Readers List Their Favorite Reads

Ready for a "novel" read? How about a Novel Destination?

The drawn winners of the Dorchester County Library Novel Destinations have selected six good reads for this summer.

Here are the books selected by readers in the adult summer reading program held June and July:

• The Body of Christopher Creed by Carol Plum-Ucci. Selected by Alisha Wrighten.

• Drive Me Wild by Gwynne Forster. Selected by De’Neishia Marshall.

• State Fair by Earlene Fowler. Selected by Charlene Amweg.

• Blackbird, a memoir, by Jennifer Lauck. Selected by Joyce Smith.

• The Paris Wife by Paula McLain. Selected by Amy Zielke.

• Buried Prey by John Sandford. Selected by Debbie Chaney.

Last year, the first that Dorchester County Library extended summer reading incentives to those beyond 18 years old, there were 65 entries in the contest. This year, the program doubled with 135 total entries, according to library staff.

About The Body of Christopher Creed

Steepleton could have dealt with a runaway, a suicide, an abduction, or even a murder. Other towns survive them. But the thing about Chris Creed's disappearance is that he was just plain gone.

Chris Creed grew up as the class freak-the bullies' punching bag. After he vanished, the weirdness that had once surrounded him began spreading. It was as if a darkness reached out of his void to grab at the most normal, happy people-like some twisted joke or demented form of justice. It tore the town apart.

For 16-year-old Torey Adams, Creed's disappearance becomes a major turning point in his privileged and sheltered life. The only apparent clue-a cryptic e-mail message written twenty-four hours before Chris turned up missing-draws Torey into the mystery and sets him on a path filled with terror and pain. In his search for the truth, Torey slowly discovers that some mysteries are not meant to be solved-they are simply meant to overcome.

For more info, click here. 

About Drive Me Wild

Gina Harkness is stunned when an elderly woman she befriended leaves her an inheritance of millions. Suddenly the former accountant is living in a Park Avenue apartment and interviewing potential chauffeurs. Sexy, charismatic Justin Whitehead is definitely qualified, but hiring a man whose gaze sets her whole body on fire could be a huge mistake.

Reporter J. L. Whitehead will do anything for a story — even pose as a chauffeur for six months to write about the suddenly rich. His relationship with his beautiful new "boss" quickly turns from business to mind-blowing pleasure. But will Gina ever believe that, though his identity was a lie, their untamed passion is real?

For more info, click here. 

About State Fair 

For Benni, the annual San Celina Mid-State Fair is a much anticipated break in her normal routine of overseeing museum exhibits, temperamental artists and stubborn cattle. This year there is a special showing of traditional African American quilts. When the exhibit's main attraction — a replica of a story quilt made by historical quilting icon Harriet Powers — is stolen, Benni suspects it is more than mere thievery.

Benni soon learns that underneath the fun, the fair has become a focal point for certain people who are angry at his year's choice for fair manager, Levi Clark. And when the theft leads to a cold-blooded murder, Benni will have to search through a crazy quilt of of clues to discover who in San Celina's seemingly idyllic society is really a wolf in sheep's clothing.

For more info, click here. 

About Blackbird

To young Jenny, the house on Mary Street was home — the place where she was loved, a blue-sky world of Barbies, "Bewitched," and The Beatles. Even her mother's pain from her mysterious illness could be patted away with powder and a kiss on the cheek. But when everything that Jenny had come to rely on begins to crumble, an odyssey of loss, loneliness and a child's will to survive takes flight.

For more info, click here. 

About The Paris Wife

Set during a remarkable time, the same period as Ernest Hemingway's A Moveable Feast and The Sun Also Rises, Paula McLain's The Paris Wife brilliantly captures the voice and heart of Hadley Hemingway as she struggles with her roles as a woman—wife, lover, muse, friend, and mother—and tries to find her place in the intoxicating and tumultuous world of Paris in the twenties.

For more info, click here. To see what Dorchester County Library staff says about this book, .

About Buried Prey

An entire block on the edge of the Minneapolis loop is being torn down for development, when an unpleasant surprise is unearthed: the bodies of two girls, wrapped in plastic, underneath an old house. It looks like they've been down there a long time. Lucas Davenport knows exactly how long.

In 1985, Davenport was a young cop just about to be promoted out of uniform, despite a reputation for playing fast and loose with the regulations. A local hockey hero, a womanizer, a superb undercover guy, he was part of the massive police effort that followed the kidnapping of two girls who were never found again, dead or alive. Eventually, the case was closed.

But not for Davenport. Now, with the bodies discovered, he has the chance to investigate the kidnappings all over again, and the deeper he probes, the more one thing becomes clear: It wasn't just the bodies that were buried. It was the truth.

For more info, click here.