rembrandt_affair.jpg Spend less time searching for new genre fiction and more time reading it as I watch for newly-released genre fiction in the Kindle Store so you don't have to. Recent genre fiction releases in mystery and fantasy fiction include:

MYSTERY

The Rembrandt Affair by Daniel Silva. Putnam. Print length: 496 p. Kindle edition $12.99. Text-to-Speech: Disabled.
Determined to sever his ties with the Office, Gabriel Allon has retreated to the windswept cliffs of Cornwall with his beautiful Venetian-born wife Chiara. But once again his seclusion is interrupted by a visitor from his tangled past: the endearingly eccentric London art dealer, Julian Isherwood. As usual, Isherwood has a problem. And it is one only Gabriel can solve. In the ancient English city of Glastonbury, an art restorer has been brutally murdered and a long-lost portrait by Rembrandt mysteriously stolen. Despite his reluctance, Gabriel is persuaded to use his unique skills to search for the painting and those responsible for the crime. But as he painstakingly follows a trail of clues leading from Amsterdam to Buenos Aires and, finally, to a villa on the graceful shores of Lake Geneva, Gabriel discovers there are deadly secrets connected to the painting..." - Amazon.
Less expensive alternative: The Kill Artist, Silva's first thriller to feature art restorer Gabriel Allon.

Think of a Number by John Verdon. Crown. Print length: 432 p. Kindle edition $3.99. Text-to-Speech: Disabled.
"Arriving in the mail over a period of weeks are taunting letters that end with a simple declaration, 'Think of any number...picture it...now see how well I know your secrets.' Amazingly, those who comply find that the letter writer has predicted their random choice exactly. For Dave Gurney, just retired as the NYPD’s top homicide investigator and forging a new life with his wife, Madeleine, in upstate New York, the letters are oddities that begin as a diverting puzzle but quickly ignite a massive serial murder investigation. What police are confronted with is a completely baffling killer, one who is fond of rhymes filled with threats and warnings, whose attention to detail is unprecedented, and who has an uncanny knack for disappearing into thin air. Brought in as an investigative consultant, Dave Gurney soon accomplishes deductive breakthroughs that leave local police in awe. Yet, even as he matches wits with his seemingly clairvoyant opponent, Gurney’s tragedy-marred past rises up to haunt him, his marriage approaches a dangerous precipice, and finally, a dark, cold fear builds that he’s met an adversary who can’t be stopped..." - Amazon.

Faithful Place by Tana French. Viking. Print length: 416 p. Kindle edition $12.99. Text-to-Speech: Disabled.
"Back in 1985, Frank Mackey was nineteen, growing up poor in Dublin's inner city and living crammed into a small flat with his family on Faithful Place. But he had his sights set on a lot more. He and his girl Rosie Daly were all set to run away to London together, get married, get good jobs, break away from factory work and poverty and their old lives. But on the winter night when they were supposed to leave, Rosie didn't show. Frank took it for granted that she'd dumped him - probably because of his alcoholic father, nutcase mother, and generally dysfunctional family. He never went home again. Neither did Rosie. Everyone thought she had gone to England on her own and was over there living a shiny new life. Then, twenty-two years later, Rosie's suitcase shows up behind a fireplace in a derelict house on Faithful Place..." - www.tanafrench.com.
Less expensive alternative: All of the novels by Tana French are priced at $12.99 in Kindle editions. For an alternative mystery set in Dublin, consider Bartholomew Gill's Death in Dublin.

Hostage Zero by John Gilstrap. Pinnacle Books. Print length: 400 p. Kindle edition $4.47. Text-to-Speech: Enabled.
"The addictively readable second thriller featuring freelance hostage rescue operative Jonathan 'Digger' Grave (after 2009's No Mercy) marries a breakneck pace to a complex, multilayered plot. When two teenage boys are inexplicably kidnapped from a Virginia residential school for children of incarcerated parents, Grave and his crew set out to locate the victims and apprehend the abductors. Then one of the boys is drugged and left to die in a field, saved only by the fateful intervention of a passing homeless man, and Grave's investigation begins to turn up leads that point to government and organized crime connections..." - Publishers Weekly.

Live to Tell by Lisa Gardner. A Detective D. D. Warren novel. Bantam. Print length: 400 p. Kindle edition $9.99. Text-to-Speech: Disabled.
"Boston police detective D. D. Warren returns in another gripping thriller. A family is murdered, apparently by the father... But soon there are questions, the most pressing of which is, Why would this man, apparently out of the blue, slaughter his own family? Is it possible that someone else was the killer, perhaps another member of the family? In addition to telling a compelling story, Gardner also explores an issue that is rarely discussed in fiction: children who are psychotic. In first-person chapters narrated by other characters (Victoria, a mother at her wits’ end; Danielle, survivor of a family slaughter), she eases the reader into unfamiliar territory, telling us about children - like Evan, Victoria’s eight-year-old son - who are capable of astonishing violence, including plotting to murder their own parents... The notion of murderous children may be off-putting enough to make some readers avoid the book. That would be a mistake... - David Pitt for Booklist.

FANTASY

Tongues of Serpents by Naomi Novik. A novel of Temeraire. Del Rey. Print length: 272 p. Kindle edition $9.99. Text-to-Speech: Disabled.
"Convicted of treason despite their heroic defense against Napoleon’s invasion of England, Temeraire and Laurence - stripped of rank and standing - have been transported to the prison colony at New South Wales in distant Australia, where, it is hoped, they cannot further corrupt the British Aerial Corps with their dangerous notions of liberty for dragons. Instead of leaving behind all the political entanglements and corruptions of the war, Laurence and Temeraire have instead sailed into a hornet’s nest of fresh complications. For the colony at New South Wales has been thrown into turmoil after the overthrow of the military governor, one William Bligh - better known as Captain Bligh, late of HMS Bounty. Bligh wastes no time in attempting to enlist Temeraire and Laurence to restore him to office, while the upstart masters of the colony are equally determined that the new arrivals should not upset a balance of power precariously tipped in their favor..." - from the hardcover edition.
This is book six in Novik's Temeraire series which began with His Majesty's Dragon. The first three volumes of the series are available in a Kindle omnibus edition as In His Majesty's Service. For more detailed information on the author and the series, check out the official Temeraire website.

Shadow's Son by Jon Sprunk. Pyr. Print length: 279 p. Kindle edition $9.99. Text-to-Speech: Enabled.
"Like many other assassin characters, Caim is an orphan. But he has a ghostlike companion, Kit, whom only he can hear and see, and an uncanny ability to manipulate shadows. Set in a kingdom where the religious are not so holy and the nobility are corrupt, Caim has no loyalties and few scruples. He reluctantly accepts a contract to assassinate a nobleman, only to find that someone else got there first. He and the nobleman's daughter, Josey, become an unlikely pair in the search for her father's killers and the people who set up Caim. The intrigue, action scenes, and ever-more-revealing character insights are masterfully woven together in a book the reader won't want to put down." - Rebecca Gerber for Booklist.

Dark and Stormy Knights edited by P. N. Elrod. St. Martin's Griffin. Print length: 368 p. Kindle edition $9.99. Text-to-Speech: Enabled.
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"They're the ultimate defenders of humanity - modern day knights who do dark deeds for all the right reasons. In this all-star collection, nine of today's hottest paranormal authors bring us thrilling, all-new stories of supernatural knights that are brimming with magic mystery and mayhem. John Marcone sets aside his plans to kill Harry Dresden to go head-to-head with a cantrev lord in Jim Butcher's Even Hand. Kate Daniels is called upon for bodyguard duty to protect Saimen, a shifter she trusts less than the enemy in Ilona Andrews' A Questionable Client. Cormac must stop a killer werewolf before it attacks again on the next full moon in Carrie Vaughn's God's Creatures. And in Vicki Pettersson's Shifting Star, Skamar gets more than she bargained for when she goes after a creature kidnapping young girls - and enlists the aid of her frustratingly sexy neighbor." - Amazon.

Imager's Intrigue by L. E. Modesitt, Jr.. Tor Books. Print length: 496 p. Kindle edition $14.99. Text-to-Speech: Enabled.
This is book three of the Imager Portfolio series, following Imager and Imager's Challenge.
"In Imager, the first book of the Imager Portfolio, we met Rhennthyl, an apprentice portrait artist whose life was changed by a disastrous fire. But the blaze that took his master’s life and destroyed his livelihood revealed a secret power previously dormant in Rhenn; the power of imaging, the ability to shape matter using thought. With some trouble, he adapts to the controlled life of an imager. By Imager’s Challenge, Rhenn has become a liaison to the local law forces. He finds himself in direct conflict with both authorities and national politics as he tries to uphold the law and do his best by the people of his home city. Now, in Imager’s Intrigue, Rhenn has come into his own. He has a wife and a young child, and a solid career as an imager. But he has made more than one enemy during his journey from apprentice painter to master imager, and even his great powers won’t allow him to escape his past." - us.macmillan.com

Crossroads of Twilight by Robert Jordan. Tor. Print length: 864 p. Kindle edition $7.99. Text-to-Speech: Enabled.
This is book ten in Jordan's The Wheel of Time series. This volume was first published in hardcover in 2003.
"...the world and the characters stand at a crossroads, and the world approaches twilight, when the power of the Shadow grows stronger. Fleeing from Ebou Dar with the kidnapped Daughter of the Nine Moons, whom he is fated to marry, Mat Cauthon learns that he can neither keep her nor let her go, not in safety for either of them. Perrin Aybara seeks to free his wife, Faile, a captive of the Shaido, but his only hope may be an alliance with the enemy. At Tar Valon, Egwene al'Vere, the young Amyrlin of the rebel Aes Sedai, lays siege to the heart of Aes Sedai power. In Andor, Elayne Trakland fights for the Lion Throne that is hers by right, but enemies and Darkfriends surround her, plotting her destruction. Rand al'Thor, the Dragon Reborn himself, has cleansed the Dark One's taint from the male half of the True Source, and everything has changed. Yet nothing has, for only men who can channel believe that saidin is clean again, and a man who can channel is still hated and feared - even one prophesied to save the world..." - http://us.macmillan.com/crossroadsoftwilight
If, like many of Jordan's readers, you have a tendency to get bogged down with the myriad of characters and plot lines of the series, you might take a break and read Simeon Shoul's entertaining review of Crossroads of Twilight at Infinity Plus.