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NAMED ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR BY THE LOS ANGELES TIMES, THE SEATTLE TIMES, AND PUBLISHERS WEEKLY When a murdered woman is found in the city of Beszel, somewhere at the edge of Europe, it looks to be a routine case for Inspector Tyador Borlú of the Extreme Crime Squad. To investigate, Borlú must travel from the decaying Beszel to its equal, rival, and intimate neighbor, the vibrant city of Ul Qoma. But this is a border crossing like no other, a journey as psychic as it is physical, a seeing of the unseen. With Ul Qoman detective Qussim Dhatt, Borlú is enmeshed in a sordid underworld of nationalists intent on destroying their neighboring city, and unificationists who dream of dissolving the two into one. As the detectives uncover the dead woman's secrets, they begin to suspect a truth that could cost them more than their lives. What stands against them are murderous powers in Beszel and in Ul Qoma: and, most terrifying of all, that which lies between these two cities.

NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • "An absolute delight to read . . . How lucky we are that [Ruth Reichl] had the courage to follow her appetite."-NewsdayAt an early age, Ruth Reichl discovered that "food could be a way of making sense of the world. If you watched people as they ate, you could find out who they were." Her deliciously crafted memoir Tender at the Bone is the story of a life defined, determined, and enhanced in equal measure by a passion for food, by unforgettable people, and by the love of tales well told. Beginning with her mother, the notorious food-poisoner known as the Queen of Mold, Reichl introduces us to the fascinating characters who shaped her world and tastes, from the gourmand Monsieur du Croix, who served Reichl her first foie gras, to those at her politically correct table in Berkeley who championed the organic food revolution in the 1970s. Spiced with Reichl's infectious humor and sprinkled with her favorite recipes, Tender at the Bone is a witty and compelling chronicle of a culinary sensualist's coming-of-age. Featuring a special Afterword by the author and more than a dozen personal family photosPraise for Tender at the Bone"A poignant, yet hilarious, collection of stories about people [Reichl] has known and loved, and who, knowingly or unknowingly, steered her on the path to fulfill her destiny as one of the world's leading food writers."-Chicago Sun-Times "While all good food writers are humorous . . . few are so riotously, effortlessly entertaining as Ruth Reichl."-The New York Times Book Review "Reading Ruth Reichl on food is almost as good as eating it. . . . Reichl makes the reader feel present with her, sharing the experience."-Washington Post Book World"[In] this lovely memoir . . . we find young Ruth desperately trying to steer her manic mother's unwary guests toward something edible. It's a job she does now . . . in her columns, and whose intimate imperatives she illuminates in this graceful book."-The New Yorker"A savory memoir of [Reichl's] apprentice years . . . Reichl describes [her] experiences with infectious humor. . . . The descriptions of each sublime taste are mouthwateringly precise. . . . A perfectly balanced stew of memories."-Kirkus Reviews

NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • "[Sarah Addison Allen] juggles small-town history and mystical thriller, character development and eerie magical realism in a fine Southern gothic drama."-Publishers WeeklyIt's the dubious distinction of thirty-year-old Willa Jackson to hail from a fine old Southern family of means that met with financial ruin generations ago. The Blue Ridge Madam-built by Willa's great-great-grandfather and once the finest home in Walls of Water, North Carolina-has stood for years as a monument to misfortune and scandal. Willa has lately learned that an old classmate-socialite Paxton Osgood-has restored the house to its former glory, with plans to turn it into a top-flight inn. But when a skeleton is found buried beneath the property's lone peach tree, long-kept secrets come to light, accompanied by a spate of strange occurrences throughout the town. Thrust together in an unlikely friendship, united by a full-blooded mystery, Willa and Paxton must confront the passions and betrayals that once bound their families-and uncover the truths that have transcended time to touch the hearts of the living.Praise for The Peach Keeper"Secrets are ready to be uncovered. . . . Allen masterfully weaves a Southern world of believable characters and keeps readers flipping pages with this dreamy one-nighter."-Southern Literary Review "In this delectable, read-in-one-sitting treasure, Allen once again demonstrates her astonishing ability to believably blur the lines between the magical and the mundane."-Booklist "Peppered with Allen's trademark Southern charm . . . a must-read for fans of Alice Hoffman."-Library Journal "Immensely readable . . . pulses with sensual details."-The Denver Post"Sarah Addison Allen writes the kind of books I love best: rich, magical, irresistible."-New York Times bestselling author Susan Elizabeth Phillips

To open this book is to enter the perilous, thrilling world of Billy Bathgate, the brazen boy who is accepted into the inner circle of the notorious Dutch Schultz gang. Like an urban Tom Sawyer, Billy takes us along on his fateful adventures as he becomes good-luck charm, apprentice, and finally protégé to one of the great murdering gangsters of the Depression-era underworld in New York City. The luminous transformation of fact into fiction that is E. L. Doctorow's trademark comes to triumphant fruition in Billy Bathgate, a peerless coming-of-age tale and one of Doctorow's boldest and most beloved bestsellers.

NAMED ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR BYSlate • Cosmopolitan • Salon • BuzzFeed • BookPageWritten with the riveting storytelling of authors like Emma Donoghue, Adam Johnson, Ann Patchett, and Curtis Sittenfeld, Cartwheel is a suspenseful and haunting novel of an American foreign exchange student arrested for murder, and a father trying to hold his family together. When Lily Hayes arrives in Buenos Aires for her semester abroad, she is enchanted by everything she encounters: the colorful buildings, the street food, the handsome, elusive man next door. Her studious roommate Katy is a bit of a bore, but Lily didn't come to Argentina to hang out with other Americans. Five weeks later, Katy is found brutally murdered in their shared home, and Lily is the prime suspect. But who is Lily Hayes? It depends on who's asking. As the case takes shape-revealing deceptions, secrets, and suspicious DNA-Lily appears alternately sinister and guileless through the eyes of those around her: the media, her family, the man who loves her and the man who seeks her conviction. With mordant wit and keen emotional insight, Cartwheel offers a prismatic investigation of the ways we decide what to see-and to believe-in one another and ourselves. In Cartwheel, duBois delivers a novel of propulsive psychological suspense and rare moral nuance. No two readers will agree who Lily is and what happened to her roommate. Cartwheel will keep you guessing until the final page, and its questions about how well we really know ourselves will linger well beyond.WINNER OF THE HOUSATONIC BOOK AWARD • Look for special features inside. Join the Random House Reader's Circle for author chats and more."A smart, literary thriller [for] fans of Gillian Flynn's Gone Girl."-The Huffington Post "Psychologically astute . . . DuBois hits [the] larger sadness just right and dispenses with all the salacious details you can readily find elsewhere. . . . The writing in Cartwheel is a pleasure-electric, fine-tuned, intelligent, conflicted. The novel is engrossing, and its portraiture hits delightfully and necessarily close to home."-The New York Times Book Review (Editor's Choice) "Marvelous . . . a gripping tale . . . Every sentence crackles with wit and vision. Every page casts a spell."-Maggie Shipstead, author of Seating Arrangements"[You'll] break your own record of pages read per minute as you tear through this book."-Marie Claire "A convincing, compelling tale . . . The story plays out in all its well-told complexity."-New York Daily News"[A] gripping, gorgeously written novel . . . The emotional intelligence in Cartwheel is so sharp it's almost ruthless-a tabloid tragedy elevated to high art. [Grade:] A-"-Entertainment Weekly "Sure-footed and psychologically calibrated . . . Reviewers of duBois's first novel, A Partial History of Lost Causes, called it brainy and beautiful, a verdict that fits this successor. . . . As the pages fly, the reader hardly notices that duBois has stretched the genre of the criminal procedural."-Newsday"The power of Cartwheel resides in duBois' talent for understanding how the foreign world can illuminate the most deeply held secrets we keep from others, and ourselves."-Chicago Tribune

In the middle of her life, Nan decides to leave her husband at home and begin an impromptu trek across the country, carrying with her a turquoise leather journal she intends to fill. The Pull of the Moon is a novel about a woman coming to terms with issues of importance to all women. In her journal, Nan addresses the thorniness-and the allure-of marriage, the sweet ties to children, and the gifts and lessons that come from random encounters with strangers, including a handsome man appearing out of the woods and a lonely housewife sitting on her front porch steps. Most of all, Nan writes about the need for the self to stay alive. In this luminous and exquisitely written novel, Elizabeth Berg shows how sometimes you have to leave your life behind in order to find it.

America, 1787. Ethan Saunders, once among General Washington's most valued spies, is living in disgrace after an accusation of treason cost him his reputation. But an opportunity for redemption comes calling when Saunders's old enemy, Alexander Hamilton, draws him into a struggle with bitter rival Thomas Jefferson over the creation of the Bank of the United States.Meanwhile, on the western Pennsylvania frontier, Joan Maycott and her husband, a Revolutionary War veteran, hope for a better life and a chance for prosperity. But the Maycotts' success on an isolated frontier attracts the brutal attention of men who threaten to destroy them. As their causes intertwine, Joan and Saunders-both patriots in their own way-find themselves on opposing sides of a plot that could tear apart a fragile new nation.

A kind, bookish only child born in the 1940s, Alice Lindgren has no idea that she will one day end up in the White House, married to the president. In her small Wisconsin hometown, she learns the virtues of politeness, but a tragic accident when she is seventeen shatters her identity and changes the trajectory of her life. More than a decade later, when the charismatic son of a powerful Republican family sweeps her off her feet, she is surprised to find herself admitted into a world of privilege. And when her husband unexpectedly becomes governor and then president, she discovers that she is married to a man she both loves and fundamentally disagrees with-and that her private beliefs increasingly run against her public persona. As her husband's presidency enters its second term, Alice must confront contradictions years in the making and face questions nearly impossible to answer.

A sweeping novel of intrigue and identity, of love and legacy, as a young woman discovers that her own fate is irrevocably tied-for better or worse-to literature's greatest star-crossed lovers.Twenty-five-year-old Julie Jacobs is heartbroken over the death of her beloved aunt Rose. But the shock goes even deeper when she learns that the woman who has been like a mother to her has left her entire estate to Julie's twin sister. The only thing Julie receives is a key-one carried by her mother on the day she herself died-to a safety-deposit box in Siena, Italy. This key sends Julie on a journey that will change her life forever-a journey into the troubled past of her ancestor Giulietta Tolomei. In 1340, still reeling from the slaughter of her parents, Giulietta was smuggled into Siena, where she met a young man named Romeo. Their ill-fated love turned medieval Siena upside-down and went on to inspire generations of poets and artists, the story reaching its pinnacle in Shakespeare's famous tragedy. But six centuries have a way of catching up to the present, and Julie gradually begins to discover that here, in this ancient city, the past and present are hard to tell apart. The deeper she delves into the history of Romeo and Giulietta, and the closer she gets to the treasure they allegedly left behind, the greater the danger surrounding her-superstitions, ancient hostilities, and personal vendettas. As Julie crosses paths with the descendants of the families involved in the unforgettable blood feud, she begins to fear that the notorious curse-"A plague on both your houses!"-is still at work, and that she is destined to be its next target. Only someone like Romeo, it seems, could save her from this dreaded fate, but his story ended long ago. Or did it?Praise for Juliet"One of those rare novels that have it all . . . I was swept away"-Sara Gruen, author of Water for Elephants "Juliet leads us on a thrilling treasure hunt through present-day Italy that makes the classic tragedy itself spellbinding all over again."-Elle "Boldly imagined, brilliantly plotted, beautifully described, Juliet will carry you spellbound until the gripping end."-Susan Vreeland, author of Clara and Mr. Tiffany "The Shakespearean scholarship on display is both impressive and well-handled."-The Washington Post

Each song on Julian's iPod, "that greatest of all human inventions," is a touchstone. There are songs for the girls from when he was single, there's the one for the day he met his wife-to-be, there's one for the day his son was born. But when Julian's family falls apart, even music loses its hold on him.Until one snowy night in Brooklyn, when his life's soundtrack-and life itself-start to play again. Julian stumbles into a bar and sees Cait O'Dwyer, a flame-haired Irish rock singer, performing with her band, and a strange and unlikely love affair is ignited. Over the next few months, Julian and Cait's passion plays out, though they never meet. What follows is a heartbreaking dark comedy, the tenderest of love stories, and a perfectly observed tale of the way we live now.