Libriomancer (Jim C. Hines)

This is the first book in a series, and I expect to keep reading it. It's a contemporary fantasy based on the idea that books are magical. When enough people read the same book in the same form, and it's written well enough so that the story becomes real for them as they read, then people who have the proper magical abilities can literally reach into the book and pull things out into the real world. Isaac, the hero of this story, has pulled out things like sonic screwdrivers, blasters, and light sabers. There are magical creatures in the world, some naturally created and some book-based (such as the recent appearance of sparkly vampires), and there's a balance of power between the libriomancers who govern the magic of the books and other magical beings (vampires, werewolves, and such). This balance has been disrupted recently; both vampires and libriomancers have suffered attacks that they blame on each other, and before total war breaks out Isaac has to find out who's behind it and defeat them. Along the way he joins up with a dryad and his trusty pet fire spider. Isaac is a good hero, smart and engaging and sympathetic, and the idea of magical books appeals to me. Lots of fun.

Zer0es (Chuck Wendig)

The Zeroes are a motley group of hackers and trolls dragged to a prison compound by a mysterious government organization and put to work on various hacker-related tasks that don't seem to make much sense. They gradually figure out that there's a powerful and dangerous force that's taking over the Internet, causing death and mayhem, and they band together to escape and fight this power. I enjoyed the geeky references to tech and pop culture, but ultimately the story didn't really work for me. The characters never came alive, but remained cardboard stand-ins for stock people. The story also had two basic flaws that dragged my disbelief to the ground. One is that if a computer takes over the Internet then it can take direct control over any interconnected digital device, from the GPS in an airplane to your car's radio. The other, even more implausible, is that it is possible to throw someone down on a table, drill a hole in their skull, and shove in a cable that allows the computer to both download all their memories and upload a command program that turns them into a remote-controlled zombie. I'm sorry, but no.

Storm Front (Jim Butcher)

I've read a few of the books from this series here and there and liked them, so I'm starting over from the beginning. Harry Dresden is a wizard, all trained up and powerful and everything, living in modern Chicago and hanging out an actual shingle identifying himself as such. There are lots of other wizards around (he's got a very chancy relationship with the White Council that governs wizards' affairs), but he's the only one that's out and public. He's called in as a police consultant to study some particularly gruesome murders that have a magical basis, and also hired by a woman as a private investigator to look for her husband, an amateur wizard who's disappeared. Naturally, these two cases come together in an unexpected but satisfying way. I really like Harry's voice and attitude. He's a good guy with some serious skills who throws himself into problems way beyond his level when there are people in trouble. He reminds me a bit of Travis McGee, in John D. MacDonald's wonderful series, with a layer of cool magic on top.

The Power and the Glory (Graham Greene)

This highly acclaimed novel by a well-respected author tracks an unnamed priest on the run during a time when Mexico declared the Church to be illegal and the priesthood to be treasonous. He knows he's not a very good priest; he drinks, he had sex with a parishioner and has a daughter, he is too focused on his own ambitions to think much about his flock. On the other hand, he can't bring himself to completely turn his back on his faith, so he runs. Little by little the police, led by a Lieutenant whose hatred of the church is second to none, close off his escape routes, and he is finally trapped. This book raises interesting questions about the nature of faith and of God, and what it means to be a godly person in a broken world. I'm sorry to say that I wasn't able to connect with the story or the characters very much, so I pressed to the end out of a sense of duty, much as the unnamed priest did.

River Marked (Patricia Briggs)

I still love this series of contemporary fantasies, featuring Mercy Thompson, who is tough, brave, sexy, and compassionate. In this story, the focus is firmly on Mercy's relationship with Adam, and on coming to terms with her Native-American culture and with Coyote, as they band together to fight an abomination of a river monster that's been returned from the dead to prey on people. Her mechanic shop, the vampires, fae, and even the rest of the wolf pack are secondary. The action is intense, the stakes are high, and Adam and Mercy are put through the wringer in every possible way, but they manage to come through in the end. I will definitely keep reading these as long as she keep writing them.