Michael C. White

A breathtaking tale of love, loyalty, and intrigue set in the early days of World War II from the acclaimed New York Times Notable Book author of Soul Catcher, which USA Today hailed as "a marvelous historical novel" World War II threatens to engulf the globe. The beleaguered Soviets, struggling to hold back the rising German tide, face despair and defeat daily. Yet just as all seems lost, a fearless female sniper named Tat'yana Levchenko gains fame in the Battle of Sevastopol with her remarkable composure and stunning skill. Offering hope in her nation's darkest moments, she becomes a Soviet hero, and word of her beauty and prowess eventually reaches Washington, D.C. Soon, First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt invites Tat'yana to visit America and tour the country with her. For the Soviets, Tat'yana's newfound friendship with the wife of the most powerful man in the world is an opportunity to garner public support for a much-needed second front in the war—but it's also a chance to gather information about President Roosevelt's plans. Surrounded by those who would exploit her position, Tat'yana becomes a pawn in a battle for information, and she is forced to question the motivations of everyone she knows, including the American captain who has been assigned as her translator. But as quickly as she rises to fame, Tat'yana vanishes. Did she defect? Was she silenced—and if so, by whom? Decades later, a clever journalist will discover Tat'yana's story . . . and reveal the truth. In Beautiful Assassin, Michael White delivers a heartrending story of war, betrayal, and a mother's love that can never be extinguished. Lyrical, evocative, and powerfully moving, this is a tale you will not soon forget.

A Novel

Beautiful Assassin

Edgar Award Finalist: A German comes to Maine to investigate his brother’s long-forgotten murder. Dieter Kallick fought for Rommel in North Africa, doing his duty to the Fatherland right up until he was captured by American GIs. He and his comrades had been told stories of the savagery of the Americans, but when he arrived at the work camp in Maine, he was surprised to find the countryside beautiful and the people kind. In the summer of 1944, he worked in a logging camp in the backwoods of New England, befriending a quiet young girl named Libby Pelletier. She is the only one to mourn Dieter when he dies. Fifty years later, Libby’s memories of the logging camp are stirred when Dieter’s brother Wolfgang appears seeking information about Dieter’s death. His questions puncture the placid surface of this small, rural town, and soon lead to another murder. To find the truth behind these two killings, Libby will have to learn to put the past to rest.

A Brother's Blood

From the author of the critically acclaimed novel A Brother's Blood, comes a haunting story about an Irish housekeeper who must discover the truth when her friend, the parish priest, is accused of horrible crimes. Maggie Quinn has had her share of misfortune: Having grown up poor and fatherless in Galway, she was forced to quit school early and find work to support her ailing mother and her own child. But when a tragedy of her own making strikes, it is too much for her to bear. Plagued by feelings of guilt and sorrow and by losing her faith in God, she runs from her past; first by fleeing Ireland for America and later by drowning her sorrows with the bottle. Maggie hits rock bottom when she makes an unsuccessful suicide attempt.While recuperating in a hospital bed, she meets the remarkable Father Jack Devlin. With his compassion and love, Maggie once more finds her faith and a reason to live. For the past eighteen years, Maggie has devoted herself to the man who saved her life. But now Father Jack, the beloved if controversial priest in the small town of Hebron Falls, Massachusetts, is accused of having done terrible things to altar boys many years before. At first Maggie is convinced that the accusations are only lies brought out by Father Jack's enemies. Yet as she sifts through the memories of her life with Father Jack, doubts begin to emerge: Could she have been blind to a darker side of her friend all these years? And when new information surfaces regarding the unsolved murder of a young altar boy with possible links to Father Jack, her faith is once again put to the test. Maggie must search her memory and her heart to help her decide what to believe. The Blind Side of the Heart poignantly captures one woman's struggle to remain loyal to a friend while at the same time she is forced to examine her conscience to arrive at the truth.

The Blind Side of the Heart

Mike White

Douglas Lorain

"This book is a guide to thirteen backpacking trips in California and Nevada. Each trip description contains complete information to plan the hike, including detailed trail notes, maps, alternative routes, estimated number of days to complete, difficultylevel, elevation gain/loss, nearby attractions and amenities, and so forth. Unlike other backpacking guides, this book also includes profiles of well-known individuals associated with the trails, such as John Muir (John Muir Trail) and Glenn Hampton (Tahoe Rim Trail). In addition, each trail concludes with a personal anecdote from one of the authors about his experience hiking the trail"--

Best Backpacking Trips in California and Nevada

"In "Heights," we meet a young woman whose husband is paralyzed and who must come to grips with the life she now finds herself inhabiting; in "Disturbances," a doctor is called to the scene of a brutal murder, only to discover he will be asked to do much more than pronounce the man dead; in "Burn Patterns," an arson investigator traveling to the scene of a fire picks up a young runaway drifter, an event that causes him to reflect on his own failed marriage; in "The Crossing," a recent widow learns to deal with her fears regarding her alien new life; and in "The Cardiologist's House," the narrator builds model houses at night when he can't sleep and at the same time keeps watch on a neighbor who is having an affair."--BOOK JACKET.

Stories

Marked Men

Augustus Cain has his back against the wall. A war-scarred wanderer, he faces a past he wants to forget, a present without prospect or fortune and an uncertain future, reliant upon his one skill: an uncanny ability to track people who don't want to be found. With the clouds of civil war gathering, a plantation owner has called in a debt and Cain is forced to head north from Richmond and retrieve a runaway slave named Rosetta, on the promise that his creditor will not only clear his debt, but pay him as well. Running Rosetta to ground in Boston, Cain discovers she carries a secret, and the size of the bounty on her head begins to make more sense. Fleeing the northern states pursued by a posse of unionists lead by John Brown, Cain finds himself increasingly drawn to Rosetta and starts to wonder if his five hundred dollar fee - if any fee - could ever be enough to return her to her master...

Soul Catcher

Elizabeth Moynihan, a New York journalist, has hit the jackpot. It's 1996 and a chance remark has sent her to a small farm in Colorado. There resides Russia's most notorious sniper-turned-spy, the one-time beautiful assassin, Tat'yana Levchenko, and Elizabeth knows this story could make her career. When Elizabeth convinces the obstinate and embittered Tat'yana that it is now safe to tell the truth, the old lady begins the story of a mother so devoted to her beautiful daughter that when, aged just four, her child was shot down and killed by a German pilot, all she had to live for was revenge. Enlisting immediately as a sniper, Tat'yana soon racked up three hundred kills and became her nation's most celebrated soldier. But it couldn't last forever, and when she was badly injured during a siege, her superiors had new plans. Eleanor Roosevelt had asked for her to visit the US and tour the nation in a bid to help the war effort. For the Russian army, it was an excellent opportunity to spy for her country. For Tat'yana, it was the chance of a new life.

Michael C. White

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