When Rob Stone gives a ride to a woman on the run, he has unwittingly crossed a drugs cartel. With the DEA, FBI and local cops closing in on America's most wanted, it's time for Stone to stop running and start fighting. But south of the border on the cartel's own terms, the fight is altogether more brutal...

A soldier reconnects with his past as he fights to save his mother from the radicals who have kidnapped her in this taut, layered, riveting suspense novel.Special Operations soldier Theo Bailey is right to be concerned when his mother, a controversial Muslim writer, announces that she will be traveling to Pakistan to attend a symposium on peace. His worst fears are realized when the conference is taken hostage by a group of terrorists who resolve to execute the captives one at a time. Fortunately, Sonia Bailey Laghari has a few tricks of her own: an astounding facility with languages, the mysterious insights of Jungian psychotherapy, and an unthinkable, at times brutal, sense of faith.While Theo masterminds a high-stakes military operation to save the hostages, his mother discovers in her gift for dream interpretation a psychological tool of great power and subtlety. For her fellow prisoners, including an eccentric American billionaire and a Jesuit priest, Sonia’s uncanny influence over the captors is their only hope for survival.Praise for The Good Son“Adeptly plotted yet philosophical, worldly yet preoccupied with moral truth, it’s a book to provoke comparisons with John le Carré and Graham Greene.” —Laura Miller, Salon.com“The brilliant character development and the labyrinthian plot . . . make this a provocative thriller that readers won’t soon forget.” —Publishers Weekly (starred review)“Gruber . . . weaves the threads together masterfully while successfully exploring themes of family, duty, loyalty, cultural identity and more, without ever slowing the momentum. Smart, tense and vastly entertaining.” —Kirkus Reviews

**Best Books of August ~ Apple Books**

“Coauthors Steve Berry and M.J. Rose take lots of hairpin turns, making for an intense, suspenseful, and action-packed read. The Lake of Learning is the kind of page-turner that makes you crave a big bowl of popcorn—we just wanted it to keep on going.” ~ Apple Books

For over a decade Cassiopeia Vitt has been building an authentic French castle, using only materials and techniques from the 13th century. But when a treasure is unearthed at the construction site—an ancient Book of Hours—a multitude of questions are raised, all pointing to an ancient and forgotten religious sect.

Once the Cathars existed all across southern France, challenging Rome and attracting the faithful by the tens of thousands. Eventually, in 1208, the Pope declared them heretics and ordered a crusade—the first where Christians killed Christians—and thousands were slaughtered, the Cathars all but exterminated. Now a piece of that past has re-emerged, one that holds the key to the hiding place of the most precious object the Cathars possessed. And when more than one person becomes interested in that secret, in particular a thief and a billionaire, the race is on.

From the medieval walled city of Carcassonne, to the crest of mysterious Montségur, to a forgotten cavern beneath the Pyrenees, Cassiopeia is drawn deeper and deeper into a civil war between two people obsessed with revenge and murder.

A deep secret that only one man knew … until the whole world found out. Richard Halliburton, the world famous travel writer and explorer in the early 1920s and 30s, embarked on a journey to explore the world. But he found much more than he ever imagined—and far more than he ever told. Following the end of World War I, the German Reichswehr set out on an ambitious—and unconventional—expedition to rebuild the military’s war chest beyond the auspices of the restrictive Treaty of Versailles. But when U.S. Army intelligence got wind of what the Reichswehr was doing, action was required. And Richard Halliburton was the man drafted into service. Join Halliburton on this pulse-pounding adventure in his race to stop the Germans from uncovering one of the greatest artifacts—and secrets—in Egyptian history. If you love the Indiana Jones franchise, Clive Cussler, or Dan Brown, you’re sure to enjoy this new series from Garrett Drake.