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Hazel’s murder. Wright eloquently
weaves in Imogene’s faith and belief in
redemption, and the prose easily jumps
between the two eras as Aggie gets closer
to the truth. Fans of Terri Blackstock
will love this. Agent: Janet Kobobel, Books
& Such. (Dec.)
Remember Me: A Novella About
Finding Our Way to the Cross
Sharon Garlough Brown. IVP, $20 (144p)
ISBN 978-0-8308-4670-2
Brown follows up Shades of Light with
this pleasing novella that continues the
story of Wren Crawford and Kit Rhodes,
who first met at New Hope Retreat Center
in rural
Michigan. Wren
is still over-
coming depres-
sion and grief
after the death
of her friend
Casey. She gets
help from Kit,
director of New
Hope, who has
been a comfort
throughout Wren’s recovery. But as Kit
helps Wren, Kit’s own emotional wounds
reopen, though she’d thought they were
long since dealt with. Through a series of
faith-filled letters to Wren, Kit reflects on
her past, including a difficult divorce and
the quick remarriage of her ex-husband.
Wren, meanwhile, works through her
grief and finds some happiness in the
paintings she makes for New Hope’s
Journey to the Cross prayer walk. Through
Kit’s letters and Wren’s paintings—ren-
dered in colorful prints by artist Elizabeth
Ivy Hawkins—the characters’ quiet battles
to overcome trauma become outlets for
opening themselves to God’s love. Brown’s
stirring tale also comes with a Journey to
the Cross reflection guide, making this
perfect for Christians who appreciate stories
that dive deeply into scripture. (Dec.)
Hearts Set Free
Jess Lederman. Azure Star, $14.95 trade
paper (398p) ISBN 978-0-9986-0301-8
Lederman’s powerful debut interlaces
three stories that span nearly a century and
are tied together by a church of outcasts in
Las Vegas. Luke Noongwook and his
mother, Yura, leave the Alaskan territory
in 1925 to
search for Luke’s
father, who left
his family for a
beautiful
woman that
Yura vows to
kill. Earlier,
during the
height of WWI,
boxer and bible
school dropout
David Gold struggles with deep questions
about God and about what God wants of
him. After a bout, he is recruited by a
prostitute to be the head pastor of the
Church of the Heart Set Free in Las Vegas.
In that position he preaches to a diverse cast
of repentant sinners and, years later, meets
Luke and Yura and offers to teach them
about God. In 2011, television producer
Tim Faber and his lover, Joan Reed, head
to Las Vegas to interview the elderly Luke
for a story. Tim puts his faith in science
rather than God, but his search for pleasure
in sin city leaves him questioning matters
of the soul. Meanwhile, Joan rediscovers
the faith of her youth after speaking with
Luke. While it can be a challenge to keep
track of the many supporting characters,
Lederman smoothly weds each of the three
plotlines through the Church of the Heart
Set Free. Readers of inspirational fiction
will love this moving story that affirms
the power of God’s mercy. (Self-published.)Comics
The Little Blue Kite
Mark Z. Danielewski. Pantheon, $25.95 (96p)
ISBN 978-1-5247-4769-5
This adult picture book aspires to strike
inspiration as an all-ages fable in the mold
of The Little Prince or The Giving Tree, but
like many other attempted followers of this
formula, it falls flat. Kai, a curly-haired
boy in a yellow shirt, is given a blue kite
by a teacher and told to fly it “when you’re
ready.” He spends the rest of the book
building up the courage to fly the kite into
the Murk, a depressing smog that sur-
rounds his undefined world. Danielewski,
who made his name with the postmodern
horror novel House of Leaves and has spent
recent years working on a series of 27
interconnected novels, fills this short textwith positive messages about self-assurance,
kindness, fighting depression, and culti-
vating “gentle thoughts.” But they come
off as more cloying than enlightening, and
the climactic moral doesn’t seem partic-
ularly connected to the rest of the story.
Danielewski plays with typography and
continues a favorite stylistic quirk: printing
important words and phrases in colored
text. The art by Gonzales, who only receives
credit on a back page, is oddly amateurish,
with ugly human figures pasted on top of
computer-generated skies. The good
intentions are overwhelmed by poor crafts-
manship and awkward storytelling. (Nov.)Bury the Lede
Gaby Dunn and Claire Roe. Boom! Studios,
$19.99 trade paper (128p) ISBN 978-1-68415-
427-2
A modern take on crime noir, this elab-
orate thriller stars the ambitious, bisexual,
and occasionally devious Madison Jackson,
a news intern at the Boston Lede. While the
gig starts out as making coffee or grabbing
quotes for senior staff, Madison is both
shaken and elated when she happens to
stumble in as one of the first reporters on
the scene of a crime. Dahlia Kennedy, the
wife of a wealthy man, is being arrested
for the murder of her husband and won’t
reveal the location of her missing son. Every
newspaper in the city is clamoring to get
the scoop from the icy Dahlia; inexplicably,
she decides to “confess” to Madison, and
refuses to talk to anyone else. Unprepared
for the spotlight, Madison tries to solve
the mystery from within the middle of
the scandal, unsure if she’s reporting the
story or part of it. Between chasing plot-
twisting leads, she tries not to fall for the
flirtations of Dahlia (while also diving
into dalliances both with a senior reporter
and one of her best sources, a cop). Dunn
delivers a script packed with a diverse cast
with distinctive personalities, while Roe’s
angled renderings of characters’ body lan-
guage are starkly framed in the panel
design, recalling classic noir cinema. Fans
of the genre will be sucked in by this fast-
paced tale of manipulation, intrigue, and
self-discovery. (Oct.)Heroes in Crisis
Tom King and Clay Mann. DC, $29.99 (248p)
ISBN 978-1-4012-9142-6
King (the Mister Miracle series) con-