If "The Mexican Gardener" were a movie, you’d be well served to finish your popcorn during the previews because there isn’t a lot of downtime during the story. Len Lamensdorf starts with urgent action: chemist José Rivera-Diego is... Read More

Martial artists study contrasts: deep calm gives way to heated battle in the blink of an eye. Loren W. Christensen, himself a black belt several times over, cleverly captures this balancing act in "Dukkha Reverb", the second novel in his... Read More

Intrepid CIA operative Victoria Pierce trades the sandstorms of Sudan for the Ukrainian steppes in the latest spy thriller from accomplished author Molly Best Tinsley. In Satan’s Chamber, Tinsley introduced Pierce as a novice who... Read More

Our ever-changing perception of reality is at the heart of Michael James Rizza’s unsettling debut novel. In "Cartilage and Skin", Rizza shines an uncomfortable light on his voyeuristic antihero, Dr. Parker, an eccentric recluse holed... Read More

The great American road trip takes a dark turn in C. J. Howell’s moody debut thriller. As we hitch a ride in a musty Malibu with an off-the-grid drifter called Tom, we travel not only the reservation roads of the Southwest but also the... Read More

Does the world’s tallest bungee jump sound like adventure? How about drag racing in Los Angeles or swimming with sharks Down Under? Too crazy? Not crazy enough? Then imagine sand-boarding in Namibia, a wife-carrying race in Finland,... Read More

Guidebooks are well and fine, certainly a “must” for travelers, along with good walking shoes. But sometimes we crave the experience without the airports, foreign language, and sore heels. "The Little Book of Japan" provides an... Read More

Fifty million people visited Manhattan last year, and those who put a museum on their itinerary probably chose the Metropolitan Museum of Art. Janet Halpern and Harvey Applebaum have nothing against the Met, but they’d like you to know... Read More