FORCE OF NATURE, by Jane Harper. (Flatiron, $16.99.) In this thriller from the hugely popular Australian crime novelist, five colleagues set out for a hike in the bush, but only four return. Aaron Falk, a federal agent, investigates the missing hiker - a woman who was widely disliked and secretly looking into her firm's dodgy finances. He turns up a web of betrayals and secrets, and acts as the book's moral compass. FEEL FREE: Essays, by Zadie Smith. (Penguin, $18.) Ajoyful current guides these selections, which touch on everything from a philosophical consideration of Justin Bieber's appeal to the thrill of public parks in Italy. As our reviewer, Amanda Fortini, put it, "It is exquisitely pleasurable to observe Smith thinking on the page, not least because we have no idea where she's headed." ANATOMY OF A MIRACLE, by Jonathan Miles. (Hogarth, $16.) When an Army veteran who has been paralyzed from the waist down suddenly can walk again, his recovery raises a number of questions: Was it divine intervention? A medical breakthrough? And above all, why him? Miles's novel mimics a New Journalism narrative style, and our reviewer, Christopher R. Beha, called the book "a highly entertaining literary performance." DAUGHTERS OF THE WINTER QUEEN: Four Remarkable Sisters, the Crown of Bohemia, and the Enduring Legacy of Mary, Queen of Scots, by Nancy Goldstone. (Back Bay/Little, Brown, $18.99.) Goldstone is known for her histories of royals, and this one charts the stormy life of Elizabeth Stuart. The daughter of Charles I and known as "the most charming princess of Europe," she schemed for her children in 17th-century England. The book doubles as a useful introduction to a time when Britain's relations with Europe were strained. THE ESSEX SERPENT, by Sarah Perry. (Custom House/William Morrow, $16.99.) In this romance-meets-ghost-story, it's 1893 and Cora, recently widowed, heads to the coast of England with her son. There, she finds a town racked with worry that a fearsome monster has returned. As Cora investigates the phenomenon, she is drawn to a local pastor, and their dialogues about faith and science help create a richly satisfying relationship. THE LINE BECOMES A RIVER, by Francisco Cantú. (Riverhead, $17.) To better understand immigration in the United States, Cantu joined the Border Patrol. He writes of his time with the agency, where he witnessed casual cruelty toward migrants. A later section, which tells the story of a friend who was deported, makes a meaningful contribution to literature of the border.

In good Queen Victoria's heyday (the year is never specified but would seem to be in the early 1890s), rumor has it that an earthquake has opened a fissure in leafy, bucolic, and apparently very muddy coastal Essex, through which a serpent slithers, part local bogey-beastie and part tourist attraction. Perry's (After Me Comes the Flood) large cast of characters centers on Cora Seaborne, recently widowed, who visits the town of Aldwinter, both because of her interest in fossils and to try out her newfound freedom. It turns out that her marriage had not been happy. While in Aldwinter, Cora meets married Rev. William Ransome, and they discuss faith and fossils, among other things. Almost 30 years ago, A.S. Byatt's take on the Victorian era, Possession, caught fire with readers. Lightning just might strike twice with this winner of British retailer Waterstone's 2016 Book of the Year. -VERDICT Exercise caution approaching this literary garden pavilion, floored with mud, glorious mud, and canopied with lush and lovely blue English roses. You just may find yourself unable to leave. [See Prepub Alert, 12/19/16; see "Editors' Spring Picks," LJ 2/15/17.]-Bob Lunn, Kansas City, MO © Copyright 2017. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.

*Starred Review* Secret love and the suggestion of something unearthly moving in the Essex Blackwater drive the intricate plot of this atmospheric historical novel about Cora Seaborne, a widow visiting Colchester with her companion, ostensibly to explore the estuary for fossils. A medieval winged serpent myth still holds the inhabitants of Aldwinter in thrall, despite the best efforts of the local rector, Will Ransome; and as Perry's second novel (following After Me Comes the Flood, 2015) wends its way through mysterious disappearances, fog-laden visions, suspicion, and tragedy, it seems as if the monster is real. The vivid, often frightening imagery (the Leviathan, a shack sinking in the bog, the scrape of scales moving up the shingle) and the lush descriptions (stained glass angels had the wings of jays) create a magical background for the sensual love story between Sarah and Will. Book-discussion groups will have a field day with the imagery, the well-developed characters, and the concepts of innocence, evil, and guilt. Like Lauren Groff's The Monsters of Templeton (2008), the appearance of a sea monster sheds more light on humanity than on natural history, while the sudden revelation of a creature of the deep heralds change and revelation, as in Jim Lynch's The Highest Tide (2005).--Baker, Jen Copyright 2017 Booklist

In Perry's (After Me Comes the Flood) excellent second novel, set in the Victorian era, recent widow Cora Seaborne leaves London with her 11-year-old son, Francis, and loyal companion, Martha, and goes to Colchester, where a legendary, fearsome creature called the Essex Serpent has been sighted. Scholarly Cora, who is more interested in the study of nature than in womanly matters of dress, tramps about in a man's tweed coat, determined to find proof of this creature's existence. Through friends, she is introduced to William Ransome, the local reverend; his devoted wife, Stella; and their three children. Cora looks for a scientific rationale for the Essex Serpent, while Ransome dismisses it as superstition. This puts them at odds with one another, but, strangely, also acts as a powerful source of attraction between them. When Cora is visited by her late husband's physician, Luke Garrett, who carries a not-so-secret torch for her, a love triangle of sorts is formed. In the end, a fatal illness, a knife-wielding maniac, and a fated union with the Essex Serpent will dictate the ultimate happiness of these characters. Like John Fowles's The French Lieutenant's Woman, whose Lyme Regis setting gets a shout-out here, this is another period literary pastiche with a contemporary overlay. Cora makes for a fiercely independent heroine around whom all the other characters orbit. (June) © Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved.

The unlikely friendship between a canny widow and a scholarly vicar sets the stage for this sweeping 19th-century saga of competing belief systems.Widow Cora Seaborne knows she should mourn the death of her husband; instead, she finally feels free. Eschewing the advice of her friends, Cora retreats from London with her lady's maid, Martha, and strange, prescient son, Francis. The curious party decamps to muddy Essex, where Cora dons an ugly men's coat and goes tramping in the mud, looking for fossils. Soon she becomes captivated by the local rumor of a menacing presence that haunts the Blackwater estuary, a threat that locks children in their houses after dark and puts farmers on watch as the tide creeps in. Cora's fascination with the fabled Essex Serpent leads her to the Rev. William Ransome, desperate to keep his flock from descending into outright hysteria. An unlikely pair, the two develop a fast intellectual friendship, curious to many but accepted by all, including Ransome's ailing wife, Stella. Perry (After Me Comes the Flood, 2015) pulls out all the stops in her richly detailed Victorian yarn, weaving myth and local flavor with 19th-century debates about theology and evolution, medical science and social justice for the poor. Each of Perry's characters receives his or her due, from the smallest Essex urchin to the devastating Stella, who suffers from tuberculosis and obsesses over the color blue throughout her decline. There are Katherine and Charles Ambrose, a good-natured but shallow society couple; the ambitious and radical Dr. Luke Garrett and his wealthier but less-talented friend George Spencer, who longs for Martha; Martha herself, who rattles off Marx with the best of them and longs to win Cora's affection; not to mention a host of sailors, superstitious tenant farmers, and bewitched schoolgirls. The sumptuous twists and turns of Perry's prose invite close reading, as deep and strange and full of narrative magic as the Blackwater itself. Fans of Sarah Waters, A.S. Byatt, and Elizabeth Gilbert's The Signature of All Things should prepare to fall under Perry's spell and into her very capable hands. Stuffed with smarts and storytelling sorcery, this is a work of astonishing breadth and brilliance. Copyright Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.