Seven top stories of suspense in a seaside house

Peter Swanson is the New York Times bestselling author of The Kind Worth Killing, winner of the New England Society Book Award and finalist for the CWA Ian Fleming Steel Dagger; Her Every Fear, an NPR book of the year; and Eight Perfect Murders, a New York Times bestseller, among others.

[My Book, The Movie: The Kind Worth Killing; The Page 69 Test: The Kind Worth Killing; Writers Read: Peter Swanson (February 2015)]

Swanson's new book is Do You See What I See?: A Chilling Holiday Mystery Novella of a Celebrity Writer's Christmas Party Gone Wrong.

At CrimeReads the author tagged seven great stories of suspense featuring seaside houses. One title on the list:

The Talented Mr. Ripley by Patricia Highsmith

I don’t think this book is commonly thought of as a classic house-by-the-sea novel. But the whole first half of this timeless novel has Tom Ripley insinuating himself into the life of Dickie Greenleaf, who is currently idling away at his summer home in the imagined village of Mongibello on the Italian coast. I love the details of the small villa, the martini lunches, the steep walk down to the beach. And from all that sunlight and bliss Highsmith moves the story into her typically dark, murderous territory.

Read about another title on the list.

The Talented Mr Ripley is on Elizabeth Arnott's list of six top atmospheric thrillers set during heatwaves, Adam Hamdy's list of ten of the most popular literary antiheroes, Nadia Khomami's list of five of the best psychological thrillers by women, the UK-based Crime Writers' Association's list of ten page-turning reads, Nathan Oates's list of eight of the best bad seed novels, Lizzy Barber's list of seven titles about wealthy people behaving badly, Charlotte Northedge's top ten list of novels about toxic friendships, Elizabeth Macneal's list of five books that explore the dark side of fitting in, Saul A. Lelchuk's nine great thrillers featuring alter egos, Emma Stonex's list of seven top mystery novels set by the sea, Russ Thomas's top ten list of queer protagonists in crime fiction, Paul Vidich's list of five of the most enduring imposters in crime fiction & espionage, Lisa Levy's list of eight of the most toxic friendships in crime fiction, Elizabeth Macneal's list of five sympathetic fictional psychopaths, Laurence Scott's list of seven top books about doppelgangers, J.S. Monroe's list of seven suspenseful literary thrillers, Simon Lelic's top ten list of false identities in fiction, Jeff Somers's list of fifty novels that changed novels, Olivia Sudjic's list of eight favorite books about love and obsession, Roz Chast's six favorite books list, Nicholas Searle's top five list of favorite deceivers in fiction, Chris Ewan's list of the ten top chases in literature, Meave Gallagher's top twenty list of gripping page-turners every twentysomething woman should read, Sophia Bennett's top ten list of books set in the Mediterranean, Emma Straub's top ten list of holidays in fiction, E. Lockhart's list of favorite suspense novels, Sally O'Reilly's top ten list of novels inspired by Shakespeare, Walter Kirn's top six list of books on deception, Stephen May's top ten list of impostors in fiction, Simon Mason's top ten list of chilling fictional crimes, Melissa Albert's list of eight books to change a villain, Koren Zailckas's list of eleven of literature's more evil characters, Alex Berenson's five best list of books about Americans abroad John Mullan's list of ten of the best examples of rowing in literature, Tana French's top ten maverick mysteries list, the Guardian's list of the 50 best summer reads ever, the Telegraph's ultimate reading list, and Francesca Simon's top ten list of antiheroes.

--Marshal Zeringue

Pg. 99: Barbara Young Welke's "Writing with Fire"

Featured at the Page 99 Test: Writing with Fire: The Cowboy Suit Tragedy and the Course of a Life by Barbara Young Welke.

About the book, from the publisher:

A cultural and legal history intertwined with a deeply emotional meditation on the course of life, memory, and the documents that define us.

During the 1940s and 1950s, an untold number of American children suffered devastating injuries when the fur-like fabric on the chaps of their Gene Autry–branded cowboy playsuits exploded into flame. Barbara Young Welke was researching this history when her teenage daughter unexpectedly died.

The shock of Welke’s loss transformed her understanding of the children and their families. Her experience also led her to question the norms of scholarship and of writing. Historians are trained to separate the personal from the intellectual, to be suspicious of emotion. These and other norms are embedded in and reinforced by the calling card of academics, the curriculum vitae. Welke wondered how that cold document―with its literal meaning, “the course of life”―had become a form that excludes so much of what gives life meaning. What impact did that have on what we know, how we know it, and how we understand ourselves? Similarly, Welke wondered, what might we see if we looked at the history of the cowboy suit tragedy as more than a matter of lawsuits brought by grieving families? Here, Welke traces the making, marketing, and selling of the cowboy suits; the lengths the defendants went to avoid and limit liability; and the meaning of the injuries, deaths, and legal settlements in the course of these children’s and families’ lives.

Writing with Fire interweaves the histories of the cowboy suit tragedy and the curriculum vitae. Grounded in archival and legal research, oral histories, and letters Welke wrote her daughter following her death, Welke offers an inimitable examination of trauma, law, autobiography, and identity. The result is revelatory and unforgettable: a provocative historical reflection on life and death, depression and war, markets and families, law, power, and precarity in modern America.

Learn more about Writing with Fire at the University of Chicago Press website.

The Page 99 Test: Writing with Fire.

--Marshal Zeringue

Pg. 69: David McGlynn's "Liberal Arts"

Featured at the Page 59 Test: Liberal Arts: A Novel by David McGlynn.

About the book, from the publisher:

A kaleidoscopic novel-in-stories set at a fictional Midwest college

Two centuries old and covered in ivy, Wisconsin’s Buchanan College is populated by an eclectic mix of students, staff, and professors hailing from the nearby suburbs to the far corners of the globe. From the outside, Buchanan seems an idyllic world of higher learning. Yet behind its bucolic exterior, a series of interconnected dramas play out: a slew of first-year students mysteriously disappear within days of moving in; an injured hockey star discovers an unlikely fountain of youth; an alumna returns to campus after fifty years in the hope of reconnecting with a former love. And throughout the novel we follow the story of Jenny Ramirez, a social worker and the wife of a popular professor, who commits an act that alters how the college sees her, and how she sees herself. Over a span of four years, from orientation to graduation, the characters in Liberal Arts are forced to weigh their ideals and aspirations against the harsh and often ridiculous realities of the world, and are left asking what, if anything, a liberal arts education has left to teach them.

Visit David McGlynn's website.

Writers Read: David McGlynn (September 2025).

Q&A with David McGlynn.

The Page 69 Test: Everything We Could Do.

The Page 59 Test: Liberal Arts.

--Marshal Zeringue

Eight of the best books about haunted houses

Lorna Wallace has a PhD in English Literature and is a lover of all things science fiction and horror. She lives in Scotland with her rescue greyhound, Misty.

At Mental Floss Wallace tagged eight top books about haunted houses, including:

A House with Good Bones (2023) // T. Kingfisher

Sam Montgomery is on a break from work and is looking forward to an extended stay with her mom, but her brother has warned her that something seems off. When she arrives, she finally understands what he means: vultures are circling the property, the whole house has been redecorated, and her mom is being unusually jumpy and sensitive. Sam decides to get to the bottom of what’s going on and soon discovers that a mean-spirited specter is involved—but don’t expect this to be a classic haunting, because things get very weird.

T. Kingfisher—which is a pseudonym used by Ursula Vernon—won two awards for best horror novel for A House with Good Bones: the 2023 Dragon Award and the 2024 Locus Award.

Read about another entry on the list.

--Marshal Zeringue

Q&A with Natalie Kikić

From my Q&A with Natalie Kikić, author of The Haunting of Lavender House: A Haunting, Gothic Story of Croatian Folklore:

How much work does your title do to take readers into the story?

The title of my book, The Haunting of Lavender House, does an excellent job introducing readers to my story, but it’s actually not my original title. For years, while I was writing the novel, I called it House of Lavender. While I like the simplicity of it, it doesn’t really communicate the gothic elements of my story—the house in my novel is haunted, you see. And so, my publishing team introduced the new and current title, which I love. It evokes other gothic horror tales, such as The Haunting of Hill House. And it still keeps the lavender element, which is common flower along the coastal region of Croatia, where my story is set. So in the end, my title is...[read on]

Visit Natalie Kikić's website.

Q&A with Natalie Kikić.

--Marshal Zeringue

Eight top witchy mysteries and thrillers

Carolina Ciucci is a teacher, writer and reviewer based in the south of Argentina. She hoards books like they’re going out of style. In case of emergency, you can summon her by talking about Ireland, fictional witches, and the Brontë family. At Book Riot she tagged eight books that "are either intriguing mysteries or absorbing thrillers, and they’re all brimming with magic." One title on the list:

River Woman, River Demon by Jennifer Givhan

When her husband is arrested for the murder of a friend, Eva’s life is thrown off kilter. Soon, she’s questioning everyone she knows, including herself. Now, Eva must use her magick as a bruja to protect the ones she loves.

Read about another entry on the list.

River Woman, River Demon is among Rey Rowland's top six top speculative thrillers.

The Page 69 Test: River Woman, River Demon.

--Marshal Zeringue

Pg. 99: Livia K. Stone's "Without Masters"

Featured at the Page 99 Test: Without Masters: Autogestión, Anarchist Ethics, and Mexico City Punk by Livia K. Stone.

About the book, from the publisher:

Without Masters is an anthropological history of the radical ethical and political principle of autogestión as it traveled around the world in the twentieth century and came to be popularized in Mexico City in the early 2000s. A political term that first arose in 1962 Algeria traveled across continents until it landed in Mexico City’s anarcho-punk scene in the 1980s, where it eventually came to be associated more with zines, music, art, and Zapatismo than with its origins in anarchism or syndicalism. Without Masters brings the true history of autogestión and the quiet radicalism of Mexico City’s autogestive collectives to an English-speaking audience for the first time. Along the way, Stone brings together diverse materials, from punk zines and political fliers to Beat novels and Zapatista parables, that tell an alternate history of radical politics throughout the world in the second half of the twentieth century which serves as a reminder of Mexico’s formative role in the creation of modern social theory.

Learn more about Without Masters at the Duke University Press website.

The Page 99 Test: Without Masters.

--Marshal Zeringue

Elizabeth Noel's "Beneath the Edelweiss," the movie

Featured at My Book, The Movie: Beneath the Edelweiss by Elizabeth Noel.

The entry begins:

If Beneath the Edelweiss became a movie, new ground in disability representation would be broken. Hurray! The main protagonist, Mitzi Hausler, is an alpine herbalist in training. She is short-statured and this is viewed by her superstitious community as an impediment to her ability to heal the sick with herbs. Oma says, Mitzi is beautiful, but no one will marry her. She gives Mitzi the herbs because she believes Mitzi will have nothing else. As Oma ages and war creeps closer she seems to realize she is wrong when she tells Mitzi, “We’re all made in the image of God. Jesus bled. His body leaked just like mine and yours. You must rise above flesh like everyone else. Do you understand?”

Mitzi does rise above other people’s attitudes, becoming an herbalist in her own right. However, she comes of age during Austria’s annexation to Nazi Germany, and as the veil of Nazism is pulled back, Mitzi must make life changing choices about herself and the people under her care.

My first casting would be Hollis Jane Andrews, an L.A. actress who I came across...[read on]

Visit Elizabeth Noel's website.

Q&A with Elizabeth Noel.

Writers Read: Elizabeth Noel.

The Page 69 Test: Beneath the Edelweiss.

My Book, The Movie: Beneath the Edelweiss.

--Marshal Zeringue

Pg. 69: Justine Pucella Winans's "Your Boyfriend Needs an Exorcist"

Featured at the Page 69 Test: Your Boyfriend Needs an Exorcist by Justine Pucella Winans.

About the book, from the publisher:

Jennifer's Body meets The Weight of Blood in this horror-comedy about an evil spirit looking for a second chance at love and life.

Just because Schuyler is a bloodthirsty evil spirit doesn't mean she can't fall in love. Ever since Wren Castillo moved into the house Schuyler haunts, Schuyler has been crushing hard. But Wren has a boyfriend, Enzo, and he's the worst. Schuyler has no choice but to watch as Enzo treats Wren terribly-until she accidentally possesses him.

With Enzo's spirit nowhere to be found, Schuyler must pretend to be him until she can set things right. But Schuyler feels more at home in Enzo's body than she ever did in her own, and as she grows closer to his family and friends-including Wren-she starts to wonder if this could all be for keeps.

Maintaining a possession is harder than Schuyler expected, though, and it might just take some spilled blood to keep her new body going strong. Worse, it turns out she's not the only one interested in stealing Enzo's body. When another evil spirit threatens everyone Schuyler now holds dear, she must decide just how far she's willing to go to secure her second chance at love-and life.

Visit Justine Pucella Winans's website.

Q&A with Justine Pucella Winans.

The Page 69 Test: Your Boyfriend Needs an Exorcist.

--Marshal Zeringue

Five essential books on Chinese American history

Beth Lew-Williams is Professor of History and Director of the Program in Asian American Studies at Princeton University. She is the author of The Chinese Must Go: Violence, Exclusion, and the Making of the Alien in America.

Her latest book is John Doe Chinaman: A Forgotten History of Chinese Life under American Racial Law.

At Lit Hub Lew-Williams suggest five books if "you want to know more about the history of Chinese Americans, Asian Americans, and the discriminatory laws their presence inspired." One title on the list:

Erika Lee, The Making of Asian America: A History

For a primer on Asian American history, I’d start with Erika Lee’s The Making of Asian America. It is a difficult task to trace each strand of America’s diverse Asian community and braid them together into a single volume. But Lee has done it. She recounts generations of immigrants—from Filipino sailors to Chinese gold miners, Japanese farmers, and Vietnamese refugees—and the prejudice they encountered in the United States. For the younger reader, Lee has published Made in Asian America, which offers an introduction appropriate for the middle grades. Young readers will find stories of survival and resistance, as well as hard truths about America’s history of discrimination.

Read about another book on the list.

--Marshal Zeringue

What is Laura Jensen Walker reading?

Featured at Writers Read: Laura Jensen Walker, author of The Pilgrimage of Primrose Honeychurch: A Novel.

From her entry:

I recently finished An Artful Dodge, by the brilliant Karen Odden. If you’re looking for impeccably researched historical fiction, mesmerizing characters you’ll fall in love with, and a compelling story you can’t put down, look no further. This was a fascinating dive into Victorian London and a ring of women thieves, Kit Jimeson is my favorite new heroine. Fingers crossed her...[read on]

About The Pilgrimage of Primrose Honeychurch, from the publisher:

From the author of Death of a Flying Nightingale comes the moving story of a solitary seventy-year-old curmudgeon embracing the connection of family and daring to follow her dreams.

Primrose Honeychurch doesn’t really “get” people. Books, though, make perfect sense.

At seventy, the sharp-tongued recluse prefers to keep company with her own routines. But when a life-altering diagnosis leaves her worried she’ll never be missed, she decides it’s finally time to do something to leave her mark: something no one will ever forget.

Clutching her mother’s ashes and the book of her heart, Primrose hops on a plane, bound for Hay-on-Wye, the legendary Welsh “Town of Books.” Unfortunately, her literary pilgrimage just won’t follow the plot. After an accident derails her trip, she finds herself staying awhile with estranged family. But she senses a kindred spirit in the niece she’s getting to know, who uncannily understands the world much the same as Primrose herself does.

As rolling green hills and book-lined streets frame an unexpected season of discovery, what began as an unwelcome detour becomes something more profound. For the first time in her life, Primrose begins to glimpse the beauty―and courage―of true human connection.

Visit Laura Jensen Walker's website.

My Book, The Movie: The Alphabet Sleuths.

Q&A with Laura Jensen Walker.

The Page 69 Test: The Alphabet Sleuths.

Writers Read: Laura Jensen Walker (February 2026).

My Book, The Movie: The Postmistress of Puddlington.

The Page 69 Test: The Postmistress of Puddlington.

My Book, The Movie: The Pilgrimage of Primrose Honeychurch.

Writers Read: Laura Jensen Walker.

--Marshal Zeringue

Five top revenge and eat-the-rich thrillers

L.M. Chilton is a journalist with fifteen years of experience working on TV shows for the BBC, ITV, and Channel 4 in the UK, as well as writing columns for magazines such as Cosmopolitan and Glamour, and reporting for national newspapers across the world, everywhere from Doncaster to Delhi. He lives in London, procrastinating.

Chliton's new novel is I Think We Should Kill Other People.

At CrimeReads he tagged five revenge and eat-the-rich thrillers about the 1 Percent, including:

Liv Constantine, The Last Mrs. Parrish

Marrying rich seems like a fast track to wealth, but what if the guy you have your eye on is already taken?

In this fast-paced beach-read, Amber Patterson is tired of being poor. She wants everything Daphne Parrish has, the money, the handsome property-mogul husband and the golden-couple status in exclusive Bishops Harbor, Connecticut. After worming her way into Daphne’s life, she becomes her BFF, and gets closer and closer to her man. But Amber is hiding secrets of her own, and nothing in Daphne’s marriage is quite what it seems.

This one is twisty, wicked and very hard to put down.

Read about another entry on the list.

The Last Mrs. Parrish is among Nicole Blades's six thrillers set in the suburbs, Susan Moore's seven top domestic psychological thrillers, Trisha Sakhlecha's eleven thrillers that feature the mega-rich, Jaime Lynn Hendricks's seven best unlikeable characters in thrillers, Eliza Jane Brazier's nine books that pit the Have against the Have-Nots, Seraphina Nova Glass's seven top obsession thrillers, Allison Dickson's top ten thrillers featuring a dance of girlfriends and deception, Kristyn Kusek Lewis's eight shocking thrillers featuring scandals, Margot Hunt's top nine thrillers featuring duplicitous spouses, and Jennifer Hillier's eight crime novels of women starting over.

The Page 69 Test: The Last Mrs. Parrish.

--Marshal Zeringue

Pg. 99: Kevin Waite's "The Boundless Biddy Mason"

Featured at the Page 99 Test: The Boundless Biddy Mason: An Odyssey from Slavery to Freedom Across the American West by Kevin Waite.

About the book, from the publisher:

How Biddy Mason crossed the continent, broke free from slavery, and built Black Los Angeles.

Born in bondage, Biddy Mason endured one of the longest forced migrations in American history—three thousand miles on foot from Georgia to California. She and her daughters labored in slavery in the “free” state of California for five years before launching a landmark emancipation suit in 1856. Free at last, she defied barriers of race and gender, rising to prominence as a healer, philanthropist, church builder, and real estate entrepreneur whose commercial properties stood at what became known as the “Wall Street of the West.” By the time of her death in 1891, she had laid the foundations of Black Los Angeles and ranked among the richest women of color in the United States.

In this first book-length biography of Mason, prizewinning historian Kevin Waite uncovers an extraordinary story of survival that carries readers from the cotton South to metropolitan California, and through the Civil War, Reconstruction, and the dawn of Jim Crow. By retracing Mason’s odyssey, he illuminates both the continental sweep of American slavery and the fragile, hard-won possibilities of freedom in the West.

Learn more about The Boundless Biddy Mason at the University of California Press website.

The Page 99 Test: The Boundless Biddy Mason.

--Marshal Zeringue

Monona Wali's “Sutra Americana,” the movie

Featured at My Book, The Movie: Sutra Americana by Monona Wali.

The entry begins:

If Sutra Americana were to be made into a movie, or preferably a television series, I would love to have the very talented Shuchi Talati write and direct it. She directed Girls Will Be Girls (2023) a moving film about a mother-daughter relationship set in modern-day India. She is able to capture intimate relationships between characters with real subtlety and power. Because my novel is so much about the dynamics of family members, moments of conflict as well as of love, I think Talati would be the perfect director for this material. The novel also has the social backdrop of America as it goes through the upheavals of the civil rights movement, the Vietnam war, and...[read on]

Visit Monona Wali's website.

Q&A with Monona Wali.

The Page 69 Test: Sutra Americana.

Writers Read: Monona Wali.

My Book, The Movie: Sutra Americana.

--Marshal Zeringue

Pg. 69: Elizabeth Noel's "Beneath the Edelweiss"

Featured at the Page 69 Test: Beneath the Edelweiss by Elizabeth Noel.

About Beneath the Edelweiss, from the publisher:

From a poetic new voice in historical fiction comes a story of resistance, community, and survival set against the breathtaking backdrop of the Austrian Alps and the heartbreaking onset of World War II.

Growing up on a farm, high among the flowering slopes of Carinthia, Mitzi Hausler has never fit in―not even with her own family. At thirteen, she’s no taller than a six-year-old, and her peers’ taunts of “Witchy Mitzi” follow her everywhere. Thankfully, she has her loyal pup for comfort. And Oma, the grandmother who raised her.

But Oma, a gifted herbalist, won’t be around forever. She vows to pass on her knowledge before it’s too late, sharing her mysterious alpine remedies with Mitzi. With no marriage prospects, herbs may be Mitzi's only path forward. Indeed, when resources grow tight, her resentful older sister sends Mitzi away to Talend to care for a grieving widower and his sickly young child.

In the town, against all odds, Mitzi’s life gradually blooms into something unexpected and she discovers she belongs. But when political violence and Nazi eugenic policies come to town, she’s forced to make a life-altering choice.

Visit Elizabeth Noel's website.

Q&A with Elizabeth Noel.

Writers Read: Elizabeth Noel.

The Page 69 Test: Beneath the Edelweiss.

--Marshal Zeringue

Eight top literary science fiction books

Susie Dumond is a queer writer originally from Little Rock, Arkansas. She is the author of Queerly Beloved, Looking for a Sign, and Bed and Breakup, and she also talks about books as a senior contributor at Book Riot and a bookseller at her local indie bookstore. Dumond lives in Washington, D.C., with her spouse, Mickey, and her cat, Maple. When she’s not writing or reading, you can find her baking cupcakes or belting karaoke at the nearest gay bar.

At Book Riot Dumond tagged eight "literary science fiction books [that] tell engaging stories set in futuristic worlds, but they’ll also make you think about humanity and your own life from new perspectives." One title on the list:

The Light Pirate by Lily Brooks-Dalton

Lily Brooks-Dalton’s The Light Pirate dabbles in sci-fi, cli-fi, dystopia, and fantasy. But no matter what you call it, it’s an undeniably brilliant book that will spin you up in a web of gorgeous prose and have you obsessed by the end of the first chapter. In a near-future Florida eroded by climate change, a baby is born in the middle of a hurricane and given the storm’s name: Wanda. Wanda witnesses horrific natural disasters due to climate change, but the circumstances of her birth also left her with an inexplicable gift for survival. Brooks-Dalton is an enormously gifted writer, and her characters from this book have continued to stick with me for years since reading it.

Read about another title on the list.

The Light Pirate is among Scott Guild's eight dystopian novels that explore hope in the climate crisis.

--Marshal Zeringue

What is Monona Wali reading?

Featured at Writers Read: Monona Wali, author of Sutra Americana.

From her entry:

One book I recently finished reading is The Loneliness of Sonia and Sunny by Kiran Desai (2025) At 670 pages this novel is a major undertaking but thankfully is mostly a pleasure to read. Will Sonia and Sunny ever find each other, and then, will they ever find each other again after they stupidly part ways — this is the burning plotline of the novel. But the plot is hardly important – what is important is the web of their respective families and how they have a hold on their two children who, having left India to lead searingly lonely lives in America, seem unable to settle into any comfortable notions of identity. There are many passages in which Desai captures beautifully the dilemma of...[read on]

About Sutra Americana, from the publisher:

In 1960 S. K. Sharma, a brilliant young astrophysicist at the beginning of his academic career, has finally succeeded in bringing his wife, Sushila, from India to America. Intensely drawn to one another as star university students, the couple pursue an unlikely affair and marriage that crosses caste lines. Their sweeping, decades-long story of love, forgiveness, and coming of age takes place in a country that is both fascinated by and shuns them. The United States, with its exaltation of individualism, offers immense opportunities, but its looser sexual mores threaten to undermine the family’s happiness and devotion to one another.

As their three daughters become young women, they must navigate the tumultuous decades of the Vietnam War, the civil rights movement, and the women’s liberation movement. In their journeys of self-discovery, they upend their parents’ hold on them to craft radically new identities for themselves. As they discover their parents’ faults they grow increasingly puzzled by their devotion to one another, eventually learning how love and forgiveness have the power to overcome the most uncomfortable truths.

Visit Monona Wali's website.

Q&A with Monona Wali.

The Page 69 Test: Sutra Americana.

Writers Read: Monona Wali.

--Marshal Zeringue

Q&A with Anna Maloney

From my Q&A with Anna Maloney, author of The 10:12:

How much work does your title do to take readers into the story?

The 10:12 suggests a train and I wanted people to know the story would involve something that happens on a train. I was influenced by the writers who have set stories on trains such as Agatha Christie and Patricia Highsmith. It is a very specific location. People effectively trapped in a moving tube. And I wanted that to be the invitation to the story. Titles can be difficult, though. For my first teleplay I produced 22 alternatives after a new producer rejected the original. (And yes, I was beginning to get facetious.)

What’s in a name?

I’m not fond of awkward character names that sound implausible – unless...[read on]

Learn more about The 10:12, and follow Anna Maloney on Facebook, Instagram, and Threads.

Q&A with Anna Maloney.

--Marshal Zeringue

Pg. 99: Scot McFarlane's "The River That Made Texas"

Featured at the Page 99 Test: The River That Made Texas: A Forgotten History of the Trinity by Scot McFarlane.

About the book, from the publisher:

Today, half of Texas’s expanding population, including the cities of Dallas, Fort Worth, and Houston, depends on the Trinity River, a river that has shaped the state’s politics, economy, and environment for centuries. From the prairies of North Texas to the Gulf of Mexico, the Trinity established Native nations, foiled Spanish and French imperialism, stood at the center of the Texas plantation system, and fueled the growth of the state’s largest cities.

In the first history of this vital river, historian Scot McFarlane illuminates how the Trinity has defined Texas history. Its floods enriched the soil and destroyed crops, its channel served as both a route and barrier to freedom, and its once-polluted waters now sustain a significant portion of the state. McFarlane’s captivating narrative brims with stories of the people who called the Trinity home over the centuries: the Comanche, steamboat pilots, enslaved and freed people, sharecroppers, inmates, and millions of urban residents. The result is a fresh perspective on economic development, slavery, and the environment—revealing the Trinity not as a backdrop to Texas history but as a force that shaped it.

Visit Scot McFarlane's website.

The Page 99 Test: The River That Made Texas.

--Marshal Zeringue

Eighteen top romantasy books

Sofia Lodato is a staff writer at Oprah Daily. Aside from reading, writing, and wellness, she is a lover of all things media-related, and can usually be found overanalyzing her latest favorite show, album, or video game.

One title on Lodato's list of the eighteen best romantasy books:

The Undertaking of Hart and Mercy, by Megan Bannen

Hart is a demigod marshal in a frontier town, fighting the reanimated dead who cross the magical border. Mercy works day and night propping up her family’s failing funeral business and defending it from a corporate takeover. Of course, Hart and Mercy “loathe” each other, and every encounter is loaded with belligerent sexual tension. But when a lonely Hart writes an anonymous letter expressing his yearning for a friend and sends it off via the magical postal service, an equally lonely Mercy is somehow the missive’s recipient. It's You’ve Got Mail meets Six Feet Under but as a magical Western; the result is an absolutely adorable fantasy romance with some lovely beta couple pairings, warm family scenes, humorously awkward moments, and even some cool gun-slinging action.

Read about another title on the list.

--Marshal Zeringue