Archives de catégorie : Fiction

STATE CHAMP de Hilary Plum

Ferocious, hilarious, slippery, and wise” (Leni Zumas ) – the story of a woman risking her life and finding her own way to protest the end of abortion rights.

STATE CHAMP
by Hilary Plum
Bloomsbury, May 2025
(via The Gernert Company)

A high-school state champion runner turned college dropout, Angela is working as a receptionist at an abortion clinic when a “heartbeat law” criminalizes most abortions statewide. In the ensuing upheaval, her boss is arrested for providing illegal procedures and the clinic is shut down.

Angela has never been either an activist or a model employee. But she gets why her boss didn’t follow the rules. She decides to go on a hunger strike in the boarded-up clinic, to protest her boss’s arrest and everything that’s been lost. She’ll draw on her skillset: the masochistic discipline of a runner, a history of self-destructive behavior, and a willingness to sleep on exam room tables (whose hygienic paper she uses as her diary).

Angela’s protest is solitary, enraged, and a little messy, but it mobilizes a group of people around her-an ex who’s a local journalist looking for a good story, the everyday people the clinic once served, and most especially a formidable anti-abortion activist named Janine.

Lucid, strange, and deeply metal, State Champ cuts through the political rhetoric to explore the relationship between bodily autonomy and real freedom. Angela’s story is about what abortion access means day-to-day and how much we are-in ways that can transform us-responsible for one another.

“Oh, this voice! Ferocious, hilarious, slippery, wise-I couldn’t stop listening. Hilary Plum is one of my favorite writers working today because her curiosity about injustice and liberation is so relentless, so tender, and so alert to the fact that every single one of us is implicated in the struggle.” ―Leni Zumas, author of Red Clocks

“Revelatory . . . Perfect for fans of Henry Hoke’s Open Throat and Rita Bullwinkel’s Headshot . . . Hilary Plum, through this funny and furious narrator, throws bold punches in defense of reproductive rights and celebrates the commitment of those who uphold them.” ―Shelf Awareness

Hilary Plum is the author of five books, including the poetry collection Excisions, the essay collection Hole Studies, and the Fence Modern Prize in Prose-winning novel Strawberry Fields. She teaches at Cleveland State University and in the NEOMFA program, and she serves as associate director of the CSU Poetry Center. Her work has appeared in Granta, Astra, The Rupture, Los Angeles Review of Books, Cleveland Review of Books, and elsewhere. She lives in Cleveland Heights, Ohio.

THE METHOD de Matthew Quirk

From the author of The Night Agent (the basis of the blockbuster Netflix series, whose second season launches in early 2025) comes Matt Quirk’s next big thriller.

THE METHOD
by Matthew Quirk
William Morrow, January 2026
(via Writers House)

TV actress Anna Hutton has played roles of bad-ass cops and other action parts—so she’s put in countless hours of martial arts and stunt training to learn how to handle herself in a fight, with a gun, or behind the wheel. When her real-life best friend goes missing, though, she uses some of the tradecraft she learned for her performances to break into her friend’s apartment, where the clue she finds leads her down a twisty path of real-world espionage and murder.

Matthew Quirk is the New York Times bestselling author of Red Warning, Hour of the Assassin, The Night Agent, The 500, The Directive, Cold Barrel Zero, and Dead Man Switch. He spent five years at The Atlantic reporting on crime, private military contractors, terrorism prosecutions, and international gangs. He lives in San Diego, California.

THESE VILE HEARTS de Melody Robinette

For fans of Geneva Lee, Rebecca Yarros, and Holly Black, THESE VILE HEARTS is the perfect pacy, steamy crossover read for readers craving their next deadly fae fix.

THESE VILE HEARTS
by Melody Robinette
Putnam, 2026
(via Park, Fine & Brower Literary)

Maddox Sinclair’s father told her to never trust a dryad. At the age of eight she learned why: dryads murdered her mom and dad before her eyes. Now at twenty-six, Maddox is freshly laid off and desperate—f or a home, for a future, and, as a type-one diabetic, for a way to pay for the insulin that keeps her alive. Utterly without options, she flees to the forest where her parents were killed to make a binding pact with a dryad queen: kill the queen’s immortal enemy, the Redwood King, and be cured of her disease before the broken healthcare system sends her to an early grave.

In the redwood treetops, adopted Prince Castor is plagued by a curse that kills anyone foolish enough to love him. It’s been a year since the Redwood King—a lover of cruel and twisted games—made Castor an offer he couldn’t turn down: get a mortal to fall in love with him by the Sylveris Solstice and be freed of his curse. But should he fail, he’ll be imprisoned for a year in the Tree of Exile, a place of dark magic that drives its inhabitants mad. Castor hasn’t had any luck yet…and with the solstice fast approaching, time is running out.

When Maddox mistakes Castor for the king, Castor knows this mortal stranger—who knows nothing about his curse— is his last chance at freedom. But while Castor will stop at nothing to seduce Maddox, she’s scheming to get him alone so she can drive her dagger through his heart. As the pair’s sparks accidentally kindle a romantic fire, Castor must decide: damn the woman he has feelings for, or give up his future and freedom? And can Maddox untangle the web of secrets she’s in before she kills the wrong man, or worse…falls for a cursed prince, sealing her fate once and for all?

Melody Robinette is a dark fantasy author who grew up living in a daydream. A lover of all things macabre and fantastical, she now lives in Austin, Texas with her cocktail crafting husband, Ben, and their two ridiculous felines. As a type one diabetic, she has joined the #insulin4all movement and strives to spread awareness about her disease. When she isn’t writing, she can be found playing D&D, hunkering down in a coffee shop with a good book, or begging her cat Edgar Allan Poe Tato to sit with her.

YOU ARE THE DETECTIVE: THE CREEPING HAND MURDER de Maureen Johnson & Jay Cooper

November 1933. London. Seven people receive mysterious letters. Someone knows their terrible secrets. They are summoned to a posh townhouse where one is stabbed right in front of the others, but somehow no one saw a thing. Can you help Scotland Yard solve the mystery?

An interactive murder mystery from the bestselling author and illustrator of Your Guide to Not Getting Murdered in a Quaint English Village.

YOU ARE THE DETECTIVE:
THE CREEPING HAND MURDER
by Maureen Johnson & Jay Cooper
Ten Speed Press, September 2025
(via KT Literary)

Dear Detective,

Surely you have seen the papers and read about the murder of the American novelist Roy Peterson—stabbed while in a room with six other people, and yet no one went near him or saw the murder occur. The crime is so devious, so logistically impossible, that it seems to have been committed not by a person but by a disembodied hand.

I must confess that we are at a loss. Who wrote the poison pen letters that lured these seven people to this deadly gathering? What do a poet, an Earl, an actress, a cook, a telephone operator, and a lothario have in common? And how can a man be stabbed in a room full of suspects when none of them could have done it?

We have had our best people on the case, Detective, and we still can’t make heads or tails of it. We are giving this case file to you. Can you decipher the clues, decode the witness statements, and identify the murderer? You are our last hope. Can you help us crack the Case of the Creeping Hand?

Yours truly,

Detective Chief Inspector of the Metropolitan Police

Maureen Johnson is the #1 New York Times and USA Today bestselling author of Your Guide to Not Getting Murdered in a Quaint English Village (illustrated by Jay Cooper) and many young adult novels, including the very murderous Shades of London series, the Stevie Bell mysteries (starting with Truly Devious), and Death at Morning House. She has also done collaborative works, such as Let It Snow with John Green and Lauren Myracle (now a movie on Netflix), and several books in the Shadowhunter universe with Cassandra Clare. For safety’s sake, she lives in New York City; the vicar cannot reach her there.

Jay Cooper’s books don’t normally include grisly murders, nefarious deeds, or corpses of any kind. He has illustrated over twenty-five books for young people, including the New York Times and USA Today bestselling graphic novel series The Last Comics On Earth. He is also a Clio award-winning creative director of theatrical advertising, and has worked on over 150 Broadway musicals and plays (which have heaps of deaths).

THE UNPAID DEBT de Thomas Dann

In this southern noir, two detectives forge an unlikely alliance as they strive to bridge the racial divide and catch a killer hell bent on revenge. Set against a historical backdrop of racial inequality and political turmoil, this thriller is perfect for fans of William Kent Kruger and Greg Iles.

THE UNPAID DEBT
by Thomas Dann
Crooked Lane, November 2025

1955, Memphis. Homicide detective Burdett Vance is trying to outrun his past, but working in the homicide division always ends up bringing in new waves of horror. The time, a killer is reaping retribution for decades of lynching by targeting the daughters of rich white families in Memphis. When Vance is assigned to the case, he’s also put in charge of a new trainee, Officer Eustace Johnson.

In the latest publicity stunt of the police department, Eustace Johnson has been recently hired as the only Black man on the force. Forced to work together, Vance and Johnson must catch the rampaging killer in a city that is already roiling with racial injustice and a fight to control the crumbling local politics.

Then Emmeline Bryce, Vance’s old flame, becomes the killer’s next target. With Emmeline’s life on the line, Vance and Johnson must confront their deepest fears and darkest desires before the city ignites into chaos and the blissful vision of a better future disappears forever.

Readers of James Lee Burke will delight in this bitingly smart thriller full of intrigue and age-old animosities

Thomas Dann was born and bred in Memphis, Tennessee, five generations deep in a family fighting the entrenched political machine there. He has spent time variously on the East and Left Coasts, studying creative writing at Stanford, working for years as a felony defense investigator for the Washington, DC Public Defender, then lawyer, company builder, and writer, all the while wondering what he wants to do when he grows up. He now lives in Chevy Chase, Maryland with his wife Melissa and their goofy golden retriever Benji. And he loves the Blues.