Donald Maass Literary Agency

Kirkus: The daughter of a famous self-help author struggles when she must join a tour celebrating the 25th anniversary of her mother’s bestselling book, Letters to My Someday Daughter.

Logical, driven, precise Audrey is everything Camilla St. Vrain, her yoga-practicing, emotionally distant, image-conscious mother, is not, but she still winds up accompanying her on a nationwide press tour. This means that Johns Hopkins–bound Audrey must give up a place in a prestigious summer program for pre-med students at UPenn that her similarly ambitious boyfriend is attending. Along for the tour is Sadie, the accomplished young doctor Camilla hired to introduce Audrey to medical professionals around the country. They’re also accompanied by three spontaneous interns, Cleo, Mick, and Silas. Audrey’s evolving relationships with each of them, but particularly with Silas, to whom she is quickly drawn, turn out to be the catalyst she needs to re-examine many of her thoughts about herself and her place in the world. Audrey’s transformation from non-emotive and somewhat flat to multidimensional is portrayed with convincing complexity and appealing measures of both humor and earnestness. Some readers may anticipate the twist toward the end, but it still adds an interesting layer to this contemporary drama. Most characters read white; Chloe is Japanese American. Sadie is married to a woman. There’s a brief, entertaining encounter with a character from O’Clover’s Seven Percent of Ro Devereux (2023).

Booklist: Get ready to travel to the French Quarter for a wild weekend. In Lynch’s latest, originally published as an e-book in 2022, Rosalee is excited to marry the man of her dreams and can’t wait to celebrate her upcoming nuptials in New Orleans. Her best friend, cousin, mother-in-law, sister-in-law, and fiancé’s friend will all stay the weekend at a fancy historical mansion. The six will indulge in extravagant meals and a night on the town drinking and dancing. What could go wrong? As tensions begin to run high, the weekend will end in murder, and Detective Nina Smalls will be called upon to solve the crime. Rosalee must survive her bachelorette party in order to make it to the altar. This locked-room mystery is filled with nasty characters with sinister motives. Lynch explores themes of revenge, classism, and domestic violence. Readers will not see the twists coming in this thriller perfect for fans of Ruth Ware, Lucy Foley, and Shari Lapena.

Kirkus: When bullying triggers Hector’s unsuspected ability to turn invisible, it seems like a superpower—but he’s not invisible to the monster lurking at school.

At home, sixth grader Hector faces bullying stepbrothers and a stepfather who values sports over piano. He was reconciled to his Catholic boys’ school thanks to best friend Blake—until Hector asked Blake to be his boyfriend, and Blake (despite having two moms) turned into a homophobic bully. After Hector discovers his power of invisibility while hiding from Blake, he encounters former pupil Orson, who’s been stuck there for years being invisible and pursued by the tentacled gelim, who entraps vulnerable students and feeds on their fears. As a gay boy and a Black boy (respectively) in a predominantly white school, Hector and Orson are easy targets. Wanting to save Orson and defeat the gelim, Hector finds allies in school librarian Mr. Morhill and Samantha, Mr. Morhill’s niece, a fellow student others perceive as a boy; Orson is also an active participant who supports Hector. Throughout his ordeals, Hector still hopes Blake will return to normal. This well-structured story is threaded with themes of misjudgment, misunderstanding, forgetting, and forgiveness. Both the visible and invisible worlds are evocatively described, and the characters are believably flawed. Despite mitigating circumstances, Hector’s swift forgiveness of Blake may sit uneasily with some readers, and while the gelim is suitably terrifying, the convoluted details about how it functions may be confusing.

Invisibility offers no protection in this well-paced, multilayered horror story.

Booklist: In their third adult contemporary romance, following Never Vacation with Your Ex (2023), married writing duo Wibberley and Siegemund-Broka explore the relationship between a famous pop star and the man who inspired her greatest hit. Riley Wynn has finally attained mainstream success with her newest album and its lead single, but everyone thinks the song is about her famous ex-husband. Determined to reclaim the narrative, she asks her ex-college-boyfriend, Max Harcourt, to go public as its real inspiration. Max agrees only if he can come on tour with her band, and soon he and Riley realize there may be more than break-up songs in their future. Wibberley and Siegemund-Broka prove they are masters of the second-chance romance, getting the essentials just right—lingering chemistry, intense longing, and two people who have regrets about the past and one more chance to make it right. Max and Riley are believable as both romantic leads and fully formed characters with conflicting desires, and readers will laugh and swoon as they find their way back to each other through music.