The myths and reality behind the state of Israel and the Israeli-Palestinian conflict from the most eloquent writer on Palestinian history (New Statesman).

In this groundbreaking book, published on the fiftieth anniversary of the Occupation, the outspoken and radical Israeli historian Ilan Pappé examines the most contested ideas concerning the origins and identity of the contemporary state of Israel.

The “ten myths” that Pappé explores—repeated endlessly in the media, enforced by the military, accepted without question by the world’s governments—reinforce the regional status quo. He explores the claim that Palestine was an empty land at the time of the Balfour Declaration, as well as the formation of Zionism and its role in the early decades of nation building. He asks whether the Palestinians voluntarily left their homeland in 1948, and whether June 1967 was a war of “no choice.”

Turning to the myths surrounding the failures of the Camp David Accords and the official reasons for the attacks on Gaza, Pappé explains why the two-state solution is no longer viable.

Go west. Capture Apollo before he can find the next oracle.
If you cannot bring him to me alive, kill him.

Those were the orders my old enemy Nero had given to Meg McCaffrey. But why would an ancient Roman emperor zero in on Indianapolis? And now that I have made it here (still in the embarrassing form of Lester Papadopoulos), where is Meg?

Meg, my demigod master, is a cantankerous street urchin. She betrayed me to Nero back at Camp Half-Blood. And while I'm mortal, she can order me to do anything... even kill myself. Despite all this, if I have a chance of prying her away from her villainous stepfather, I have to try.

But I'm new at this heroic-quest business, and my father, Zeus, stripped me of all my godly powers. Oh, the indignities and pain I have already suffered! Untold humiliation, impossible time limits, life-threatening danger... Shouldn't there be a reward at the end of each completed task? Not just more deadly quests?

I vow that if I ever regain my godhood, I will never again send a poor mortal on a quest. Unless it is really important. And unless I am sure the mortal can handle it. And unless I am pressed for time... or I really just don't feel like doing it myself. I will be much kinder and more generous than everyone is being to me—especially that sorceress Calypso. What does Leo see in her, anyway?

A hilarious and deeply touching debut novel about a son, the mother who left him as a child, and how his search to uncover the secrets of her life leads him to reclaim his own.

Meet Samuel Andresen-Anderson: stalled writer, bored teacher at a local college, obsessive player of an online video game. He hasn't seen his mother, Faye, since she walked out when he was a child. But then one day there she is, all over the news, throwing rocks at a presidential candidate. The media paints Faye as a militant radical with a sordid past, but as far as Samuel knows, his mother never left her small Iowa town. Which version of his mother is the true one?

Determined to solve the puzzle—and finally have something to deliver to his publisher—Samuel decides to capitalize on his mother's new fame by writing a tell-all biography, a book that will savage her intimately, publicly. But first, he has to locate her; and second, to talk to her without bursting into tears.

As Samuel begins to excavate her history, the story moves from the rural Midwest of the 1960s to New York City during the Great Recession and Occupy Wall Street, to the infamous riots at the 1968 Chicago Democratic National Convention, and finally to Norway, home of the mysterious Nix that his mother told him about as a child. And in these places, Samuel will unexpectedly find that he has to rethink everything he ever knew about his mother—a woman with an epic story of her own, a story she kept hidden from the world.

Based on the true story of a forgotten hero, Beneath a Scarlet Sky is the triumphant, epic tale of one young man’s incredible courage and resilience during one of history’s darkest hours.

Pino Lella wants nothing to do with the war or the Nazis. He’s a normal Italian teenager—obsessed with music, food, and girls—but his days of innocence are numbered. When his family home in Milan is destroyed by Allied bombs, Pino joins an underground railroad helping Jews escape over the Alps, and falls for Anna, a beautiful widow six years his senior. In an attempt to protect him, Pino’s parents force him to enlist as a German soldier—a move they think will keep him out of combat. But after Pino is injured, he is recruited at the tender age of eighteen to become the personal driver for Adolf Hitler’s left hand in Italy, General Hans Leyers, one of the Third Reich’s most mysterious and powerful commanders.

Now, with the opportunity to spy for the Allies inside the German High Command, Pino endures the horrors of the war and the Nazi occupation by fighting in secret, his courage bolstered by his love for Anna and for the life he dreams they will one day share.

Fans of All the Light We Cannot See, The Nightingale, and Unbroken will enjoy this riveting saga of history, suspense, and love.

The archetypal Victorian melodrama, as heartfelt and moving today as when it was first published, Charles Dickens's The Old Curiosity Shop is edited with notes and an introduction by Norman Page in Penguin Classics.

Little Nell Trent lives in the quiet gloom of the old curiosity shop with her ailing grandfather, for whom she cares with selfless devotion. But when they are unable to pay their debts to the stunted, lecherous and demonic money-lender Daniel Quilp, the shop is seized and they are forced to flee, thrown into a shadowy world in which there seems to be no safe haven.

Dickens's portrayal of the innocent, tragic Nell made The Old Curiosity Shop an instant bestseller that captured the hearts of the nation. Yet alongside the story's pathos are some of Dickens's greatest comic and grotesque creations: the ne'er-do-well Dick Swiveller, the mannish lawyer Sally Brass, the half-starved 'Marchioness' and the lustful, loathsome Quilp himself.

This edition, based on the original text of 1841, contains an introduction by Norman Page discussing the various contrasting themes of the novel and its roots in Dickens's own personal tragedy, with prefaces to the 1841 and 1848 editions, a chronology, notes and original illustrations produced for the serial version.

Anything Is Possible by Elizabeth Strout is a novel that delves into the intimate dramas of small-town life, exploring the full range of human emotions. The story revolves around a compelling cast of characters, each grappling with their own struggles and desires.

Two sisters are at the heart of this narrative: one trades self-respect for a wealthy husband, while the other discovers a kindred spirit in the pages of a book, transforming her life. Meanwhile, a grown daughter yearns for her mother's love, even as she comes to terms with her mother's happiness in a foreign land.

After a long absence of seventeen years, Lucy Barton returns to her hometown to reconnect with her siblings, setting the stage for a story filled with deep family bonds and the hope of reconciliation.

With its heartfelt storytelling and exploration of self-discovery and family dynamics, Anything Is Possible offers readers a chance to reflect on their own lives and relationships.

iDEATH is a place where the sun shines a different color every day and where people travel to the length of their dreams. Rejecting the violence and hate of the old gang at the Forgotten Works, they lead gentle lives in watermelon sugar.

In this book, Richard Brautigan discovers and expresses the mood of the counterculture generation.

Too many Americans are taking too many drugs—and it's costing us our health, happiness, and lives.

Prescription drug use in America has increased tenfold in the past 50 years, and over-the-counter drug use has risen just as dramatically. In addition to the dozens of medications we take to treat serious illnesses, we take drugs to help us sleep, to keep us awake, to keep our noses from running, our backs from aching, and our minds from racing. Name a symptom, there's a pill to suppress it.

Modern drugs can be miraculously life-saving, and many illnesses demand their use. But what happens when our reliance on powerful pharmaceuticals blinds us to their risks? Painful side effects and dependency are common, and adverse drug reactions are America's fourth leading cause of death.

In Mind Over Meds, bestselling author Dr. Andrew Weil alerts readers to the problem of overmedication, and outlines when medicine is necessary, and when it is not. Dr. Weil examines how we came to be so drastically overmedicated, presents science that proves drugs aren't always the best option, and provides reliable integrative medicine approaches to treating common ailments like high blood pressure, allergies, depression, and even the common cold. With case histories, healthy alternative treatments, and input from other leading physicians, Mind Over Meds is the go-to resource for anyone who is sick and tired of being sick and tired.

The Gray House is an astounding tale of how what others understand as liabilities can be leveraged into strengths. Bound to wheelchairs and dependent on prosthetic limbs, the physically disabled students living in the House are overlooked by the Outsides. Not that it matters to anyone living in the House, a hulking old structure that its residents know is alive. From the corridors and crawl spaces to the classrooms and dorms, the House is full of tribes, tinctures, scared teachers, and laws—all seen and understood through a prismatic array of teenagers’ eyes.

But student deaths and mounting pressure from the Outsides put the time-defying order of the House in danger. As the tribe leaders struggle to maintain power, they defer to the awesome power of the House, attempting to make it through days and nights that pass in ways that clocks and watches cannot record.

Keita Ali is on the run. Like every boy on the mountainous island of Zantoroland, running is all Keita’s ever wanted to do. In one of the poorest nations in the world, running means respect. Running means riches—until Keita is targeted for his father’s outspoken political views and discovers he must run for his family’s survival. He signs on with notorious marathon agent Anton Hamm, but when Keita fails to place among the top finishers in his first race, he escapes into Freedom State—a wealthy island nation that has elected a government bent on deporting the refugees living within its borders in the community of AfricTown. Keita can stay safe only if he keeps moving and eludes Hamm and the officials who would deport him to his own country, where he would face almost certain death. This is the new underground: a place where tens of thousands of people deemed to be “illegal” live below the radar of the police and government officials. As Keita surfaces from time to time to earn cash prizes by running local road races, he has to assess whether the people he meets are friends or enemies: John Falconer, a gifted student struggling to escape the limits of his AfricTown upbringing; Ivernia Beech, a spirited old woman at risk of being forced into an assisted living facility; Rocco Calder, a recreational marathoner and the immigration minister; Lula DiStefano, self-declared queen of AfricTown and madam of the community’s infamous brothel; and Viola Hill, a reporter who is investigating the lengths to which her government will go to stop illegal immigration. Keita’s very existence in Freedom State is illegal. As he trains in secret, eluding capture, the stakes keep getting higher. Soon, he is running not only for his life, but for his sister’s life, too. Fast moving and compelling, The Illegal casts a satirical eye on people who have turned their backs on undocumented refugees struggling to survive in a nation that does not want them. Hill’s depiction of life on the borderlands of society urges us to consider the plight of the unseen and the forgotten who live among us.

One of the Best Books of 2016--NPR, the Washington Post, The Wall Street Journal, the Boston Globe, Elle, Thrillist, Men's Journal, Publishers Weekly, Time Out New York, Self and Kirkus The audacious new novel about family and ambition from "one of the best living mystery writers" (Grantland) and bestselling, award-winning author of The Fever, Megan Abbott. How far will you go to achieve a dream? That's the question a celebrated coach poses to Katie and Eric Knox after he sees their daughter Devon, a gymnastics prodigy and Olympic hopeful, compete. For the Knoxes there are no limits--until a violent death rocks their close-knit gymnastics community and everything they have worked so hard for is suddenly at risk. As rumors swirl among the other parents, Katie tries frantically to hold her family together while also finding herself irresistibly drawn to the crime itself. What she uncovers--about her daughter's fears, her own marriage, and herself--forces Katie to consider whether there's any price she isn't willing to pay to achieve Devon's dream. From a writer with "exceptional gifts for making nerves jangle and skin crawl" (Janet Maslin), You Will Know Me is a breathless rollercoaster of a novel about the desperate limits of parental sacrifice, furtive desire, and the staggering force of ambition.

The misty sea spray caressing Catherine's face portends the unclear path ahead as she contemplates the beginning of her new life in California. Her ten-year journey will include a new relationship, a trek to the highest summit in the contiguous United States, and a poignant hospice experience that will challenge her to rise from the ashes of despair.

Catherine decides to leave Boston when a company from the Silicon Valley presents an offer for her very successful website design company. After accepting the buyout, she signs a contract with a Los Angeles based health care corporation to work as a consultant and thus begins her decade-long stay on the west coast. As time passes in her sunny new environment, Catherine grows increasingly homesick despite the thrill of falling in love and her passion for hiking the Southern California trails.

Conflicts arise when the desire to return to her native New England dominates her thoughts and she meets Kenny, a young man who is facing his final days. As Catherine sits at Kenny's bedside, she helps him work through his struggles to understand love and devotion while facing the fear of a completed life's journey. Their conversations inspire her to reflect deeply upon her own life, the decisions she has made, and the path she must follow.

Opposites in every way... except the one that matters. Shaw Landon loved Rule Archer from the moment she laid eyes on him. Rule is everything a straight-A pre-med student like Shaw shouldn’t want—and the only person she’s never tried to please. She isn’t afraid of his scary piercings and tattoos or his wild attitude. Though she knows that Rule is wrong for her, her heart just won’t listen.

To a rebel like Rule Archer, Shaw Landon is a stuck-up, perfect princess—and his dead twin brother’s girl. She lives by other people’s rules; he makes his own. He doesn’t have time for a good girl like Shaw—even if she’s the only one who can see the person he truly is.

But a short skirt, too many birthday cocktails, and spilled secrets lead to a night neither can forget. Now, Shaw and Rule have to figure out how a girl like her and a guy like him are supposed to be together without destroying their love... or each other.

Killers of the Flower Moon delves into the haunting true-life murder mystery of one of the most monstrous crimes in American history. In the 1920s, members of the Osage Nation in Oklahoma were the wealthiest people per capita in the world, thanks to oil discovered beneath their land. They lived opulently with chauffeured automobiles, mansions, and European-educated children. However, a sinister series of events unfolded as they began to be systematically murdered.

The family of an Osage woman, Mollie Burkhart, was a prime target, with relatives being shot and poisoned. As the body count grew, the newly formed FBI stepped in, with the young director, J. Edgar Hoover, assigning former Texas Ranger Tom White to the case. White assembled an undercover team, including a Native American agent, to work with the Osage and uncover a chilling conspiracy.

Author David Grann presents a masterful work of literary journalism that captures the urgency of the mystery. Killers of the Flower Moon is not only a riveting account but also a searing indictment of the era's racial injustice.

Hourglass is an inquiry into how marriage is transformed by time--abraded, strengthened, shaped in miraculous and sometimes terrifying ways by accident and experience. With courage and relentless honesty, Dani Shapiro opens the door to her house, her marriage, and her heart, and invites us to witness her own marital reckoning--a reckoning in which she confronts both the life she dreamed of and the life she made, and struggles to reconcile the girl she was with the woman she has become.

Drawing on literature, poetry, philosophy, and theology, Shapiro writes gloriously of the joys and challenges of matrimonial life, in a luminous narrative that unfurls with urgent immediacy and sharp intelligence. Artful, intensely emotional work from one of our finest writers.

Landfill Dogs, as featured on ABC World News with Diane Sawyer (2013) and CNN (2015), shines a light on some of the most overlooked dogs from a county shelter in Raleigh, NC. Through this touching photography project, more than 160 dogs have found homes or been sent to rescue.

This book tells the story of who the Landfill Dogs are, featuring a compilation of their portraits at Landfill Park and individual adoption stories. It's a must-have for any animal advocate!

Note: All proceeds go directly toward helping shelter animals.

Seventeen-year-old Molly Peskin-Suso knows all about unrequited love—she’s lived through it twenty-six times. She crushes hard and crushes often, but always in secret. Because no matter how many times her twin sister, Cassie, tells her to woman up, Molly can’t stomach the idea of rejection. So she’s careful. Fat girls always have to be careful.

Then a cute new girl enters Cassie’s orbit, and for the first time ever, Molly’s cynical twin is a lovesick mess. Meanwhile, Molly’s totally not dying of loneliness—except for the part where she is. Luckily, Cassie’s new girlfriend comes with a cute hipster-boy sidekick. Will is funny and flirtatious and just might be perfect crush material. Maybe more than crush material. And if Molly can win him over, she’ll get her first kiss and she’ll get her twin back. There’s only one problem: Molly’s coworker Reid. He’s an awkward Tolkien superfan with a season pass to the Ren Faire, and there’s absolutely no way Molly could fall for him. Right?

Lo Blacklock, a journalist who writes for a travel magazine, has just been given the assignment of a lifetime: a week on a luxury cruise with only a handful of cabins. The sky is clear, the waters calm, and the veneered, select guests jovial as the exclusive cruise ship, the Aurora, begins her voyage in the picturesque North Sea.

At first, Lo's stay is nothing but pleasant: the cabins are plush, the dinner parties are sparkling, and the guests are elegant. But as the week wears on, frigid winds whip the deck, gray skies fall, and Lo witnesses what she can only describe as a dark and terrifying nightmare: a woman being thrown overboard. The problem? All passengers remain accounted for and so, the ship sails on as if nothing has happened, despite Lo's desperate attempts to convey that something (or someone) has gone terribly, terribly wrong.

With surprising twists, spine-tingling turns, and a setting that proves as uncomfortably claustrophobic as it is eerily beautiful, Ruth Ware offers up another taut and intense read in The Woman in Cabin 10—one that will leave even the most sure-footed reader restlessly uneasy long after the last page is turned.

Botanical Shakespeare is a captivating and beautifully illustrated compendium of the flowers, fruits, herbs, trees, seeds, and grasses cited in the works of the world’s greatest playwright, William Shakespeare. This unique book is accompanied by their companion quotes from all of his plays and poems.

With a foreword by Dame Helen Mirren, this striking compilation brings together the knowledge and skill of Shakespeare historian Gerit Quealy and respected Japanese artist Sumie Hasegawa Collins. It is the first and only book that examines every plant appearing in the works of Shakespeare.

At the heart of the book are "portraits" of over 170 flowers, fruits, grains, grasses, trees, herbs, seeds, and vegetables mentioned in Shakespeare's plays and poems. Each is beautifully illustrated, providing a "face" to the name, alongside the specific text in which it appears and the character(s) who utter the lines.

This visual compendium includes a dictionary describing each plant, such as Eglantine, a wild rose cherished for its singular scent, and explains the difference between apples and apple-john. It features indices listing the botanical by play/poem, by character, and genus for easy reference, making it ideal for gardeners and literature enthusiasts alike.

This breathtaking collection offers unique depth and insight into Shakespeare and his timeless work through the unusual perspective of the plants themselves.

Anne Lamott explores the concept of mercy in her enthralling and heartening book, Hallelujah Anyway: Rediscovering Mercy. She delves into the idea that mercy is radical kindness. It's the permission you give others—and yourself—to forgive a debt, to absolve the unabsolvable, to let go of the judgment and pain that make life so difficult.

In this profound and caring book, Lamott ventures to explore where to find meaning in life. She suggests we begin by facing a great big mess, especially the great big mess of ourselves. It's up to each of us to recognize the presence and importance of mercy everywhere—within us and outside us, all around us—and to use it to forge a deeper understanding of ourselves and more honest connections with each other.

While that can be difficult to do, Lamott argues that it's crucial, as kindness towards others, beginning with myself, buys us a shot at a warm and generous heart, the greatest prize of all. Full of Lamott’s trademark honesty, humor, and forthrightness, Hallelujah Anyway is a hopeful book of hands-on spirituality.

Five months ago, Valerie Leftman's boyfriend, Nick, opened fire on their school cafeteria. Shot trying to stop him, Valerie inadvertently saved the life of a classmate, but was implicated in the shootings because of the list she helped create. A list of people and things she and Nick hated. The list he used to pick his targets.

Now, after a summer of seclusion, Val is forced to confront her guilt as she returns to school to complete her senior year. Haunted by the memory of the boyfriend she still loves and navigating rocky relationships with her family, former friends, and the girl whose life she saved, Val must come to grips with the tragedy that took place and her role in it, in order to make amends and move on with her life.

In One-Punch Man, Vol. 13: Monster Cells, the Class-A heroes are in a fierce battle against the giant monster Multieyed Octopus. As the situation intensifies, Class-S hero Flashy Flash enters the fray, adding his strength to the chaotic confrontation. Meanwhile, the Monster Association escalates its onslaught, but their ultimate objective remains shrouded in secrecy.

Amidst the action, the martial arts tournament advances to the semifinals, promising to showcase the prowess and skills of the remaining fighters.

I was born for killing – the gods made me to ruin.

At the Convent of Sweet Mercy, young girls are raised to be killers. In a few, the old bloods show, gifting talents rarely seen since the tribes beached their ships on Abeth. Sweet Mercy hones its novices’ skills to deadly effect: it takes ten years to educate a Red Sister in the ways of blade and fist.

But even the mistresses of sword and shadow don’t truly understand what they have purchased when Nona Grey is brought to their halls as a bloodstained child of eight, falsely accused of murder: guilty of worse. Stolen from the shadow of the noose, Nona is sought by powerful enemies, and for good reason.

Despite the security and isolation of the convent, her secret and violent past will find her out. Beneath a dying sun that shines upon a crumbling empire, Nona Grey must come to terms with her demons and learn to become a deadly assassin if she is to survive…

Sophia is not just smart; she's a genius-calculator-brain smart. However, even a prodigious intellect like hers isn't equipped to handle the chaos of real life. As everything familiar begins to crumble, she's left to solve the most complex problem of all: figuring out her future. Joshua, on the other hand, dedicates his time to perfecting magic tricks and devising plans to win Sophia's affection. But how does one impress a genius when his best trick is making homework vanish? In the delicate dance of life and love, timing is the critical element. Told through the perspectives of two starkly different teenagers, this tale is a heartwarming journey of self-discovery and the intricate magic of young love.

PASSION IN PROVENCE: Ben and Lee Alto follow Van Gogh’s 19th century path to Provence, hoping to find inspiration for their own lives and give their son, Misha, some insight into a world completely different from their own. They find art, of course, and a world of beautiful landscapes, warm temperatures, and, yes, wonderful food. But they also find a ghost of their past, and it’s not Vincent Van Gogh but a woman Ben once loved and a man, Zach, a well-known jazz musician, who teach them some hard lessons about art and life, as well as the art of life.

A SUMMER OF GOOD-BYES resonates with the warmth of France’s southern sun, famous artists, and violent conflicts. It’s a vital, romantic story filled with the tensions of love and marriage, sexual longing and family loyalty, and the struggle to live in the face of impending death and loss.

Thérèse Raquin is one of Zola's most famous realist novels, a clinically observed, sinister tale of adultery and murder among the lower classes in nineteenth-century Parisian society.

Set in the claustrophobic atmosphere of a dingy haberdasher's shop in the passage du Pont-Neuf in Paris, this powerful novel tells how the heroine and her lover, Laurent, kill her husband, Camille, but are subsequently haunted by visions of the dead man, and prevented from enjoying the fruits of their crime.

Zola's shocking tale dispassionately dissects the motivations of his characters—mere "human beasts", who kill in order to satisfy their lust—and stands as a key manifesto of the French Naturalist movement, of which the author was the founding father. Published in 1867, this is Zola's most important work before the Rougon-Macquart series and introduces many of the themes that can be traced through the later novel cycle.

Internal Family Systems Therapy with Children details the application of IFS in child psychotherapy. The weaving together of theory, step-by-step instruction, and case material gives child therapists a clear roadmap for understanding and utilizing the healing power of this modality.

In addition, any IFS therapist will deepen their understanding of the theory and practice of Internal Family Systems by reading how it is practiced with children. This book also covers the use of IFS in parent guidance, an important aspect of any therapeutic work with families or adult individuals with children.

The poignant and humorous vignettes of children’s therapy along with their IFS artwork make it an enjoyable and informative read.

The dream chooses the dreamer, not the other way around—and Lazlo Strange, war orphan and junior librarian, has always feared that his dream chose poorly. Since he was five years old he’s been obsessed with the mythic lost city of Weep, but it would take someone bolder than he to cross half the world in search of it. Then a stunning opportunity presents itself, in the person of a hero called the Godslayer and a band of legendary warriors, and he has to seize his chance or lose his dream forever.

What happened in Weep two hundred years ago to cut it off from the rest of the world? What exactly did the Godslayer slay that went by the name of god? And what is the mysterious problem he now seeks help in solving?

The answers await in Weep, but so do more mysteries—including the blue-skinned goddess who appears in Lazlo’s dreams. How did he dream her before he knew she existed? And if all the gods are dead, why does she seem so real?

Welcome to Weep.

From one of the most beloved and bestselling authors in the English language, comes a vivid, nostalgic, and utterly hilarious memoir of growing up in the 1950s. Bill Bryson was born in the middle of the American century—1951—in the middle of the United States—Des Moines, Iowa—in the middle of the largest generation in American history—the baby boomers. As one of the best and funniest writers alive, he is perfectly positioned to mine his memories of a totally all-American childhood for 24-carat memoir gold.

Like millions of his generational peers, Bill Bryson grew up with a rich fantasy life as a superhero. In his case, he ran around his house and neighborhood with an old football jersey with a thunderbolt on it and a towel about his neck that served as his cape, leaping tall buildings in a single bound and vanquishing awful evildoers (and morons)—in his head—as "The Thunderbolt Kid." Using this persona as a springboard, Bill Bryson re-creates the life of his family and his native city in the 1950s in all its transcendent normality—a life at once completely familiar to us all and as far away and unreachable as another galaxy.

It was, he reminds us, a happy time, when automobiles and televisions and appliances (not to mention nuclear weapons) grew larger and more numerous with each passing year, and DDT, cigarettes, and the fallout from atmospheric testing were considered harmless or even good for you. He brings us into the life of his loving but eccentric family, including affectionate portraits of his father, a gifted sportswriter for the local paper and dedicated practitioner of isometric exercises, and of his mother, whose job as the home furnishing editor for the same paper left her little time for practicing the domestic arts at home.

Warm and laugh-out-loud funny, and full of his inimitable, pitch-perfect observations, The Life and Times of the Thunderbolt Kid is as wondrous a book as Bill Bryson has ever written. It will enchant anyone who has ever been young.

Why They Stay explores the possible reasoning and motivation behind why political wives stay with their husbands after the husbands cheat. Hillary Clinton couldn't have known in 1998 how her husband's high-profile philandering would play out. Would he be rehabilitated in the public eye? She couldn't be sure, but she took the gamble. Had she left the marriage, today she might be the spurned wife of a retired politician instead of the first American woman to run for president on a major party ticket.

Looking back on the path chosen by the nine political wives profiled in this book, we have the evidence to see a pattern—as old as the dynastic maneuverings of England's medieval queens. The women married to the "royalty" of our times—politicians—make similar cold calculations in order to hold onto their "thrones" and their family's history-making potential.

After covering politicians for decades, acclaimed columnist Anne Michaud switched her gaze to the women behind the cheating men. Drawing from multiple sources that span the Roosevelts' marriage to the more recent scandal involving Hillary Clinton's closest aide Huma Abedin (wife of "sexter," Anthony Weiner), Why They Stay: Sex Scandals, Deals, and Hidden Agendas of Nine Political Wives argues that when it comes to the "power behind the throne," women in the limelight weigh the risks and rewards. They remain loyal to their men, because of complex, often unconscious forces.

From mapping a path to power to laudable notions of holding the family together, Michaud examines the uniquely challenging Faustian bargains that political wives grapple with, even as the public spotlight illuminates their every move.

The Facts of Life is a poignant and beautifully drawn graphic memoir by Paula Knight. This visual exploration delves deep into the stigma-inducing health issues of miscarriage, childlessness, and chronic medical conditions.

Set in the 1970s, best friends Polly and April collect hazy knowledge about the “facts of life”—sex, reproduction, and gender norms—through the gossip of older girls, magazines, and books, along with the everyday behavior of their families and teachers. As the years pass, they each choose paths they believe will enable them to “have it all.”

April’s dreams of motherhood come true quickly, while Polly enthusiastically builds a career. However, her desire and hope to start a family become less firmly ingrained, influenced by her struggles with chronic illness. Polly's journey with her partner Jack is fraught with debates on parenthood, heartbreak of repeated miscarriages, and the effects of illness on their ability to have a child.

Throughout this journey, Polly is forced to reexamine what family can mean in a society that often associates family—and womanhood—with children. The Facts of Life is a funny, sometimes painful narrative that explores what it takes to be a woman, a partner, and a mother... or not.

Seattle is often listed as one of the most walkable cities in the United States. With its beautiful scenery, miles of non-motorized trails, and year-round access, Seattle is an ideal place to explore on foot.

In Seattle Walks, David B. Williams weaves together the history, natural history, and architecture of Seattle to paint a complex, nuanced, and fascinating story. He shows us Seattle in a new light and gives us an appreciation of how the city has changed over time, how the past has influenced the present, and how nature is all around us—even in our urban landscape.

These walks vary in length and topography and cover both well-known and surprising parts of the city. While most are loops, there are a few one-way adventures with an easy return via public transportation. Ranging along trails and sidewalks, the walks lead to panoramic views, intimate hideaways, architectural gems, and beautiful greenways.

With Williams as your knowledgeable and entertaining guide, encounter a new way to experience Seattle.

Everything about Jessie is wrong. At least, that’s what it feels like during her first week of junior year at her new ultra-intimidating prep school in Los Angeles. Just when she’s thinking about hightailing it back to Chicago, she gets an email from a person calling themselves Somebody/Nobody (SN for short), offering to help her navigate the wilds of Wood Valley High School.

Is it an elaborate hoax? Or can she rely on SN for some much-needed help?

It’s been barely two years since her mother’s death, and because her father eloped with a woman he met online, Jessie has been forced to move across the country to live with her stepmonster and her pretentious teenage son.

In a leap of faith—or an act of complete desperation—Jessie begins to rely on SN, and SN quickly becomes her lifeline and closest ally. Jessie can’t help wanting to meet SN in person. But are some mysteries better left unsolved?

The Idiot, a novel by Elif Batuman, is a portrait of the artist as a young woman, exploring the themes of self-discovery and inventing oneself. Set in the year 1995, when email was a new phenomenon, we follow Selin, the daughter of Turkish immigrants, as she begins her freshman year at Harvard. Without any preconceived plans, she enrolls in classes on unfamiliar subjects, forges a friendship with the charismatic and worldly Serbian classmate Svetlana, and, almost by chance, starts corresponding with Ivan, a Hungarian mathematics student.

Despite their limited face-to-face interactions, Selin and Ivan develop a complex relationship through their email exchanges, with each message adding new and mysterious layers to the act of writing. As the school year concludes, Ivan departs for Budapest, and Selin embarks on a teaching assignment in the Hungarian countryside, a position arranged by one of Ivan's friends. Her journey also includes a two-week sojourn in Paris with Svetlana.

Unlike the typical narratives of American college students abroad, Selin's experiences in Europe lead her on an introspective journey. She confronts the bewildering and exhilarating turmoil of first love and comes to an important realization: she is destined to become a writer. The Idiot is a candid reflection on the complexities of becoming an adult, filled with exquisite emotional and intellectual sensitivity, mordant wit, and a writing style that captures the unpredictable nature of memory itself.

Universal basic income. A 15-hour workweek. Open borders. Does it sound too good to be true? One of Europe's leading young thinkers shows how we can build an ideal world today.

After working all day at jobs we often dislike, we buy things we don't need. Rutger Bregman, a Dutch historian, reminds us it needn't be this way—and in some places it isn't. Rutger Bregman's TED Talk about universal basic income seemed impossibly radical when he delivered it in 2014. A quarter of a million views later, the subject of that video is being seriously considered by leading economists and government leaders the world over. It's just one of the many utopian ideas that Bregman proves is possible today.

Utopia for Realists is one of those rare books that takes you by surprise and challenges what you think can happen. From a Canadian city that once completely eradicated poverty, to Richard Nixon's near implementation of a basic income for millions of Americans, Bregman takes us on a journey through history, and beyond the traditional left-right divides, as he champions ideas whose time have come.

Every progressive milestone of civilization—from the end of slavery to the beginning of democracy—was once considered a utopian fantasy. Bregman's book, both challenging and bracing, demonstrates that new utopian ideas, like the elimination of poverty and the creation of the fifteen-hour workweek, can become a reality in our lifetime. Being unrealistic and unreasonable can in fact make the impossible inevitable, and it is the only way to build the ideal world.

Mankind had spent decades trying to overcome an impending ecological global disaster. By the late 23rd century the disaster that they were attempting to prevent was at hand, and there was no reversing the damage. Now two scientists, both more than a 150 years apart are brought together to find a way to change the mistakes of the past and try to save a future that can only be done through the destiny of these two individuals. The love they will find together will not only determine the fate of their own lives, but the fate of the world.

Can the two of them turn back the clock and reset the future of discovery? It is a love story more than 200 years in the making that will define a destiny that will survive all time.

A few years ago, Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie received a letter from a dear friend from childhood, asking her how to raise her baby girl as a feminist. Dear Ijeawele is Adichie's letter of response.

Here are fifteen invaluable suggestions -compelling, direct, wryly funny, and perceptive- for how to empower a daughter to become a strong, independent woman. From encouraging her to choose a helicopter, and not only a doll, as a toy if she so desires; having open conversations with her about clothes, makeup, and sexuality; debunking the myth that women are somehow biologically arranged to be in the kitchen making dinner, and that men can "allow" women to have full careers, Dear Ijeawele goes right to the heart of sexual politics in the twenty-first century. It will start a new and urgently needed conversation about what it really means to be a woman today.

Everything, Everything tells the story of Maddy, a girl who's literally allergic to the outside world, and Olly, the boy who moves in next door and becomes the greatest risk she's ever taken. Maddy's disease is as rare as it is famous. Essentially, she's allergic to the world and has not left her house in seventeen years. The only people she ever sees are her mom and her nurse, Carla.

But then, a moving truck arrives next door. Maddy looks out her window, and she sees him. He's tall, lean, and dressed entirely in black. When he catches Maddy looking, they share a moment. His name is Olly. Maddy wants to learn everything about him, and as she does, she finds that talking to him makes her whole world open up. She begins to change, to want things, to want out of her bubble—to want everything, everything the world has to offer.

While it's impossible to predict the future, some things are certain. For example, Maddy is definitely going to fall in love with Olly. And it's almost certainly going to be a disaster. Yet, through this journey, Everything, Everything will make you laugh, cry, and feel everything in between. It's an innovative, inspiring, and heartbreakingly romantic debut novel that unfolds in a unique manner, including vignettes, diary entries, and illustrations.

Inspired by the life of a real World War II heroine, this debut novel reveals a story of love, redemption, and secrets that were hidden for decades.

New York socialite Caroline Ferriday has her hands full with her post at the French consulate and a new love on the horizon. But Caroline’s world is forever changed when Hitler’s army invades Poland in September 1939—and then sets its sights on France.

An ocean away from Caroline, Kasia Kuzmerick, a Polish teenager, senses her carefree youth disappearing as she is drawn deeper into her role as courier for the underground resistance movement. In a tense atmosphere of watchful eyes and suspecting neighbors, one false move can have dire consequences.

For the ambitious young German doctor, Herta Oberheuser, an ad for a government medical position seems her ticket out of a desolate life. Once hired, though, she finds herself trapped in a male-dominated realm of Nazi secrets and power.

The lives of these three women are set on a collision course when the unthinkable happens and Kasia is sent to Ravensbrück, the notorious Nazi concentration camp for women. Their stories cross continents—from New York to Paris, Germany, and Poland—as Caroline and Kasia strive to bring justice to those whom history has forgotten.

The Inexplicable Logic of My Life is a warmly humane look at universal questions of belonging, infused with humor, from the bestselling author of Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe. Sal used to know his place with his adoptive gay father, their loving Mexican American family, and his best friend, Samantha. But it’s senior year, and suddenly Sal is throwing punches, questioning everything, and realizing he no longer knows himself. If Sal’s not who he thought he was, who is he?

This novel is set on the American border with Mexico and beautifully explores themes of family, friendship, life, and death, focusing on one teen struggling to understand what his adoption does and doesn't mean about who he is.

A powerful and inspiring examination of the connection between the potential for great talent and conditions commonly thought to be “disabilities,” revealing how the source of our struggles can be the origin of our greatest strengths.

In The Power of Different, psychiatrist and bestselling author Gail Saltz examines the latest scientific discoveries, profiles famous geniuses who have been diagnosed with all manner of brain “problems”—including learning disabilities, ADD, anxiety, Depression, Bipolar disorder, schizophrenia, and Autism—and tells the stories of lay individuals to demonstrate how specific deficits in certain areas of the brain are directly associated with the potential for great talent.

Saltz shows how the very conditions that cause people to experience difficulty at school, in social situations, at home, or at work, are inextricably bound to creative, disciplinary, artistic, empathetic, and cognitive abilities.

Many people dream of escaping modern life, but most will never act on it. The Stranger in the Woods: The Extraordinary Story of the Last True Hermit tells the remarkable true story of Christopher Knight, a man who lived alone in the woods of Maine for 27 years, not out of anger at the world, but simply because he preferred to live on his own.

In 1986, a shy and intelligent twenty-year-old named Christopher Knight left his home in Massachusetts, drove to Maine, and disappeared into the forest. He would not have a conversation with another human being until nearly three decades later, when he was arrested for stealing food. Living in a tent even through brutal winters, he had survived by his wits and courage, developing ingenious ways to store edibles and water, and to avoid freezing to death. He broke into nearby cottages for food, clothing, reading material, and other provisions, taking only what he needed but terrifying a community never able to solve the mysterious burglaries.

Based on extensive interviews with Knight himself, author Michael Finkel provides a vividly detailed account of Knight's secluded life—why did he leave? what did he learn?—as well as the challenges he has faced since returning to the world. It is a gripping story of survival that asks fundamental questions about solitude, community, and what makes a good life, and a deeply moving portrait of a man who was determined to live his own way, and succeeded.

In the tradition of Speak, this extraordinary debut novel shares the unforgettable story of a young woman as she struggles to find strength in the aftermath of an assault.

Eden was always good at being good. Starting high school didn’t change who she was. But the night her brother’s best friend rapes her, Eden’s world capsizes.

What was once simple, is now complex. What Eden once loved—who she once loved—she now hates. What she thought she knew to be true, is now lies. Nothing makes sense anymore, and she knows she’s supposed to tell someone what happened but she can’t. So she buries it instead. And she buries the way she used to be.

Told in four parts—freshman, sophomore, junior, and senior year—this provocative debut reveals the deep cuts of trauma. But it also demonstrates one young woman’s strength as she navigates the disappointment and unbearable pains of adolescence, of first love and first heartbreak, of friendships broken and rebuilt, and while learning to embrace a power of survival she never knew she had hidden within her heart.

A young woman without prospects at a ball in Gilded Age Newport, Rhode Island is a target for a certain kind of “suitor.” At the Memorial Day Ball during the Panic of 1893, impoverished but feisty Penelope Stanton draws the unwanted advances of a villainous millionaire banker who preys on distressed women—the incorrigible Edgar Daggers. Over a series of encounters, he promises Penelope the financial security she craves, but at what cost? Skilled in the art of flirtation, Edgar is not without his charms, and Penelope is attracted to him against her better judgment. Initially, as Penelope grows into her own in the burgeoning early Women’s Suffrage Movement, Edgar exerts pressure, promising to use his power and access to help her advance. But can he be trusted, or are his words part of an elaborate mind game played between him and his wife? During a glittering age where a woman’s reputation is her most valuable possession, Penelope must decide whether to compromise her principles for love, lust, and the allure of an easier life.

Marcel Proust's In Search of Lost Time is one of the most entertaining reading experiences in any language and arguably the finest novel of the twentieth century. But since its original prewar translation, there has been no completely new version in English. Now, Penguin Classics brings Proust’s masterpiece to new audiences throughout the world, beginning with Lydia Davis’s internationally acclaimed translation of the first volume, Swann's Way.

Swann's Way is one of the preeminent novels of childhood: a sensitive boy's impressions of his family and neighbors, all brought dazzlingly back to life years later by the taste of a madeleine. It also enfolds the short novel "Swann in Love," an incomparable study of sexual jealousy that becomes a crucial part of the vast, unfolding structure of In Search of Lost Time. The first volume of the work that established Proust as one of the finest voices of the modern age — satirical, skeptical, confiding, and endlessly varied in its response to the human condition — Swann's Way also stands on its own as a perfect rendering of a life in art, of the past recreated through memory.

World War II comes to Farleigh Place, the ancestral home of Lord Westerham and his five daughters, when a soldier with a failed parachute falls to his death on the estate. After his uniform and possessions raise suspicions, MI5 operative and family friend Ben Cresswell is covertly tasked with determining if the man is a German spy. The assignment also offers Ben the chance to be near Lord Westerham’s middle daughter, Pamela, whom he furtively loves. But Pamela has her own secret: she has taken a job at Bletchley Park, the British code-breaking facility.

As Ben follows a trail of spies and traitors, which may include another member of Pamela’s family, he discovers that some within the realm have an appalling, history-altering agenda. Can he, with Pamela’s help, stop them before England falls?

Inspired by the events and people of World War II, writer Rhys Bowen crafts a sweeping and riveting saga of class, family, love, and betrayal.

On Tyranny is a call to arms and a guide to resistance, offering invaluable ideas for preserving our freedoms in the uncertain years to come.

The Founding Fathers tried to protect us from the threat they knew: the tyranny that overcame ancient democracy. Today, our political order faces new threats, not unlike the totalitarianism of the twentieth century. We are no wiser than the Europeans who saw democracy yield to fascism, Nazism, or communism. Our one advantage is that we might learn from their experience.

Timothy Snyder reasons with unparalleled clarity, throwing the past and future into sharp relief. He has written the rare kind of book that can be read in one sitting but will keep you coming back to help regain your bearings.