Sandra Brown "Smoke Screen"

A few words about detective story I recommend to read. When newswoman Britt Shelley wakes up to find herself in bed beside Charleston PD detective Jay Burgess, she remembers nothing of how she got there – or how he wound up dead. Burgess was one of four heroic city officials who risked their lives five years earlier to lead others to safety from a catastrophic fire. His lifelong friend, Raley Gannon, was later assigned to investigate. But Raley never finished the inquiry because one calamitous night his career was destroyed by scandal. Now the newswoman whose biased reporting helped bring about Raley’s downfall might be his only chance to vindicate himself and get justice for the fire’s victims. But the more Raley and Britt discover about that fateful day, the more perilous their situation becomes, until they’re not only chasing the truth but running for their lives.

Ann  

Wally Lamb "She's Come Undone"

  In his extraordinary coming-of-age odyssey, Wally Lamb invited us to hitch a wild ride on a journey of love, pain and renewal with the most heartbreaking comical heroine to come along in years.

  Meet Dolores Price. She’s thirteen, wise mouthed but wounded, having bid childhood good-bye. Stranded in front of her bedroom TV, she spends the next few years nourishing herself with the Mallomars, potato chips and Pepsi her anxious mother supplies. When she finally orbits into young womanhood at 257 pounds, Dolores is no stronger and life is no kinder. But this time she’s determined to rise to the occasion and give herself one more chance before she really goes under.  
  Larisa

Christie Golden "Marooned"

If you are a science fiction fan and especially the Star Trek Voyager’s fan then it’s time to read a real thing – a book of the Star Trek Voyager series by Christie Golden named “Marooned”.

When an alien pirate abducts Kes, U.S.S. Voyager takes off in hot pursuit, but the first rescue mission fails disastrously; an ion storm forces the shuttle to crash on an unknown world. Now Captain Janeway and her Away Team must embark on a hazardous trek through a hostile environment in search of a way off the planet, while Voyager, commanded by Chakotay, confronts an enemy fleet in the depth of space.

Vadim

Rich Cohen "Lake Effect"

Raised in an affluent suburb on the North Shore of Chicago, Rich Cohen had a cluster of interesting friends, but none more interesting than Jamie Drew. Fatherless, reckless and lower middle class in a place that wasn’t, Jamie possessed such an irresistible insouciance and charm that even the teachers called him Drew-licious. Through the high school years of parties and Cub games and girls, of summer nights on the beach and forbidden forays into the blues bars of Chicago’s notorious South Side, the two formed a lasting bond. Even after Cohen went to college in New Orleans (Jamie went to Kansas) and then moved to New York, where he had a memorable interlude with the legendary New Yorker writer Joseph Mitchell, Jamie remained oddly crucial to his life. Exquisite and taut, Lake Effect is a bittersweet coming-of-age story that quietly bores to the essence of friendship and how it survives even as it is destined to change.

Rich Cohen has taken the everyday stuff of life and made it joyously readable. The mundane becomes richly evocative in his hands. The usual becomes unusual, the boring becomes interesting, the sweet becomes bittersweet and Lake Effect becomes the proverbial book you can’t put down.
Michail    

What to Read This Summer

Ken Follett “The Pillars of the Earth”

It is a story of a British family that built Cathedrals in England. What made the book for me were the characters. The characters were interesting and complex There were the monk, the young woman, the builder and I felt that they were like a real persons As you read this book, you get to know Tom, his family and the lives of each member. The storyline was captivating and exciting.

Also I loved the love stories in it. I loved Tom and Ellen's story most of all. It was sad that it happened so quickly after Agnes but it became so like as if they were meant to be together. This love story is intriguing and captivating
A marvelous and exciting novel.
Ann

Jonathan Franzen "The Corrections"

A comic, tragic epic stretching from the Midwest of the midcentury to the Wall Street and Eastern Europe of today, The Corrections brings an old-fashioned world of civic virtue and sexual inhibitions into violent collision with the era of home surveillance, hands-off parenting, do-it-yourself mental health care and globalized greed.

After almost fifty years as a wife and mother, Enid is ready to have some fun. Unfortunately, her husband, Alfred, is losing his sanity to Parkinson's disease and their children have long since flown the family nest to the catastrophes of their own lives. Desperate for some pleasure to look forward to, Enid has set her heart on bringing the family together for one last Christmas at home.

Greg 

Dean Koontz "Icebound"

Suspense! If you are a fan of the genre, in that case I recommend to read a novel by Dean Koontz “Icebound”.

A widespread drought is causing murderous famine. There is one possible solution: giant masses of Arctic ice, split from the polar pack by high explosives, could be moved south to parched coastlines and melted for water.

In an Arctic ice field a special team of eight scientists has planned a number of powerful bombs that will detonate automatically at midnight. But before they can withdraw to the safety of their base camp – Edgeway Station – a shuttering tidal wave breaks loose the ice on which they are working. Now they are hopelessly marooned on an iceberg during the worst winter storm of the decade. The bombs in the ice beneath them are buried irretrievably deep … and ticking.

 Abruptly thrown into a desperate struggle for survival, the Edgeway scientists are further plagued by the discovery that one of them is a ruthless killer hellbent on a strange mission of his own…

The reading of the novel swept me along with a breathless pace …

Michail

Steven Saylor “The Seven Wonders: A Novel of the Ancient World”

“The Seven Wonders: A Novel of the Ancient World” by Steven Saylor is a collection of short stories. The protagonist, Gordianus, is 18 years old and he sets off with his tutor Antipater of Sidon, the world’s most celebrated poet. Their journey takes them on a tour of the Seven Wonders of the World and we go along on the journey. One of the things I admire most about this book is the incredible research and description of the wonders and the cities of Greece, Asia, Egypt, which Gordianus and Antipater visit. They meet many interesting people and solve many mysteries and riddles. We see the beginnings of the Olympic Games. We not only see the wonders of the world, we go inside them. We're introduced to the politics of the time.

Saylor's writing is so real. And I really enjoy reading this book.

Ann

John Gridham "The Partner"

What can be better than to read a good detective story during the day off? Especially if it’s a story by John Grisham!!! Now a few words about the plot…

Once he was a well-liked, well paid young partner in a thriving Mississippi law firm. Then Patrick Lanigan stole ninety million dollars from his own firm and run for his life. For four years he evaded men who were rich, powerful and would stop at nothing to find him. Then inevitably on the edge of the Brazilian jungle they finally tracked him down.

Now Patrick is coming home. And in the Mississippi city where it all began an extraordinary trial is about to begin. As prosecutors circle like sharks, as Patrick’s lawyer prepares his defense, as Patrick’s lover prays for his deliverance and his former partners wait for their revenge, another story is about to emerge. Because Patrick Lanigan, the most reviled white-collar criminal of his time, knows something that no one else in the world knows. He knows the truth…

Jack