Michelle Huneven, Richard Russo once wrote, is "a writer of extraordinary and thrilling talent." That talent explodes with her third book, "Blame," a spellbinding novel of guilt and love, family and shame, sobriety and the lack of it, and the moral ambiguities that ensnare us all. The story: Patsy MacLemoore, a history professor in her late twenties with a brand-new Ph.D. from Berkeley and a wild streak, wakes up in jail--"yet again"--after another epic alcoholic blackout. "Okay, what'd I do?" she asks her lawyer and jailers. "I really don't remember." She adds, jokingly: "Did I kill someone?" In fact, two Jehovah's Witnesses, a mother and daughter, are dead, run over in Patsy's driveway. Patsy, who was driving with a revoked license, will spend the rest of her life--in prison, getting sober, finding a new community (and a husband) in AA--trying to atone for this unpardonable act. Then, decades later, another unimaginable piece of information turns up. For the reader, it is an electrifying moment, a joyous, fall-off-the-couch-with-surprise moment. For Patsy, it is more complicated. Blame must be reapportioned, her life reassessed. What does it mean that her life has been based on wrong assumptions? What can she cleave to? What must be relinquished? When Huneven's first novel, "Round Rock," was published, Valerie Miner, in the "Los Angeles Times Book Review," celebrated Huneven's "moral nerve, sharp wit and uncommon generosity." The same spirit electrifies "Blame." The novel crackles with life--and, like life, can leave you breathless.

When Whiting Writers' Award winner Teddy Wayne published his critically acclaimed debut, "Kapitoil," it was hailed as "one of the best novels of [this] generation" by the "Boston Globe" and was shortlisted for a spate of national prizes. Jonathan Franzen wrote in "The Daily Beast" that "no other writer, as far as I know, has invented such a funny and compelling voice and story for [this type of character.]" Now, in "The Love Song of Jonny Valentine," Wayne turns his sharp wit, flawless narrative ventriloquism, and humane sensibility to our monstrous obsession with fame. Megastar Jonny Valentine, eleven-year-old icon of bubblegum pop, knows that the fans don't love him for who he is. The talented singer's image, voice, and even hairdo have been relentlessly packaged--by his L.A. label and his hard-partying manager-mother, Jane--into bite-size pabulum. But within the marketing machine, somewhere, Jonny is still a vulnerable little boy, perplexed by his budding sexuality and his heartthrob status, dependent on Jane, and endlessly searching for his absent father in Internet fan sites, lonely emails, and the crowds of faceless fans. Poignant, brilliant, and viciously funny, told through the eyes of one of the most unforgettable child narrators, this literary masterpiece explores with devastating insight and empathy the underbelly of success in 21st-century America. "The Love Song of Jonny Valentine "is a tour de force by a standout voice of his generation.

From the bestselling author of War of the Roses, soon to be The Roses, a major motion picture starring Olivia Colman and Benedict Cumberbatch, comes the next explosive chapter of the Rose family saga. Meet Josh and Evie Rose, heirs to the notorious legacy of Barbara and Jonathan. In The Children of the Roses, Adler delivers a darkly comic, razor-sharp sequel about love, family, and the havoc we inherit. Josh's marriage to Victoria seems destined to avoid the mistakes of the past. But when a harmless prank involving missing Milky Ways at their son's elite private school spirals into all-out war, everything changes. Josh and Victoria find themselves caught in a whirlwind of emotional chaos, fueled by a depraved headmaster, hidden affairs, and a meddling mother-in-law with a vendetta against men. Meanwhile, Josh's sister Evie, ever loyal and always ready with a comforting meal, tries to hold the family together. As tensions rise, even the children, Michael and Emily, plot their own desperate plan to keep their family from falling apart. Witty, biting, and unforgettable, The Children of the Roses explores how the ghosts of the past haunt the present and how even the most perfect facades can shatter in an instant.

This brilliant new novel by an American master, the author of Ragtime, The Book of Daniel, Billy Bathgate, and The March, takes us on a radical trip into the mind of a man who, more than once in his life, has been the inadvertent agent of disaster. Speaking from an unknown place and to an unknown interlocutor, Andrew is thinking, Andrew is talking, Andrew is telling the story of his life, his loves, and the tragedies that have led him to this place and point in time. And as he confesses, peeling back the layers of his strange story, we are led to question what we know about truth and memory, brain and mind, personality and fate, about one another and ourselves. Written with psychological depth and great lyrical precision, this suspenseful and groundbreaking novel delivers a voice for our times—funny, probing, skeptical, mischievous, profound. Andrew's Brain is a surprising turn and a singular achievement in the canon of a writer whose prose has the power to create its own landscape, and whose great topic, in the words of Don DeLillo, is “the reach of American possibility, in which plain lives take on the cadences of history.” Praise for Andrew's Brain “Too compelling to put down . . . fascinating, sometimes funny, often profound . . . Andrew is a provocatively interesting and even sympathetic character. . . . The novel seamlessly combines Doctorow's remarkable prowess as a literary stylist with deep psychological storytelling pitting truth against delusion, memory and perception, consciousness and craziness. . . . [Doctorow] takes huge creative risks—the best kind.” — USA Today “ Andrew's Brain is cunning. . . . [A] sly book . . . This babbling Andrew is a casualty of his times, binding his wounds with thick wrappings of words, ideas, bits of story, whatever his spinning mind can unspool for him. . . . One of the things that makes [Andrew] such a terrific comic creation is that he's both maddeningly self-delusive and scarily self-aware: He's a fool, but he's no innocent. . . . Andrew may not be able to enjoy his brain, but Doctorow, freely choosing to inhabit this character's whirligig consciousness, can.” — The New York Times Book Review “A tantalising tour de force . . . a journey worth taking . . . With exhilarating brio, the book plays off . . . two contrasting takes on mind and brain. . . . [ Andrew's Brain encompasses] an astonishing range of modes: vaudeville humour, tragic romance, philosophical speculation. . . . It fizzes with intellectual energy, verbal pyrotechnics and satiric flair.” — The Sunday Times (London) “Dramatic . . . cunning and beautiful . . . strange and oddly fascinating, this book: a musing, a conjecture, a frivolity, a deep interrogatory, a hymn.” — San Francisco Chronicle “Provocative . . . a story aswirl in a whirlpool of neuroscience, human relations, loss, guilt and recent American history . . . Doctorow reveals his mastery in the sheen of a text that is both window and mirror. Reading his work is akin to soaring in a glider. Buoyed by invisible breath, readers encounter stunning vistas stretching to horizons they've never imagined.” — The Plain Dealer “Andrew's ruminations can be funny, and his descriptions gorgeous.” —Associated Press “[An] evocative, suspenseful novel about the deceptive nature of human consciousness.” — More “A quick and acutely intelligent read.” — Entertainment Weekly From the Hardcover edition.

On a quiet night in the best part of Greenwich, Connecticut, eight people assemble for a convivial dinner. But after that night, their lives will never be the same, as death erupts into their lives. They are a disparate group, including a former State Department employee, a Catholic nun, a linguistics professor, and a successful novelist. They, and the people they love, portray the arrogance and innocence, brutality and compassion in America today. Each character becomes a thread-dark, light, or a shade in between-in a carpet of intricate design, and as Howard Fast weaves them together, they embody the interdependence of human life and human guilt and the eternal work of redemption.

They met in college and have been inseparable ever since: Cecile, confident, elegant, daughter of privilege; Norma, extraordinarily gifted and sadly troubled; Amanda, determined to rise above her humble southern beginnings. Two are married; one despairs of ever finding love; all lead busy adult lives. Yet, first and always, friends. But, in every life there is a moment when everything changes. For Cecile, Norma and Amanda it comes in the form of a pivotal event, a shattering act of betrayal that will shift the balance of power between husbands and wives, parents and children, sisters and brothers. After, the three friends will look at their families, their lives- and one another- differently. And none of them will be the same. Filled with the magical storytelling and emotional resonance that are Belva Plain's trademarks, "Looking Back" captures the profound intimacy and drama in the lives of women and their families. Tender, moving, and unforgettable, it is a richly woven page-turner by one of our most gifted authors.

A compelling moral fable in the shape of a gritty, twist-filled thriller. Wall Street Journal John Shannon is a petty thief on the run. A three-time loser framed for murder, he knows that he s facing life in prison or death by lethal injection. Then, a bizarre text message draws him to a meeting in the dark of night. A foreigner who calls himself the Identity Man offers Shannon an incredible chance to start again: a new face, a new home, a new beginning. In a ruined city trying to rebuild, he gets work as a carpenter, and falls in love. It seems too good to be true and it is. It turns out this city is crawling with crooked politicians, gangsters, and dirty cops all of whom seem to want Shannon dead. Moving through the shambles of a town, he s got to ferret out the secret of his new life and fast if he wants to be left with any life at all. A gripping thriller. Entertainment Weekly A work of intense realism pervaded by sorrow, mercy, hope and ultimately, transcendence. Washington Times Andrew Klavan is the author of such classic suspense novels as True Crime , filmed by Clint Eastwood, Don t Say a Word , filmed starring Michael Douglas, and Empire of Lies . He has been nominated for the Edgar Award five times and has won it twice. "

The final volume in a trilogy beginning with Umbrella and followed by Shark , Phone tells the story of two men: Zack Busner and Jonathan De'Ath. Busner is a psychiatrist who has made his name through his unorthodox treatment of psychological damage, such as administering LSD to World War II PTSD-sufferers. But now Busner's own mind is fraying: Alzheimer's is shredding his memory and his newest possession is a shiny smartphone given to him by his autistic grandson Ben. Meanwhile, Jonathan De'Ath, aka "the Butcher," is an MI6 man who remains a mystery even to those closest to him. Perhaps there is only one person who thinks of him with tenderness, a man he keeps top secret, encrypted in the databanks of his steely mind: Colonel Gawain Thomas, husband, father, highly trained tank commander, and Jonathan De'Ath's long-time lover. As Busner's mind totters and Jonathan and Gawain's affair teeters, they come to face the interconnectedness of all lives, online and off, while an irritating phone continues to ring. . . . ring. . . . ring. . . .

Herb and Jean Hervey fight all the time. It makes him crazy, but still Herb can't get Jean out of his system. Jean's in love with Paul, Wilda's husband. All Paul wants to do is leave for China and become a flyer. One evening Herb meets Dorothy, whose husband Tommy is fighting in Spain. Dorothy wants comfort and company, and Herb can't keep away from her. Then Jean lets herself get picked up by George Green, who can't keep away from her. It all adds up to a lot of trouble. Retreat from Oblivion is a story of passion, sacrifice and frustration set in New York City at the outset of World War II. It is a story you will not soon forget. David Goodis is considered one of the top writers of noir fiction, and this is his first novel, out of print in the U.S. for over 80 years and never before published in paperback.

"Marge Piercy is a raw, tough, willfull, magnificent novelist." THE CHRISTIAN SCIENCE MONITOR Set against the early days of the modern feminist movement, SMALL CHANGES tells the story of sensual Miriam Berg, who trades her doctorate for marriage and security, but still hungers for a life of her ow,n and shy, frightened Beth who is running from the life Miriam seeks and into a new world of different ideas and a different kind of love.....

'One of the best novels of recent years, a complete success'- Le Monde (France) Following years of unrequited love, an out-of-work school teacher takes matters into his own hands, triggering a chain of events neither he nor his psychiatrist could have anticipated. At once a psychological thriller and a social critique, Seven Types of Ambiguity is a story of obsessive love in an age of obsessive materialism.

From the internationally renowned author of In a Different Voice, a remarkable debut novel: a love story that introduces an unforgettable character in modern fiction, Kyra, and a superb new fiction writer, Carol Gilligan. Kyra is an architect designing a new city, a woman of humor and courage living in a vibrant world of family, friends, and colleagues and determined to break out of old structures. When she meets Andreas, a director staging an innovative production of Tosca, neither wants to fall in love–and yet, inevitably, they do. Their story takes us from Cambridge and an island off the coast of Massachusetts to Vienna, Thailand, Cyprus, and Wales as Kyra seeks the deepest truths about herself, other people, loyalty, and love. This reaching leads her to commit singular acts that startle and shock, inspiring new freedom for others as well as for Kyra herself. Rich with Carol Gilligan’s signature gifts–emotional wisdom, subtle renderings of the intricacies of human relationship, conflict and choice, and lyrical prose–Kyra is a luminous, magnificent novel by a writer realizing the range of her powers.

An electrifying novel about a woman struck by lightning, which brings together, as only Hoffman can, the fabulous and the real, chaos theory and the irrational everyday moment, in a compelling, haunting and sexy novel, with a sharp edge. As in a fairy tale (and the echo in the title is not accidental), the story starts with a little girl who makes a wish one snowy night and ruins her life. Her mother is killed on an icy road. Be careful what you wish for. Later, as a smalltown librarian who knows more than is good for her about ways of death, she lives a quiet life without excitement. One day, standing by her kitchen window, she is struck by lightning. But instead of ending her life, this cataclysmic event sparks it into beginning - if only she knew what she was supposed to do with this second chance. She goes in search of Lazarus Jones, a fellow survivor who was struck dead for forty minutes, but walked away. Perhaps this stranger who has seen death face to face can teach her to live without fear. When she finds him, he is her opposite, a burning man whose breath can boil water and whose touch scorches. As an obsessive love affair begins between them, both are forced to hide their most dangerous secrets - what turned one to ice and the other to fire. THE ICE QUEEN is a haunting story of passion, loss, and the secrets that come to define us, if we're not careful.

Cal Bradley's marriage is the stuff of romance. For fifteen year,, he has shared his life with Marie, a woman he passionately adores. In an idyllic corner of New England that has been home to his family for generations, Cal has become one of the most respected men in town: a father, churchgoer and a talented psychiatrist who runs a family clinic. Life is good. Then one night, a nineteen-year-old boy named Peter Blue sets a local church on fire and is sent to Cal for treatment For the patient, it's a last chance at redemption. For Cal, it's a journey into fear, deception, and murder. Because somehow Peter Blue's inner life is connected to Cal', reality...and to his wife's hidden past. And before Cal can hunt down the truth he is going to have to choose between everything he believes is right, and everything he loves.

Three years ago, something terrible happened to Naomi Jenkins - so terrible that she never told anybody. Now Naomi has another secret - the man she has fallen passionately in love with, unhappily married Robert Haworth. When Robert vanishes without trace, Naomi knows he must have come to harm. But the police are less convinced, particularly when Robert's wife insists he is not missing. In desperation, Naomi has a crazy idea. If she can't persuade the police that Robert is in danger, perhaps she can convince them that he is a danger to others. Then they will have to look for him - urgently. Naomi knows how describe in detail the actions of a psychopath. All she needs to do is dig up her own troubled past...

Lucas Baird is on the lam. He accidentally killed a man in LA. Totally defensible, but he chose to run, as he has done most of his aimless twenty-four years of life. This time Luke ends up in New York, making love to Daisy on a beach on Long Island. A sudden storm traps him under debris in a rain sewer where he is held captive by a gang of kids under the sway and prod of a fiendish twelve-year-old town bully. The kids, in dreadful fear of their tyrannical master, turn savage, heaping hideous acts of torment and cruelty upon poor Luke. P> How he manages to free himself becomes a redemptive tale woven into the fabric of a fraught, bizarre love story reminiscent of THE BEACH and LORD OF THE FLIES.

The spirit of a man named Sam, who died unexpectedly, inhabits the body of his beloved cat and communicates with his best friend, Jacob, and the woman he loved, Emilia.

When investigative journalist Isabel Morgan vanishes, her colleagues and lovers see this as just another gambit in her ever dramatic life. But her closest friend, Leo Holland, a Manhattan cartoonist, is filled with a sense of dread: something terrible has happened to Isabel. She is more certain of this than of much else in a life that is teetering close to the edge. In desperation, she flies to London to trace the woman she realizes has become her sustaining force.Convinced that Isabel's disappearance is tied in some way to the genetically modified substances she has been investigating and that her analyst holds the keys to her whereabouts, Leo masquerades as a potential patient. In the process, she discovers more than she set out to know. Danger, in Isabel's secret world, comes in many guises.

Hailed as a masterpiece by Jean Genet, Marguerite Duras, and Jean-Paul Sartre, Tropisms is considered one of the defining texts of the nouveau roman movement. Nathalie Sarraute has defined her work as the "movements that are hidden under the commonplace, harmless instances of our everyday lives." Like figures in a grainy photograph, Sarraute's characters are blurred and shadowy, while her narrative never develops beyond a stressed moment. Instead, Sarraute brilliantly finds and elaborates subtle details--when a relationship changes, when we fall slightly deeper into love, or when something innocent tilts to the smallest degree toward suspicion.

"Climats" is a profound and elegant psychological novel that explores the intricate complexities of human relationships, love, and the shifting emotional landscapes of the heart. Written by the celebrated French author André Maurois, this masterpiece delves into the lives of Philippe Marcenat and the women who shape his existence, offering a searingly honest portrayal of the joys and devastations of romantic obsession. The narrative is divided into two compelling perspectives. The first part follows Philippe as he recounts his tumultuous marriage to the ethereal but elusive Odile, whose need for freedom clashes with his possessive nature. In the second part, Philippe's second wife, Isabelle, provides a contrasting viewpoint, revealing the challenges of living in the shadow of a past love and the struggle to create a lasting bond. Through these dual narratives, Maurois examines how personal "climates"-the emotional atmospheres individuals bring to their relationships-can both attract and repel, leading to cycles of misunderstanding and longing. Regarded as a classic of 20th-century literature, "Climats" remains a timeless meditation on the nature of jealousy, the difficulty of truly knowing another person, and the pursuit of happiness within the confines of marriage. Its lyrical prose and keen psychological insights continue to resonate with readers seeking a deep understanding of the human condition. This work has been selected by scholars as being culturally important, and is part of the knowledge base of civilization as we know it. This work was reproduced from the original artifact, and remains as true to the original work as possible. Therefore, you may see the original copyright references, library stamps (as most of these works have been housed in our most important libraries around the world), and other notations in the work. This work is in the public domain in the United States of America, and possibly other nations. Within the United States, you may freely copy and distribute this work, as no entity (individual or corporate) has a copyright on the body of the work. As a reproduction of a historical artifact, this work may contain missing or blurred pages, poor pictures, errant marks, etc. Scholars believe, and we concur, that this work is important enough to be preserved, reproduced, and made generally available to the public. We appreciate your support of the preservation process, and thank you for being an important part of keeping this knowledge alive and relevant.