Sam Wachman's beautiful, heartbreaking debut novel, The Sunflower Boys, follows a pair of young brothers whose world is upended by the 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine. As they travel west, hoping to escape the chaos of war and reunite with their father, who has been working in the U.S., narrator Artem captures details of their journey in his sketchbook, creating a poignant account of what he has loved and lost.

Wachman begins his story in peacetime, when Artem's life in Chernihiv, north of Kyiv, is blessedly ordinary. He walks to school with his little brother, Yuri, and best friend, Viktor. Artem is mostly content, but he's starting to wonder two things: one, what it truly means to be a man, and two, if his growing feelings for Viktor will make him a fundamentally flawed man. When Russia launches its attack on Ukraine, Artem and Yuri flee their city. The peaceful, almost pastoral, quality of the novel's early chapters serves to heighten the jarring contrast with the sudden upheaval destruction of war. Wachman depicts the brothers' harrowing journey through small, stark details: blistered feet and clothes stiff with grime, Yuri's stuffed crocodile, and Artem's precious sketchbook, which he carries everywhere, even when he can't draw a thing. As Artem tries to care for Yuri, he continues to wrestle with his feelings for Viktor and his identity in an increasingly chaotic and confusing world.

Tender and poignant, shot through with deep sadness and wry humor, The Sunflower Boys is a bittersweet rendering of life in modern-day Ukraine, the effect of war on ordinary lives, and a young person discovering who he is. --Katie Noah Gibson, blogger at Cakes, Tea and Dreams

In 1980, noted British writer Penelope Fitzgerald wrote an essay entitled "Following the Plot," alluding to a trip she and her five-year-old son, Valpy, took to northern Mexico in 1952, at the invitation of two wealthy, elderly women in search of an heir to the fortune from their family's former silver mine. Taking Fitzgerald's barebones description of that strange journey as her starting point, Jessica Francis Kane (Rules for Visiting) has vividly imagined that experience in Fonseca, creating a story that's steeped in atmosphere as it explores themes of class and creativity, seasoning that mix with a touch of romance and even a bit of a ghost story.

When Penelope arrives in Fonseca, home to spinster Doña Elena and her sister-in-law Doña Anita, she finds she's only one of a collection of "Pretenders" to the expected inheritance. That group gathers nightly to jostle for the favor of the eccentric women. For Penelope, the pressure of a competition she finds distasteful is leavened by the presence of the famed painter Edward Hopper and his wife, Jo.

Kane paints a revealing, multidimensional psychological portrait of Penelope Fitzgerald, one that's enriched by information she gained from e-mail exchanges with the adult Valpy and his younger sister Tina, excerpts of which appear periodically in the text. It's an unusual, but effective, technique that doesn't detract from the novel's appeal as a work of fiction. Twenty-four years before she published her first novel, the Fitzgerald who appears in Fonseca is a deeply sympathetic character: a loving mother, anguished wife, and writer in whom the fires of literary ambition are smoldering, waiting to burst into flames. --Harvey Freedenberg, freelance reviewer

Maya Arad's moving 12th novel, Happy New Years, charts the triumphs and challenges of an Israeli woman living in the U.S. through five decades of annual Rosh Hashanah letters to her college friends back home.

After graduating from teachers college, Leah Moskovich moves to Massachusetts, where she must quickly adapt to a new language and an entirely new culture. As the years pass, Leah writes faithfully to her classmates, detailing her experiences with relationships and motherhood; her careers in education and real estate; and her eventual move to California, where she spends much of her adulthood. A relentless optimist, Leah is always more inclined to celebrate her joys and accomplishments than dwell on darker realities. However, her private postscripts to her best friend, Mira, reveal the more complicated nuances, including her continual struggle with self-esteem and the long-term echoes of some difficult early circumstances. As she chronicles her hopes and troubles, Leah also comments on world events, such as 9/11 and the 2008 financial crisis. Her tart, often wryly humorous voice provides a fascinating glimpse of her experience as an Israeli immigrant. As she ages, Leah becomes more reflective and more honest with herself, sharing deeper insights into her life as well as the times that affected her so profoundly.

Wise, absorbing, and relatable in their small details and messy emotions, Leah's letters create a richly layered portrait of a woman determined to build a satisfying life for herself. --Katie Noah Gibson, blogger at Cakes, Tea and Dreams

A sophisticated ivory tower drama holds a magnifying glass up to the emotional cracks in a marriage between two academics in Seduction Theory by Emily Adrian. Adrian's marvelous third novel for adults takes the intriguing form of a Masters of Fine Arts thesis crafted by a student infatuated with her adviser and considers what, in essence, constitutes infidelity in a long-established relationship.

The graduating student is Robbie and her thesis adviser is Simone, the charismatic star of the creative writing department at Edwards University. Simone is happily married to Ethan. They are colleagues in the same department, sexual soulmates, and each other's adoring best friend. With Robbie as narrator, Seduction Theory follows the course of an intense summer friendship with Simone that leaves Robbie wanting much more. Robbie doesn't know if she wants to sleep with her thesis adviser "or be her." Meanwhile, Ethan's blossoming friendship with the department secretary, Abigail, takes off that same fateful summer.

Adrian (Everything Here Is Under Control; The Second Season) has equipped Robbie with a persuasive, entertaining voice tinged with scorn and wicked humor. Therein lies the captivating pull of the novel, with its close observation of the boundary-crossing professor-student friendship, scandalously intimate details of Ethan and Simone's marriage, and the devastating repercussions of Ethan's fall from grace.

As with most relationships, Simone and Ethan have their separate inner lives--the last frontier of privacy in a marriage as blissfully entangled as theirs. It is here that Robbie unleashes her imagination, merging fact and fiction to craft a story that is, at its core, a breathtaking act of betrayal. --Shahina Piyarali

When the late Fumio Yamamoto's The Dilemmas of Working Women won the coveted Naoki Prize in 2001 in Japan, its bestselling success was "a phenomenon," writes Brian Bergstrom, who meticulously translates this audacious five-story collection populated by women bluntly eschewing expectations. The narrators here--four women, one man--each face complex decisions on the cusp of major change.

Tradition proves potentially stifling in the titular story when Mito's longtime boyfriend announces on her 25th birthday, " 'Well, I guess it's about time. We can get married.'... he said it as if granting permission." Mito once thought wifehood should happen by 25, but the possibility of actual nuptials only engenders reasons to refuse. In "Here, Which Is Nowhere"--the collection's most nuanced story--Maho is trapped in an endless cycle of caring for and serving others: her husband of 21 years, her disgruntled widowed mother, her dismissive almost-adult children. Maho's rage builds in increments, but finding some semblance of release does little to improve her daily life.

The ending "A Tomorrow Full of Love"--the quintet's sweetest, with the single male narrator--moves between an izakaya owner's unpredictable interactions with his free-spirited live-in lover and his utter devotion to the tween daughter he's allowed to see every three months.

That Yamamoto writes solely in first-person cleverly encourages immediate engagement, creating an instant gateway into the intimacies of these characters' lives. Throughout her fictional universe, marriage is the biggest loser, particularly for women, something to avoid or escape. In upsetting and challenging the venerable institution, many of Yamamoto's empathic characters--even a quarter-century after their debut--remain timeless figures of strength and resilience. --Terry Hong

Juliette Fay's winsome eighth novel, The Harvey Girls, follows two young women who become colleagues--and, eventually, much more--as they work alongside one another in the United States' first hospitality chain, along the Santa Fe Railroad.

Charlotte Crowninshield turned her back on her Boston Brahmin family when she married a handsome professor. Now, fleeing a marriage gone terribly wrong, she takes a new name and lands a job working for the Fred Harvey Company. She travels to Topeka, Kan., to train as a waitress at the company's flagship "Harvey House." Charlotte's roommate, Billie MacTavish, is the sheltered Nebraskan daughter of Scottish immigrants, forced to leave home and lie about her age to secure her position as a Harvey Girl. Though they dislike each other on sight, Billie and Charlotte must learn to live and work together. The railroad, and their lives as Harvey Girls, will take them both to places they never imagined.

Fay (The Tumbling Turner Sisters) paints a striking historical portrait of 1920s America, detailing the bustling train stations and well-appointed restaurants. Despite their prickly relationship, Billie and Charlotte stand by one another through tough days and several harrowing experiences. As Charlotte's past catches up with her and Billie debates whether to reveal her true age, the women must rely on their Harvey Girl training--plus their inner grit and compassion--to support each other and step into their futures.

At once a fascinating slice of little-known 1920s history and a tribute to staunch female friendship, The Harvey Girls is as satisfying as a slice of lemon meringue pie served in a Harvey House dining room. --Katie Noah Gibson, blogger at Cakes, Tea and Dreams

Are miracles a thing? Ask a secular humanist, then ask someone more pious for two different but equally definitive answers. Ask Arthur, the narrator of God and Sex, Jon Raymond's easygoing assumption challenger of a novel, and the answer is more nuanced. One expects nuance from Raymond (Freebird), co-screenwriter of many Kelly Reichardt films, including Wendy and Lucy and First Cow. In this novel, 40-ish Arthur is the author of four "spirituality-cum-science" books that fared poorly. The last one's failure plunged him into such a "cauldron of self-doubt" that he moved back to his childhood home in Oregon. But he has an idea for a fifth work, "a small, lyrical book in praise of trees." He meets Phil French, a forest ecologist, who helps him with research. Their friendship develops a wrinkle: Arthur falls for Phil's wife, Sarah, a high school librarian.

The inevitability of Arthur and Sarah's affair is as fraught as one might expect, but it gets even more complicated when Sarah leaves for a weeklong mindfulness retreat at Mount Hood. An environmental disaster forces nonbeliever Arthur to pray for a beneficial outcome. Therein lies the richness of this quietly intense novel. What begins as a conventional domestic drama reaches greater heights as Raymond explores important themes, including environmental degradation, climate change, infidelity, the agony of artistic creation, and the concept of faith. Raymond's light touch makes what could have been heavy-handed moralizing instead a gently thrilling meditation on life and virtue. --Michael Magras, freelance book reviewer

Theodore C. Van Alst Jr. (Sacred Smokes; Sacred City) offers a love letter to the city of Chicago via a single-day odyssey in The El, an expansive novel featuring young gang members on a circular journey through an urban landscape. With strong imagery, dreamlike sequences, and gritty considerations of family, love, spicy potato chips, and gun violence, this unusual story will capture and hold the imagination.

On an August day in 1979, teenaged Teddy wakes up early, eats a few buttered tortillas, and gets ready for a momentous event. He will lead 18 fellow members of the Simon City Royals across town via Chicago's elevated train (the El) to a meeting with another "set" of the gang and many others, where a new alliance formed in prison would be applied on the outside. The new Nation will include old enemies, but Teddy is a team player. It is a day of high stakes, and while they all share trepidations, not everyone shares Teddy's hopeful outlook. Teddy's Native identity matters because race is a question for the new Nation, spoken of but not exactly on the official agenda.

The El is utterly intriguing at every turn, shifting pace from high-drama action scenes to contemplative ones. Van Alst portrays a strong sense of both time and place as his characters grapple with race, class, and culture. He gives us tragedy as well as beauty, and a sharp, loving portrait of a very particular big city, with Teddy "riding all the way back toward the neighborhood, window wide open, warm wind howling in, and me in love with everything we could ever be." --Julia Kastner, blogger at pagesofjulia

Daniel Saldaña París (Planes Flying over a Monster; Ramifications) eerily constructs a deconstructing world in The Dance and the Fire, a deft novel told in three voices and translated from the Spanish by Christina MacSweeney.

Mexico is rife with wildfires, and the city of Cuernavaca is especially affected, with its citizens normalized to a state of perpetual drought, smoke, and ash. Within this smoldering environment are three childhood friends, now in their 30s and dealing with various relationship and body issues. Natalia is a choreographer enraptured with bromeliads (she dotes over 12 varieties) and the phenomenon of choreomania, also known as the dancing plague or hysteria. She lives with an aging painter and eventually crosses paths with Erre, her one-time boyfriend. Erre has returned to Cuernavaca after a divorce, and now obsesses over the pains afflicting his body. Conejo, an amiable conspiracy theorist, lives with his blind father and mostly does drugs and tries to stay inside. Conejo and Natalia have stayed in loose touch over the years, but with Erre back, the past comes to the forefront, revealing complex dynamics and calamitous consequences.

París is not a straightforward storyteller, which will thrill fans of books such as Samanta Schweblin's Fever Dream or Juan Rulfo's Pedro Páramo. Indeed, París plays with the ideas of malleable memory, gossip, rumor, myth, and more, even writing, "Where did that story originate? There's no way to weed out the legends, fantasies, and downright lies from history." The Dance and the Fire is a thrilling, macabre read. --Nina Semczuk, writer, editor, and illustrator

The Grand Paloma Resort by Cleyvis Natera (Neruda on the Park) is a novel of race, class, secrets, and striving, set within a luxury resort staffed by struggling locals amid the natural beauty of the Dominican Republic.

Laura has been her sister Elena's caretaker since they were 14 and four years old when their mother died. The Grand Paloma has been Laura's career and lifeline. But Elena persists, in Laura's eyes, in slacking, taking Ecstasy and partying while working as a babysitter at the resort. In the novel's opening pages, a young child in Elena's care--from a family of great wealth and privilege--has been badly injured. It falls to Laura, yet again, to clean up: Elena must be protected from criminal charges, and the resort from bad press.

But this time, despite Laura's experience in saving the day, a bad situation spirals. Elena thinks she sees a way out by accepting a large sum of money from a tourist in exchange for giving him access to two young local girls. Although she initially believes the girls won't come to harm, the crisis worsens when the children go missing. All of that coincides with an approaching category-five hurricane. A larger cast of already marginalized resort employees are endangered in a ripple effect, and Laura's career is at risk.

Natera deftly splices into this narrative the history of the Dominican Republic and the plight of Haitian workers. With a propulsively paced plot and heart-racingly high stakes, The Grand Paloma Resort interrogates capitalism and exploitation through a community's concern for two little girls. The result is exhilarating, entertaining, and thought-provoking. --Julia Kastner, blogger at pagesofjulia

A college campus that's both welcoming and forbidding, a single mother's unconditional love for her daughter, and years of secrets swirl in Megan Miranda's absorbing You Belong Here.

A pervasive dread hovers over Beckett Bowery, who tries to handle her complicated emotions about keeping her daughter, Delilah, safe and allowing the 18-year-old to make her own decisions, all while hiding her own past. Beckett grew up in the mountain town of Wyatt Valley, Va., where her parents were professors at Wyatt College. She's even named after the building where they taught. It was expected that she would attend the college, but she was asked to leave during her senior year there, after two local men died in a fire in an underground tunnel at the college. At first, Beckett was a suspect, but blame shifted to her roommate, who disappeared.

Now a ghostwriter in North Carolina, Beckett is appalled that her daughter secretly applied to Wyatt and earned a full scholarship. Beckett views the town and college as places of danger but is powerless to stop Delilah, who's legally an adult. Beckett's fears are realized when Delilah briefly vanishes in the nearby woods during a freshman initiation and a body is found nearby.

Miranda (The Last House Guest; Fracture) skillfully shows how the past has a hold on Beckett, who knows that 20 years later, she remains suspected of starting that fire. Family dynamics compellingly stir the plot. Beckett's fraying relationship with Delilah echoes Beckett's parents' relationship with her. You Belong Here delivers elevated suspense. --Oline H. Cogdill, freelance reviewer

Full of lush details and eerie mysteries, It Was Her House First by Cherie Priest (Grave Reservations) is a ghost story for HGTV fans.

Flush with her brother's life insurance payout and mourning his loss, Ronnie Mitchell purchases a decaying mansion that was once home to silent film star Venita Rost with renovation in mind. Though it's not yet her dream house, Ronnie is in love and determined to make it work, despite the lack of plumbing and electricity, abundance of mold and rotting wood, and the fact that the last person who tried to renovate the house died suddenly.

Ronnie soon discovers a creepy basement shrine to Venita that holds the actress's diary. With no other evening entertainment, Ronnie devours Venita's innermost thoughts and fears leading up to her tragic end. As more and more bone-chilling and strange encounters transpire, Ronnie realizes she is more than just another renovator and begins to understand that she must make peace with the house's past inhabitants to survive.

Priest merges the magical with the natural, transporting readers into not only the dilapidated house with its commonplace dangers but also all its former splendor. The novel's multiple perspectives, in the 1930s and the present day, draw readers into the lives of the characters. Through Priest's precise prose, the scent of rotting carpet, the taste of a strong gin drink, and the sound of a child's laughter come alive. It Was Her House First is an atmospheric, heartbreaking novel of loss and shattered trust that will make readers take a second glance at old, crumbling houses and wonder what secrets they could hold. --Alyssa Parssinen, freelance reviewer and former bookseller

Mean girls have to grow up sometime, and when they do, they may well end up like the calculating, self-centered, secret-keeping, and extravagantly entertaining mothers of Emma Rosenblum's Mean Moms.

This satirical thriller revolves around Atherton Academy, a top Manhattan private school that seems to bring out bad behavior--not in its students but in their parents. At drop-off on the first day of the new school year, a clutch of moms gossip about a newcomer to the community: Sofia Perez, a divorcée who has recently moved from Miami to New York with her two kids, now Athertonians. After a mom invites Sofia into her friendship cluster, bad things start happening: one mom gets knocked down by a guy on an electric scooter; a man robs everyone at gunpoint at the opening of another mom's "sound bath spa"; and so on. Nothing like this happened before Sofia came on the scene. Surely she's to blame?

Rosenblum (Bad Summer People; Very Bad Company) presents a hilariously and obscenely privileged world--there seems to be a reference to a luxury brand for every punctuation mark. The novel's perspective roves as Atherton's legendary theme parties outdo one another for conspicuous consumption; meanwhile, the narrative slow-builds to the mayhem promised in the prologue. Throughout Mean Moms, readers get the sense that, while the delicious characterizations are heightened--one mom sees Atherton as the "key to the Ivies, which, most annoyingly, you couldn't buy your way into nowadays"--they're not heightened by much. --Nell Beram, author and freelance writer

Yasuhiko Nishizawa's first novel in English, The Man Who Died Seven Times, engagingly translated by Jesse Kirkwood, arrives 30 years after its 1995 Japanese publication having lost none of its quirky charm. Other than the absence of cell phones and digital screens, Nishizawa's "classic time-loop murder mystery" remains timeless entertainment.

Sixteen-year-old Hisataro Oba is the youngest in his complicatedly dysfunctional family. Each New Year's Day--at least since a few years back--the three generations gather at wealthy Grandfather's mansion, each member color-coded in tracksuits and chanchanko jackets. After being an abusive wastrel to his three daughters--Kamiji, Kotono, Haruna--Grandfather mended his squandering ways and created a major corporation worth a staggering fortune. Only Kotono stuck around, positioning her to inherit everything. Kamiji and Haruna are maneuvering for their share, hoping to install one of Kamiji's three sons (including Hisataro) or one of Haruna's two daughters as successor. Meanwhile, Hisataro has a "troublesome 'condition'  " he calls "the Trap": getting stuck in an unpredictable, loop--"one full day, from midnight to midnight"--that repeats nine times. Of course, it hits this New Year's, and Grandfather ends up dead in the second loop. Can (should?) his life be saved?

Hisataro is a delightfully chatty narrator, sharing every thought, examining every angle, explaining every option. He may be biologically 16, but his "mind is at least thirty years old... a mathematically provable fact" given his "condition." With insight and humor, this "jaded old man" guides readers to a comical "quagmire" of a finale: mysteries are solvable, families not so much. --Terry Hong

Sarah Pekkanen's The Locked Ward is a twisty novel of psychological suspense with an eerie bond between twin sisters at its heart.

The Locked Room alternates between the points of view of Georgia Cartwright and Mandy Ravenel. Georgia is the adopted daughter of a very wealthy family who is being held in a psychiatric ward and accused of murdering her younger sister, Annabelle, while Mandy runs a bar she inherited from her adoptive parents. In the novel's opening pages, Mandy learns that Georgia is actually her twin sister, separated at birth, and that Georgia wants to meet with her. During the visit, Mandy feels an instant cellular connection with her sister, who insists that she is innocent and begs Mandy for her help.

Pekkanen (Things You Won't Say; Catching Air; The Golden Couple with Greer Hendricks) expertly guides readers through the left turns and twisted corners of her compelling story, contrasting the lives of the sisters in short, strobing chapters. As Mandy uncovers dark family secrets, Georgia contends with hidden enemies inside her ward. All the while, questions of whether Georgia is manipulating Mandy and why Mandy seems so game to dive into Georgia's life thrum under the surface. Pekkanen explores the complex and sometimes spooky connection between the two with a keen eye and examines the effects of privilege and entitlement--or lack of it---on each of their lives. The Locked Ward delivers on that all-important suspense element--its final twist is a doozy. --Debra Ginsberg, author and freelance editor

J.R. Dawson's second novel, The Lighthouse at the Edge of the World, is an atmospheric and enthralling story of grief, love, and choice.

Charlie Connor is mourning the loss of her sister, Sam, who died in a mass shooting, and trying to care for her father, who has withdrawn into himself. Charlie started seeing ghosts after Sam died, and she has spent the past six months carrying sheet music of an unfinished song Sam composed all over Chicago in an attempt to draw out her sister's ghost. Nera Harosen lives in the Station, a midway point situated between the city and the lake for souls on their way to the afterlife. She spends her days helping her father keep malicious spirits known as Haunts out of the Station while he ferries souls across the lake. When Charlie follows the sound of her sister's song and discovers the Station, both women's realities are shattered. Nera becomes aware of her corporeal body in ways she never imagined possible, but she would have to forfeit her duty to follow her heart and live with Charlie. Charlie's piano playing strengthens the flickering Station light, but she would have to abandon her life to help keep it burning bright. As they each pursue their goals and even gain sympathy for the Haunts, long-hidden secrets threaten to destroy their worlds.

The novel's sapphic romance develops alongside the slowly unfolding plot that draws on Greek and Jewish mythology and grapples with themes of loss, duty, and marginalized identities. Dawson (The First Bright Thing) creates an eerie, quiet atmosphere throughout, which makes the showdown scenes even more explosive. --Dainy Bernstein, freelance reviewer

Emma Lord's sharp, sweet second rom-com for adults, For the Record, follows two ex-rival musicians forced to collaborate on a joint comeback album. Pop star and glitter fanatic Mackenzie Waters is terrified to perform after a major vocal surgery changed her sound, and former punk-rock front man Sam Blaze is content co-parenting his son, Ben, with his bakery-owning ex and her wife. But their fans--and their record label--haven't forgotten the sparks that flew onstage when Sam's band, Candy Shard, and Mackenzie's pop-diva trio, Thunder Hearts, toured together.

Lord (The Break-Up Pact) switches between Sam's and Mackenzie's perspectives to plumb the depths of their relationship: the onstage-offstage rivalry, the misconceptions, and the witty repartee that (barely) concealed a crackling mutual attraction. Both protagonists examine their reluctance to let anyone in and the push-pull of desire and fear familiar to pop music fans and anyone who's ever fallen madly in love. Lord also comments on the music industry and its tendency to exploit artists via a subplot involving a music-sharing app where Mackenzie has been anonymously posting new songs. As Mackenzie and Sam spend more time together, co-writing songs and daring each other to get closer, they must each decide what they're willing to risk to relaunch their careers and possibly to write a new love story together.

Packed with whip-smart banter, heart-stopping romantic moments, and delectable descriptions of baked goods, For the Record will be a hit with readers who can't resist a love song. --Katie Noah Gibson, blogger at Cakes, Tea and Dreams

After her mom left and her dad followed shortly after, Stella Moore decided to find the treasure they gave up everything--including her--to search for: the Elephant's Heart Diamond. Heart Marks the Spot combines a vivid treasure-hunting adventure with a beautiful second-chance romance. Libby Hubscher (If You Ask Me; Meet Me in Paradise) fills Stella's story with action, suspense, and heart.

Stella is tenacious in her commitment to uncovering and preserving treasures and histories that have long been hidden, lost, and abandoned. Stella and her best friends Teddy, Gus, and Zoe spend every summer hunting for treasure. Their almost entirely unsuccessful trip to Iceland turns around when Stella meets a handsome stranger who is surprisingly good at deciphering the clues from old poems that might lead to what they're seeking. Even more surprisingly, the stranger, Huck Sullivan, turns out to be Teddy's former roommate and Stella's favorite author. Their instant connection glows brilliantly under the Northern Lights, but when Huck departs with no explanation, Stella is confused and hurt.

A year later, Huck's treasure-hunting novel is a bestseller, and Stella is ready to take on her biggest quest yet, bringing her nearer than ever to the Elephant's Heart Diamond. What she's not prepared for is Huck joining her to gather inspiration for his sequel. Summer storms and simmering emotions draw spirited fun and vulnerable confessions to the surface. Stella's found family adds warmth and heartfelt moments as the summer unfolds and the search intensifies. Stella and Huck explore waterfalls, shipwrecks, and their growing feelings, coming closer and closer to discovering the most important treasure of all: true love. --Clara Newton, freelance reviewer

In The Mission, Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Tim Weiner follows up on his 2007 National Book Award-winning history of the Central Intelligence Agency, Legacy of Ashes, to document the torturous permutations of the agency's mission in the 21st century. Since 2000, Weiner writes, the CIA was "twice transformed" by a lack of good intelligence: the first in preventing the 9/11 terrorist attacks and the second in making the false case for Iraq's weapons of mass destruction.

Weiner goes deep into CIA leadership with riveting first-person recollections of those who witnessed the agency pivot away from its primary mission of espionage and counterespionage to that of a paramilitary force responsible for leading the hunt for al-Qaeda in Afghanistan and beyond. This mission shift resulted in endless scandals and congressional hearings over events at the Abu Ghraib prison and the use of torture at CIA "black sites" around the globe. Drawing on rare on-the-record interviews with six former CIA directors, more than a dozen station chiefs, and countless operation officers, Weiner's taut account climaxes with the CIA's most dangerous foe as of 2025. President Donald Trump repeatedly undermined the agency and its operatives by "embracing dictators and despots" in his first term, and his plans for his second term might require "a handful of CIA officers with the greatest morality" to stop him from damaging U.S. security beyond repair. The Mission is a penetrating portrait of the nation's most powerful intelligence service and its existential evolution as a last line of defense against enemies foreign and domestic. --Peggy Kurkowski, book reviewer in Denver

Lindsay H. Metcalf (Outdoor Farm, Indoor Farm) dissects the question of whether a tomato is a fruit or a vegetable in her alliterative, pun-filled nonfiction picture book Tomatoes on Trial. Metcalf, referencing a 19th-century Supreme Court battle over produce taxes, lays out the evidence on both sides of the argument with humor and panache. Her playful text and the "blotted line and color wash" illustrations crafted by Edwin Fotheringham (Those Rebels, John and Tom) together make a deliciously fun historical "food fight."

In 1886, "produce king of New York" John Nix wanted to beat his competition and bring in the spring's first tomatoes. But the U.S. government taxed fruits lower than vegetables. Nix argued that his tomatoes from Bermuda should be considered fruits; the Customs House collector believed that "if Nix wanted to haul [tomatoes] in from overseas, he would have to pay up." When neither side budged, Nix sued the collector. "After six years of stewing, the [Nix v. Hedden] case boiled over into the US Supreme Court" where both sides made their arguments for the proper definition of a tomato.

Fotheringham's delightful, realistic illustrations, executed in the blotted line technique created by Andy Warhol, depict a competitive atmosphere of culinary amusement. Metcalf's poetic prose banters and blusters as it renders this fascinating history about one of the country's most popular foods; backmatter offers readers additional information. Regardless of whether a reader is Team Fruit or Team Vegetable, Tomatoes on Trial serves up a healthy portion of legal process with ample sides of entertainment and insight. --Jen Forbus, freelancer

A thoughtful child experiences a first taste of loss while learning the inner workings of the local waste management center in King of the Dump by Canadian creators Tim Wynne-Jones (The Ruinous Sweep) and Scot Ritchie (Zander Stays).

A white child with red hair holds a small riding dog toy in the backseat of a car. "Can't we keep him?" the child asks. The equally red-haired caretaker driving the duo to the dump explains, "You're too big now, Teddy." Kid and adult arrive at the center and a series of vignettes show Teddy participating in reducing, reusing, and recycling. When the time comes to donate Teddy's little rider to the dump's secondhand shop, the kid sadly grasps the little red dog's tail. The shop attendant replaces the toy with a bright crown to sit atop the doleful child's red locks. Shortly after, a toddler jumps on the dog and begins to giggle; Teddy's hesitancy transforms into delight. When Teddy asks to go on the next dump trip, the kid's caretaker responds with cheer: "Sure thing, Ted! You're the King of the Dump!"

King of the Dump has the clean appeal of a loose-lined cartoon strip, with sparse text contained in speech balloons. Wynne-Jones's evergreen messages on sharing, community, and eco-consciousness are shown in Ritchie's illustrations of the broad landscapes of the dump as well as the smaller, emotion-filled landscapes of the face. Onomatopoeia and big machinery will likely attract and excite younger readers, while the book invites older children to consider their contributions to caring for the environment and for others. --Cristina Iannarino, children's book buyer, Books on the Square

Lio Min channels The Matrix in The L.O.V.E. Club, a genre-busting YA behemoth with elements of sci-fi, horror, soap opera, and action.

Liberty, O, Vera, and Elle, the titular L.O.V.E. Club, have been friends since third grade. The girls, who grew up feeling like outcasts in the upper-crusty Chinese community of Calendula, Calif., connected with each other playing video games in their middle school's abandoned Study Room L-7, their very own clubhouse. That is, until Elle mysteriously vanished the summer before freshman year, shattering the group. Liberty's and Vera's families not only moved away after Elle's disappearance, but they went radio silent, leaving O to navigate her grief alone. Then, as senior year begins, Vera and Liberty return. The first day back together is awkward, yet that evening all three separately sneak back into the middle school, drawn to the old clubhouse. One lonely computer sits there; a new game, seemingly created by Elle, is loaded, the text asking, "PLAY AGAIN?" With a single click, the three teens portal into a digital world where they must work together to reforge their relationship and battle bosses that take the shape of their personal struggles.   

Min's writing is especially sharp, both mischievous and melodic--"I sort through the bouquet of emotions wilting in the vase of my chest"--which creates a dizzying, satisfying effect. Be warned though: with so many twists, turns and a scope that at times can become unwieldy, the dizzying effect is very real. Themes of generational trauma, abuse, race, gender identity, and more come together to make Min's sophomore effort a catharsis bomb for readers who are up for the challenge; an ouroboros of grief, memory, and, naturally, love. --Luis G. Rendon, freelance reviewer

The classic tale of The Ugly Duckling gets a fiery, fantastical twist in the funny, spirited beginner graphic novel The Fire-Breathing Duckling, written and illustrated by Frank Cammuso (The Night Door).

"One night, under a shooting star... a miracle occurred," the text states as a fireball streaks across the sky and flashes into the ground beneath a tree. The next morning, a mother duck is surprised to find a new enormous pink egg among her own. When another bird notes the egg's difference, Mama Duck says, "There is nothing wrong with being different." Eventually she hatches three tiny ducklings and Nort, a pink dragon with fin-like ears and nubbin horns on an oversized noggin. Mama Duck loves all her ducklings without question. A failed swimming lesson, though, sends Nort on a journey of self-discovery with a friendly bird who suggests he might not be a "Quacking Duckling" but instead an "Oinking Duckling" or a "Mooing Duckling." The duo unsuccessfully visits a series of farm animals looking for somewhere Nort can fit in. Then a prowling wolf bursts onto the scene. Nort's identity reveals itself as he defends the other animals: a double-page spread announces in massive, flaming letters, "I'm a Fire-Breathing Duckling!" The wolf flees, and the rescued animals declare Nort a "very brave Fire-Breathing Duckling" indeed.

Cammuso's draconian twist on Hans Christian Andersen highlights the power of knowing oneself. His pencil and digital illustrations favor blue skies and adorable, cartoonish character design inside neat, black-lined panels. This fairy tale retelling should delight young comic readers looking for lighthearted fare. --Jaclyn Fulwood, youth services manager, Allen County Public Library