David Sedaris's ability to transform the mortification of everyday life into wildly entertaining art is elevated to wilder and more entertaining heights than ever in this remarkable new book.

Trying to make coffee when the water is shut off, David considers using the water in a vase of flowers, leading his chain of associations from the French countryside to a hilariously uncomfortable memory of buying drugs in a mobile home in rural North Carolina.

In essay after essay, Sedaris proceeds from bizarre conundrums of daily life—having a lozenge fall from your mouth into the lap of a fellow passenger on a plane or armoring the windows with LP covers to protect the house from neurotic songbirds—to the most deeply resonant human truths.

Culminating in a brilliant account of his venture to Tokyo in order to quit smoking, David Sedaris's sixth essay collection is a new masterpiece of comic writing from a writer worth treasuring.

Hikaru no Go, Vol. 19: One Step Forward! follows the journey of Hikaru Shindo who, after discovering a haunted go board, is possessed by the spirit of a master player named Fujiwara-no-Sai. This encounter awakens an untapped genius for the game within Hikaru, propelling him to pursue his dream of defeating Akira Toya, a famed go prodigy.

When Chelsea Handler needs to get a few things off her chest, she appeals to a higher power - vodka. You would too if you found out that your boyfriend was having an affair with a Peekapoo or if you had to pretend to be honeymooning with your father in order to upgrade to first class. Welcome to Chelsea's world - a place where absurdity reigns supreme and a quick wit is the best line of defense.

In this hilarious, deliciously skewed collection, Chelsea mines her past for stories about her family, relationships, and career that are at once singular and ridiculous. Whether she's convincing her third-grade class that she has been tapped to play Goldie Hawn's daughter in the sequel to Private Benjamin, deciding to be more egalitarian by dating a redhead, or looking out for a foulmouthed, rum-swilling little person who looks just like her... only smaller, Chelsea has a knack for getting herself into the most outrageous situations.

Are You There, Vodka? It's Me, Chelsea showcases the candor and irresistible turns of phrase that have made her one of the freshest voices in comedy today.

The House at Riverton is a breathtaking debut novel set in England between World War I and World War II. Perfect for fans of Downton Abbey, it unfolds the story of an aristocratic family, a mysterious death, and a bygone way of life, all seen through the eyes of a woman who experienced it firsthand.

As a young girl, Grace Bradley starts working at Riverton House, becoming deeply intertwined with the Hartford family, especially the daughters, Hannah and Emmeline. During a grand society party in the summer of 1924, a young poet commits suicide, an event only witnessed by Hannah, Emmeline, and Grace—who harbors the truth.

Years later, in 1999, as Grace nears the end of her life at ninety-eight, a young director seeks her out for a film about that fateful summer, reigniting her memories. The narrative, rich in flashbacks, captures the essence of Grace's youth amidst the final days of Edwardian aristocracy, the vibrant twenties, and the sweeping changes that followed, leading to the disappearance of an entire way of life.

This novel is laden with secrets—some revealed, others forever concealed, echoing the romantic suspense of Daphne du Maurier. It is also a contemplation on memory, the ravages of war, and a beautifully portrayed glimpse into a captivating period in history.

In the world of The Minority Report, Commissioner John Anderton is credited for the absence of crime. He is the creator of the Precrime System, which employs "precogs"—individuals with the ability to see into the future—to pinpoint criminals before they can act. Tragically for Anderton, he is identified by the precogs as the next perpetrator. Despite knowing he has never considered such an act, this premonition suggests the precogs can err. Caught in a dire situation, Anderton's fate seems sealed unless he can uncover the precogs's "minority report"—the singular dissenting opinion that might allow him to unearth the truth and save himself from the very system he designed.

A motion picture adaptation of The Minority Report, directed by Steven Spielberg and featuring Tom Cruise, has been released, signifying the lasting influence of Philip K. Dick's imaginative literature.

The Name of the Wind, also known as The Kingkiller Chronicle: Day One, is a heroic fantasy novel by American author Patrick Rothfuss. It is the first book in the ongoing fantasy trilogy The Kingkiller Chronicle.

Told in the protagonist's own voice, this is the tale of the magically gifted young man who grows to be the most notorious wizard the world has ever seen. The intimate narrative of his childhood in a troupe of traveling players, his years as a near-feral orphan in a crime-ridden city, his daring bid to enter a legendary school of magic, and his life as a fugitive after the murder of a king form a gripping coming-of-age story unrivaled in recent literature.

A high-action story written with a poet's hand, The Name of the Wind is a masterpiece that transports readers into the body and mind of a wizard, and how his search for meaning in his universe gave birth to a legend.

In the last thirty years, the big pharmaceutical companies have transformed themselves into marketing machines selling dangerous medicines as if they were Coca-Cola or Cadillacs. They pitch drugs with video games and soft cuddly toys for children; promote them in churches and subways, at NASCAR races and state fairs. They've become experts at promoting fear of disease, just so they can sell us hope.

No question: drugs can save lives. But the relentless marketing that has enriched corporate executives and sent stock prices soaring has come with a dark side. Prescription pills taken as directed by physicians are estimated to kill one American every five minutes. And that figure doesn't reflect the damage done as the overmedicated take to the roads.

Our Daily Meds connects the dots for the first time to show how corporate salesmanship has triumphed over science inside the biggest pharmaceutical companies and, in turn, how this promotion-driven industry has taken over the practice of medicine and is changing American life. It is an ageless story of the battle between good and evil, with potentially life-changing consequences for everyone, not just the 65 percent of Americans who unscrew a prescription cap every day.

An industry with the promise to help so many is now leaving a legacy of needless harm.

Last year, Annabel was the girl who has everything — at least that's the part she played in the television commercial for Kopf's Department Store.

This year, she's the girl who has nothing: no best friend because mean-but-exciting Sophie dropped her, no peace at home since her older sister became anorexic, and no one to sit with at lunch. Until she meets Owen Armstrong.

Tall, dark, and music-obsessed, Owen is a reformed bad boy with a commitment to truth-telling. With Owen's help, maybe Annabel can face what happened the night she and Sophie stopped being friends.

It was January 2021, and Rick Deckard had a license to kill. Somewhere among the hordes of humans out there, lurked several rogue androids. Deckard's assignment--find them and then retire them. Trouble was, the androids all looked exactly like humans, and they didn't want to be found!

By 2021, the World War has killed millions, driving entire species into extinction and sending mankind off-planet. Those who remain covet any living creature, and for people who can't afford one, companies built incredibly realistic simulacra: horses, birds, cats, sheep. They've even built humans. Immigrants to Mars receive androids so sophisticated they are indistinguishable from true men or women. Fearful of the havoc these artificial humans can wreak, the government bans them from Earth. Driven into hiding, unauthorized androids live among human beings, undetected.

Rick Deckard, an officially sanctioned bounty hunter, is commissioned to find rogue androids and retire them. But when cornered, androids fight back--with lethal force.

Geralt the Witcher -- revered and hated -- holds the line against the monsters plaguing humanity in this collection of adventures in the NYT bestselling series that inspired the blockbuster video games. Geralt is a Witcher, a man whose magic powers, enhanced by long training and a mysterious elixir, have made him a brilliant fighter and a merciless assassin. Yet he is no ordinary murderer: his targets are the multifarious monsters and vile fiends that ravage the land and attack the innocent. But not everything monstrous-looking is evil and not everything fair is good...and in every fairy tale there is a grain of truth. Andrzej Sapkowski, winner of the World Fantasy Lifetime Achievement award, started an international phenomenon with his Witcher series. The Last Wish short story collection is the perfect introduction to this one of a kind fantasy world. Witcher collectionsThe Last WishSword of Destiny Witcher novelsBlood of Elves The Time of Contempt Baptism of Fire The Tower of SwallowsLady of the LakeSeason of Storms The Malady and Other Stories: An Andrzej Sapkowski Sampler (e-only) Translated from original Polish by Danusia Stok

Seventeen years ago, Sepha Stephanos fled the Ethiopian Revolution after witnessing soldiers brutally beat his father. Selling off his parents' jewelry, he paid for passage to the United States. Now, he finds himself running a grocery store in a poor African-American neighborhood in Washington, D.C. His only companions are two fellow African immigrants who share his feelings of frustration and bitter nostalgia for their home continent.

He realizes that his life has turned out completely different and far more isolated from the one he had imagined for himself years ago. Soon, Sepha's neighborhood begins to change. Hope comes in the form of new neighbors—Judith and Naomi, a white woman and her biracial daughter—who become his friends and remind him of what having a family is like for the first time in years.

But when the neighborhood's newfound calm is disturbed by a series of racial incidents, Sepha may lose everything all over again. Told in a haunting and powerful first-person narration, the novel casts the streets of Washington, D.C., and Addis Ababa through Sepha's eyes. The Beautiful Things That Heaven Bears is a deeply affecting and unforgettable debut novel about what it means to lose a family and a country—and what it takes to create a new home.

After decades of research, world-renowned Stanford University psychologist Carol S. Dweck, Ph.D., discovered a simple but groundbreaking idea: the power of mindset. In this brilliant book, she shows how success in school, work, sports, the arts, and almost every area of human endeavor can be dramatically influenced by how we think about our talents and abilities.

People with a fixed mindset—those who believe that abilities are fixed—are less likely to flourish than those with a growth mindset—those who believe that abilities can be developed. Mindset reveals how great parents, teachers, managers, and athletes can put this idea to use to foster outstanding accomplishment.

In this edition, Dweck offers new insights into her now famous and broadly embraced concept. She introduces a phenomenon she calls false growth mindset and guides people toward adopting a deeper, truer growth mindset. She also expands the mindset concept beyond the individual, applying it to the cultures of groups and organizations. With the right mindset, you can motivate those you lead, teach, and love—to transform their lives and your own.

Ian McEwan’s symphonic novel of love and war, childhood and class, guilt and forgiveness provides all the satisfaction of a brilliant narrative and the provocation we have come to expect from this master of English prose. On a hot summer day in 1935, thirteen-year-old Briony Tallis witnesses the flirtation between her older sister, Cecilia, and Robbie Turner, the son of a servant.

But Briony’s incomplete grasp of adult motives and her precocious imagination bring about a crime that will change all their lives, a crime whose repercussions Atonement follows through the chaos and carnage of World War II and into the close of the twentieth century.

Americans have lost touch with their history, and in Lies My Teacher Told Me Professor James Loewen shows why. After surveying eighteen leading high school American history texts, he has concluded that not one does a decent job of making history interesting or memorable. Marred by an embarrassing combination of blind patriotism, mindless optimism, sheer misinformation, and outright lies, these books omit almost all the ambiguity, passion, conflict, and drama from our past.

In this revised edition, packed with updated material, Loewen explores how historical myths continue to be perpetuated in today's climate and adds an eye-opening chapter on the lies surrounding 9/11 and the Iraq War. From the truth about Columbus's historic voyages to an honest evaluation of our national leaders, Loewen revives our history, restoring the vitality and relevance it truly possesses.

Thought provoking, nonpartisan, and often shocking, Loewen unveils the real America in this iconoclastic classic beloved by high school teachers, history buffs, and enlightened citizens across the country.

Louis Charles Lynch (also known as Lucy) is sixty years old and has lived in Thomaston, New York, his entire life. He and Sarah, his wife of forty years, are about to embark on a vacation to Italy. Lucy's oldest friend, once a rival for his wife's affection, leads a life in Venice far removed from Thomaston.

Perhaps for this reason Lucy is writing the story of his town, his family, and his own life that makes up this rich and mesmerizing novel, interspersed with that of the native son who left so long ago and has never looked back.

Bridge of Sighs, from the beloved Pulitzer Prize-winning author of Empire Falls, is a moving novel about small-town America that expands Russo's widely heralded achievement in ways both familiar and astonishing.

Since their mother's death, Tip and Teddy Doyle have been raised by their loving, possessive, and ambitious father. As the former mayor of Boston, Bernard Doyle wants to see his sons in politics, a dream the boys have never shared. But when an argument in a blinding New England snowstorm inadvertently causes an accident that involves a stranger and her child, all Bernard Doyle cares about is his ability to keep his children—all his children—safe.

Set over a period of twenty-four hours, Run takes us from the Museum of Comparative Zoology at Harvard to a home for retired Catholic priests in downtown Boston. It shows us how worlds of privilege and poverty can coexist only blocks apart from each other, and how family can include people you've never even met.

As in her bestselling novel Bel Canto, Ann Patchett illustrates the humanity that connects disparate lives, weaving several stories into one surprising and endlessly moving narrative. Suspenseful and stunningly executed, Run is ultimately a novel about secrets, duty, responsibility, and the lengths we will go to protect our children.

The Lace Reader is a novel set in the mysterious town of Salem, Massachusetts, a place steeped in history and intrigue. The story revolves around Towner Whitney, a woman descended from a long line of mind readers and fortune tellers who can read the future in the patterns of lace.

Returning to Salem for some rest and relaxation, Towner's life is thrown into turmoil when her beloved aunt drowns under mysterious circumstances. As Towner delves deeper into her family's secrets, she must confront her painful past and the shocking truth about the death of her twin sister.

Through unreliable narratives and a blend of reality and imagination, the novel explores themes of family, memory, and the supernatural. The Whitney women's ability to read lace serves as both a gift and a curse, revealing hidden truths and challenging their perceptions of reality.

As the story unfolds, readers are drawn into a suspenseful, fast-paced tale that questions the boundaries between what is real and what is imagined. The novel's rich, evocative prose casts an enthralling spell, making it a compelling read for those who enjoy a mix of mystery, psychological drama, and historical fiction.

The impossible has been accomplished. The Lord Ruler—the man who claimed to be god incarnate and brutally ruled the world for a thousand years—has been vanquished. But Kelsier, the hero who masterminded that triumph, is dead too, and now the awesome task of building a new world has been left to his young protégé, Vin, the former street urchin who is now the most powerful Mistborn in the land, and to the idealistic young nobleman she loves.

As Kelsier's protégé and slayer of the Lord Ruler she is now venerated by a budding new religion, a distinction that makes her intensely uncomfortable. Even more worrying, the mists have begun behaving strangely since the Lord Ruler died, and seem to harbor a strange vaporous entity that haunts her.

Stopping assassins may keep Vin's Mistborn skills sharp, but it's the least of her problems. Luthadel, the largest city of the former empire, doesn't run itself, and Vin and the other members of Kelsier's crew, who lead the revolution, must learn a whole new set of practical and political skills to help. It certainly won't get easier with three armies—one of them composed of ferocious giants—now vying to conquer the city, and no sign of the Lord Ruler's hidden cache of atium, the rarest and most powerful allomantic metal.

As the siege of Luthadel tightens, an ancient legend seems to offer a glimmer of hope. But even if it really exists, no one knows where to find the Well of Ascension or what manner of power it bestows.

This anniversary edition of the extraordinary #1 New York Times bestseller features pages of bonus content, including marked-up manuscript pages, original sketches, and pages from the author's writing notebook. “Life-changing.” —The New York Times When Death has a story to tell, you listen. It is 1939. Nazi Germany. The country is holding its breath. Death has never been busier, and will become busier still. Liesel Meminger is a foster girl living outside of Munich, who scratches out a meager existence for herself by stealing when she encounters something she can’t resist–books. With the help of her accordion-playing foster father, she learns to read and shares her stolen books with her neighbors during bombing raids as well as with the Jewish man hidden in her basement. In superbly crafted writing that burns with intensity, award-winning author Markus Zusak, author of I Am the Messenger, has given us one of the most enduring stories of our time. “Deserves a place on the same shelf with The Diary of a Young Girl by Anne Frank.” —USA Today DON’T MISS BRIDGE OF CLAY, MARKUS ZUSAK’S FIRST NOVEL SINCE THE BOOK THIEF.

Toby Maytree first sees Lou Bigelow on her bicycle in postwar Provincetown, Massachusetts. Her laughter and loveliness catch his breath. Maytree is a Provincetown native, an educated poet of thirty. As he courts Lou, just out of college, her stillness draws him. Hands-off, he hides his serious wooing, and idly shows her his poems.

In spare, elegant prose, Dillard traces the Maytrees' decades of loving and longing. They live cheaply among the nonconformist artists and writers that the bare tip of Cape Cod attracts. Lou takes up painting. When their son Petie appears, their innocent Bohemian friend Deary helps care for him. But years later it is Deary who causes the town to talk.

In this moving novel, Dillard intimately depicts nature's vastness and nearness. She presents willed bonds of loyalty, friendship, and abiding love. Warm and hopeful, The Maytrees is the surprising capstone of Annie Dillard's original body of work.

A gorgeously written novel that marks the debut of an astonishing new voice in psychological suspense.

As dusk approaches a small Dublin suburb in the summer of 1984, mothers begin to call their children home. But on this warm evening, three children do not return from the dark and silent woods. When the police arrive, they find only one of the children gripping a tree trunk in terror, wearing blood-filled sneakers, and unable to recall a single detail of the previous hours.

Twenty years later, the found boy, Rob Ryan, is a detective on the Dublin Murder Squad and keeps his past a secret. But when a twelve-year-old girl is found murdered in the same woods, he and Detective Cassie Maddox—his partner and closest friend—find themselves investigating a case chillingly similar to the previous unsolved mystery.

Now, with only snippets of long-buried memories to guide him, Ryan has the chance to uncover both the mystery of the case before him and that of his own shadowy past. Richly atmospheric, stunning in its complexity, and utterly convincing and surprising to the end, In the Woods is sure to enthrall fans of Mystic River and The Lovely Bones.

Joe Mackall has lived surrounded by the Swartzentruber Amish community of Ashland County, Ohio, for over sixteen years. They are the most traditional and insular of all the Amish sects: the Swartzentrubers live without gas, electricity, or indoor plumbing; without lights on their buggies or cushioned chairs in their homes; and without rumspringa, the recently popularized "running-around time" that some Amish sects allow their sixteen-year-olds.

Over the years, Mackall has developed a steady relationship with the Shetler family (Samuel and Mary, their nine children, and their extended family). Plain Secrets tells the Shetlers' story over these years, using their lives to paint a portrait of Swartzentruber Amish life and mores. During this time, Samuel's nephew Jonas finally rejects the strictures of the Amish way of life for good, after two failed attempts to leave, and his bright young daughter reaches the end of school for Amish children: the eighth grade.

But Plain Secrets is also the story of the unusual friendship between Samuel and Joe. Samuel is quietly bemused—and, one suspects, secretly delighted—at Joe's ignorance of crops and planting, carpentry and cattle. He knows Joe is planning to write a book about the family, and yet he allows him a glimpse of the tensions inside this intensely private community.

These and other stories from the life of the family reveal the larger questions posed by the Amish way of life. If the continued existence of the Amish in the midst of modern society asks us to consider the appeal of traditional, highly restrictive, and gendered religious communities, it also asks how we romanticize or condemn these communities—and why. Mackall's attempt to parse these questions—to write as honestly as possible about what he has seen of Amish life—tests his relationship with Samuel and reveals the limits of a friendship between "English" and Amish.

For sixty years, Jewish refugees and their descendants have prospered in the Federal District of Sitka, a "temporary" safe haven created in the wake of revelations of the Holocaust and the shocking 1948 collapse of the fledgling state of Israel. Proud, grateful, and longing to be American, the Jews of the Sitka District have created their own little world in the Alaskan panhandle, a vibrant, gritty, soulful, and complex frontier city that moves to the music of Yiddish. For sixty years they have been left alone, neglected and half-forgotten in a backwater of history. Now the District is set to revert to Alaskan control, and their dream is coming to an end: once again the tides of history threaten to sweep them up and carry them off into the unknown.

But homicide detective Meyer Landsman of the District Police has enough problems without worrying about the upcoming Reversion. His life is a shambles, his marriage a wreck, his career a disaster. He and his half-Tlingit partner, Berko Shemets, can't catch a break in any of their outstanding cases. Landsman's new supervisor is the love of his life—and also his worst nightmare. And in the cheap hotel where he has washed up, someone has just committed a murder—right under Landsman's nose. Out of habit, obligation, and a mysterious sense that it somehow offers him a shot at redeeming himself, Landsman begins to investigate the killing of his neighbor, a former chess prodigy. But when word comes down from on high that the case is to be dropped immediately, Landsman soon finds himself contending with all the powerful forces of faith, obsession, hopefulness, evil, and salvation that are his heritage—and with the unfinished business of his marriage to Bina Gelbfish, the one person who understands his darkest fears.

At once a gripping whodunit, a love story, an homage to 1940s noir, and an exploration of the mysteries of exile and redemption, The Yiddish Policemen's Union is a novel only Michael Chabon could have written.

Abide with Me is a luminous and long-awaited novel by the bestselling author Elizabeth Strout. Returning readers to the archetypal, lovely landscape of northern New England, the story unfolds in the late 1950s in the small town of West Annett, Maine.

Here, Reverend Tyler Caskey struggles to regain his calling, his family, and his happiness in the wake of profound loss. The community he serves charismatically must come to terms with its own strengths and failings—faith and hypocrisy, loyalty and abandonment—when a dark secret is revealed.

Tyler has come to love West Annett, "just up the road" from where he was born. The short, brilliant summers and the sharp, piercing winters fill him with awe—as does his congregation, full of good people who seek his guidance and listen earnestly as he preaches. But after suffering a terrible loss, Tyler finds it hard to return to himself as he once was. He hasn't had The Feeling—that God is all around him, in the beauty of the world—for quite some time.

He struggles to find the right words in his sermons and in his conversations with those facing crises of their own, and to bring his five-year-old daughter, Katherine, out of the silence she has observed in the wake of the family's tragedy.

A congregation that had once been patient and kind during Tyler's grief now questions his leadership and propriety. In the kitchens, classrooms, offices, and stores of the village, anger and gossip have started to swirl. And in Tyler's darkest hour, a startling discovery will test his congregation's humanity—and his own will to endure the kinds of trials that sooner or later test us all.

In prose incandescent and artful, Elizabeth Strout draws readers into the details of ordinary life in a way that makes it extraordinary. All is considered—life, love, God, and community—within these pages, and all is made new by this writer's boundless compassion and graceful prose.

The Red Parts chronicles the uncanny series of events that led to Nelson's interest in her aunt's death, the reopening of the case, the bizarre and brutal trial that ensued, and the effects these events had on the disparate group of people they brought together. But The Red Parts is much more than a "true crime" record of a murder, investigation, and trial. For into this story Nelson has woven an account of a girlhood and early adulthood haunted by loss, mortality, mystery, and betrayal, as well as a look at the personal and political consequences of our cultural fixation on dead (white) women.

A Princess of Mars is the first of eleven thrilling novels that comprise Edgar Rice Burroughs' most exciting saga, known as The Martian Series. It's the beginning of an incredible odyssey in which John Carter, a gentleman from Virginia and a Civil War veteran, unexpectedly finds himself on the red planet, scene of continuing combat among rival tribes.

Captured by a band of six-limbed, green-skinned savage giants called Tharks, Carter soon is accorded all the honor of a chieftain after it's discovered that his muscles, accustomed to Earth's greater gravity, now give him a decided advantage in strength. And when his captors take as prisoner Dejah Thoris, the lovely human-looking princess of the city of Helium, Carter must call upon every ounce of strength, courage, and ingenuity to rescue her—before Dejah becomes the slave of the depraved Thark leader, Tal Hajus!

Anticancer: A New Way of Life by David Servan-Schreiber offers a groundbreaking perspective on the biology of cancer. He boldly asserts that to combat this disease, we must also engage our natural defenses.

While modern Western medicine excels at detecting and treating cancer, it often overlooks recent discoveries that reveal how we can better protect ourselves. Servan-Schreiber traces the thrilling scientific journeys that led to this approach and provides practical guidance on prevention and complementing traditional treatments—achieving results supported by cutting-edge research—to develop an anticancer biology.

We can all take action in four main areas:

• Shielding ourselves from environmental imbalances
• Adjusting our diet
• Healing psychological wounds
• Reimagining our relationship with our bodies

Speaking not only as a doctor and researcher, Servan-Schreiber shares his personal battle with cancer, recounting his confrontation with the disease and his healing journey. By sharing this deeply personal experience, which emerges as an intense inner adventure, he hopes to empower everyone, regardless of their situation, to maximize their chances of overcoming cancer.

A Feast for Crows is the fourth book in the A Song of Ice and Fire series by George R.R. Martin, the foundation of the acclaimed HBO series Game of Thrones. As a kingdom torn asunder finds itself on the brink of peace, it is quickly launched on an even more terrifying course of destruction.

With the death of the monstrous King Joffrey, Cersei rules as regent in King's Landing. The demise of Robb Stark has broken the back of the Northern rebels, and his siblings are scattered like seeds on barren soil. The war has burned itself out, but the aftermath is just as dangerous. Outlaws, renegades, and carrion eaters gather, picking over the bones of the dead and fighting for the spoils.

In the Seven Kingdoms, new plots and alliances are formed, and surprising faces emerge from the twilight of past struggles to take up the challenges ahead. Nobles and commoners, soldiers and sorcerers, assassins and sages all stake their fortunes and their lives. For at a feast for crows, many are guests, but only a few are survivors.

A bitingly funny grand tour of our culture of excess from an award-winning humorist. Whether David Rakoff is contrasting the elegance of one of the last flights of the supersonic Concorde with the good-times-and-chicken-wings populism of Hooters Air; working as a cabana boy at a South Beach hotel; or traveling to a private island off the coast of Belize to watch a soft-core video shoot—where he is provided with his very own personal manservant—rarely have greed, vanity, selfishness, and vapidity been so mercilessly skewered.

Somewhere along the line, our healthy self-regard has exploded into obliterating narcissism; our manic getting and spending have now become celebrated as moral virtues. Simultaneously a Wildean satire and a plea for a little human decency, Don’t Get Too Comfortable shows that far from being bobos in paradise, we’re in a special circle of gilded-age hell.

When Colonel Protheroe is found dead from a single gun shot wound to the head, none of his neighbors in the village of St. Mary Mead is much surprised.

So many people wished this local official would say farewell, if not quite so permanently. With suspects abound and the local police stymied, it is up to Miss Jane Marple to root out the killer.

‘Anyone who murdered Colonel Protheroe,’ declared the parson, brandishing a carving knife above a joint of roast beef, ‘would be doing the world at large a favour!’ It was a careless remark for a man of the cloth. And one which was to come back and haunt the clergyman just a few hours later – when the colonel was found shot dead in the clergyman’s study. But as Miss Marple soon discovers, the whole village seems to have had a motive to kill Colonel Protheroe.

The Elegance of the Hedgehog is a novel by the French professor of philosophy, Muriel Barbery. Set within an elegant hôtel particulier in Paris, the story revolves around two main characters: Renée, the concierge, who is typically short, plump, middle-aged, and inconspicuous, with an unexpected passion for art, philosophy, music, and Japanese culture; and Paloma, a twelve-year-old resident of the building, who is talented, precocious, and has decided to end her own life on her thirteenth birthday unless she can find something worth living for.

The narrative follows Renée who, despite her position, conceals a world of intellectual wealth and refined tastes beneath a veneer of simplicity. Similarly, Paloma hides her exceptional intelligence behind the facade of a mediocre pre-teen. When a wealthy Japanese man named Ozu arrives at the building, their lives begin to change as they discover kindred spirits in each other.

Humorous and full of biting wit, the story exalts the quiet victories of the inconspicuous and explores rich secret lives hidden beneath conventional exteriors, evoking a sense of kinship and understanding of human complexities.

The Worst Hard Time is a captivating tour de force of historical reportage by Timothy Egan. It rescues an iconic chapter of American history from the shadows, focusing on the dust storms that terrorized the High Plains during the darkest years of the Depression. These storms were unprecedented and have not been seen since.

Following a dozen families and their communities through the rise and fall of the region, Egan tells of their desperate attempts to carry on through blinding black dust blizzards, crop failure, and the loss of loved ones. He brilliantly captures the terrifying drama of catastrophe, while doing justice to the human characters who become the heroes of his story — the stoic, long-suffering men and women whose lives are opened up with urgency and respect.

In an era that promises ever-greater natural disasters, The Worst Hard Time serves as a powerful reminder about the dangers of trifling with nature.

Why do some changes fail while others succeed? This is the central question that Jeffrey M. Hiatt addresses in ADKAR: A Model for Change in Business, Government, and Our Community. Hiatt explains the origin of the ADKAR model and explores what drives each building block of ADKAR: Awareness, Desire, Knowledge, Ability, and Reinforcement.

Learn how to build awareness, create desire, develop knowledge, foster ability, and reinforce changes in your organization. The ADKAR Model is changing how we think about managing the people side of change and provides a powerful foundation to help you succeed at change.

The ADKAR perspective can help you develop a "new lens" through which to observe and influence change, whether you are working for change in your public school system, a small city council, your department at work, or leading an enterprise-wide change initiative. View change in a new way, see the barrier points, understand the levers that can move your changes forward, and use ADKAR to help ensure your changes are a success.

Based on research with more than 2600 companies from 59 countries, ADKAR is a simple and holistic way to manage change.

What if the whole world were a dead, blasted wasteland? For a thousand years the ash fell and no flowers bloomed. For a thousand years the Skaa slaved in misery and lived in fear. For a thousand years the Lord Ruler, the "Sliver of Infinity," reigned with absolute power and ultimate terror, divinely invincible.

Then, when hope was so long lost that not even its memory remained, a terribly scarred, heart-broken half-Skaa rediscovered it in the depths of the Lord Ruler's most hellish prison. Kelsier "snapped" and found in himself the powers of a Mistborn. A brilliant thief and natural leader, he turned his talents to the ultimate caper, with the Lord Ruler himself as the mark.

Kelsier recruited the underworld's elite, the smartest and most trustworthy allomancers, each of whom shares one of his many powers, and all of whom relish a high-stakes challenge. Then Kelsier reveals his ultimate dream, not just the greatest heist in history, but the downfall of the divine despot.

But even with the best criminal crew ever assembled, Kel's plan looks more like the ultimate long shot, until luck brings a ragged girl named Vin into his life. Like him, she's a half-Skaa orphan, but she's lived a much harsher life. Vin has learned to expect betrayal from everyone she meets. She will have to learn trust if Kel is to help her master powers of which she never dreamed.

Brandon Sanderson, fantasy's newest master tale-spinner and author of the acclaimed debut Elantris, dares to turn a genre on its head by asking a simple question: What if the prophesied hero failed to defeat the Dark Lord? The answer will be found in the Mistborn Trilogy, a saga of surprises that begins with the book in your hands. Fantasy will never be the same again.

The Uses of Haiti tells the truth about uncomfortable matters—uncomfortable, that is, for the structures of power and the doctrinal framework that protects them from scrutiny. It tells the truth about what has been happening in Haiti, and the US role in its bitter fate.

Noam Chomsky, from the introduction

In this third edition of the classic The Uses of Haiti, Paul Farmer looks at what has happened to the health of the poor in Haiti since the coup. Winner of a McArthur Genius Award, Paul Farmer is a physician and anthropologist who has worked for 25 years in Haiti, where he serves as medical director of a hospital serving the rural poor. He is the subject of the Tracy Kidder biography, Mountains Beyond Mountains.

The Devil's Teeth is a thrilling journey into the world of great white sharks, nestled in the remote Farallon Islands, just twenty-seven miles off the coast of San Francisco. Susan Casey, a journalist, becomes fascinated by these fearsome predators after seeing them in a documentary. Her curiosity transforms into an obsession, leading her to the islands.

Accompanied by biologists Scot Anderson and Peter Pyle, Casey experiences the stark reality of life in this isolated region. Living in a haunted, 135-year-old house, she witnesses the majestic, terrifying sharks up close and personal.

This book is not just a tale of adventure and survival; it explores the boundary between human civilization and the untamed wilderness, where humans are neither wanted nor needed.

In what is perhaps her richest and most deeply searching novel, Anne Tyler gives us a story about what it is to be an American, and about Maryam Yazdan, who after thirty-five years in this country must finally come to terms with her “outsiderness.”

Two families, who would otherwise never have come together, meet by chance at the Baltimore airport—the Donaldsons, a very American couple, and the Yazdans, Maryam’s fully assimilated son and his attractive Iranian American wife. Each couple is awaiting the arrival of an adopted infant daughter from Korea. After the babies from distant Asia are delivered, Bitsy Donaldson impulsively invites the Yazdans to celebrate with an “arrival party,” an event that is repeated every year as the two families become more deeply intertwined.

Even independent-minded Maryam is drawn in. But only up to a point. When she finds herself being courted by one of the Donaldson clan, a good-hearted man of her vintage, recently widowed and still recovering from his wife’s death, suddenly all the values she cherishes—her traditions, her privacy, her otherness—are threatened. Somehow this big American takes up so much space that the orderly boundaries of her life feel invaded.

A luminous novel brimming with subtle, funny, and tender observations that cast a penetrating light on the American way as seen from two perspectives, those who are born here and those who are still struggling to fit in.

The Omnivore's Dilemma: A Natural History of Four Meals is a groundbreaking book by Michael Pollan, one of America's most fascinating, original, and elegant writers. Pollan turns his omnivorous mind to the seemingly straightforward question of what we should have for dinner. This question has confronted humanity since the discovery of fire, but how we answer it today may determine our very survival as a species.

Pollan follows each of the food chains that sustain us—industrial food, organic or alternative food, and food we forage ourselves—from the source to a final meal. He develops a definitive account of the American way of eating, taking readers from Iowa cornfields to food-science laboratories, from feedlots and fast-food restaurants to organic farms and hunting grounds. He emphasizes our dynamic coevolutionary relationship with the plant and animal species we depend on.

Each time Pollan sits down to a meal, he deploys his unique blend of personal and investigative journalism to trace the origins of everything consumed, revealing what we unwittingly ingest. He explains how our taste for particular foods and flavors reflects our evolutionary inheritance. The surprising answers Pollan offers have profound political, economic, psychological, and moral implications for all of us. Ultimately, The Omnivore's Dilemma is a book as much about visionary solutions as it is about problems, contending that, when it comes to food, doing the right thing often turns out to be the tastiest thing an eater can do.

Beautifully written and thrillingly argued, The Omnivore's Dilemma promises to change the way we think about the politics and pleasure of eating. For anyone who reads it, dinner will never again look, or taste, quite the same.

The Omnivore's Dilemma: A Natural History of Four Meals is a groundbreaking book by Michael Pollan, one of America's most fascinating, original, and elegant writers. Pollan turns his omnivorous mind to the seemingly straightforward question of what we should have for dinner. This question has confronted humanity since the discovery of fire, but how we answer it today may determine our very survival as a species.

Pollan follows each of the food chains that sustain us—industrial food, organic or alternative food, and food we forage ourselves—from the source to a final meal. He develops a definitive account of the American way of eating, taking readers from Iowa cornfields to food-science laboratories, from feedlots and fast-food restaurants to organic farms and hunting grounds. He emphasizes our dynamic coevolutionary relationship with the plant and animal species we depend on.

Each time Pollan sits down to a meal, he deploys his unique blend of personal and investigative journalism to trace the origins of everything consumed, revealing what we unwittingly ingest. He explains how our taste for particular foods and flavors reflects our evolutionary inheritance. The surprising answers Pollan offers have profound political, economic, psychological, and moral implications for all of us. Ultimately, The Omnivore's Dilemma is a book as much about visionary solutions as it is about problems, contending that, when it comes to food, doing the right thing often turns out to be the tastiest thing an eater can do.

Beautifully written and thrillingly argued, The Omnivore's Dilemma promises to change the way we think about the politics and pleasure of eating. For anyone who reads it, dinner will never again look, or taste, quite the same.

It all starts when Nick asks Norah to be his girlfriend for five minutes. He only needs five minutes to avoid his ex-girlfriend, who's just walked in to his band's show. With a new guy. And then, with one kiss, Nick and Norah are off on an adventure set against the backdrop of New York City—and smack in the middle of all the joy, anxiety, confusion, and excitement of a first date.

This he said/she said romance told by YA stars Rachel Cohn and David Levithan is a sexy, funny roller coaster of a story about one date over one very long night, with two teenagers, both recovering from broken hearts, who are just trying to figure out who they want to be—and where the next great band is playing.

Told in alternating chapters, teeming with music references, humor, angst, and endearing side characters, this is a love story you'll wish were your very own. Working together for the first time, Rachel Cohn and David Levithan have combined forces to create a book that is sure to grab readers of all ages and never let them go.

In Edinburgh in the 1930s, the Lennox family is having trouble with their youngest daughter. Esme is outspoken, unconventional, and repeatedly embarrasses them in polite society. Something will have to be done.

Years later, a young woman named Iris Lockhart receives a letter informing her that she has a great-aunt in a psychiatric unit who is about to be released. Iris has never heard of Esme Lennox. What could Esme have done to warrant a lifetime in an institution? And how is it possible for a person to be so completely erased from a family's history?

Maggie O’Farrell’s intricate tale of family secrets, lost lives, and the freedom brought by truth will haunt readers long past its final page.

Paulo Coelho's enchanting novel has inspired a devoted following around the world. This story, dazzling in its powerful simplicity and soul-stirring wisdom, is about an Andalusian shepherd boy named Santiago who travels from his homeland in Spain to the Egyptian desert in search of a treasure buried near the Pyramids.

Along the way he meets a Gypsy woman, a man who calls himself king, and an alchemist, all of whom point Santiago in the direction of his quest. No one knows what the treasure is, or if Santiago will be able to surmount the obstacles in his path. But what starts out as a journey to find worldly goods turns into a discovery of the treasure found within. Lush, evocative, and deeply humane, the story of Santiago is an eternal testament to the transforming power of our dreams and the importance of listening to our hearts.

Wicked: The Grimmerie is not just a companion book to the musical; it is a phenomenon in its own right. Every week, thousands flock to the Gershwin Theatre in New York to experience the show, which has become the most successful musical on Broadway since 2004. Based on Gregory Maguire's bestselling novel, Wicked tells the story of Elphaba, the headstrong Wicked Witch of the West, and Glinda, the good witch, as they navigate life in the Land of Oz.

This whimsical keepsake is designed to resemble the Grimmerie, an ancient book of spells that Elphaba uses in the show. It offers fans a behind-the-scenes peek at the musical, profiles of the cast and creative team, and inside stories. The book is filled with full-color photographs and includes irresistible special features such as an Ozian glossary, spells, an illustrated family tree, and a step-by-step look at how Elphaba gets green before each show. Wicked: The Grimmerie provides everything fans need to relive the Broadway experience day after day.

Meet the Female Chauvinist Pig – the new brand of "empowered woman" who embraces "raunch culture" wherever she finds it. In her groundbreaking book, New York magazine writer Ariel Levy argues that, if male chauvinist pigs of years past thought of women as pieces of meat, Female Chauvinist Pigs of today are doing them one better, making sex objects of other women – and of themselves.

Irresistibly witty and wickedly intelligent, Female Chauvinist Pigs makes the case that the rise of raunch does not represent how far women have come; it only proves how far they have left to go.

In this passionate report from the front lines, Ariel Levy examines the enormous cultural impact of the newest wave of post-feminism. She interviews college women who flash for the cameras on spring break and teens raised on Paris Hilton and breast implants. Levy examines a culture in which every music video seems to feature a stripper on a pole, the memoirs of porn stars are climbing the bestseller lists, Olympic athletes parade their Brazilian bikini waxes in the pages of Playboy, and thongs are marketed to prepubescent girls.

Levy meets the high-powered women who create raunch culture—the new oinking women warriors of the corporate and entertainment worlds who eagerly defend their efforts to be “one of the guys.” And she traces the history of this trend back to conflicts between the women’s movement and the sexual revolution long left unresolved. Levy pulls apart the myth of the Female Chauvinist Pig and argues that what has come to pass for liberating rebellion is actually a kind of limiting conformity.

One summer night, when Dumbledore arrives at Privet Drive to collect Harry Potter, his wand hand is blackened and shriveled, but he does not reveal why.

Rumors and suspicion spread through the wizarding world – it feels as if even Hogwarts itself might be under threat.

Harry is convinced that Malfoy bears the Dark Mark: could there be a Death Eater amongst them?

He will need powerful magic and true friends as, with the help of Dumbledore, he investigates Voldemort’s darkest secrets.

In Marvel 1602, award-winning writer Neil Gaiman presents a unique vision of the Marvel Universe set four hundred years in the past. Classic Marvel icons such as the X-Men, Spider-Man, the Fantastic Four, and Daredevil appear in this intriguing world of 17th-century science and sorcery, instantly familiar to readers, yet subtly different in this new time.

Marvel 1602 combines classic Marvel action and adventure with the historically accurate setting of Queen Elizabeth I's reign to create a unique series unlike any other published by Marvel Comics. This collection includes Marvel 1602 issues #1-8, penciled by Andy Kubert and digitally painted by Richard Isanove, with covers by Scott McKowen.