"Drink, Play, F@#k"

New from Black Cat and Grove/Atlantic: Drink, Play, F@#k: One Man's Search for Anything Across Ireland, Las Vegas, and Thailand by Andrew Gottlieb.

About the book, from the publisher:

One man’s spiritual journey to rediscover how much he hates spiritual journeys

What’s a guy supposed to do when eight years of marriage end in a nasty divorce? How does he rediscover his manly essence after years of being forced to attend poetry readings, string quartet recitals, and pasta making courses? There is only one way: drink, play, and f@#k.

In Drink, Play, F@#k, Bob Sullivan, jilted husband, sets off to explore the world, have a few laughs, and kill a few brain cells. From his home in New York City, he goes on a bender across Ireland, pumps the action in Las Vegas, and basks in physical pleasures in Thailand. After a lifetime of playing it safe, he lives out man’s great fantasies. For who among us hasn’t dreamed of a drunken knife-throwing contest outside a Dublin pub? What could be more exhilarating than losing every penny you have because an Australian rules football team did something at the last second you don’t even understand? And what sensate creature could ever doubt that the greatest pleasure known to man can be found in a tropical hut on a secret beach at the end of an unnamed jungle road?

Mr. Sullivan has a lot to teach us about life. Let’s just pray we have the wisdom to put aside our preconceptions and listen. Because what he finds, with the help of his guru Rick, who sometimes sleeps in the bathroom at the YMCA, isn’t at all what he expected.

"Nothing Right"

New from Bloomsbury USA: Nothing Right: Short Stories by Antonya Nelson.

About the book, from the publisher:

A collection of stories from one of the New Yorker’s “twenty young fiction writers of the new millennium,” a series of unforgettable glimpses into contemporary family life.

Set in the American Southwest, and featuring one previously unpublished story, Nothing Right shows one of our best writers working at the top of her game. Antonya Nelson’s stories are masterpieces: poignant, hilarious, truthful explorations of domesticity.

The artfully rendered characters in Nothing Right try to keep themselves intact as their personal lives explode around them. A mother and her teenage son finally find common ground when his girlfriend becomes pregnant. A woman leaves her husband and finds herself living with a stranger who is getting extensive plastic surgery while her best friend is dying of cancer. In “Or Else,” one of three short stories nominated for a National Magazine Award for the New Yorker, a man brings his girlfriend to a house he claims belongs to his family, only to have his lie exposed when one of the real owners comes home to scatter her father’s ashes.

These stories are sure to delight longtime fans and readers lucky enough to be just discovering Antonya Nelson.

"Security"

New from Farrar, Straus and Giroux: Security by Stephen Amidon.

About the book, from the publisher:

There isn’t much crime in Stoneleigh, Massachusetts. It’s a college town, a mountain getaway for the quietly rich, where the average burglar alarm is set off by wildlife. So when Edward Inman, owner of Stoneleigh Sentinel Security, gets a late-night alarm from the home of Doyle Cutler, one of his wealthiest clients, Edward thinks nothing of it—until a local student claims that she was sexually assaulted that same night at Cutler’s house.

From the author of Human Capital (“a wonderfully wicked satire on a twenty-first-century gilded age,” Chicago Tribune), Security is a timely, wry, and riveting story of adults and children, suspicion and sexual hysteria. It confirms Stephen Amidon as a master of the art and one of the foremost chroniclers of American life today.

Visit Stephen Amidon's website.

"Hot Springs"

New from Tin House: Hot Springs by Geoffrey Becker.

About the book, from the publisher:

Vibrant, sexy, and quite possibly crazy, Bernice is determined to reclaim the child she gave up for adoption five years ago. She convinces her boyfriend, Landis, to help carry out her plan, but once the abduction is accomplished, Bernice—whose own mother was given to manic episodes and strange behavior—is plagued with doubts. Will Landis stay with her, given her volatile personality and his own drifter past? Will she and Landis both end up in jail for this crime? And, perhaps most importantly, will she fail at being a mother? Dovetailed with this is the story of the conservative Christian adoptive parents, Tessa and David, and the effect the kidnapping has on their troubled marriage. As Bernice and Landis journey across America, from Colorado Springs to Tucson to Baltimore, Bernice must confront her past and the secrets she has kept.

Visit Geoffrey Becker's website.

"Pleasing the Dead"

New from Poisoned Pen Press: Pleasing the Dead by Deborah Turrell Atkinson.

About the book, from the publisher:

Some nasty predators dwell in paradise, and they aren’t all hiding in the azure waters. The day attorney Storm Kayama arrives in Kahului to help Lara Farrell set up her new dive shop, someone bombs a restaurant. When one of Lara’s employees, a recent Japanese immigrant, kills himself and one of his young daughters, Storm begins to ask questions.

The tentacles of the Yakuza, the dangerous, Japanese organized crime group, grip local businesses, real estate, and politics. Cunning and deadly, the clan leaders exploit underage women and eliminate anyone who dares face up to them.

Storm finds herself up against a lethal and faceless enemy, in a place where disposing of a victim is easy as dumping her in shark-infested waters.

But who is hunting whom? In a struggle to the death, Storm begins to realize that surviving doesn’t always mean living. For some, the ghosts of the past may be more painful than the anguish of the present.

Hawaii lawyer Storm Kayama must battle against the yakuza's presence and an ancient adherence to tradition to save more young girls from a terrible fate.

Visit Deborah Turell Atkinson's website.

"The Women"

New from Viking: The Women by T.C. Boyle.

About the book, from the publisher:

A dazzling novel of Frank Lloyd Wright, told from the point of view of the women in his life

Having brought to life eccentric cereal king John Harvey Kellogg in The Road to Wellville and sex researcher Alfred Kinsey in The Inner Circle, T.C. Boyle now turns his fictional sights on an even more colorful and outlandish character: Frank Lloyd Wright. Boyle’s account of Wright’s life, as told through the experiences of the four women who loved him, blazes with his trademark wit and invention. Wright’s life was one long howling struggle against the bonds of convention, whether aesthetic, social, moral, or romantic. He never did what was expected and despite the overblown scandals surrounding his amours and very public divorces and the financial disarray that dogged him throughout his career, he never let anything get in the way of his larger-than-life appetites and visions. Wright’s triumphs and defeats were always tied to the women he loved: the Montenegrin beauty Olgivanna Milanoff; the passionate Southern belle Maud Miriam Noel; the spirited Mamah Cheney, tragically killed; and his young first wife, Kitty Tobin. In The Women, T.C. Boyle’s protean voice captures these very different women and, in doing so, creates a masterful ode to the creative life in all its complexity and grandeur.

"Random Acts of Heroic Love"

New from Thomas Dunne Books: Random Acts of Heroic Love by Danny Scheinmann.

About the book, from the publisher:

With over 200,000 copies sold in the UK, aRichard & Judy pick, rights sold in 19 countries, called “riveting” and “mesmerizing,” this is a cinematic debut from a gifted new writer. Based on real family events, Danny Scheinmann’s novel paints a dramatic portrait of two apparently unconnected epic love stories.

1992: Traveling through South America with his girlfriend, Leo wakes up in a hospital to find his girlfriend is dead. He blames himself for the tragedy and is sucked into a spiral of despair. But a surprising secret leads Leo to discover something that will change his life forever.

1917: Moritz is a POW fugitive, with seven thousand kilometers of the Russian steppes separating him from his first love, whose memory has kept him alive through carnage and captivity. The war may be over, but he now faces a perilous journey and the insecurity of whether his love is still waiting.

Visit Danny Scheinmann's website.

"The Lost Witness"

New from St. Martin's Minotaur: The Lost Witness by Robert Ellis.

About the book, from the publisher:

With his novel City of Fire, Robert Ellis debuted a dynamic new character in Los Angeles detective Lena Gamble, but also captured a vivid picture of the city of Los Angeles. Readers and critics made City of Fire an instant phenomenon, as the book became a Los Angeles Times bestseller and was named a top summer read by People magazine, USA Today, and The New York Times.

Now Lena Gamble is a cop held in disgrace by department higher-ups for the explosive way the Romeo case played out, though she’s still hailed as a hero by her colleagues for catching the killer. For her punishment, she hasn’t handled a real murder investigation in eight months. When the chief finally tosses her a case, she’s thrilled until she gets a look at the scene and realizes he’s probably setting her up to be exiled once and for all: The victim is unidentified, and there are no witnesses, and no leads. Just the body, chopped into pieces and dropped in a Dumpster—gruesome enough to ensure that once again the media will be following Lena’s every move.

Robert Ellis delivers another high-speed, commercial, powerful read, featuring one of the most engaging and vibrant police characters on the shelf today.

Check out Robert Ellis's website.

The Page 69 Test: City of Fire.

"Mop Men"

New from Thomas Dunne Books: Mop Men: Inside the World of Crime Scene Cleaners by Alan Emmins.

About the book, from the publisher:

Neal Smither doesn’t hide his work. The side of his van reads: “Crime Scene Cleaners: Homicides, Suicides and Accidental Death.” Whenever a hotel guest permanently checks out, the cops finish an investigation, or an accidental death is reported, Smither’s crew pick up the pieces after the police cruisers and ambulances have left.

Alan Emmins offers a glimpse at this little-known aspect of America’s most gruesome deaths. Filled with details as fascinating as they are gory, Mop Men examines not just the public fascination with murder but also how a self-made success like Smither can make a fortune just by praying for death.

Visit Alan Emmins' website.

"The Agency"

New from St. Martin's Press: The Agency by Ally O'Brien.

About the book, from the publisher:

Meet Tess Drake. She’s earned everything she has. Now it’s time to get what she deserves…

Sexy super-agent Tess Drake has worked hard to make a name for herself in the glamorous yet cut-throat entertainment industry. Tess works at an international agency, where she skillfully manages some of the world's biggest egos—her company, Bardwell International operates in the thrilling, fast-paced worlds of Rights, wrongs and revenge. Tess has been an agent there for longer than she cares to remember and now she's in trouble. Real trouble. After the mysterious death of the agency's senior partner, Lowell Bardwright, Tess's sworn enemy, Cosima Tate, has taken over and would do anything to send Tess's career down in flames. And Cosima is only one of the rogue’s gallery of agents in London and New York who want Tess to take a fall.

Tess has another little complication, too. She’s sleeping with men on both sides of the Atlantic who are in bed with the women who are trying to sink her.

Can Tess jump ship without losing her clients and breaking her heart? Or will she lose everything before finding out if she really has what it takes to do what she’s always wanted?

There’s risk and reward in this wickedly funny novel that turns the world of agenting inside out and lays bare all the ambition, sex, adrenaline, bad luck, and good luck at the center of one young woman’s success.

Visit the Ally O'Brien website.