Things You Save in a Fire <\/em>by Katherine Center and One Good Deed <\/em>by David Baldacci<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

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I read the first fourteen pages of Houston author Katherine Center\u2019s new novel, <\/span>Things You Save in a Fire<\/span><\/em><\/strong><\/a> (St. Martin\u2019s Press, $26.99 hardcover), and I was hooked. The story revolves around Cassie Hanwell, who at age twenty-six is the youngest person\u2014and the first female\u2014to receive the Austin fire department\u2019s Valor Award for saving a busload of school children. Headlines call her the School Bus Angel.<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

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Her fellow firefighters stand in the banquet hall and chant her name as she makes her way to the podium and is handed a heavy wooden plaque. Which she proceeds to use to attack the man presenting the award\u2014knocking him unconscious and sending him to the hospital with a concussion! She refuses to say why she attacked the city councilman, just that it goes back to something that happened in high school. Anyway, Hanwell\u2019s promising career with the Austin fire department is pretty much over. <\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

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New possibilities await in Massachusetts as she reconnects with her mother\u2014who deserted her ten years ago\u2014and accepts an opening in a suburban fire department that is overtly hostile to women. But there is this other new hire\u2014a chef turned rookie firefighter\u2014who is not like the other guys. Hanwell proves her strength and toughness in the fire service, while battling prejudice and harassment. But she finds she has a lot to learn about life, forgiveness, and love.<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

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Things You Save in a Fire<\/span><\/em>, Center\u2019s seventh novel, goes on sale Tuesday. Her last novel was <\/span>How to Walk Away<\/span><\/em><\/strong><\/a>, which was one of my favorite novels last year. Cassie Hanwell had a small but critical role in that story as the firefighter who rescued the main character from a wrecked and burning airplane.<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

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On her website\u2014<\/span>http:\/\/www.katherinecenter.com<\/span><\/a>\u2014Center says she believes \u201cthe single most inspiring thing about the human race is the way life knocks us down over and over and over, but we just keep on getting back up.\u201d Her stories, she adds, \u201care always about resilience and struggle and finding ways to savor life\u2019s moments of grace.\u201d She promises that she \u201cwill never, ever, run the main character over with a bus in the final chapter.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

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Not a Texas novel: <\/span><\/strong>Mega-best-selling author David Baldacci\u2019s new novel, <\/span>One Good Deed<\/span><\/em><\/strong><\/a> <\/em><\/strong> (Grand Central Publishing, $29 hardcover), is not set in Texas, but Texas does figure into the story in a few scenes. And, anyway, I really enjoyed the <\/span>book and recommend it to y<\/span>ou.<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

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The main chara<\/span>cter is World War II hero Aloysius Archer\u2014or just Archer\u2014who has served time in prison for a crime he didn\u2019t commit and finds himself on parole and a suspect in the murder of the most prominent businessman in town. But there are several other suspects as well, and Archer needs to help police solve the crime and clear his name. <\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

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