ZADIE SMITH
A witty, sparkling first novel that captures London's gestalt through the friendship of a Bengali Muslim and an English bloke.
A Vast Conspiracy
JEFFREY TOOBIN
Astonishing feat: Toobin narrates the tired Clinton-Lewinsky-Starr scandal, and it reads like a freshly minted political thriller.
Georgiana: Duchess of Devonshire
AMANDA FOREMAN
She loved clothes, suffered from bulimia and was the most celebrated noblewoman of her day. Nope, not Princess Diana but her equally fascinating great-great-great-great aunt.
Blonde
JOYCE CAROL OATES
Oates is at the height of her powers with this fictionalized take on what she calls the "snarled, dreamlike, riddlesome" life of Marilyn Monroe.
Bee Season
MYLA GOLDBERG
In this impressive debut novel, seismic changes occur in a Pennsylvania family after 9-year-old Eliza Naumann wins a spelling bee championship.
Sick Puppy
CARL HIAASEN
The irrepressible Florida satirist aims a hilarious broadside at enemies of the state—i.e., developers—who vie with a bighearted, bad-tempered ecoterrorist.
A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius
DAVE EGGERS
In a scathingly perceptive memoir, Eggers writes of rearing his kid brother after the death of their parents.
Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire
J.K. ROWLING
For the fourth time, Rowling has bewitched us with Harry, now 14 and back at Hogwarts School. This one's the longest and arguably the best of the lot.
Blue Angel
FRANCINE PROSE
A literary grenade aimed at the PC pieties rife on today's campus, this sly and funny novel reaches deeper, toward unknowable depths of lust and folly.
Flags of Our Fathers
JAMES BRADLEY
In a gripping, often heartbreaking book, the author reconstructs the lives of the six Marines who raised the flag at Iwo Jima, one of whom was his late father.
Saved by the Bell Reunion
The hookups, the meltdowns, the memoires
The case reveals what was really going on what they think of each other now!
