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A CLOSER LOOK AT MAY’S SIX BOOK CLUB-WORTHY TITLES

AMERICA

By Mike Bond

The 1960s shook America to its foundation — the assassination of an idealistic young president, a tragic and unpopular war, a battle for civil rights, a cosmic clash of riots and burning cities, and an explosion of sex, drugs and rock ’n roll.

For four young people, the ‘60s is a decade of promise and freedom. For orphaned Troy, it’s the joy of living with his new family and exploring the world of flight and outer space. For Tara, the girl he loves, the power of song as she evolves into a rock ’n roll star. For his new brother, Mick, a football hero and rebel, a time to question everything, including the fast-growing war in Vietnam. And for Daisy, the girl Mick loves, a chance to fight for equality, join the Peace Corps, and expand her study of the human mind.

America is the first of Mike Bond’s seven-volume historical novel series, capturing the victories and heartbreaks of the last 70 years and of our nation’s most profound upheavals since the Civil War — a time that defined the end of the 20th Century and where we are today.

THE AUTHOR

Mike Bond is the author of nine critically-acclaimed, bestselling novels, an award-winning poet, ecologist, and journalist. He has covered wars, revolutions, terrorism, military dictatorships and death squads in the Middle East, Latin America, Asia and Africa, and environmental crises worldwide. His novels depict the innate hunger of the human heart for good, the intense joys of love, the terror and fury of battle, the sinister deceptions of governments and corporations, and the vanishing beauty of the natural world.

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To learn more about Mike, visit his website.

SUMMER CLUB

By Katherine Dean Mazerov

Murder meets the absurd in this sizzling thriller.

Normally, politics and parent drama, drunken soirees and sex-capades reign at Lydia Phillips’s swim and tennis club. Now, a strange car following the club manager, a break-in at Lydia’s home, and a shocking discovery on the club grounds have this stay-at-home mom dusting off her newspaper-reporting skills to unravel the mystery. But when a body surfaces in the river, Lydia’s life gets a whole lot more complicated — and dangerous.

In one moment, readers of Summer Club will be laughing at the colorful characters’ outrageous antics. The next moment, they will be riveted as the story reveals a troubling, complex scheme involving fraud and murder.

Perfect for parents balancing career and family, Summer Club casts a beam of dark humor across the hidden reality that sometimes makes domestic life more harrowing than the most cutthroat of corporate jobs.

THE AUTHOR

Career journalist Katherine Dean (Katie) Mazerov writes stories that resonate with people. She has been a magazine writer, worked in corporate communications for a Fortune 500 company, and written extensively on trends, market outlook and emerging technologies for the global energy industry. As an editor at The Denver Post, Katie was a member of the team that won the 2000 Pulitzer Prize for breaking news reporting. Decades after launching her career, she remains passionate about writing, expanding her horizons along the way as a wife, mom, tennis player, skier, cyclist and world traveler. She lives in Greenwood Village, Colorado.

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Read BookTrib’s review of Summer Club.

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To learn more about Katie, visit her website.

ORIGINAL WISDOM: HARNESS THE POWER OF THE AUTHENTIC YOU

By Donna Bond

A transformative memoir that reminds us how practicing self-love can uplift our lives.

You are a beautiful, empowered, radiant, drop of God. You are a divine spiritual being on a human adventure. You are here to express the magnificence that is you. You are here to learn to respect, honor, and love your sweet self and your whole life. Donna Bond is here to remind you how.

With this uplifting guide to personal evolution, you will:

Celebrate your Human Self with reverence and trust your Higher Self with confidence.
Learn to embrace everything on your path, so you can continue to grow.
Let go of old identities and stories of not-enoughness to be more of you.
Observe the miracles in your daily life to enrich your experience.
Reclaim your authentic self with this illuminating memoir of personal transformation for women based on the practice of Spiritual Psychology. By integratig the wholeness of your Higher Self and your Human Self, you will transform your consciousness and empower your life from the inside out. Walk with Bond as she shares her profound journey with you. Awaken Soul-centered practice for self-love. Learn how to be happy with yourself and your life. Activate the authentic power that resides within you — your Original Wisdom.

THE AUTHOR

Donna Bond, M.A., is a Soul-centered catalyst for personal transformation. An Igniter of Light, she serves as an author, a speaker, a spiritual life and business coach, and a personal transformation consultant. Supporting individual transformation of consciousness, she helps clients across the globe evolve into new heights of meaningful success, personal fulfillment, and spiritual aliveness. She and her husband, award-winning oil painter Paul Bond, live part-time in both Southern California and Costa Rica with their two cats, Mystic and Rumi.

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Follow Donna Bond on FacebookTwitter and Instagram.

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To learn more about Donna, visit her website.

FINDING NAPOLEON

By Margaret Rodenberg

Two hundred years after Napoleon’s death, this elegant, richly researched novel reveals the man history conceals.

After the defeated Emperor Napoleon goes into exile on tiny St. Helena Island in the remote South Atlantic, he and his lover, Albine de Montholon, plot to escape and rescue his young son. Banding together African slaves, British sympathizers, a Jewish merchant, a Corsican rogue, and French followers, they confront British opposition ― as well as treachery within their own ranks ― with sometimes subtle, sometimes bold, but always desperate action.

When Napoleon and Albine break faith with one another, ambition and Albine’s husband threaten their reconciliation. To survive, Albine must decide whom to betray. To succeed, Napoleon must learn whom to trust.

With its delightful adaptation of Napoleon Bonaparte’s real attempt to write a novel, Finding Napoleon offers a fresh take on Europe’s most powerful man after he’s lost everything. The audacious Albine de Montholon narrates their tale of intrigue, love and betrayal.

THE AUTHORS

Margaret Rodenberg’s passion for French history began when she lived in France as a young teen with her US Navy family. An avid traveler who has visited over 60 countries, she has journeyed more than 30,000 miles to conduct Napoleonic research, including to St. Helena Island in the remote South Atlantic. She’s a former businesswoman, an award-winning writer, and a proud director of the Napoleonic Historical Society, a nonprofit that promotes knowledge of the Napoleonic era. She lives near Washington, DC.

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To learn more about Margaret, visit her website.

JACOBO’S RAINBOW

By David Hirshberg

“A highly original novel by an inspired chronicler of fact and fiction that reveals our darkest instincts while celebrating our innate humanity,” says Barbara Josselsohn, author of The Lilac House.

On the 15th anniversary of a transformative event in Jacobo’s life — the day he is sent to jail —he writes about what happened behind the scenes of the Free Speech Movement, providing the backdrop for a riveting story centered on his emergence into a world he never could have imagined. His recording of those earlier events is the proximate cause of his being arrested. Allowed to leave jail under the condition of being drafted, Jacobo engages in gruesome fighting in Vietnam and returns to continue his work of chronicling America in the throes of significant societal changes.

Jacobo’s Rainbow is a story of triumph over adversity — hypocrisy, loss, lies, murder, concealment, prejudice — told with vivid descriptions, perceptive insights, humor and sensitivity, which enables the reader to identify with the characters who come to life in a realistic fashion to illustrate who we are, how we behave, and what causes us to change.

THE AUTHOR

David Hirshberg is the author of the multiple-award-winning debut novel My Mother’s Son (2018), Jacobo’s Rainbow (2021), and A Stone’s Throw, scheduled to be published in 2022. Hirshberg holds an undergraduate degree from Dartmouth College and a master’s degree from the University of Pennsylvania. He lives with his wife and two setters in Westchester County, New York.

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To learn more about David, visit his website.

THE VENICE SKETCHBOOK

by Rhys Bowen

Love and secrets collide in Venice during WWII in an enthralling novel of brief encounters and lasting romance by the New York Times bestselling author of The Tuscan Child and Above the Bay of Angels.

Caroline Grant is struggling to accept the end of her marriage when she receives an unexpected bequest. Her beloved great-aunt Lettie leaves her a sketchbook, three keys, and a final whisper…Venice. Caroline’s quest: to scatter Juliet “Lettie” Browning’s ashes in the city she loved and to unlock the mysteries stored away for more than sixty years.

It’s 1938 when art teacher Juliet Browning arrives in romantic Venice. For her students, it’s a wealth of history, art, and beauty. For Juliet, it’s poignant memories and a chance to reconnect with Leonardo Da Rossi, the man she loves whose future is already determined by his noble family. However star-crossed, nothing can come between them. Until the threat of war closes in on Venice and they’re forced to fight, survive, and protect a secret that will bind them forever.

Key by key, Lettie’s life of impossible love, loss, and courage unfolds. It’s one that Caroline can now make right again as her own journey of self-discovery begins.

THE AUTHOR

Rhys Bowen is the New York Times bestselling author of more than forty novels, including The Victory Garden, The Tuscan Child, and the World War II-based In Farleigh Field, the winner of the Left Coast Crime Award for Best Historical Mystery Novel and the Agatha Award for Best Historical Novel. Bowen’s work has won twenty honors to date, including multiple Agatha, Anthony, and Macavity awards. Her books have been translated into many languages, and she has fans around the world, including seventeen thousand Facebook followers. A transplanted Brit, Bowen divides her time between California and Arizona.

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Follow Rhys Bowen on FacebookTwitter and Instagram.

Invite Rhys to your book club.

To learn more about Rhys, visit her website.

CONTACT: Jim Alkon, Editorial Director | BookTrib | jim@booktrib.com | 203-226-0199 | www.booktrib.com