MURDER IN MAINE: THE FLY MAN MURDERS BY MILDRED DAVIS WITH KATHERINE D. ROOME AND REN ROOME

The audaciously constructed second Murder in Maine novel (after 2006's The Avenging of Nevah Wright) features Dilly, a three-year-old child who finds himself inexplicably abandoned and has to cope not only without an adult but with a killer hunting for him; Faith, a homeless amnesiac whose memory returns only in tantalizing wisps that fuel an increasing sense of urgency; and Skip, a horribly abused boy growing up at the mercy of an unloving mother and a sadistic father. Paperback 192 pages