Bestseller Read-Alikes for the Week of May 21st

Can’t wait to get your hands on the latest best-seller, but the hold list is too long? To tide you over, every week we’ll offer similar titles and authors to the week’s fiction and nonfiction best sellers.

Fiction

This week's #1 book on the fiction bestsellers list is 11th Hour by James Patterson & Maxine Paetro. The latest installation in The Women's Murder Club series finds the four women - a homicide detective, a medical examiner, an assistant district attorney and a crime reporter - investigating the the murder of a millionaire who was killed with a weapon linked to the deaths of four San Francisco criminals. Detective Lindsay Boxer is horrified to realize that the killer could be among her closest friends.

You can catch up with the series beginning with 1st to Die (2001). While 11th Hour can be read on its own, it helps to know the personal back stories of the recurring characters.

Other books with similar writing styles and themes include:

Tess Gerritsen - Author of the best-selling Rizzoli and Isles series, Gerritsen uses her knowledge as a physician to write detail-rich, fast-paced mysteries. Her plots often follow contemporary medical issues, as well as questions of medical ethics. Whether possessing the medical or the investigative expertise, Gerritsen's heroines must work their way through medical clues and track the villains, all while facing life-or-death situations. Try The Surgeon, the first in the series.

John Sandford - Like Patterson, Sandford writes fast-paced suspenseful crime novels, in series and stand-alone formats. The crimes are often committed by a serial killer, and the atmosphere of the novels is generally menacing and dark, with graphic descriptions of violence. Try Broken Prey, from the Lucas Davenport series.

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Nonfiction

This week's #1 nonfiction book is The Years of Lyndon Johnson: The Passage of Power by Robert A. Caro. The conclusion in his multivolume biography former president Lyndon Johnson - The Path to Power (1982), Means of Ascent (1990), Master of the Senate (2002) - highlights five key years in Johnson's life, beginning in 1958 with his presidential campaign and ending in 1964 after John F. Kennedy's assassination. Drawing on thousands of interviews and documents, Caro paints an intriguing and detailed portrait of Johnson from the tension between him and the Kennedy brothers, to the political maneuvering (and strong-arming) that lead to the successful passage of the the Civil Rights Act of 1964.

Other books similar to The Years of Lyndon Johnson: The Passage of Power include:

Lone Star Rising (1991) and Flawed Giant (1998) by Robert Dallek - Another multivolume examination of Lyndon Johnson and his legacy, this time authored by a presidential historian, and casts the former president in more sympathetic light than other biographer's have. Tracing his life and career from his childhood in Texas to his eventual selection as JFK's running mate and then to the presidency,  Dallek attributes Johnson's reputation as a "wheeler-dealer" to his genuine desire to help the disadvantaged.  

Theodore Rex, by Edmund Morris - The sequel to the 1979 biography The Rise of Theodore Roosevelt , Morris describes Theodore Roosevelt's presidency as he faced the challenges of a new century in which the United States would become a world power, and discusses his accomplishments and failures, the enemies he made, and his family life.

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If you'd like more recommendations, stop by the Recommendations Desk on the first floor, check out NoveList Plus on the library's website, or visit W. 11th & Bluff next week for more reading suggestions. Or submit a Personal Recommendations request, and we'll create a reading list just for you!