Harbor Me by Jacqueline Woodson (2018) Nancy Paulson Books (6/28)

Part of a school year of six students passes in a special class in the fifth grade in a school in Brooklyn.  These students know they have been put into the class because they have learning difficulties.  But it’s not a problem with their intelligence, it’s because they’re all trying to deal with different events in their lives because of a kind of PTSD due to things that happened to members of their family.

The story is narrated by a red-headed, girl whose mother was black and the father is Irish.  They were in a car accident that killed her mother and when the man went to get help, he returned to find the police already there and has been imprisoned because he left the scene.  Another is hyper-active because she lost her father.  Another is depressed because his father, from the Dominican Republic, has been taken by the INS.

The teacher has given them an hour each week in a room by themselves to talk.  This is the story of what they talk about and how that changes their lives.

Career of Evil by Robert Galbraith (2015) Mulholland Books

The third C.B. Strike mystery.  Having solved two highly publicized crimes, Cormoran’s detective business is doing well, until someone sends a woman’s severed leg to his secretary/partner.  She was expecting it was flowers sent by her fiancé. 

This gets just as highly publicized and most of their clients call and cancel their contracts, leaving only two.  Cormoran can think of three possible suspects, including two he put away and the man who was accused of killing his mother.  But the police think they have nothing to do with it and ignore all three.

Cormoran, with the help of his assistant/partner, start trading off surveillance on the two people they still have contracts for and Strike’s suspect list.  This leads to Strike trying to keep her out of hard by giving her surveillance he thinks is harmless – of course, it’s anything but.

The writing is gritty and the plot leads inexorably to the murderer, though hints are placed so innocuously that the reader is surprised at the reveal while in agreement that the clues were there all along.

Innocence by Dean Koontz (2013) Bantam (6/15)

The story of Addison Goodheart, who because of his appearance, must hide from man so as to not cause them to attack him.  He was born in the woods in a cottage and birthed with the help of a midwife, who wanted to kill him as soon as he came out from his mother.  Even she, the woman who bore him could only stand to look at him for moments at a time.  Over the first 8 years of his life, she tried to kill him six times, but in the end could not bring herself to do the deed.  After his eighth birthday, she gave him a backpack and insisted he leave – since he had mostly raised himself in the woods, this was not a problem, but the night she sent him away, she took her own life.

He hopped into the back of a heavy-hauler truck and hid beneath a tarp and rode to the city.  There he met a man who was like him and who then raised him and became his father.  But even that came to an end a decade later when two policemen came upon them in a snowstorm and insisted on identification.  When his father removed his ski mask, the police shot him to death and then beat him.  Addison was able to hide away until they left.  Then he disposed of the corpse as he’d been instructed to do.

Another eight years passed with him living in a subterranean room and venturing out only when he was sure he would not be seen.  Then one night, in his favorite place, the city library, he saw a girl being chased by a man.  The girl, Gwyneth, dresses and uses makeup to appear like a marionette.

The story goes from there, showing man’s fear of innocence and how the world ends and is renewed.

Of Blood and Bone by Nora Roberts (2018) St. Martin’s Press

The story continues from Year One with the child who was born to be The One turning thirteen and having grown up with a step father and three younger brothers, she goes with Mallick the Sorcerer to be trained and to get ready for the battle against evil.

She meets elves and changelings, and goes on three quests and finds a white owl, who guards a treasure and will not give it to anyone who climbs its tree, a white wolf who likewise has a treasure to guard and a white horse, whom everyone fears, who turns out to be a combination unicorn and Pegasus.  She eventually reaches into the well of life where she takes up a flaming sword and a shield.  Having accomplished all this, she returns to her mother and family, then begins training them.

When she is ready to go to the town of New Hope, her family goes with her.

Once there she has a battle with three evil witches, a mother, father and girl.  She manages to kill the father, but the others get away.

Obviously there will be a third volume.

Fair Game by Patricia Briggs (2012) Ace

We follow the werewolf enforcer and his wife as they work on the mysterious deaths of three werewolves.  When they get to Boston, there is a currently missing fae, the half-human daughter of one of the ruling lords of the fae.  Our werewolves find her, but she has been hurt badly and will never be able to dance again.  The people responsible are brought to trial, but are declared not guilty by a jury.  The fae lord, declares that the fae are no longer at peace with the U.S. and decapitates the guilty party.

God of the Hive by Laurie R King (2010) Bantam

Mary Russell and her husband, Sherlock Holmes try to rescue his son, Damien.  Reverend Brothers has survived the incident on Orkney Island, but when he checks-in with his benefactor, he is killed.  Holmes and Russell do not know this.  Russell, with Damien’s daughter connect with a pilot (who took her north in the previous volume) and attempt to fly back to London but are shot at on the way and crash in a forest.  A man who seems like the Green Man, rescues them and gives them shelter.  Holmes older brother Mycroft has been abducted and has his life threatened.  A group of men invade the green man’s home but are stranded when the green man leads Russell and party to their car.  The green man turns out to be a war hero with a tainted past and son of a Lord.  Russell discovers a key in Mycroft’s home and tracks it to a woman who says the key hasn’t been used in ages and in fact the lock was changed years ago.  She also discovers that Mycroft’s secretary has been receiving large sums of money from an unknown source, especially just after Mycroft’s disappearance and then mysteriously disappeared himself.  Holmes has his some secreted away in Holland but returns to London to solve the mystery.  The story culminates with all parties coming together.