto a plate, honoring lobster trappers, tipping a cup to harvesters, and celebrating animals and the land--indeed, everything under the moon. --Katie Weed, freelance writer and reviewer

On the morning of March 16, 1968, U.S. Army soldiers killed between 347 and 504 unarmed men, women, children and infants in the villages of My Lai and My Khe in South Vietnam. The story of how these young Americans perpetrated what became known as the My Lai Massacre is one of disastrous leadership, an emotional boiling point, personal acts of inhuman savagery and a few noble deeds committed amid a hurricane of hate. In My Lai: Vietnam, 1968, and the Descent into Darkness, Howard Jones (Mutiny on the Amistad, The Bay of Pigs) gives a decisive account of this pivotal trauma in the Vietnam War.

Charlie Company, 1st Battalion of the 23rd Infantry (Americal) Division, was in Vietnam for three months before the massacre. They operated in an area designated Pinkville for its strong Viet Cong presence. By mid-March, the company had suffered 28 casualties from booby traps and mines without seeing a single enemy combatant. Their anger and frustration was channeled by their superior officers into an operation that would "clear" the Viet Cong from Pinkville once and for all. They were told, repeatedly, that the villages in the area (including My Lai) would be emptied of civilians on the morning of the mission, that anyone still there was a VC or VC sympathizer.

Charlie Company, led by Lieutenant William Calley Jr., found My Lai full of civilians. Jones tracks the massacre in excruciating detail as Charlie Company and several other units under the command of Captain Ernest Medina gather these civilians into large groups before gunning them down at point-blank range--among other atrocities. The resulting attempted cover-up, exposure and courts-martial make for equally gut-wrenching but necessary reading. --Tobias Mutter, freelance reviewer

Anyone desiring a frank assessment of some of the most serious risks facing the planet--sea-level rise, the hazards of powerful artificial intelligence--would do well to read Richard Clarke and Randolph Eddy's provocative Warnings. Inspired by the myth of Cassandra--the princess of Troy cursed with the ability to foresee the downfall of her city while unable to persuade her fellow citizens of its impending doom--the authors methodically survey the catastrophic consequences of recent unheeded warnings and offer guidance they hope will prevent repetition.

National security experts Clarke (Against All Enemies) and Eddy offer seven case studies featuring "accurate visions of looming disasters"--including the SEC's failure to credit multiple warnings about Bernie Madoff's Ponzi scheme and government officials' heedlessness concerning hurricane threats to New Orleans. These grim stories provide the foundation for Warnings' second half, in which the authors unveil their "Cassandra Coefficient," a matrix for assessing the risk that decisionmakers will ignore current predictions of dangers like threats from hackers or a pandemic surpassing the scale of 1918's Spanish flu. Their goal, simply put, is to "spot those with sentinel intelligence before a disaster occurs."

While it's reasonable to hope that some of the most dire predictions discussed in this clear-eyed work won't materialize, wise government and corporate leaders should consider adding Warnings to their reading lists. They just won't want to curl up with it at bedtime. --Harvey Freedenberg, attorney and freelance reviewer

In her memoir, Memory's Last Breath: Field Notes on My Dementia, Gerda Saunders gives the reader an intimate, revealing account of living with dementia, as well as insightful meditations on selfhood and a window into her childhood in apartheid-era South Africa. Starting with her diagnosis of microvascular disease--the second leading cause of dementia--five days before her 61st birthday, Saunders copes by taking an anthropological view of her own illness. Her memoir features excerpts from a journal she kept called "Dementia Field Notes," with entries that range from the mundane ("I could not combine the up and sideways movements of our bathroom tap to make cold water come out. Instead fetched cold water from the kitchen in the plastic jug") to the existential ("When I put away the salad bowl after lunch, it appeared oval rather than round.... It made me feel disconnected from myself--as if it were not me looking at the bowl").

Saunders's memoir is similarly wide-ranging, discussing the state of neuroscience as it relates to dementia, the awful inequalities hidden by the shadow of a happy youth, the unreliability of memory in even healthy brains and her thoughts on end-of-life care (she is frank about her eventual plans for an assisted suicide). Saunders approaches some of the most difficult questions a human being can face with clarity and wisdom--her mind may be failing, but one could never tell from reading her memoir. Memory's Last Breath somehow transmutes "bottomless dread" into remarkable insight. --Hank Stephenson, bookseller, Flyleaf Books, Chapel Hill, N.C.

Prez Mellows hasn't talked since his grandfather was taken away. When he's placed in a foster home with the talkative Blythe family on Stramoddie Farm, Prez appreciates the routine of farm life after years in a caretaking role for his grandfather, whose Alzheimer's has progressed to the point where he is no longer safe on his own. But Prez worries about his grandfather and doesn't know when he'll see him again.

When Prez answers the doorbell one day--realizing only later that Stramoddie has no doorbell--he discovers an odd boy in a kilt and goggles. Sputnik marches into the house and charms everyone in the family, who perceive him as a dog. However, he is actually an alien on a mission to prove to Planetary Clearance--the organization that "get[s] rid of all the useless old stars and planets to make room for new celestial bodies"--that Earth is worth saving. Prez and Sputnik must come up with a list of 10 things on the planet worth seeing or doing, "and then Earth can carry on waltzing around its little sun." Luckily, Sputnik can read Prez's mind, so there's no need for Prez to start speaking and no one need discover that Sputnik is not a dog.

Boyce (The Astounding Broccoli Boy; Chitty Chitty Bang Bang Flies Again; Framed; Millions) has an imagination that soars, paired with a profound empathy for the inner, sometimes bewildered, life of a child. --Emilie Coulter, freelance writer and editor

The only thing that the unnamed, "invisible" girl who narrates this lyrical yet chilling novel wants is a safe place for her and Ma to live, off the streets, where the Authorities can't get them. Because the last time they were sleeping in an alley, when Ma was still drinking and using drugs, the Authorities came to take the girl away.

Now, they live in an old mill they call the Castle. Even though the mill has broken windows and rotten floors, it's the best place they've had since the day Ma and Gran had a massive fight, Ma packed her backpack and they left Gran's. As long as they're together, they'll be fine. But the girl has to remember not to stress Ma out. She doesn't want her to go back to drinking and getting what she needs from Monkey Man, a frightening drug dealer Ma sometimes works for. There's another danger looming, too. The Authorities are planning to tear down the mill to make room for new buildings, just as they've done across the road.

Sarah Carroll's heartbreaking debut, The Girl in Between, relates a darkly compelling story, albeit one tinged with hope. The girl never doubts her mother's love for her, and spends her time weaving fantastic tales, exploring the mill and hoping that one day Ma will bring them home to Gran's. Even when Ma leaves, even when she's sad and her eyes sink "as deep as the canal that runs past the mill," she always comes back. Eventually. --Lynn Becker, blogger and host of Book Talk, a monthly online discussion of children's books for SCBWI