The Captain is Out to Lunch and the Sailors Have Taken Over the Ship is a book-length collaboration between two underground legends, Charles Bukowski and Robert Crumb. Bukowski's last journals candidly and humorously reveal the events in the writer's life as death draws inexorably nearer, thereby illuminating our own lives and natures, and giving new meaning to what was once only familiar.

Crumb has illustrated the text with 12 full-page drawings and a portrait of Bukowski, adding a visual depth to the raw and iconoclastic nature of Bukowski's words. These journals alternate between generous accounts of his gambling jaunts and the bizarre intrusions of fame: the interviewers, Hollywood glitterati, TV producers — odd counterpoints to "the racetrack crowd... the world brought down to size, life grinding against death and losing."

Disarmingly candid, and salted with a particularly wry and gritty wisdom, this book offers a unique glimpse into the mind of one of America's most influential writers.

Sammy Keyes and her friend Marissa decide to escape their routine and take a bus to the seedy, insane town of Hollywood to surprise Sammy's mother, the elusive Lady Lana. Upon arrival, they discover that she has transformed herself into the glamorous, platinum-blonde, "25-year-old" actress Dominique Windsor. This new persona certainly could never have spawned a 12-year-old—let alone a scruffy, no-nonsense girl like Sammy.

The plot thickens as Lady Lana's masquerade backfires in the most dreadful of ways, leaving Sammy to save the day and solve the biggest mystery of her life. Hollywood is a world where everyone pretends and no one is who or what they seem. When a woman is killed in the room next door, Sammy is hard-pressed to find someone who doesn’t have a motive—including her own mom.

This fast-paced, funny, and thoroughly modern mystery will keep readers on the edge of their seats. It's not just the mystery that's exciting, but also the drama in Sammy's personal life that keeps readers coming back for more.

A Warning from the Publisher:

Many readers have questions about Lemony Snicket, author of the distressing serial concerning the trials of the charming but unlucky Baudelaire orphans, published under the collective title A Series of Unfortunate Events.

Before purchasing, borrowing, or stealing this book, you should be aware that it contains the answers to some of those questions, such as the following:

1. Who is Lemony?
2. Is there a secret organization I should know about?
3. Why does Lemony Snicket spend his time researching and writing distressing books concerning the Baudelaire orphans?
4. Why do all of Lemony Snicket's books contain a sad dedication to a woman named Beatrice?
5. If there's nothing out there, what was that noise?

Our advice to you is that you find a book that answers less upsetting questions than this one. Perhaps your librarian, bookseller, or parole officer can recommend a book that answers the question, "Aren't ponies adorable?"

From This American Life alum David Rakoff comes a hilarious collection that single-handedly raises self-deprecation to an art form. Whether impersonating Sigmund Freud in a department store window during the holidays, climbing an icy mountain in cheap loafers, or learning primitive survival skills in the wilds of New Jersey, Rakoff clearly demonstrates how he doesn’t belong–nor does he try to.

In his debut collection of essays, Rakoff uses his razor-sharp wit and snarky humor to deliver a barrage of damaging blows that, more often than not, land squarely on his own jaw–hilariously satirizing the writer, not the subject. Joining the wry and the heartfelt, Fraud offers an object lesson in not taking life, or ourselves, too seriously.

Meet Rachel Walsh. She has a pair of size 8 feet and such a fondness for recreational drugs that her family has forked out the cash for a spell in Cloisters – Dublin’s answer to the Betty Ford Clinic. She’s only agreed to her incarceration because she’s heard that rehab is wall-to-wall jacuzzis, gymnasiums and rock stars going tepid turkey – and it’s about time she had a holiday.But what Rachel doesn’t count on are the toe-curling embarrassments heaped on her by family and group therapy, the dearth of sex, drugs and rock’n’roll – and missing Luke, her ex. What kind of a new start in life is this?

Welcome to Empire Falls, a blue-collar town full of abandoned mills whose citizens surround themselves with the comforts and feuds provided by lifelong friends and neighbors and who find humor and hope in the most unlikely places, in this Pulitzer Prize-winning novel by Richard Russo.

Miles Roby has been slinging burgers at the Empire Grill for 20 years, a job that cost him his college education and much of his self-respect. What keeps him there? It could be his bright, sensitive daughter Tick, who needs all his help surviving the local high school. Or maybe it’s Janine, Miles’ soon-to-be ex-wife, who’s taken up with a noxiously vain health-club proprietor. Or perhaps it’s the imperious Francine Whiting, who owns everything in town–and seems to believe that “everything” includes Miles himself.

Weiner's witty, original, fast-moving debut features a lovable heroine, a solid cast, snappy dialogue and a poignant take on life's priorities. For twenty-eight years, things have been tripping along nicely for Cannie Shapiro. Sure, her mother has come charging out of the closet, and her father has long since dropped out of her world. But she loves her friends, her rat terrier, Nifkin, and her job as pop culture reporter for The Philadelphia Examiner. She's even made a tenuous peace with her plus-size body.

But the day she opens up a national women's magazine and sees the words "Loving a Larger Woman" above her ex-boyfriend's byline, Cannie is plunged into misery...and the most amazing year of her life. From Philadelphia to Hollywood and back home again, she charts a new course for herself: mourning her losses, facing her past, and figuring out who she is and who she can become.

Life, the Universe and Everything is the third book in the five-volume Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy science fiction series by British writer Douglas Adams. The title refers to the Answer to Life, the Universe, and Everything.

The unhappy inhabitants of planet Krikkit are sick of looking at the night sky above their heads—so they plan to destroy it. The universe, that is. Now only five individuals stand between the killer robots of Krikkit and their goal of total annihilation.

They are Arthur Dent, a mild-mannered space and time traveler who tries to learn how to fly by throwing himself at the ground and missing; Ford Prefect, his best friend, who decides to go insane to see if he likes it; Slartibartfast, the indomitable vice president of the Campaign for Real Time, who travels in a ship powered by irrational behavior; Zaphod Beeblebrox, the two-headed, three-armed ex-president of the galaxy; and Trillian, the sexy space cadet who is torn between a persistent Thunder God and a very depressed Beeblebrox.

How will it all end? Will it end? Only this stalwart crew knows as they try to avert “universal” Armageddon and save life as we know it—and don’t know it!

“Adams is one of those rare treasures: an author who, one senses, has as much fun writing as one has reading.”—Arizona Daily Star

Considered by critics to be Barth's most distinguished masterpiece, The Sot-Weed Factor has acquired the status of a modern classic. Set in the late 1600s, it recounts the wildly chaotic odyssey of hapless, ungainly Ebenezer Cooke, sent to the New World to look after his father's tobacco business and to record the struggles of the Maryland colony in an epic poem.

On his mission, Cooke experiences capture by pirates and Indians; the loss of his father's estate to roguish impostors; love for a farmer prostitute; stealthy efforts to rob him of his virginity, which he is (almost) determined to protect; and an extraordinary gallery of treacherous characters who continually switch identities. A hilarious, bawdy tribute to all the most insidious human vices, The Sot-Weed Factor has a lasting relevance for readers of all times.

Holy wood is a different sort of place. People act differently here. Everywhere else the most important things are gods or money or cattle. Here, the most important thing is to be important.

People might say that reality is a quality that things possess in the same way that they possess weight. Sadly, alchemists never really held with such a quaint notion. They think that they can change reality, shape it to their own purpose. Imagine then the damage that could be wrought if they get their hands on the ultimate alchemy: the invention of motion pictures, the greatest making of illusions. It may be a triumph of universe-shaking proportions. It's either that or they're about to unlock the dark terrible secret of the Holy Wood hills - by mistake...

Vlad Taltos is a sorcerer and freelance assassin, living as an Easterner (a human) among the Dragaerans. He has a reptilian familiar with a biting sense of humor. Vlad finds himself in trouble when he must prevent a war that could lead to the destruction of his best friends and the great families of Dragaera.

The first published book, Jhereg is actually the fourth novel in the VLAD TALTOS series timeline. The books recount the adventures of the wisecracking hired killer Vlad, a human on a planet mainly inhabited by the long-lived, extremely tall sorcerers known as the Dragaerans.

One of the most powerful bosses in the Jhereg—Dragaera's premier criminal organization—hires Vlad, one of their guild members, to assassinate Mellar, who stole millions from the Jhereg leadership and fled. Unfortunately, this thief turns out to be protected in a way that makes it difficult for Vlad to do his job without gaining the permanent enmity of a friend.

The reader also learns more about Vlad's past in this, and in other, lives.

Great Britain circa 1985: time travel is routine, cloning is a reality (dodos are the resurrected pet of choice), and literature is taken very, very seriously. Baconians are trying to convince the world that Francis Bacon really wrote Shakespeare, there are riots between the Surrealists and Impressionists, and thousands of men are named John Milton, an homage to the real Milton and a very confusing situation for the police.

Amidst all this, Acheron Hades, Third Most Wanted Man In the World, steals the original manuscript of Martin Chuzzlewit and kills a minor character, who then disappears from every volume of the novel ever printed! But that's just a prelude... Hades' real target is the beloved Jane Eyre, and it's not long before he plucks her from the pages of Bronte's novel.

Enter Thursday Next. She's the Special Operative's renowned literary detective, and she drives a Porsche. With the help of her uncle Mycroft's Prose Portal, Thursday enters the novel to rescue Jane Eyre from this heinous act of literary homicide. It's tricky business, all these interlopers running about Thornfield, and deceptions run rampant as their paths cross with Jane, Rochester, and Miss Fairfax. Can Thursday save Jane Eyre and Bronte's masterpiece? And what of the Crimean War? Will it ever end? And what about those annoying black holes that pop up now and again, sucking things into time-space voids...

Suspenseful and outlandish, absorbing and fun, The Eyre Affair is a caper unlike any other and an introduction to the imagination of a most distinctive writer and his singular fictional universe.

Feeling Sorry for Celia is a hilariously candid novel that captures the roller coaster ride of being a teenager. Written entirely in the form of letters, messages, postcards, and bizarre missives from imaginary organizations, the book delves into the life of Elizabeth Clarry, whose existence is anything but simple.

Her best friend, Celia, has a habit of disappearing, her father who was absent has now reappeared, and her communication with her mother relies solely on wacky notes left on the fridge. To add to her confusion, Elizabeth's English teacher is determined to revive the art of letter writing, leading to a Complete and Utter Stranger knowing more about her than anyone else.

Elizabeth is on the brink of numerous changes. She might lose her best friend but could find an incredible new one, share a kiss with the sexiest guy alive, and even participate in a marathon. The story goes to show that a lot can happen in the time it takes to write a letter.

Feeling Sorry for Celia is not just a story about teenage life; it sharply captures the essence of female friendship and the moments of bonding and separation that come with growing up. Jaclyn Moriarty's debut is as much fun as it is poignant, offering a vivid reminder of the highs and lows of adolescence.

If we could only put aside our civil pose and say what we really thought, the world would be a lot like the one alluded to in The Unabridged Devil’s Dictionary. There, a bore is "a person who talks when you wish him to listen," and happiness is "an agreeable sensation arising from contemplating the misery of another."

This is the most comprehensive, authoritative edition ever of Ambrose Bierce’s satiric masterpiece. It renders obsolete all other versions that have appeared in the book’s ninety-year history.

A virtual onslaught of acerbic, confrontational wordplay, The Unabridged Devil’s Dictionary offers some 1,600 wickedly clever definitions to the vocabulary of everyday life. Little is sacred and few are safe, for Bierce targets just about any pursuit, from matrimony to immortality, that allows our willful failings and excesses to shine forth.

This new edition is based on David E. Schultz and S. T. Joshi’s exhaustive investigation into the book’s writing and publishing history. All of Bierce’s known satiric definitions are here, including previously uncollected, unpublished, and alternative entries. Definitions dropped from previous editions have been restored while nearly two hundred wrongly attributed to Bierce have been excised.

Ambrose Bierce’s Devil’s Dictionary is a classic that stands alongside the best work of satirists such as Twain, Mencken, and Thurber. This unabridged edition will be celebrated by humor fans and word lovers everywhere.

In the wake of unexpected planetary peace and the disappearance of the Dendarii payroll, mercenary captain Miles Naismith attempts to discover the link between the insufferable Captain Galeni and the Komarran rebel expatriates.

For some unexplained reason, the Dendarii payroll is missing and orders from the Barrayaran Imperial Command are being delayed by Miles's superior, Captain Galeni. What connects the impeccable, insufferable Captain Galeni and the Komarran rebel expatriates on Earth anyway?

But the most deadly question of all before Miles is more personal: are Miles's two identities, Admiral Naismith of the Dendarii and Lieutenant Lord Vorkosigan of Barrayar, splitting apart along the lines of his divided loyalties? And who is trying to assassinate which version of him?

When Miles unravels the answers, then the complications really begin.

Since we all eat, we all must poop. All of us! Everyone!

This wonderful, modern-day toddler classic presents information that children both want and need in a refreshingly honest, informative, and age-appropriate way.

It's September 2001 and Arthur Lakelady is a man beset by worries. It seems that his wife, Alys, is infatuated with the home renovator who is working on their new kitchen. His daughter, Gwen, is doing well at school, although with pass marks that often exceed 100%, he worries that her school doesn’t grasp the meaning of percentage. Meanwhile, his son, Lance, might never pass another exam ever again if he doesn’t soon give up sports.

These worries are soon put into perspective when Arthur’s Canadian employer is taken over by Americans, and they replace the local executives in an attempt to introduce their own initiatives. As the world changes around him and he is expected to lead a team at work, Arthur hires a young temp, Lydia, to help him. But Lydia only adds to his worry with her desire to get as up close and personal with him as possible.

And when the madness of the world spills over and thousands are killed in the World Trade Center attack, Arthur looks at the state of the planet and sees that it needs someone who can clear the confusion, make the complex simple, and package it into manageable pieces. It needs a diarist. And right now, the nobody who is Arthur Lakelady might one day become a somebody in the mold of Samuel Pepys.

Make Way for Ducklings is a classic tale that has enchanted generations of readers. This delightful story follows a pair of Mallard ducks who decide to raise their family on an island in the lagoon of the Boston Public Garden, a charming park in the heart of Boston, Massachusetts. The story unfolds with Mrs. Mallard and her eight ducklings—Jack, Kack, Lack, Nack, Ouack, Pack, and Quack—navigating the bustling streets of Boston with a little help from the kind Boston police.

The book, awarded the Caldecott Medal in 1942, is celebrated for its unusual and stunning illustrations by Robert McCloskey, capturing both the humor and beauty of the duckling family's adventure. With its fine large pictures and wealth of detail, the story is as amusing as it is heartwarming.

This book is ideal for reading aloud and deserves a place of honor on every child's bookshelf. It captures the quaint charm of a family's search for the perfect home and is a testament to the enduring appeal of McCloskey's storytelling and artistry.

"My parents suck ass. Banning me from the phone and restricting my computer privileges are the most tyrannical parental gestures I can think of. Don't they realize that Hope's the only one who keeps me sane? I don't see how things could get any worse."

When her best friend, Hope Weaver, moves away from Pineville, New Jersey, hyperobservant sixteen-year-old Jessica Darling is devastated. A fish out of water at school and a stranger at home, Jessica feels more lost than ever now that the only person with whom she could really communicate has gone.

How is she supposed to deal with the boy- and shopping-crazy girls at school, her dad's obsession with her track meets, her mother salivating over big sister Bethany's lavish wedding, and her nonexistent love life?

A fresh, funny, utterly compelling fiction debut by first-time novelist Megan McCafferty, Sloppy Firsts is an insightful, true-to-life look at Jessica's predicament as she embarks on another year of teenage torment—from the dark days of Hope's departure through her months as a type-A personality turned insomniac to her completely mixed-up feelings about Marcus Flutie, the intelligent and mysterious "Dreg" who works his way into her heart.

It's bad enough being new on the job, but Teppic hasn't a clue as to what a pharaoh is supposed to do. After all, he's been trained at Ankh-Morpork's famed assassins' school, across the sea from the Kingdom of the Sun. First, there's the monumental task of building a suitable resting place for Dad -- a pyramid to end all pyramids. Then there are the myriad administrative duties, such as dealing with mad priests, sacred crocodiles, and marching mummies. And to top it all off, the adolescent pharaoh discovers deceit, betrayal -- not to mention a headstrong handmaiden -- at the heart of his realm.

The Wrong Boy is a hilarious and bittersweet novel by Willy Russell, the playwright behind Educating Rita, Shirley Valentine, and the award-winning musical Blood Brothers.

Dear Morrissey,

I'm feeling dead depressed and down. Like a streetlamp without a bulb or a goose at the onset of Christmas time. Anyroad, I thought I'd pen a few lines to someone who'd understand...

It's 1991. Raymond Marks is a normal boy, from a normal family, in a normal northern town. Only lately, he's been feeling dead down. His dad left home after falling in love with a five-string banjo. His fun-hating grandma believes she should have married Jean-Paul Sartre: 'I could never read his books, but y' could tell from his picture, there was nothing frivolous about John-Paul Sartre.' Felonious Uncle Jason and Appalling Aunty Paula are lusting after the satellite dish.

And so he turns to the one person who'll understand what he's going through: Morrissey. Told through a series of heartfelt letters to the frontman of The Smiths, this is a laugh-out-loud funny, incredibly poignant tale from a character you can't help but love.

Have you ever wished your partner came with an instruction booklet? This international bestseller is the answer to all the things you've ever wondered about the opposite sex.

For their controversial new book on the differences between the way men and women think and communicate, Barbara and Allan Pease spent three years traveling around the world, collecting the dramatic findings of new research on the brain, investigating evolutionary biology, analyzing psychologists, studying social changes, and annoying the locals.

The result is a sometimes shocking, always illuminating, and frequently hilarious look at where the battle line is drawn between the sexes, why it was drawn, and how to cross it. Read this book and understand—at last!—why men never listen, why women can't read maps, and why learning each other's secrets means you'll never have to say sorry again.

At the center of this invigorating novel are two unlikely friends, Archie Jones and Samad Iqbal. Hapless veterans of World War II, Archie and Samad and their families become agents of England’s irrevocable transformation. A second marriage to Clara Bowden, a beautiful, albeit tooth-challenged, Jamaican half his age, quite literally gives Archie a second lease on life, and produces Irie, a knowing child whose personality doesn’t quite match her name (Jamaican for “no problem”). Samad’s late-in-life arranged marriage (he had to wait for his bride to be born), produces twin sons whose separate paths confound Iqbal’s every effort to direct them, and a renewed, if selective, submission to his Islamic faith.

Set against London’s racial and cultural tapestry, venturing across the former empire and into the past as it barrels toward the future, White Teeth revels in the ecstatic hodgepodge of modern life, flirting with disaster, confounding expectations, and embracing the comedy of daily existence.

David Sedaris' move to Paris from New York inspired these hilarious pieces, including the title essay, about his attempts to learn French from a sadistic teacher who declares that every day spent with you is like having a caesarean section. His family is another inspiration. You Can't Kill the Rooster is a portrait of his brother, who talks incessant hip-hop slang to his bewildered father. And no one hones a finer fury in response to such modern annoyances as restaurant meals presented in ludicrous towers of food and cashiers with six-inch fingernails.

Every time Bill Bryson walks out the door, memorable travel literature threatens to break out. This time in Australia. His previous excursion along the Appalachian Trail resulted in the sublime national bestseller A Walk in the Woods. In a Sunburned Country is his report on what he found in an entirely different place: Australia, the country that doubles as a continent, and a place with the friendliest inhabitants, the hottest, driest weather, and the most peculiar and lethal wildlife to be found on the planet. The result is a deliciously funny, fact-filled, and adventurous performance by a writer who combines humor, wonder, and unflagging curiousity.

Despite the fact that Australia harbors more things that can kill you in extremely nasty ways than anywhere else, including sharks, crocodiles, snakes, even riptides and deserts, Bill Bryson adores the place, and he takes his readers on a rollicking ride far beyond that beaten tourist path. Wherever he goes he finds Australians who are cheerful, extroverted, and unfailingly obliging, and these beaming products of land with clean, safe cities, cold beer, and constant sunshine fill the pages of this wonderful book. Australia is an immense and fortunate land, and it has found in Bill Bryson its perfect guide.

"I come from Des Moines. Somebody had to." And, as soon as Bill Bryson was old enough, he left. Des Moines couldn't hold him, but it did lure him back. After ten years in England, he returned to the land of his youth and drove almost 14,000 miles in search of a mythical small town called Amalgam, the kind of trim and sunny place where the films of his youth were set.

Instead, his search led him to Anywhere, USA; a lookalike strip of gas stations, motels, and hamburger outlets populated by lookalike people with a penchant for synthetic fibers. Traveling around thirty-eight of the lower states—united only in their mind-numbingly dreary uniformity—he discovered a continent that was doubly lost; lost to itself because blighted by greed, pollution, mobile homes, and television; lost to him because he had become a stranger in his own land.

The Lost Continent is a classic of travel literature—hilariously, stomach-achingly funny, yet tinged with heartache—and the book that first staked Bill Bryson's claim as the most beloved writer of his generation.

Great Plains is an expedition through the heart of the American West. With a unique blend of intrepidity, tongue-in-cheek humor, and wide-eyed wonder, Ian Frazier takes us on a journey of more than 25,000 miles across the vast and myth-inspiring Great Plains.

This travelogue, work of scholarship, and western adventure takes readers from the site of Sitting Bull's cabin, to an abandoned house once terrorized by Bonnie and Clyde, to the scene of the murders chronicled in Truman Capote's In Cold Blood.

It is a hilarious and fascinating look at the great middle of our nation, revealing the spirit and landscapes of the American West.

The White Boy Shuffle is Paul Beatty's electrifying debut novel about Gunnar Kaufman, a teenage surf-bum who is forced to wise up when his mother moves from suburban Santa Monica to urban West Los Angeles.

There, he begins to undergo a startling transformation from neighborhood outcast to basketball superstar, and eventually to the reluctant messiah of a "divided, downtrodden people."

This bombastic coming-of-age novel has the uncanny ability to make readers want to laugh and cry at the same time. Beatty mingles horrific reality with wild fancy in this outlandish, laugh-out-loud funny, and poignant vision of contemporary America.

Time is a resource. Everyone knows it has to be managed.And on Discworld that is the job of the Monks of History, who store it and pump it from the places where it's wasted (like underwater -- how much time does a codfish need?) to places like cities, where there's never enough time.But the construction of the world's first truly accurate clock starts a race against, well, time, for Lu Tze and his apprentice Lobsang Ludd. Because it will stop time. And that will only be the start of everyone's problems.Thief of Time comes complete with a full supporting cast of heroes and villains, yetis, martial artists and Ronnie, the fifth Horseman of the Apocalypse (who left before they became famous).

You don't have to be a teenager to appreciate the humorous and often self-absorbed ravings found in 14-year-old Georgia Nicolson's diary, but it certainly helps. Now fans of Angus, Thongs and Full-Frontal Snogging—Georgia's first set of hilarious musings on life—can get another peek into the mind of this wryly inquisitive English lass in the appealing sequel: On the Bright Side, I'm Now the Girlfriend of a Sex God.

As the title implies, Georgia has snagged herself a sex god in the form of Robbie, the boy of her dreams. Now that they've indulged in a bit of "full-frontal snogging," Georgia turns her attention to advancing the relationship. But things quickly go wrong when she learns that her father's new job may necessitate a move to New Zealand. Crestfallen, Georgia feels her life might as well be over. Then, miraculously, the dreaded move is canceled, and things seem to be getting better—at least until 17-year-old Robbie decides to break up with Georgia because he's bothered by the difference in their ages.

Borrowing freely from her mum's closet and advice books, even as she's steadfastly discounting everything her mum says, a crushed but determined Georgia comes up with a scheme to win Robbie back. As usual, nothing goes as planned, and life is further complicated by Georgia's temperamental cat, Angus (who's having a few amorous leanings of his own), and her baby sister, Libby, whose fascination with (and lack of control over) her bodily functions leads to several intriguing mishaps.

Of course, there are other disasters, too: a quick-tan lotion that turns Georgia's legs orange, a run-in with the aptly named Bummer sisters, and friends who insist on focusing on their own problems from time to time. Who knew the angst of adolescence could be so much fun? This Georgia's-eye view of teenage life is wonderfully egocentric and side-splittingly funny. Georgia's thoughts and experiences will prove universally recognizable to anyone who is, or has ever been, a teenager.

When last seen, the singularly inept wizard Rincewind had fallen off the edge of the world. Now magically, he's turned up again, and this time he's brought the Luggage.

But that's not all...

Once upon a time, there was an eighth son of an eighth son who was, of course, a wizard. As if that wasn't complicated enough, said wizard then had seven sons. And then he had an eighth son — a wizard squared (that's all the math, really). Who of course, was a source of magic — a sourcerer.

Lurching from the cappuccino bars of Notting Hill to the blissed-out shores of Thailand, Bridget Jones searches for The Truth in spite of pathetically unevolved men, insane dating theories, and Smug Married advice. She experiences a zeitgeist-esque Spiritual Epiphany somewhere between the pages of How to Find the Love You Want Without Seeking It ("can self-help books really self help?"), protective custody, and a lightly chilled Chardonnay.

Esta divertida novela relata la búsqueda de un extraterrestre que ha desaparecido, tras adoptar la apariencia de la vocalista Marta Sánchez, en la jungla urbana barcelonesa. Pero el protagonista de la narración no es Gurb, sino otro alienígena que sale en pos de él y cuyo diario constituye el esqueleto de la narración.

La verdadera naturaleza del relato es de carácter satírico: Mendoza convierte esta Barcelona, a un tiempo cotidiana y absurda, en el escenario de una carnavalada que revela el verdadero rostro del hombre urbano actual.

Anne Fadiman is (by her own admission) the sort of person who learned about sex from her father's copy of Fanny Hill, whose husband buys her 19 pounds of dusty books for her birthday, and who once found herself poring over her roommate's 1974 Toyota Corolla manual because it was the only written material in the apartment that she had not read at least twice.

This witty collection of essays recounts a lifelong love affair with books and language. For Fadiman, as for many passionate readers, the books she loves have become chapters in her own life story. Writing with remarkable grace, she revives the tradition of the well-crafted personal essay, moving easily from anecdotes about Coleridge and Orwell to tales of her own pathologically literary family.

As someone who played at blocks with her father's 22-volume set of Trollope ("My Ancestral Castles") and who only really considered herself married when she and her husband had merged collections ("Marrying Libraries"), she is exquisitely well equipped to expand upon the art of inscriptions, the perverse pleasures of compulsive proofreading, the allure of long words, and the satisfactions of reading out loud.

There is even a foray into pure literary gluttony: Charles Lamb liked buttered muffin crumbs between the leaves, and Fadiman knows of more than one reader who literally consumes page corners. Perfectly balanced between humor and erudition, Ex Libris establishes Fadiman as one of our finest contemporary essayists.

Captains Courageous is a tale of transformation and growth. A pampered millionaire's son, Harvey Cheyne Jr., tumbles overboard from a luxury liner, only to be rescued by a gruff and hearty crew of fishermen. Stripped of his former privileges, he must learn the ways of the sea and earn his place among the crew.

As Harvey navigates the waters off the Grand Banks of Newfoundland, he discovers the value of hard work, loyalty, and friendship. Through thrilling adventures and humorous encounters, he sheds his spoiled demeanor and embraces the tough life of a fisherman.

Rudyard Kipling's masterful storytelling brings to life the rugged beauty of the sea and the camaraderie of those who live by its rules. This classic coming-of-age story is filled with action, humor, and the timeless lessons of resilience and honor.

Forty years after its first publication, this much-loved Child's Play classic is as popular as ever. Ingenious die-cut holes bring this iconic nursery rhyme to life, and Pam Adams' fabulous illustrations lend humor and vibrancy to the proceedings.

Bouncy images, innovative die-cutting, and favorite rhymes make Books with Holes a must for every child. Available in three formats, suitable for babies, toddlers, pre-schoolers, and the nursery or classroom.

The Dancers at the End of Time is a series of science fiction novels and short stories written by Michael Moorcock, set in an era where entropy is king and the universe is collapsing upon itself. The inhabitants of this era are immortal decadents, creating flights of fancy using power rings drawing on energy stored by their ancestors millions of years prior.

Time travel is possible, and throughout the series, various points in time are visited and revisited. Space travelers are also common, though most residents find leaving the planet distasteful and clichéd.

This tenth volume of the Eternal Champion series blends humor and romance in a monumental story that spans all of space and time. Can love blossom across millennia, in a world where 'conscience' and 'morality' are meaningless, amidst a multiverse collapsing and racing toward destruction?

Sam Bagshott, son of the late Boko Bagshott, had been at Blandings Castle only a short while, but long enough to know that anyone enjoying its hospitality must get the occasional shock. He was prepared for bad news in any form, but not the one in which it actually came.

Sam braced himself as the possibilities flitted through his mind. Was the house on fire? Had the Empress of Blandings taken to the bottle again? Had Constable Evans arrived with a search warrant? There was a wide area of speculation, and he was prepared for bad news in any form. In any form, that is to say, except the one in which it came.

Can the Empress of Blandings win the Fat Pigs class at the Shropshire Show for the third year running? Galahad Threepwood, Beach the butler, and others have put their shirt on this, and for Lord Emsworth, it will be paradise on earth. But a substantial obstacle lurks in the way: Queen of Matchingham, the new sow of Sir Gregory Parsloe Bart. Galahad knows this pretender to the crown must be pignapped. But can the Empress in turn avoid a similar fate?

In this classic Blandings novel, pigs rise above their bulk to vanish and reappear in the most unlikely places, while young lovers are crossed and recrossed in every room in Blandings Castle.

In this bitterly funny novel by the renowned Polish author Witold Gombrowicz, a writer finds himself tossed into a chaotic world of schoolboys by a diabolical professor who wishes to reduce him to childishness.

Originally published in Poland in 1937, Ferdydurke became an instant literary sensation and catapulted the young author to fame. Deemed scandalous and subversive by Nazis, Stalinists, and the Polish Communist regime in turn, the novel (as well as all of Gombrowicz's other works) was officially banned in Poland for decades.

It has nonetheless remained one of the most influential works of twentieth-century European literature. Ferdydurke is translated here directly from the Polish for the first time. Danuta Borchardt deftly captures Gombrowicz's playful and idiosyncratic style, and she allows English speakers to experience fully the masterpiece of a writer whom Milan Kundera describes as "one of the great novelists of our century."

Georgia Nicolson's year might just be the most fabbity fab fab ever! Between trying to reduce the size of her nose, stopping her mad cat Angus from terrorizing the neighborhood animals, and winning the love of handsome hunk Robbie, Georgia's life is anything but dull. Her diary captures the soaring joys and bottomless angst of being a teenager with humor and irreverence.

This wildly funny journal, in the spirit of Bridget Jones's Diary, will leave you laughing out loud. As Georgia would say, it's "Fabbity fab fab!"

Ramona the Pest is the second book in the popular series about Ramona Quimby. Ramona doesn't think she's a pest—she knows she isn't one on purpose. So, how does she always end up in trouble? Why does Davy run away whenever Ramona is near, and how does she manage to disrupt the entire kindergarten class during rest time?

Join Ramona as she navigates her first few months at kindergarten, meeting interesting people like Davy, whom she keeps trying to kiss, and Susan, whose springy curls seem to ask to be pulled. This charming tale captures the innocent yet mischievous spirit of childhood.

Switters is a contradiction for all seasons: an anarchist who works for the government; a pacifist who carries a gun; a vegetarian who sops up ham gravy; a cyberwhiz who hates computers; a man who, though obsessed with the preservation of innocence, is aching to deflower his high-school-age stepsister (only to become equally enamored of a nun ten years his senior). Yet there is nothing remotely wishy-washy about Switters. He doesn't merely pack a pistol. He is a pistol.

And as we dog Switters's strangely elevated heels across four continents, in and out of love and danger, discovering in the process the "true" Third Secret of Fatima, we experience Tom Robbins—that fearless storyteller, spiritual renegade, and verbal break dancer—at the top of his game. On one level this is a fast-paced CIA adventure story with comic overtones; on another it's a serious novel of ideas that brings the Big Picture into unexpected focus; but perhaps more than anything else, Fierce Invalids is a sexy celebration of language and life.

Generous-hearted and wickedly insightful, The Girls' Guide to Hunting and Fishing maps the progress of Jane Rosenal as she sets out on a personal and spirited expedition through the perilous terrain of sex, love, and relationships, as well as the treacherous waters of the workplace.

With an unforgettable comic touch, Bank skillfully teases out universal issues of the heart, puts a new spin on the mating dance, and captures in perfect pitch what it's like to be a young woman coming of age in America today.

Martyrs to hypochondria and general seediness, J. and his friends George and Harris decide that a jaunt up the Thames would suit them to a 'T'. But when they set off, they can hardly predict the troubles that lie ahead with tow-ropes, unreliable weather-forecasts and tins of pineapple chunks - not to mention the devastation left in the wake of J.'s small fox-terrier, Montmorency.

Three Men in a Boat was an instant success when it appeared in 1889, and proved so popular that Jerome reunited his now older - but not necessarily wiser - heroes in Three Men on the Bummel, for a picaresque bicycle tour of Germany. With their benign escapism, authorial discursions and wonderful evocation of the late-Victorian 'clerking classes', both novels hilariously capture the spirit of their age.

When it comes to children's books, it's hard to beat the bestselling team of author Laura Numeroff and illustrator Felicia Bond for creative and captivating tales that are both fun and educational. They continue the tradition that began with such whimsical titles as If You Give a Mouse a Cookie and If You Give a Moose a Muffin with yet another tale of actions and consequences: If You Give a Pig a Pancake.

Once again, Numeroff follows the potential effects of one creature's chaotic demands, creating a tale filled with beguiling characters, delightful anticipation, and a fun sense of adventure. In addition to being humorous and entertaining, If You Give a Pig a Pancake allows children to see how their own constant demands might frazzle their parents.

Kids should also enjoy studying the subtleties in Bond's colorful illustrations, such as the facial expressions of the book's adorable protagonist or the details found in a mountain of bubbles and the contents of a closet. Easy to understand, stimulating to both mind and eye, and irresistibly amusing, this is one book children will likely want to read over and over again.

Joe Mondragon, a feisty hustler with a talent for trouble, slammed his battered pickup to a stop, tugged on his gumboots, and marched into the arid patch of ground. Carefully (and also illegally), he tapped into the main irrigation channel. And so began—though few knew it at the time—the Milagro beanfield war.

But like everything else in the dirt-poor town of Milagro, it would be a patchwork war, fought more by tactical retreats than by battlefield victories. Gradually, the small farmers and sheepmen begin to rally to Joe's beanfield as the symbol of their lost rights and their lost lands.

And downstate in the capital, the Anglo water barons and power brokers huddle in urgent conference, intent on destroying that symbol before it destroys their multimillion-dollar land-development schemes.

The tale of Milagro's rising is wildly comic and lovingly tender, a vivid portrayal of a town that, half-stumbling and partly prodded, gropes its way toward its own stubborn salvation.

Farmer Brown has a problem. His cows like to type. All day long he hears:

Click, clack, MOO.
Click, clack, MOO.
Clickety, clack, MOO.

But Farmer Brown's problems REALLY begin when his cows start leaving him notes...

Doreen Cronin's understated text and Betsy Lewin's expressive illustrations make the most of this hilarious situation. Come join the fun as a bunch of literate cows turn Farmer Brown's farm upside down.