Martin Eden (1909) is a novel by American writer Jack London. The book follows the tradition of the Künstlerroman, a narrative that traces the life and development of an artist, to tell the story of a young man not unlike London himself. Part fiction, part autobiography, Martin Eden examines the consequences of dreams and achievements, successes and failures, for a young artist struggling with fame. The novel is heavily influenced by London's socialist...

The third and least political novel of the Palliser series, The Eustace Diamonds concerns the beautiful pathological liar Lizzie Greystock. Determined to marry into wealth, Lizzie snares the ailing Sir Florian Eustace and quickly becomes a widow. Despite the brevity of their marriage, Lizzie still inherits according to the generous terms of Sir Florian's will, which include the Eustace diamonds. When the Eustace family solicitor, Mr. Camperdown, begins...

"In time for the 50th anniversary of Catch-22, Tracy Daugherty, the critically acclaimed author of Hiding Man (a New Yorker and New York Times Notable book), illuminates his most vital subject yet in this first biography of Joseph Heller. Joseph Heller was a Coney Island kid, the son of Russian immigrants, who went on to great fame and fortune. His most memorable novel took its inspiration from a mission he flew over France in WWII (his plane was...

Two excerpts from never-before-seen notebooks offer insights into the author's literary mind and process and includes notes on her Sacramento upbringing, her life in the Gulf states, her views on prominent locals and her experiences during a formative "Rolling Stone" assignment.

THE LAST LETTER is based on a chapter of Vasily Grossman's novel Life and Fate. It is 1941. A Ukrainian ghetto has fallen to the Nazis and all of its Jewish residents are slated to be murdered. In the midst of the impending horror, the town's physician, a woman named Anna Semionova, dictates one final letter to her son, who is safe outside of enemy lines. The letter, with its detailed observations of daily life in a ghetto, reveals the fear, courage,...

"Nate McHale is a committed family man and a dedicated pediatric cancer specialist. But he has another side, a dark, manipulative persona he has struggled to leave behind in Greystone Lake, the Adirondacks town where he reigned as the untouchable Storm King, a rage-filled teenager who led his devoted group of friends on midnight vigilante raids, wreaking vengeance on those who crossed them. At the center of the circle is wild, beautiful Lucy Bennett,...

"From the internationally bestselling author of The Reluctant Fundamentalist and How to Get Filthy Rich in Rising Asia, a love story that unfolds in a world being irrevocably transformed by migration. In a country teetering on the brink of civil war, two young people meet--sensual, fiercely independent Nadia and gentle, restrained Saeed. They embark on a furtive love affair, thrust into premature intimacy by the unrest roiling their city. When it...

Portrays a terrifying vision of life in the future when a totalitarian government, considered a "Negative Utopia," watches over all citizens and directs all activities, becoming more powerful as time goes by.

"A young couple on the brink of marriage--the charming Veblen and her fiancé Paul, a brilliant neurologist--find their engagement in danger of collapse. Along the way they weather everything from each other's dysfunctional families, to the attentions of a seductive pharmaceutical heiress, to an intimate tête-à-tête with a very charismatic squirrel. Veblen (named after the iconoclastic economist Thorstein Veblen, who coined the term "conspicuous...

"A delightful romp through the Shakespeare authorship question, exploring how doubting that William Shakespeare wrote the plays attributed to him became an act of blasphemy... and who the Bard might really be"--