Although Claire McMillan's first novel is an homage to Edith Wharton's House of Mirth, Gilded Age also holds its own as an entertaining and thought-provoking exploration of marriage and societal expectations--and how to capture lasting happiness.

For Wharton's 1890s New York City, McMillan substitutes current-day Cleveland--presenting the city, like its predecessor, as a hotbed of gossip, tradition, wealth and superficial propriety. Her attention to the details of this Midwestern city transports the reader and affirms that provincialism, snobbery and ennui can be found in any place and time. Lily Bart is reinterpreted as Ellie Harr, a sumptuous beauty whose failed marriage brings her back to her native Cleveland to find a wealthy husband--as her childhood friends have done. "Ellie was used to being the most beautiful woman in the room where she went," McMillan writes, "but she carried it lightly. Her thick hair was the color of tobacco, subtly streaked with honey, and hung down her back like a royal mantle." 

Gilded Age is told primarily from the perspective of Ellie's oldest friend, who is happily married and pregnant with her first child; she recounts her friend's demise. The secondary characters are well crafted and authentic, even at their presumptuous worst, but the steady, reliable voice of the narrator is the true north of the novel. Although this is McMillan's debut, her ear for dialogue, eye for imagistic detail and astute commentary on the universal complexities of marriage, social status and independence--despite setting or class--is mature and deft. --Kristen Galles from Book Club Classics

Jess Walter (The Financial Lives of the Poets) gets better and better with each novel, and Beautiful Ruins has hit the trifecta: an irresistible story, rich characters and captivating Italian and Hollywood settings.

On an ordinary day in Porto Vergogna, an American actress, Dee Moray, is brought to the shores of Pasquale Tursi's pensione to rest from a terminal illness and to wait for A Man to arrive.

In several stories within the story, which moves from this small Italian village in 1962 to present-day Hollywood, Spokane, Wash., and Sandpoint, Idaho, we learn of Alvis Bender, who comes to Porto Vergogna for two weeks every year to write his book; in seven years, he has completed one chapter. We meet Claire, script reader for Hollywood producer Michael Deane, a devious conniver. Shane Wheeler is a writer with a pitch who enters the scene and becomes a translator at a crucial moment. In the background is the filming of Cleopatra. Liz and Richard are squabbling, drunk, breaking up two marriages.

It turns out that Dee isn't dying; she's pregnant. The baby's paternity is a stunner. Instead of going to Switzerland for a discreet abortion, Dee has the baby, names him Pat and gets on with her life. Pat and his girlfriend, Lydia, figure prominently in the story's wrap-up.

The story segues back and forth through years and characters and its entirety is sweetly and slowly revealed. This is a ripping great story filled with moments of hilarity, poignancy, dreams and invention. --Valerie Ryan, Cannon Beach Book Company, Ore.

In Mission to Paris, his 12th pre-World War II novel, Alan Furst introduces us to Frederic Stahl, a Hollywood actor who's been loaned out by his studio to a production company in Paris but quickly gets caught up in much larger dramas.

Stahl arrives in September 1938, just as Chamberlain is giving Hitler Czechoslovakia. As a European emigré (né Franz Stalka of Vienna), Stahl instinctively dislikes the Nazis, and he's caught off-guard by the Reich's efforts to undermine France with a propagandistic "rapprochement" campaign, which includes touches like a bribe to a well-placed official, a wealthy advertiser complaining about the editorial politics of a leading newspaper, a postcoital suggestion to a radio commentator. The Germans want Stahl in their corner, and a conversation with an official at the U.S. embassy compels him to consider the overture. The Roosevelt administration wants to take on the Nazis, but they lack public support, so they're trying to marshal the intelligence that would convince people the war is worth fighting. "You're not a spy," the diplomatic officer concedes; but, "if, in your time here you, ah, stumble on something, something important, it wouldn't be a bad idea if you let me know about it."

As shifting circumstances converge, the story gradually locks into place. When it does, our sympathetic identification with Stahl is so thoroughly formed that it heightens the dramatic tension that much more. If you've read Furst's previous novels, you'll recognize a familiar face or two along the way. If you haven't, it won't be too long before you're searching out his backlist. --Ron Hogan, founder of Beatrice.com

Mystery fans may be familiar with Colin Cotterill's popular Dr. Siri series, set in Laos. In 2011, though, Cotterill's Killed at the Whim of a Hat shifted to a new locale, in southern Thailand, and introduced a new detective: Jimm Juree, a woman who had "been one small kidney failure away from becoming the senior crime reporter at the Chiang Mai Mail" and now investigates cooking and dishwashing at her family's desolate Gulf Bay Lovely Resort and Restaurant along with her mother, brother and Grandad Jah.

Grandad, There's a Head on the Beach continues Jimm's story, which she describes as pretty boring until she comes across a severed head on the beach, the face staring "at me with one of those frightening Hallowe'en expressions." Encountering disinterest from officials, she takes it upon herself to find out who the victim is and why he was killed. It soon leads her to what seems to be a vibrant and deadly international slavery ring involving the Burmese immigrant population (an issue which Cotterill also tackled in his first novel, The Night Bastard).

Juree's first-person narration--laced with humor, sardonic asides and whimsy--is a joy to read, while the novel's Asian setting is filled to the brim with her appealing portrayal of intriguing family members and friends. --Tom Lavoie, former publisher

The biggest single bank casualty of the 2008 financial meltdown was Washington Mutual, and Kirsten Grind chronicled its fall for the Puget Sound Business Journal, coverage that earned her a place on the Pulitzer shortlist. Now, in The Lost Bank, she traces the bank's long history.

Washington Mutual was a no-frills institution that shepherded its customers' savings, helped them buy their homes on fixed-rate long-term mortgages, knew them by name. When Kerry Killinger took over as CEO in 1990, WaMu was a very profitable stock corporation. Killington vastly increased the bank's participation in writing sub-prime mortgages to questionable borrowers, then resold those mortgages to Wall Street investors. The bank's stock price rapidly rose, and Killington was named Banker of the Year in 2001.

But by 2008, nobody on Wall Street would touch WaMu when it desperately needed a buyer or capital investment. Bad loans, bad news and bad PR turned customer worry into a major run on deposits. The FDIC stepped in and closed the bank, selling selected branches and assets to JP Morgan on the cheap.

Grind's story has moments of humor and a broad cast of characters--and though we already know how it is going to end, the tragedy is moving. While the trend is to blame the financial meltdown on Wall Street, Grind shows us how a plethora of dysfunctional government agencies, coupled with a policy encouraging homeownership for all and investors chasing high yields no matter the risk, contributed just as much. --Bruce Jacobs, founding partner, Watermark Books & Cafe, Wichita, Kan.

Larry Tye brings his experience as a journalist and biographer to the behind-the-scenes story of one of the most recognized and popular figures in our modern consciousness: Superman.

He begins with the character's creation in the 1930s by Jerry Siegel and Joe Schuster, two Jewish boys from Cleveland with dreams of hitting it big. Superman leapt from the strip to the comic book relatively early, a trend that continues to this day as the character and his stories successfully transition to each new media technology soon after its creation. Siegel and Schuster sold the rights to Superman early on--to pornographers who turned around and made a fortune selling pulp fiction to children--but remain on the periphery of his success across the years, making appeals to the better nature of DC Comics, the current owners of the popular superhero, and filing lawsuits to reclaim their stake in the character.

Superman has led the vanguard of superheroes over the decades, but has somehow always been able to remain true to his universal appeal, even as the comic book, television and film stories change to fit the times. Readers who want to learn the true-life saga of this enduring symbol will thrill to Tye's engaging style as he reveals every detail, large and small, in the extensive history of the most iconic of all modern superheroes. --Rob LeFebvre, freelance writer and editor

The team behind Duck for a Day presents a clever picture book that pokes fun at bears, fairy tales and the way a tale can overtake even its own author.

"Hi I'm Ella, and this is my book," the story begins. "You can tell it's a book because there are words everywhere. Words like Once upon a time and Happily ever after and The END." Ella knows everything about the book, and "there are NO BEARS in it." But the pictures tell a different story. A bear in a bee-patterned tunic reads behind a dumpster and peers in from the side of a page--always out of Ella's view. In her book, Ella plays the part of the princess and summons a fairy godmother--"But NO BEARS." No bears in the castle; no bears in "the deep, dark forest in the faraway lands." When a monster tries to capture the princess, the bear borrows the fairy godmother's wand and plays the silent hero.

Rudge plays with the framework of the spiralbound book Ella's writing, sometimes confining the scene to those pages, and other times spilling outside of them. Ella remains convinced that NO BEARS appeared in her story: "Not one!" But readers know differently. Youngsters will enjoy catching sight of Rapunzel, the three pigs and other classic characters, as well as the Owl and the Pussycat, who ferry the monster across a river. This funny, witty picture book is a great conversation starter about the structure of fairy tales and the role of the narrator. --Jennifer M. Brown, children's editor, Shelf Awareness

Part farce, part comedy of manners, Kindl's (Owl in Love) novel transports readers to the world of Jane Austen, and a society where "ideal match" has little to do with the heart and all to do with title and, preferably, money.

Seventeen-year-old Althea Crawley may be "one of the most beautiful women in Europe," but she has no dowry, and no filter. That, however, makes her an irresistible narrator. Take this opening scene of courtship. "I love you, Althea--you are so beautiful," says Mr. Godalming. " 'I love you too,' I confessed. I averted my gaze and added privately, 'You are so rich.' Unfortunately, I apparently said this aloud." And there goes a promising prospective match. How will Althea keep her family's castle from crumbling into the North Sea?

After the death of Althea's father, her mother remarried for wealth, but her second husband died swiftly, leaving behind two more daughters to support. With three marriageable young women in the house, and a parade of men from London arriving to attend a titled neighbor's ball, one can imagine the shenanigans. One of those visiting men is even more filterless than Althea: Mr. Fredericks, cousin to Lord Boring. He rifles through the Crawleys' tapestries and proclaims their portrait frames of "shoddy workmanship."

Kindl layers on the intrigue, some of it introduced by additional characters. Even though readers will figure out her proper match before Althea does, her adventures are the stuff of great entertainment, and the witty repartee makes the pages fly. --Jennifer M. Brown, children's editor, Shelf Awareness