September, 2010
9 AM (Mon-Fri)
HOME TO HOLLY SPRINGS
by Jan Karon
Read by Jonie LaBouff. (14 episodes, 8/12-9/01/10)
With
Home to Holly Springs, New York Times-bestselling author Jan
Karon launches a new series, The Father Tim Novels, featuring
the retired Episcopal priest that her readers have come to love.
With all the deep feeling, insight, and humor that fans of the
Mitford series cherish, Karon in this novel takes Father Tim on
a journey to his hometown of Holly Springs, Mississippi. A host
of fascinating encounters with people along the way ensure that
the trip is colorful, though as Father Tim arrives in response
to a mysterious summons, he may discover that home is where the
heart is but also where secrets are hidden.
MAJOR PETTIGREW’S LAST STAND
by Helen Simonson
Read by Marty Kwatinetz. (15 episodes, 9/01-9/21/10)
Written
with a delightfully dry sense of humour and the wisdom of a born
storyteller, Major Pettigrew's Last Stand explores the risks one
takes when pursuing happiness in the face of family obligation
and tradition.
When retired Major Pettigrew strikes up an unlikely friendship
with Mrs. Ali, the Pakistani village shopkeeper, he is drawn out
of his regimented world and forced to confront the realities of
life in the twenty-first century. Brought together by a shared
love of literature and the loss of their respective spouses, the
Major and Mrs. Ali soon find their friendship on the cusp of
blossoming into something more. But although the Major was
actually born in Lahore, and Mrs. Ali was born in Cambridge,
village society insists on embracing him as the quintessential
local and her as a permanent foreigner. The Major has always
taken special pride in the village, but will he be forced to
choose between the place he calls home and a future with Mrs.
Ali?
TEACHING THE PIG TO DANCE: A MEMOIR OF
GROWING UP AND SECOND CHANCES
by Fred Thompson
Read by Sally Miller. (10 episodes, 9/22-10/05/10)
Fred
Thompson has enjoyed a remarkable career in Hollywood and
politics, but when he sat down to write a memoir about how he
got to be the person he is, he discovered that his best stories
all seemed to come out of the years he spent growing up in and
around his hometown of Lawrenceburg, Tennessee. It was a small
town but not the smallest—after all, it was the county seat and
it did have a courthouse, a couple of movie theaters, and its
own Davy Crockett statue. For truly small, you had to travel to
nearby Summertown, where the regular Sunday dinner was possum
and chocolate gravy. But Lawrenceburg is where Fred got to be a
kid, get in his share of trouble and scrapes, get to know folks
he didn’t realize were so colorful at the time but sure does
now, get married, have a few kids, become a man, and start his
career as a country lawyer (pretty much in that order). And as
Fred tells it, getting that law degree was something of a
surprise for him, since in school he’d been less than stellar as
a scholar. “Teaching Latin to someone like me,” he says, “was
like trying to teach a pig to dance. It’s a waste of the
teacher’s time and it irritates the pig.”
In these reflections, as hilarious as they are honest and warm,
Fred touches on the influences—family, hometown neighbors and
teachers, team sports, jobs, romances, and personal crises—that
molded his character, his politics, and the way he looks at life
today. We get to know the unforgettable characters who
congregated at the Blue Ribbon Café, like the rotund gentleman
called “Shorty” whose claim to fame was his ability to quickly
suck in his stomach and cause his pants to fall to the floor. Or
Fred’s Grandma Thompson, who became an early TV adopter for the
sole purpose of watching “Wrestling from Hollywood” and who once
had a “gourder” removed from her neck and subsequently walked
around town with it in a handkerchief showing it to folks. One
day Fred and an accomplice placed small explosive Fourth of July
“cracker balls” under the four legs of their teacher’s chair.
Mrs. Garner sat down and, despite the racket, didn’t flinch so
much as a muscle—but Fred felt a twinge of the one emotion he
hated most—shame. Fred idolized Coach Staggs from his high
school football days, even though he was “like Captain Ahab
without the humor” and didn’t like smart alecks, comics, or
individualists, which put the young Fred at a disadvantage. More
than anyone else from those days though, Fred remembers his mom
and dad, who taught him that kids are shaped most of all by the
love and support they can take for granted.
Teaching the Pig to Dance will delight everyone who
admires Fred Thompson for his contributions to politics or for
his work in movies and on TV, along with all those who just love
to hear rollicking but unforgettable stories about growing up in
a place where, as one of the local old timers put it, “We
weren’t big enough to have a town drunk, so a few of us had to
take turns.”
10 AM (Mon-Fri)
INSIDE OF A DOG
by Alexandria Horowitz
Read by Rosemary Scalessa (10 episodes, 8/20-9/02/10)
 |
Psychology professor and dog person Horowitz was studying
the ethology (the science of animal behavior) of white
rhinos and bonobos at the San Diego Zoo when she realized
that her research techniques could just as easily apply to
dogs at the local dog park; there, she began to see
"snapshots of the minds of the dogs" in their play. Over
eight years of study, she's found that, though humans bond
with their dogs closely, they're clueless when it comes to
understanding what dogs perceive-leading her to the
not-inconsequential notion that dogs know us better than we
know them. Horowitz begins by inviting readers into a dog's
umwelt-his worldview-by imagining themselves living 18
inches or so above the ground, with incredible olfactory
senses comparable to the human capacity for detailed sight
in three dimensions (though dogs' sight, in combination with
their sense of smell, may result in a more complex
perception of "color" than humans can imagine). Social and
communications skills are also explored, as well as the
practicalities of dog owning (Horowitz disagrees with the
"pack" approach to dog training). Dog lovers will find this
book largely fascinating, despite Horowitz's meandering
style and somnolent tone.
HERK: HERO OF THE SKIES
by Joseph E. Dabney
Read by Mack Secord. (13 episodes, 9/03-9/21/10)
Herk: Hero of the Skies is the story of the C-130
Hercules aircraft and its involvement in military,
scientific, and humanitarian missions around the world. Joe
Dabney takes readers through the turboprop s development by
Lockheed Martin and the United States Air Force and recounts
many of its heroic deeds, tracking its history from the
initial A-model through the current C-130J.
GaRRS Note -- Every Hercules aircraft ever build was made at
the Lockheed plant right outside Atalnta, in Marietta,
Georgia.
HANK AARON AND THE HOME RUN THAT
CHANGED AMERICA
by Tom Stanton
Read by Eric Roberts. (7 episodes, 9/22-9/30/10)
 |
Baseball has witnessed more than 125,000 home runs. Many
have altered the outcome of games, and some have decided
pennants and become legend. But no dinger has had greater
impact than Hank Aaron's 715th home run. His historic blast
on April 8, 1974, lifted him above Babe Ruth on the all-time
list, an achievement that shook not only baseball but our
nation itself. Aaron's magnificent feat provoked bigotry and
shattered prejudice, inspired a generation, emboldened a
flagging civil rights movement, and called forth the demons
that haunted Aaron's every step and turned what should have
been a joyous pursuit into a hellish nightmare.
In this powerful recollection, Tom Stanton penetrates the
myth of Aaron's chase and uncovers the compelling story
behind the most consequential athletic achievement of the
past fifty years. Three decades after Hank Aaron reached the
pinnacle of the national pastime, and now as Barry Bonds
makes history of his own, Stanton unfolds a tale rich with
drama, poignancy, and suspense to bring to life the elusive
spirit of an American hero.
1 PM (Mon-Fri)
TINKERS
by Paul Harding
Read by Rosemary Scalessa. (5 episodes, 8/27-9/02/10)

Harding's outstanding debut unfurls the history and final
thoughts of a dying grandfather surrounded by his family in his New
England home. George Washington Crosby repairs clocks for a living
and on his deathbed revisits his turbulent childhood as the oldest
son of an epileptic smalltime traveling salesman. The descriptions
of the father's epilepsy and the "cold halo of chemical electricity
that encircled him immediately before he was struck by a full
seizure" are stunning, and the household's sadness permeates the
narrative as George returns to more melancholy scenes.
The real star is Harding's language, which dazzles whether he's
describing the workings of clocks, sensory images of nature, the
many engaging side characters who populate the book, or even a short
passage on how to build a bird nest. This is an especially gorgeous
example of novelistic craftsmanship.
AN ACTOR AND A GENTLEMAN
by Louis Gossett, Jr. and Phyllis Karas
Read by Maurice Glatzer. (10 episodes, 9/03-9/16/10)

Award-winning African-American actor Lou Gossett, Jr. takes an
unvarnished look at the daunting challenges and incredible triumphs
of his fifty-year career
Louis Gossett, Jr. is one of the most respected African-American
stage and screen actors, who rose to fame with his Emmy-winning role
in the television mini-series Roots and Oscar-winning
performance in An Officer and a Gentleman. Now he tells the
story of his fifty years in the entertainment world—from his early
success on the New York stage appearing with Ruby Dee and Sidney
Poitier in Raisin in the Sun, through his long Hollywood career
working alongside countless stars such as Marilyn Monroe and Dennis
Quaid. He writes frankly of his struggle to get leading roles and
fair pay as a black man in Hollywood, the problems with drugs and
alcohol that took years to overcome, and of his current work to
eradicate racism and violence and give our children a better future.
Includes revealing stories and reminiscences involving famous
performers, including Sidney Poitier, Paul Newman, Shirley Booth,
Sammy Davis, Jr., Steve McQueen, Richard Gere, Maggie Smith, Halle
Berry, and Gena Rowlands
Spans half a century of American theater and film history, people,
and performances.
Highlights the problem of racism in Hollywood and the challenges
faced by African American actors from the 1950s and 1960s onward
Standing Tall penetrates the celebrity glitz and glamour to offer an
honest, heartfelt portrayal of the African-American experience both
in Hollywood and the New York theater world, as told by one of the
nation’s most enduring and highly esteemed actors.
WOMEN INVENTORS & THEIR DISCOVERIES
by Ethlie Ann Vare and Greg Ptacek
Read by Loretta Rucker (3 episodes, 9/17-9/9/21/10)
Interesting facts about 10 obscure American women who invented
famous things fill the pages of this very readable book. Elizabeth
Pinckney of the eighteenth century was responsible for the
development of the commercial crop of indigo, the mainstay of the
Southern economy before cotton. In the nineteenth century, Fannie
Farmer invented the modern-day cookbook with standardized measures
instead of "a handful of flour, and a lump of butter." The inventor
of "liquid paper" correction fluid, the pioneer in child hygiene,
the creator of cosmetics and hair products for black women, the
inventor of the fiber from which bulletproof vests are made, the
creator of the Barbie doll--these women are all featured. Each
informative chapter is devoted to the life of one remarkable woman.
The book includes many photos and a limited bibliography. For two
other titles in the Profiles series, see this issue's Series
Roundup.
OF MICS AND MEN: A LIFETIME OF BRAVES
BASEBALL
by Pete Van Wieren and Jack Wilkinson
Read by Eric Singer. (10 episodes, 9/22-10/05/10)

As a boy growing up in upstate New York, Pete Van Wieren dreamed of
becoming the play-by-play voice of his hometown heroes, the Triple A
Rochester Red Wings. Instead, he found big-league broadcast heaven
in Atlanta. In 1976, Van Wieren and another young broadcaster named
Skip Caray, son of the legendary Harry Caray, were hired to call
Atlanta Braves games. Over the next three decades, they were the
voices of America's Team, as the Braves became known thanks to Ted
Turner's TBS superstation. For 33 seasons, Van Wieren - nicknamed
"the Professor" for his scholarly approach to baseball and
resemblance to a college professor - saw it all and called it all,
including mercurial owner Ted Turner's one-game stint as the Braves'
manager in 1976. And then, in the midst of 15 seasons of mostly
awful and often hilariously inept baseball, came the Miracle of
1991, when the Braves went from worst to first, captured Atlanta's
heart, and nearly won one of the greatest World Series ever played.
10 PM (Mon-Sat)
INFAMOUS
by Ace Atkins
Read by Tom Jowers. (13 episodes, 8/23-9/08/10)

Set in 1933, Atkins's winning fourth history-based novel focuses
on two figures who, as the author explains in an introduction,
have been undeservedly lost in the shuffle of Depression-era
gangsters: George Kelly, who ironically gets saddled with the
nickname Machine Gun, and his wife, Kathryn. The fast-moving
narrative spans a three-month period, starting with a fatal
ambush in a parking lot outside Kansas City's Union Station in
which hoods gun down several lawmen and the prisoner they were
about to drive to Leavenworth.
This massacre leads to the FBI obtaining the authority to make
arrests and carry weapons. The bulk of the action concerns the
Kellys' kidnapping of Charles Urschel, a wealthy Oklahoma
oilman, and its aftermath. Atkins (Devil's Garden) brings to
vivid life the henpecked George and the bloodthirsty Kathryn as
he convincingly conjures up a past era. Not just for crime fans,
this should appeal to a wide readership.
GAME CHANGE: OBAMA AND THE CLINTONS,
MCCAIN AND PALIN, AND THE RACE OF A LIFETIME
by John Heilemann & Mark Halperin
Read by Jacquee Minor. (22 episodes, 9/07-10/01/10)

In 2008, the presidential election became blockbuster
entertainment. Everyone was watching as the race for the White House
unfolded like something from the realm of fiction. The meteoric rise
and historic triumph of Barack Obama. The shocking fall of the House
of Clinton—and the improbable resurrection of Hillary as Obama's
partner and America's face to the world. The mercurial performance
of John McCain and the mesmerizing emergence of Sarah Palin.
Based on hundreds of interviews with the people who lived the story,
Game Change is a reportorial tour de force that reads like a
fast-paced novel. Character driven and dialogue rich, replete with
extravagantly detailed scenes, this is the occasionally shocking,
often hilarious, ultimately definitive account of the campaign of a
lifetime.
11 PM (Mon-Sat)
LAST NIGHT IN TWISTED RIVER
by John Irving
Read by Jim Beattie (22 episodes, 8/20-9/14/10)
In
1954, in the cookhouse of a logging and sawmill settlement
in northern New Hampshire, an anxious twelve-year-old boy
mistakes the local constable’s girlfriend for a bear. Both
the twelve-year-old and his father become fugitives, forced
to run from Coos County–to Boston, to southern Vermont, to
Toronto–pursued by the implacable constable. Their lone
protector is a fiercely libertarian logger, once a river
driver, who befriends them.
In a story spanning five decades, Last Night in Twisted
River–John Irving’s twelfth novel–depicts the recent
half-century in the United States as “a living replica of
Coos County, where lethal hatreds were generally permitted
to run their course.” From the novel’s taut opening
sentence–“The young Canadian, who could not have been more
than fifteen, had hesitated too long”–to its elegiac final
chapter, Last Night in Twisted River is written with the
historical authenticity and emotional authority of The Cider
House Rules and A Prayer for Owen Meany. It is also as
violent and disturbing a story as John Irving’s breakthrough
bestseller, The World According to Garp.
What further distinguishes Last Night in Twisted River is
the author’s unmistakable voice–the inimitable voice of an
accomplished storyteller. Near the end of this moving novel,
John Irving writes: “We don’t always have a choice how we
get to know one another. Sometimes, people fall into our
lives cleanly–as if out of the sky, or as if there were a
direct flight from Heaven to Earth–the same sudden way we
lose people, who once seemed they would always be part of
our lives.”
THE GIRL WHO KICKED THE HORNET’S
NEST
by Stieg Larsson.
Read by Tom Jowers. (23 episodes, 9/15-10/11/10)
The
stunning third and final novel in Stieg Larsson’s
internationally best-selling trilogy
Lisbeth Salander—the heart of Larsson’s two previous
novels—lies in critical condition, a bullet wound to her
head, in the intensive care unit of a Swedish city hospital.
She’s fighting for her life in more ways than one: if and
when she recovers, she’ll be taken back to Stockholm to
stand trial for three murders. With the help of her friend,
journalist Mikael Blomkvist, she will not only have to prove
her innocence, but also identify and denounce those in
authority who have allowed the vulnerable, like herself, to
suffer abuse and violence. And, on her own, she will plot
revenge—against the man who tried to kill her, and the
corrupt government institutions that very nearly destroyed
her life.
Once upon a time, she was a victim. Now Salander is fighting
back.
MIDNIGHT (Tues-Sun)
THIS TIME TOGETHER: LAUGHTER AND
REFLECTION
by Carol Burnett
Read by Sally Miller. (10 episodes, 8/20-9/02/10)

THIS TIME TOGETHER is 100 percent Carol Burnett -- funny,
irreverent, and irresistible.
Carol Burnett is one of the most beloved and revered actresses
and performers in America. The Carol Burnett Show was seen each
week by millions of adoring fans and won twenty-five Emmys in
its remarkable eleven-year run. Now, in This Time Together,
Carol really lets her hair down and tells one funny or touching
or memorable story after another -- reading it feels like
sitting down with an old friend who has wonderful tales to tell.
In engaging anecdotes, Carol discusses her remarkable
friendships with stars such at Jimmy Stewart, Lucille Ball, Cary
Grant, and Julie Andrews; the background behind famous scenes,
like the moment she swept down the stairs in her curtain-rod
dress in the legendary "Went With the Wild" skit; and things
that would happen only to Carol -- the prank with Julie Andrews
that went wrong in front of the First Lady; the famous Tarzan
Yell...
KNOWN TO EVIL
by Walter Mosley
Read by Roy Harris. (10 episodes,
9/01-9/11/10)

The Walter Mosley and his new hero, Leonid McGill, are back in
the newNew
York Times-bestselling mystery series that's already being
hailed as a classic of contemporary noir.
Leonid McGill-the protagonist introduced in The
Long Fall, the book that returned Walter Mosley to
bestseller lists nationwide -is still fighting to stick to his
reformed ways while the world around him pulls him in every
other direction. He has split up with his girlfriend, Aura,
because his new self won't let him leave his wife-but then
Aura's new boyfriend starts angling to get Leonid kicked out of
his prime, top-of-the skyscraper office space. Meanwhile, one of
his sons seems to have found true love-but the girl has a shady
past that's all of sudden threatening the whole McGill
family-and his other son, the charming rogue Twilliam, is doing
nothing but enabling the crisis.
Most ominously of all, Alfonse Rinaldo, the mysterious
power-behind- the-throne at City Hall, the fixer who seems to
control every little thing that happens in New York City, has a
problem that even he can't fix- and he's come to Leonid for
help. It seems a young woman has disappeared, leaving murder in
her wake, and it means everything to Rinaldo to track her down.
But he won't tell McGill his motives, which doesn't quite square
with the new company policy- but turning down Rinaldo is almost
impossible to even contemplate.
Known to Evil delivers
on all the promise of the characters and story lines introduced
in The
Long Fall, and then some. It careens fast and deep into
gritty, glittery contemporary Manhattan, making the city pulse
in a whole new way, and it firmly establishes Leonid McGill as
one of the mystery world's most iconic, charismatic leading men.
BACKSEAT SAINTS
by Joshilyn Jackson
Read by Rosemary Scalessa (11 episodes, 9/12-9/24/10)
 |
Rose Mae Lolley is a fierce and dirty girl, long-suppressed
under flowery skirts and bow-trimmed ballet flats. As "Mrs.
Ro Grandee" she's trapped in a marriage that's thick with
love and sick with abuse. Her true self has been bound in
the chains of marital bliss in rural Texas, letting "Ro"
make eggs, iron shirts, and take her punches. She seems
doomed to spend the rest of her life battered outside by her
husband and inside by her former self, until fate throws her
in the path of an airport gypsy---one who shares her past
and knows her future. The tarot cards foretell that Rose's
beautiful, abusive husband is going to kill her. Unless she
kills him first.
Hot-blooded Rose Mae escapes from under Ro's perky
compliance and emerges with a gun and a plan to beat the
hand she's been dealt. Following messages that her
long-missing mother has left hidden for her in graffiti and
behind paintings, Rose and her dog Gretel set out from
Amarillo, TX back to her hometown of Fruiton, AL, and then
on to California, unearthing a host of family secrets as she
goes. Running for her life, she realizes that she must face
her past in order to overcome her fate---death by
marriage---and become a girl who is strong enough to save
herself from the one who loves her best.
BACKSEAT SAINTS will dazzle readers with a fresh and
heartwrenching portrayal of the lengths a mother will go to
right the wrongs she's created, and how far a daughter will
go to escape the demands of forgiveness. With the seed of a
minor character from her popular best-seller, GODS IN
ALABAMA, Jackson has built a whole new story full of her
trademark sly wit, endearingly off-kilter characters, and
utterly riveting plottwists.
STEP OUT ON NOTHING: HOW FAITH AND
FAMILY HELPED ME CONQUER LIFE’S CHALLENGES
by Byron Pitts
Read by Renée Ford Clark. (8 episodes, 9/25-10/03/10)

It was August 25, 2006, my first on-camera studio open for the CBS
News broadcast 60
Minutes.
Executive Producer Jeff Fager poked his head in the dressing room.”
Good luck, Brotha! You’ve come a long way to get here. You’ve earned
it.”
…If only he knew. My mind flashed back to elementary school, when a
therapist had informed my mother, “I’m sorry, Mrs. Pitts, your son
cannot read.”
In Step
Out on Nothing, Byron Pitts chronicles his astonishing story of
overcoming a childhood filled with obstacles to achieve enormous
success in life. Throughout Byron’s difficult youth—his parents
separated when he was twelve and his mother worked two jobs to make
ends meet—he suffered from a debilitating stutter. But Byron was
keeping an even more embarrassing secret: He was also functionally
illiterate. For a kid from inner-city Baltimore, it was a recipe for
failure.
Pitts turned struggle into strength and overcame both of his
impediments. Along the way, a few key people “stepped out on
nothing” to make a difference for him—from his mother, who worked
tirelessly to raise her kids right and delivered ample amounts of
tough love, to his college roommate, who helped Byron practice his
vocabulary and speech. Pitts even learns from those who didn’t
believe in him, like the college professor who labeled him a failure
and told him to drop out of college. Through it all, he persevered,
following his steadfast passion. After fifteen years in local
television, he landed a job as a correspondent for CBS News in 1998,
and went on to become an Emmy Award–winning journalist and a
contributing correspondent for 60
Minutes. Not bad for a kid who couldn’t read.
From a challenged youth to a reporting career that has covered 9/11
and Iraq, Pitts’s triumphant and uplifting story will resonate with
anyone who has felt like giving up in the face of seemingly
insurmountable hardships.
2AM (Tues-Sun)
THE BRASS VERDICT
by Michael Connelly
Read by Don Kennedy. (14 episodes, 8/17-9/01/10)

Things are finally looking up for defense attorney Mickey
Haller. After two years of wrong turns, Haller is back in the
courtroom. When Hollywood lawyer Jerry Vincent is murdered,
Haller inherits his biggest case yet: the defense of Walter
Elliott, a prominent studio executive accused of murdering his
wife and her lover. But as Haller prepares for the case that
could launch him into the big time, he learns that Vincent's
killer may be coming for him next.
Enter Harry Bosch. Determined to find Vincent's killer, he is
not opposed to using Haller as bait. But as danger mounts and
the stakes rise, these two loners realize their only choice is
to work together.
Bringing together Michael Connelly's two most popular
characters, The Brass Verdictis sure to be his biggest book yet.
WE’LL BE THERE FOR THE REST OF OUR LIVES
by Paul Shaffer w/David Ritz
Read by Marty Kwatinetz. (10 episodes, 9/14-9/24/10)

From Paul Shaffer, lifelong music junkie, hipster, and longtime
leader of David Letterman's band, comes a candid, endearing,
hilarious, and star-studded memoir of a life in-and love of-show
business.
How does a kid go from a remote Canadian town at the tip of Lake
Superior to the bright lights of Broadway and a gig leading the band
on Letterman?
This book is Paul Shaffer's answer to that question. From playing
seedy strip joints in Toronto, to his first legitimate job out of
college-which found him working with future stars (and friends)
Gilda Radner, Martin Short, and Eugene Levy-to being first musical
director of the nascent Saturday
Night Live and
helping to form the Blues Brothers, to being onstage every night
with Dave and playing with the greatest musicians of our time,
Shaffer has lived the ultimate showbiz life.
Now, in this hilarious, entertaining, and candid memoir-in which he
dishes on everyone from John Belushi and Jerry Lewis to Mel Gibson
and Britney Spears-Paul gives us the full behind-the-scenes story of
his life, from banging out pop tunes on the piano at the age of
twelve to leading the band every night at the Sullivan Theater.
NIGHT AND DAY
by Robert B. Parker
Read by Jim Beattie. (5 episodes, 9/25-9/30/10)

Sometimes Paradise, Massachusetts, police chief Jesse Stone wonders
how his town could have possibly earned its pristine name. Recently,
lewdness seems to be rampant in this little hamlet. At the local
junior high, principal Betsy Ingersoll insists on making surprise
locker room inspections of female students' underwear, but her
search for thongs and bikini panties is the least of Jesse's
worries. Worse yet are the nocturnal wanderings of "The Night Hawk,"
a sex-starved voyeur whose window peeping has escalated into much
more dangerous, confrontational acts. The author often called
"America's greatest mystery writer" takes readers on a guided tour
through the secrets of a small town.
5AM (Tues-Sun)
THE BROKEN WINDOW
by Jeffery Deaver
Read by Bill Davis. (18 episodes, 8/14-9/03/10)

Bestselling master of suspense Jeffery Deaver is back with a
brand-new Lincoln Rhyme thriller.
Lincoln Rhyme and partner/paramour Amelia Sachs return to face a
criminal whose ingenious staging of crimes is enabled by a
terrifying access to information....
When Lincoln's estranged cousin Arthur Rhyme is arrested on murder
charges, the case is perfect — too perfect. Forensic evidence from
Arthur's home is found all over the scene of the crime, and it looks
like the fate of Lincoln's relative is sealed.
At the behest of Arthur's wife, Judy, Lincoln grudgingly agrees to
investigate the case. Soon Lincoln and Amelia uncover a string of
similar murders and rapes with perpetrators claiming innocence and
ignorance — despite ironclad evidence at the scenes of the crime.
Rhyme's team realizes this "perfect" evidence may actually be the
result of masterful identity theft and manipulation.
An information service company — the huge data miner Strategic
Systems Datacorp — seems to have all the answers but is reluctant to
help the police. Still, Rhyme and Sachs and their assembled team
begin uncovering a chilling pattern of vicious crimes and coverups,
and their investigation points to one master criminal, whom they dub
"522."
When "522" learns the identities of the crime-fighting team, the
hunters become the hunted. Full of Deaver's trademark plot twists,
The Broken Window will put the partnership of Lincoln Rhyme and
Amelia Sachs to the ultimate test.
THE IMMORTAL LIFE OF HENRIETTA LACKS
by Rebecca Skloot
Read by Rosemary Scalessa. (11 episodes, 9/04-9/16/10

Her name was Henrietta Lacks, but scientists know her as HeLa. She
was a poor Southern tobacco farmer who worked the same land as her
slave ancestors, yet her cells—taken without her knowledge—became
one of the most important tools in medicine. The first “immortal”
human cells grown in culture, they are still alive today, though she
has been dead for more than sixty years. If you could pile all HeLa
cells ever grown onto a scale, they’d weigh more than 50 million
metric tons—as much as a hundred Empire State Buildings. HeLa cells
were vital for developing the polio vaccine; uncovered secrets of
cancer, viruses, and the atom bomb’s effects; helped lead to
important advances like in vitro fertilization, cloning, and gene
mapping; and have been bought and sold by the billions.
Yet Henrietta Lacks remains virtually unknown, buried in an unmarked
grave.
Now Rebecca Skloot takes us on an extraordinary journey, from the
“colored” ward of Johns Hopkins Hospital in the 1950s to stark white
laboratories with freezers full of HeLa cells; from Henrietta’s
small, dying hometown of Clover, Virginia—a land of wooden slave
quarters, faith healings, and voodoo—to East Baltimore today, where
her children and grandchildren live and struggle with the legacy of
her cells.
Henrietta’s family did not learn of her “immortality” until more
than twenty years after her death, when scientists investigating
HeLa began using her husband and children in research without
informed consent. And though the cells had launched a
multimillion-dollar industry that sells human biological materials,
her family never saw any of the profits. As Rebecca Skloot so
brilliantly shows, the story of the Lacks family—past and present—is
inextricably connected to the dark history of experimentation on
African Americans, the birth of bioethics, and the legal battles
over whether we control the stuff we are made of.
Over the decade it took to uncover this story, Rebecca became
enmeshed in the lives of the Lacks family—especially Henrietta’s
daughter Deborah, who was devastated to learn about her mother’s
cells. She was consumed with questions: Had scientists cloned her
mother? Did it hurt her when researchers infected her cells with
viruses and shot them into space? What happened to her sister,
Elsie, who died in a mental institution at the age of fifteen? And
if her mother was so important to medicine, why couldn’t her
children afford health insurance?
Intimate in feeling, astonishing in scope, and impossible to put
down, The
Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks captures
the beauty and drama of scientific discovery, as well as its human
consequences.
THE ELEVENTH VICTIM
by Nancy Grace
Read by Anne Teddlie. (13 episodes, 9/17-10/01/10)
Hailey
Dean is a young and tremendously successful criminal
prosecutor in Georgia, equally proud of her career and her
adoring fiance. But just a few weeks before the wedding, her
fiance's murder and its aftermath send her into a tailspin.
Grief-stricken and disillusioned with her profession, Hailey
decides to leave Georgia for New York City; she hopes the
change of pace and surroundings will help her heal.
Transplanted to a lively, vibrant city where she has no ties
and no painful reminders, Hailey embarks on a new career as
a therapist. But just when she's beginning to feel settled
in her new life, another tidal wave of turmoil engulfs her:
Someone is murdering her patients, one by one. And the
killer operates in the same way as the victims of the last
case Hailey prosecuted. Clearly, Hailey hasn't left her past
behind quite as well as she thought - and unless she returns
to her true calling and solves the case, still more innocent
people will die. Inspired by lawyer and television
personality Nancy Grace's own beginnings as a prosecutor and
the tragic death of her fiance, The Eleventh Victim is a
compelling mystery full of intrigue that thrills from start
to finish.
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