This column was submitted by Evangeline Cessna, local history librarian at the Warren County Vicksburg Public Library.

This week we are featuring fiction from our New Adult Fiction and New Large Print collections. The first three titles listed are new adult fiction and the last three are new large print titles.

The latest in Robert B. Parker’s Spenser series by Mike Lupica is titled Hot Property. Spenser is waiting out the latest Boston snowstorm when he gets word that Rita Fiore has been shot. His relationship with Rita is complicated—they’re more than simple friends or acquaintances. Honestly, Rita is family. And family will always be protected. Rita is no stranger to controversy. She is a pit-bull in and out of the courtroom, so, as one of the city’s toughest lawyers, Spenser knows that there’s no short list of suspects who might want to enact revenge. With Rita’s life hanging in the balance, it’s up to him to get to the bottom of things, even if it means unearthing some unsavory secrets that might just lead him into an age-old game of lies and deceit.

Brett Battles continues Stuart Woods’ Teddy Fay series with his latest Golden Hour. Teddy Fay is ready to embark on the European press tour of Peter Barrington’s latest film Storm’s Eye, when he receives an unexpected visit from Lance Cabot, director of the CIA. It seems there’s bad news: several operatives have turned up dead and the common denominator is a mission Teddy was involved in code named Golden Hour. Lance wants Teddy to use his trip as a cover to investigate who is behind these killings. From Venice and Budapest to their last stop at a film festival in Berlin, Teddy must dodge excited fans, enamored women, and a few too many assassins who seem dead set on tracking down Golden Hour agents. And if Teddy doesn’t work fast enough, his identity—and life—might just be the next target in the killer’s ruthless plot for revenge.

If you are in the mood for something a bit more atmospheric and fantastical, then try The Bog Wife by Kay Chronister. The Haddesley family from West Virginia have tended their cranberry bog since settling in the area. In exchange, the bog sustains them. This strict covenant is renewed each generation with the ritual sacrifice of their patriarch, and in return, the bog produces a “bog-wife.” She is brought to life from the vegetation and is meant to carry on the family line. Middle child Wenna, summoned back to the dilapidated family manor just as her marriage is collapsing, believes the Haddesleys’ must abandon their patrimony. Her siblings are not so easily persuaded. Eldest daughter Eda, de facto head of the household, seeks to salvage the compact by desecrating it. Younger son Percy retreats into the wilderness in a dangerous bid to summon his own bog-wife. And as youngest daughter Nora takes desperate measures to keep her warring siblings together, fledgling patriarch Charlie uncovers a disturbing secret that casts doubt over everything the family has ever believed about itself.

Lazarus Man by Richard Price presents intertwining portraits of a group of engrossing and unique characters whose lives are permanently impacted by a disaster. In East Harlem in 2008, five-story tenement collapses into a burning pile of rubble, flattening the cars parked in front and coating the street with a thick layer of ash. As the city’s rescue services and media outlets respond, the surrounding neighborhood descends into chaos. At day’s end, six bodies are recovered, but many of the other tenants are missing.  Anthony Carter―whose miraculous survival, after being buried for days beneath tons of brick and stone, transforms him into a man with a message and a passionate sense of mission. Felix Pearl―a young transplant to the city, whose photography and film work that day provokes in this previously unformed soul a sharp sense of personal destiny. Royal Davis―owner of a failing Harlem funeral home, whose desperate trolling of the scene for potential “customers” triggers a quest to find another path in life. And Mary Roe―a veteran city detective who, driven in part by her own family’s brutal history, becomes obsessed with finding Christopher Diaz, one of the building’s missing.

The Last One is a romantic fantasy by Rachel Howzell Hall. Kai awakens in the woods of a desolate land of sickness and unnatural beasts with no idea who she is or how she got there. She does no that if she cannot reach the Sea of Devour, then things will get worse. When she sees the village blacksmith fight off invaders using incredible skill, she reluctantly decides to accept his offer of help. If only he weren’t as skilled at annoying Kai as he is at fighting. On her journey for answers, she only finds more questions, especially with regards to the blacksmith who both arouses and infuriates her. All she knows is that no one is what, or who, they appear to be.

The latest Kate Burkholder novel from Linda Castillo is titled The Burning. Newlywed Chief of Police Kate Burkholder is awakened by an urgent midnight call summoning her to a suspicious fire in the woods. When she arrives at the scene, she discovers a charred body. According to the coroner, the deceased, an Amish man named Milan Swanz, was chained to a stake and burned alive. It is an appalling and eerily symbolic crime against an upstanding husband and father. Kate knows all too well that the Amish prefer to handle their problems without interference from the outside world, and no one will speak about the murdered man. From what she’s able to piece together, Swanz led a deeply troubled life and had recently been excommunicated. But if that’s the case, why are the Amish so reluctant to talk about him? Are they protecting the memory of one of their own? Or are they afraid of something they dare not share?