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    Buzz Books 2019: Fall/Winter: Excerpts from next season's best new titles by Susannah Cahalan, Eoin Colfer, J.T. Ellison, Jojo Moyes,Jeanette Winterson and more
    Buzz Books 2019: Fall/Winter: Excerpts from next season's best new titles by Susannah Cahalan, Eoin Colfer, J.T. Ellison, Jojo Moyes,Jeanette Winterson and more
    Buzz Books 2019: Fall/Winter: Excerpts from next season's best new titles by Susannah Cahalan, Eoin Colfer, J.T. Ellison, Jojo Moyes,Jeanette Winterson and more
    Ebook915 pages13 hours

    Buzz Books 2019: Fall/Winter: Excerpts from next season's best new titles by Susannah Cahalan, Eoin Colfer, J.T. Ellison, Jojo Moyes,Jeanette Winterson and more

    By Publishers Lunch

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    About this ebook

    Buzz Books gives you 45 chances to find your next great reads, providing exclusive early looks at new work from favorite authors and hot discoveries.

    Enjoy the first pre-publication samples of new work from bestselling authors Tracy Chevalier, Jojo Moyes, Kevin Wilson, Jeanette Winterson, and Eoin Colfer, known for his Artemis Fowl YA series. Readers addicted to thrillers will be glad this edition is packed with them: J.T. Ellison, Jeff Lindsay (introducing the first in a new series), Olaf Olaffson, and especially Imaginary Friend, the long-awaited second book by Stephen Chboksy, author of The Perks of Being a Wallflower.

    This Buzz Books includes 12 debut novels, including the highly-touted Such a Fun Age by Kiley Reid (a BEA Buzz Editor’s Panel pick) and the thriller Saint X, by Alexis Schaitkin, along with first novels of distinction by Elizabeth Ames, April Davila, Eliza Nellums, E.R. Ramzipoor, and more.

    Memoir dominates our large nonfiction list of 11 titles. From Adrienne Brodeur’s account of her mother’s affair to former United States Ambassador to the United Nations and Pulitzer-Prize winner Samantha Power’s The Education of an Idealist, these stories make for fascinating reading. Two true crime titles re-examine mysteries in Los Angeles and West Virginia: Dark Waters by Jake Anderson and The Third Rainbow Girl by Emma Copley Eisenberg.

    Buzz Books collections are meant to be shared, so spread your enthusiasm and “to be read” picks online. For still more great previews, check out our separate Buzz Books 2019: Young Adult Fall/Winter as well. For complete download links, lists and more, just visit buzz.publishersmarketplace.com.
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherPublishers Lunch
    Release dateMay 14, 2019
    ISBN9781948586238
    Buzz Books 2019: Fall/Winter: Excerpts from next season's best new titles by Susannah Cahalan, Eoin Colfer, J.T. Ellison, Jojo Moyes,Jeanette Winterson and more

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    • 5/5
      Many thanks to NetGalley and Publisher’s Lunch for an ARC in exchange for an honest review. My opinions are 100% my own and independent of receiving a copy of Buzz Books Falls Winter 2019 in advance.Fall is the biggest season publishing has. There is so much to look forward to. Buzz books, for those that don’t know, is a selection of the best of what is being released for that season. There is one for young adults and one for romance and this one which covers the rest of adult books. Not only do they provide a list of what is being released, but there is also a selection of excerpts so that you can make a decision as to whether or not you like it. They come out twice a year spring/summer and fall/winter. This season does not disappoint. There are new books by Jojo Moyes, Kevin Wilson, and Jeanette Winters. Eoin Colfer, famous for his Artemis Fowl series, has an adult offering and The Perks of Being a Wallflower’s Stephen Chbosky’s long awaited and highly anticipated second book, Imaginary Friend, will finally arrive. The sequel to The Handmaid’s Tale by Margaret Atwood called The Testaments and so much more from well known authors to highlighted debuts. There are 12 memoirs and 2 notable true crime plus pages of other non fiction selections. Honestly, there are 22 pages of what Publishers consider to be the best of what is coming out.There are 34 excerpts of fiction to choose from and 11 excerpts of non fiction so you can get a sense of what you might like and what there is to look forward to. Honestly, I have to stop getting these because my TBR (to be read) list grows exponentially there is so much to choose from. But go through every selection I did, just in case, there was something I might miss. I also like to see what’s new in other series that I have been following from more established authors. I highly suggest getting this season’s Buzz Books for the excerpts alone. Really interesting choices, I’m sure you will find your next favorite read right here!

    Book preview

    Buzz Books 2019 - Publishers Lunch

    cover.jpg

    Buzz Books® 2019

    Fall/Winter

    Logos: Publishers Lunch, Ingram

    Contents

    Introduction

    The Fall/Winter 2019 Publishing Preview

    Buzz Books Authors Appearing At BookExpo

    Part One: Fiction

    Jesse Ball, The Divers’ Game (Ecco)

    Clay McLeod Chapman, The Remaking (Quirk Books)

    Stephen Chbosky, Imaginary Friend (Grand Central)

    Tracy Chevalier, A Single Thread (Viking)

    Meg Waite Clayton, The Last Train To London (Harper)

    Eoin Colfer, Highfire (Harper Perennial)

    Jeanine Cummins, American Dirt (Flatiron)

    J.T. Ellison, Good Girls Lie (Mira)

    Susan Isaacs, Takes One to Know One (Atlantic Monthly Press)

    Steven James, Synapse (Thomas Nelson)

    Andrew Krivak, The Bear (Bellevue Literary Press)

    Ben Lerner, The Topeka School (Farrar, Straus and Giroux)

    Jeff Lindsay, Just Watch Me (Dutton)

    Liz Moore, Long Bright River (Riverhead)

    Jojo Moyes, The Giver of Stars (Pamela Dorman Books)

    Olaf Olafsson, The Sacrament (Ecco)

    Kira Peikoff, Mother Knows Best (Crooked Lane)

    Monique Truong, The Sweetest Fruits (Viking)

    Kevin Wilson, Nothing to See Here (Ecco)

    Jeanette Winterson, Frankissstein (Grove)

    Emma Woolf, The Years After You (Amberjack)

    Elizabeth Byler Younts, The Bright Unknown (Thomas Nelson)

    Part Two: Debut

    Elizabeth Ames, The Other’s Gold (Viking)

    Megan Angelo, Followers (Graydon House)

    April Dávila, 142 Ostriches (Kensington)

    Raymond Fleischmann, How Quickly She Disappears (Berkley)

    David Koepp, Cold Storage (Ecco)

    Mathea Morais, There You Are (Amberjack)

    Eliza Nellums, All That’s Bright and Gone (Crooked Lane)

    Shannon Pufahl, On Swift Horses (Riverhead)

    E.R. Ramzipoor, The Ventriloquists (Park Row)

    Kiley Reid, Such a Fun Age (G.P. Putnam’s Sons)

    Alexis Schaitkin, Saint X (Celadon)

    Søren Sveistrup, The Chestnut Man (Harper)

    Part Three: Nonfiction

    Jake Anderson, Dark Waters: The Mysterious Death Of Elisa Lam, (Citadel/Kensington)

    Nefertiti Austin, Motherhood So White (Sourcebooks)

    Adrienne Brodeur, Wild Game: My Mother, Her Lover, and Me, (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt)

    Susannah Cahalan, The Great Pretender (Grand Central)

    Emma Copley Eisenberg, The Third Rainbow Girl (Hachette)

    B.J. Fogg, Tiny Habits (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt)

    Heather Dune MacAdam, 999: The Extraordinary Young Women, of the First Official Transport to Auschwitz, (Citadel/Kensington)

    Ben Moon, Denali (Penguin Books)

    Megan Phelps-Roper, Unfollow (Farrar, Straus and Giroux)

    Samantha Power, The Education of an Idealist (Dey Street)

    Aarti Namdev Shahani, Here We Are:, American Dreams, American Nightmares (Celadon)

    Credits

    Copyright

    Introduction

    Our biggest Buzz Books ever gives you 45 chances to find your next great reads, providing exclusive early looks at the next big thing from favorite authors and hot new discoveries.

    From bestselling authors you know and love we have the first pre-publication samples of new work from Tracy Chevalier, Jojo Moyes, Kevin Wilson, Jeanette Winterson, and Eoin Colfer, known for his Artemis Fowl YA series. Readers addicted to thrillers will be glad to discover this edition is packed with them: J.T. Ellison, Jeff Lindsay (introducing the first in a new series), Olaf Olaffson, and especially Imaginary Friend, the long-awaited second book by Stephen Chboksy, author of The Perks of Being a Wallflower.

    This Buzz Books is packed with 12 big debut novels, including the highly-touted Such a Fun Age by Kiley Reid (a BEA Buzz Editor’s Panel pick) and the big thriller Saint X, by Alexis Schaitkin, along with first novels of distinction by Elizabeth Ames, April Davila, Eliza Nellums, E.R. Ramzipoor, and more.

    Memoir dominates our large nonfiction list of 12 titles. From Adrienne Brodeur’s account of her mother’s affair to former United States Ambassador to the United Nations and Pulitzer-Prize winner Samantha Power’s The Education of an Idealist, these stories make for fascinating reading. Two true crime titles re-examine mysteries in Los Angeles and West Virginia: Dark Waters by Jake Anderson and The Third Rainbow Girl by Emma Copley Eisenberg.

    Regular readers know that each Buzz Books collection is filled with early looks at titles that will go on to top the bestseller lists and critics’ best of the year lists. And our comprehensive seasonal preview starts the book off with a curated overview of hundreds of notable books on the way later this year.

    While Buzz Books feels like your own secret connection inside book publishing, these collections are meant to be shared, so spread your enthusiasm and to be read picks online. For still more great previews, check out our separate Buzz Books 2019: Young Adult Fall/Winter as well. For complete download links, lists and more, just visit buzz.publishersmarketplace.com

    .

    Michael Cader

    May 2019

    The Fall/Winter 2019 Publishing Preview

    It’s another exciting season of new books ahead. Readers will find their way to many of the books previewed here and others yet to be discovered. To help you sift through the many thousands of planned spring and summer titles, we’ve selected what we think are among the most noteworthy literary, commercial, and breakout titles for adults, separated into four key categories.

    You’ll be able to sample many of the highlighted titles right now in Buzz Books 2019: Fall/Winter; they are noted with an asterisk. And please remember: because we prepare this preview many months in advance, titles, content, and publication dates are all subject to change.

    Fiction

    Publishers usually release their most prominent literary titles in the fall, and this season is no exception, with big sequels from Margaret Atwood and Elizabeth Strout. Plus, look for releases from Zadie Smith, Ta-Nehisi Coates, Salman Rushdie, Téa Obreht, and many more.

    The Notables

    André Aciman, Find Me (FSG, 10/29)

    Jami Attenberg, All This Could Be Yours (HMH, 10/22)

    Margaret Atwood, The Testaments (Nan A. Talese, 9/10) – The sequel to The Handmaid’s Tale.

    Elizabeth Berg, The Confession Club (Random House, 11/19)

    *Stephen Chbosky, Imaginary Friend (Grand Central, 10/1)

    Ta-Nehisi Coates, The Water Dancer (One World, 9/24)

    Emma Donoghue, Akin (Little, Brown, 9/10)

    Alice Hoffman, The World That We Knew (Simon & Schuster, 9/24)

    Michel Houellebecq, Serotonin (FSG, 9/24)

    Howard Jacobson, Live a Little (Hogarth, 9/10)

    Etgar Keret, Fly Already (Riverhead, 9/3

    *Ben Lerner, The Topeka School (FSG, 10/1)

    Deborah Levy, The Man Who Saw Everything (Bloomsbury, 10/1)

    *Jojo Moyes, The Giver of Stars (Pamela Dorman, 10/8)

    Erin Morgenstern, The Starless Sea (Doubleday, 11/5)

    Téa Obreht, Inland (Random House, 8/13) – Her first book since The Tiger’s Wife.

    Salman Rushdie, Quichotte (Random House, 9/3)

    Richard Russo, Chances Are...(Knopf, 7/30) – Russo’s first standalone novel in a decade.

    Zadie Smith, Grand Union: Stories (Penguin Press, 10/8)

    Elizabeth Strout, Olive, Again (Random House, 10/15) – The sequel to Pulitzer-winning Olive Kitteridge.

    Jeff VanderMeer, Dead Astronauts (MCD, 12/3)

    *Kevin Wilson, Nothing to See Here (Ecco, 11/5)

    *Jeanette Winterson, Frankissstein (Grove, 10/8)

    Jacqueline Woodson, Red at the Bone (Riverhead, 9/17)

    Highly Anticipated

    *Jesse Ball, The Divers’ Game (Ecco, 9/10)

    Kevin Barry, Night Boat to Tangier (Doubleday, 9/17)

    *Tracy Chevalier, A Single Thread (Viking, 9/17)

    Jonathan Coe, Middle England (Knopf, 8/20)

    Michael Crummey, The Innocents (Doubleday, 11/12)

    *Jeanine Cummins, American Dirt (Flatiron, January)

    Amitav Ghosh, Gun Island (FSG, 9/10)

    Robert Harris, The Second Sleep (Knopf, 11/19)

    Liska Jacobs, The Worst Kind of Want (MCD, 11/5)

    Thomas Keneally, The Book of Science and Antiquities (Atria, 12/10)

    Marie NDiaye, The Cheffe: A Cook’s Novel (Knopf, 10/29)

    Edna O’Brien, Girl (FSG, 9/10)

    Carolina De Robertis, Cantoras (Knopf, 9/3)

    Cathleen Schine, The Grammarians (Sarah Crichton, 9/3)

    Kate Walbert, She Was Like That: New and Selected Stories (Scribner, 10/1)

    Stephen Wright, Processed Cheese (Little, Brown, 1/21)

    Charles Yu, Interior Chinatown (Pantheon, 1/28)

    Emerging Voices

    Carol Anshaw, Right after the Weather (Atria, 10/1)

    Tash Aw, We, the Survivors (FSG, 9/3)

    Jon Clinch, Marley (Atria, 10/8)

    Caleb Crain, Overthrow (Viking, 8/27)

    Angie Cruz, Dominicana (Flatiron, 9/3)

    Michael Frank, What Is Missing (FSG, 10/8)

    Petina Gappah, Out of Darkness, Shining Light (Scribner, 9/10)

    Iona Grey, The Glittering Hour (Thomas Dunne, 12/10)

    Ayelet Gundar-Goshen, The Liar (Little, Brown, 9/24)

    Sarah Hall, Sudden Traveler (Custom House, 10/8)

    Kiran Millwood Hargrave, The Mercies (Little, Brown, 2/11)

    Joanna Kavenna, Zed (Doubleday, 1/14)

    *Andrew Krivak, The Bear (Bellevue Literary Press, February)

    Julie Mayhew, Impossible Causes (Bloomsbury, 11/19)

    Maaza Mengiste, The Shadow King (Norton, 9/24)

    *Liz Moore, Long Bright River (Riverhead, 1/7)

    Ann Napolitano, Dear Edward (Dial, 1/14)

    Alix Nathan, The Warlow Experiment (Doubleday, 8/20)

    Dexter Palmer, Mary Toft; or, The Rabbit Queen (Pantheon, 1/21)

    Steven Price, Lampedusa (FSG, 9/17)

    Kate Racculia, Tuesday Mooney Talks to Ghosts (HHM, 10/8)

    *Monique Truong, The Sweetest Fruits (Viking, 9/3)

    Caroline Zancan, We Wish You Luck (Riverhead, 1/14)

    Debut Fiction

    Our sampler includes promising debuts from Kiley Reid, April Davila, and Elizabeth Ames. Other new voices to watch out for include David Koepp, Jorge Comensal, and Amy Bonnafons.

    *Elizabeth Ames, The Other’s Gold (Viking, 8/27)

    *Megan Angelo, Followers (Graydon House, 1/14)

    Eleanor Anstruther, A Perfect Explanation (HMH, 2/4)

    Julia Armfield, Salt Slow (Flatiron, 10/8)

    Amy Bonnafons, The Regrets (Little, Brown, 2/4)

    *Clay McLeod Chapman, The Remaking (Quirk, 10/8)

    Jeffrey Colvin, Africaville (Amistad, 12/10)

    Jorge Comensal, The Mutations (FSG, 11/12)

    Rye Curtis, Kingdomtide (Little, Brown, 1/14)

    Sarah Davis-Goff, Last Ones Left Alive (Flatiron, 8/27)

    *April Davila, 142 Ostriches (Kensington, 2/25)

    Nico Giacobone, The Crossed-Out Notebook (Scribner, 9/24)

    *Raymond Fleischmann, How Quickly She Disappears (Berkley, 1/7)

    Shaun Hamill, A Cosmology of Monsters (Pantheon, 9/17)

    Tanen Jones, The Better Liar (Ballantine, 1/14)

    Marc-Uwe Kling, Qualityland (Grand Central, 1/7)

    Christy Lefteri, The Beekeeper of Aleppo (Ballantine, 8/27)

    Katie Lowe, The Furies (St. Martin’s, 10/8)

    *David Koepp, Cold Storage (Ecco, 9/3)

    *Mathea Morais, There You Are (Amberjack, 10/8)

    * Eliza Nellums All That’s Bright And Gone (Crooked Lane, 12/10)

    Lara Prescott, The Secrets We Kept (Knopf, 9/17)

    Rosie Price, What Red Was (Hogarth, 8/27)

    *Shannon Pufahl, On Swift Horses (Riverhead, 11/5)

    *E.R. Ramzipoor, The Ventriloquists (Park Row, 8/27)

    *Kiley Reid, Such a Fun Age (Putnam, 1/7)

    *Alexis Schaitkin, Saint X (Celadon, 2/4)

    *Søren Sveistrup, The Chestnut Man (Harper, 9/3)

    Souvankham Thammavongsa, How to Pronounce Knife (Little, Brown, 1/28)

    Pete Townshend, The Age of Anxiety (Hachette, 11/5)

    Holly Watt, To The Lions (Dutton, 9/10)

    Kate Weinberg, The Truants (Putnam, 1/28)

    Commercial Fiction

    Fall is full of titles from big names with new work from Attica Locke and Josh Malerman to Stephen King, David Lagercrantz, and many more. Plus, YA author Eoin Colfer has his third adult title, Highfire, excerpted in our sampler.

    Joe Abercrombie, A Little Hatred (Orbit, 9/17)

    Jeffrey Archer, Nothing Ventured (St. Martin’s, 9/10)

    Ace Atkins, Robert B. Parker’s Angel Eyes: A Spenser Novel (Putnam, 11/19)

    Linwood Barclay, Elevator Pitch (William Morrow, 9/17)

    Leigh Bardugo, Ninth House (Flatiron, 10/1)

    Nevada Barr, What Rose Forgot (Minotaur, 9/17)

    Marc Cameron, Tom Clancy Code of Honor (Putnam, 11/19)

    Lorenzo Carcaterra, Tin Badges (Ballantine, 8/27)

    John le Carré, Agent Running in the Field (Viking, 10/22)

    Steph Cha, Your House Will Pay (Ecco, 10/15)

    Lee Child, Blue Moon (Delacorte, 10/29)

    Mary Higgins Clark, Kiss the Girls and Make Them Cry (Simon & Schuster, 11/5)

    *Meg Waite Clayton, The Last Train to London (Harper, 9/10)

    Ann Cleeves, The Long Call (Minotaur, 9/3)

    Jane Cockram, The House of Brides (Harper, 10/22)

    Reed Farrel Coleman, Robert B. Parker’s The Bitterest Pill (Putnam, 9/10)

    *Eoin Colfer, Highfire (HarperPerennial, 1/28) – The third adult novel by the author of the Artemis Fowl series.

    Michael Connelly, The Night Fire (Little, Brown, 10/22)

    John Connolly, A Book of Bones (Atria/Emily Bestler, 10/15)

    Robin Cook, Genesis (Putnam, 12/3)

    Bernard Cornwell, Untitled Saxon Tales #12 (Harper, 11/26)

    Lynn Cullen, The Sisters of Summit Avenue (Gallery, 9/10)

    Nelson DeMille and Alex DeMille, The Deserter (Simon & Schuster, 10/22)

    Clive Cussler and Jack Du Brul, Untitled Isaac Bell (Putnam, 9/10)

    Clive Cussler and Boyd Morrison, Untitled Oregon Files #14 (Putnam, 11/5)

    Rene Denfeld, The Butterfly Girl (Harper, 10/1)

    Jude Deveraux, Met Her Match (Mira, 9/17)

    *J.T. Ellison, Good Girls Lie (Mira, 12/31)

    Janet Evanovich, Twisted Twenty-Six (Putnam, 11/12)

    Christine Féret-Fleury, The Girl Who Reads on the Métro (Flatiron, 10/8)

    Joseph Finder, House on Fire (Dutton, 1/21)

    Vince Flynn and Kyle Mills, Lethal Agent (Atria/Emily Bestler, 9/24)

    Jonathan French, The True Bastards (Crown, 10/8)

    Alan Furst, Under Occupation (Random House, 12/3)

    Tess Gerritsen, The Shape of Night (Ballantine, 10/1)

    Amy K. Green, The Prized Girl (Dutton, 1/14)

    Bryn Greenwood, The Reckless Oath We Made (Putnam, 8/20)

    John Grisham, Untitled #26 (Doubleday, 10/15)

    Jasmine Guillory, Royal Holiday (Berkley, 10/1)

    Elizabeth Hand, Curious Toys (Mulholland, 10/15)

    Rob Hart, The Warehouse (Crown, 8/20)

    Elin Hilderbrand, What Happens in Paradise (Little, Brown, 10/8)

    Joe Hill, Full Throttle (William Morrow, 10/1)

    Paddy Hirsch, Hudson’s Kill (Forge, 9/17)

    Joshua Hood, Robert Ludlum’s The Treadstone Resurrection (Putnam, 9/17)

    Kirstin Innes, Fishnet (Gallery, 10/15)

    *Susan Isaacs, Takes One to Know One (Atlantic Monthly, 10/1)

    *Steven James, Synapse (Thomas Nelson, 10/8)

    J. A. Jance, Sins of the Fathers: A J.P. Beaumont Novel (William Morrow, 9/24)

    Lisa Jewell, The Family Upstairs (Atria, 10/22)

    Iris Johansen and Roy Johansen, Hindsight (Grand Central, 1/7)

    Craig Johnson, Land of Wolves (Viking, 9/17)

    Kel Kade, Fate of the Fallen (Tor, 11/5)

    Joseph Kanon, The Accomplice (Atria, 11/5)

    Stephen King, The Institute (Scribner, 9/10)

    Raymond Khoury, Empire (Forge, 10/1)

    William Kent Krueger, This Tender Land (Atria, 9/3)

    David Lagercrantz, The Girl Who Lived Twice (Knopf, 8/27) – A Lisbeth Salander novel, continuing Stieg Larsson’s Millennium Series.

    *Jeff Lindsay, Just Watch Me (Dutton, 12/3) – The first in a new series from the bestselling Dexter author.

    Attica Locke, Heaven, My Home (Mulholland, 9/17)

    T. M. Logan, 29 Seconds (St. Martin’s, 9/10)

    Sarah Lotz, Missing Person (Mulholland, 9/3)

    Louisa Luna, The Janes (Doubleday, 1/21)

    Lisa Lutz, The Swallows (Ballantine, 8/13)

    Stuart MacBride, All That’s Dead: The new Logan McRae crime thriller (William Morrow, 9/3)

    Josh Malerman, Malorie: A Bird Box Novel (Del Rey, 10/1) – The sequel to Bird Box.

    Alison McGhee, The Opposite of Fate (HMH, 2/18)

    Chris McGeorge, Now You See Me (Hanover Square, 9/3)

    Walter Mosley, Trouble Is What I Do (Mulholland, 2/25)

    Annalee Newitz, The Future of Another Timeline (Tor, 9/24)

    *Olaf Olafsson, The Sacrament (Ecco, 12/3)

    Neil Olson, Before the Devil Fell (Hanover Square, 10/8)

    Liza Palmer, The Nobodies (Flatiron, 9/10)

    James Patterson, Criss Cross (Little, Brown, 11/25)

    James Patterson and Maxine Paetro, The 19th Christmas (Little, Brown, 10/7)

    James Patterson with Howard Roughan, Killer Instinct (Little, Brown, 9/9)

    *Kira Peikoff, Mother Knows Best (Crooked Lane, 9/10)

    Louise Penny, A Better Man (Minotaur, 8/27)

    Heidi Perks, Come Back For Me (Gallery, 11/12)

    Anne Perry, Death in Focus (Ballantine, 9/17)

    Nick Petrie, The Wild One: A Peter Ash Novel (Putnam, 1/14)

    Steven Pressfield, 36 Righteous Men (Norton, 11/5)

    Douglas Preston and Lincoln Child, Old Bones (Grand Central, 8/27)

    Bob Proehl, The Nobody People (Del Rey, 9/3)

    J. D. Robb, Vendetta in Death: An Eve Dallas Novel (St. Martin’s 9/3)

    Nora Roberts, The Rise of Magicks: Chronicles of The One, Book 3 (St. Martin’s, 11/26)

    Tom Rosenstiel, Oppo (Ecco, 12/3)

    R. A. Salvatore, Boundless: A Drizzt Novel (Harper Voyager, 9/10)

    John Sandford, Bloody Genius: A Virgil Flowers Novel (Putnam, 10/1)

    Nalini Singh, A Madness of Sunshine (Berkley, 12/3)

    Martin Cruz Smith, The Siberian Dilemma (Simon & Schuster, 11/5)

    Alexander McCall Smith, To the Land of Long Lost Friends: No. 1 Ladies’ Detective Agency (20) (Pantheon, 10/22)

    Charles Soule, Anyone (Harper Perennial, 12/3)

    Simone St. James, The Sun Down Motel (Berkley, 2/18)

    Catherine Steadman, Mr. Nobody (Ballantine, 1/7)

    Danielle Steel, Child’s Play (Delacorte, 10/8)

    Danielle Steel, Spy (Delacorte, 11/26)

    Amy Stewart, Kopp Sisters on the March (HMH, 9/17)

    Stella Tillyard, Call Upon the Water (Atria, 9/17)

    Lisa Unger, The Stranger Inside (Park row, 9/17)

    Brent Weeks, The Burning White (Orbit, 10/22)

    Stuart Woods, Stealth (Putnam 10/15)

    Stuart Woods, Untitled Stone Barrington #52 (Putnam, 1/7)

    *Emma Woolf, The Years After You (Amberjack, 9/10)

    Jin Yong, A Hero Born (St. Martin’s, 9/17)

    *Elizabeth Byer Younts, The Bright Unknown (Thomas Nelson, 10/22)

    Nonfiction

    Trump books have dwindled, and books about the transgender experience—and about gender and gender equality more broadly—have a strong presence throughout this season’s nonfiction. Notable memoirs include offerings from Julie Andrews, Augusten Burroughs, Elton John, Patti Smith, and John Kerry–– along with former US Ambassador to the UN Nikki Haley’s book about her life and leadership, due from St. Martin’s some time in the fall.

    Politics & Current Events

    Binyamin Appelbaum, The Economists’ Hour: False Prophets, Free Markets, and the Fracture of Society (Little, Brown, 9/3)

    Abhijit Banerjee and Esther Duflo, Good Economics, Bad Economics (PublicAffairs, 11/12)

    Glenn Beck, Addicted to Outrage: How Thinking Like a Recovering Addict Can Heal the Country (Threshold, 11/19)

    Kate Andersen Brower, Team of Five: The Presidents Club in the Age of Trump (Harper, 11/19)

    Lonnie G. Bunch III, A Fool’s Errand: Creating the National Museum of African American History and Culture during the Age of Bush, Obama, and Trump (Smithsonian, 9/24)

    Ashley ‘Dotty’ Charles, Outrage is the New Black: Why Everyone is Shouting But No One is Talking (Bloomsbury, 9/3)

    Julie Hirschfeld Davis and Michael D. Shear, Border Wars: Inside Trump’s Assault on Immigration (Simon & Schuster, 10/8)

    Alan M. Dershowitz, Defending Israel: The Story of My Relationship with My Most Challenging Client (All Points, 9/3)

    Erik Edstrom, Un-American: A Soldier’s Reckoning of America’s Longest War (Bloomsbury, 10/29)

    Stanley Fish, The First: How to Think About Hate Speech, Campus Speech, Religious Speech, Fake News, Post-Truth, and Donald Trump (Signal, 10/29)

    Gilbert M. Gaul, The Geography of Risk: Epic Storms, Rising Seas, and the Cost of America’s Coasts (Sarah Crichton, 9/3)

    Newt Gingrich, Trump Versus China: Facing and Fighting America’s Greatest Threat (Center Street, 10/8)

    Daniel Gordis, We Stand Divided: The Rift Between American Jews and Israel (Ecco, 9/24)

    Stanley B. Greenberg, RIP GOP: How the New America Is Dooming the Republicans (Thomas Dunne, 9/10)

    Jodi Kantor and Megan Twohey, She Said: Breaking the Sexual Harassment Story That Helped Ignite a Movement (Penguin, 10/1)

    David Kirby, When They Come for You: How Police and Government Are Trampling Our Liberties—and How to Take Them Back (St. Martin’s, 10/29)

    Michael Klare, All Hell Breaking Loose: Climate Change, Global Chaos, and American National Security (Metropolitan, 11/12)

    Naomi Klein, On Fire: The (Burning) Case for a Green New Deal (Simon & Schuster, 9/17)

    Robert Kuttner, The Stakes: 2020 and the Survival of American Democracy (Norton, 9/17)

    Chung Min Lee, The Hermit King: The Dangerous Game of Kim Jong Un (All Points, 11/5)

    Lawrence Lessig, They Don’t Represent Us: Reclaiming Our Democracy (Day Street, 11/5)

    Ezra Levin and Leah Greenberg, We Are Indivisible: A Blueprint for Democracy After Trump (Signal Press, November)

    Barry Levine and Monique El-Faizy, All the President’s Women: Donald Trump and the Making of a Predator (Hachette, 10/22)

    Andrew S. Lewis, The Drowning of Money Island: A Forgotten Community’s Fight Against the Rising Seas Threatening Coastal America (Beacon, 10/1)

    Chris Liddell-Westefeld, They Said This Day Would Never Come: Chasing the Dream on Obama’s Improbable Campaign (PublicAffairs, 11/12)

    Ed Morales, Fantasy Island: Colonialism, Exploitation, and the Betrayal of Puerto Rico (Bold Type, 9/10)

    Malcolm Nance, The Plot to Commit Treason: How Donald Trump Pulled Off the Greatest Act of Treachery in US History (Hachette, 11/12)

    Anne Nelson, Shadow Network: Media, Money, and the Secret Hub of the Radical Right (Bloomsbury, 10/29)

    Fintan O’Toole, The Politics of Pain: Postwar England and the Rise of Nationalism (Liveright, 11/5)

    Star Parker with Richard Manning, Necessary Noise: How Donald Trump Inflames the Culture War and Why This Is Good for America (Center Street, 11/12)

    Robin Pogrebin and Kate Kelly, The Education of Brett Kavanaugh (Portfolio, 10/8)

    James Poniewozik, Audience of One: Donald Trump, Television, and the Fracturing of America (Liveright, 9/10)

    Paul Richter, The Ambassadors: American Diplomats on the Front Lines (Simon & Schuster, 9/17)

    Jeremy Rifkin, The Green New Deal: Why the Fossil Fuel Civilization Will Collapse by 2028 and the Bold Economic Plan to Save Life on Earth (St. Martin’s, 9/10)

    Nathan J. Robinson, We’re All Socialists Now: How the Left Can Dream Big and Win Again (All Points, 10/10)

    Kathleen Sears, Socialism 101: From the Bolsheviks and Karl Marx to Universal Healthcare and the Democratic Socialists, Everything You Need to Know about Socialism (Adams Media, 9/3)

    George Soros, In Defense of Open Society (PublicAffairs, 9/24)

    Richard Stengel, Information Wars (Atlantic Monthly, 10/8)

    Jeffrey Sterling, Unwanted Spy: The Persecution of an American Whistleblower (Bold Type, 10/15)

    Matt Stoller, Goliath: How Monopolies Secretly Took Over the World (Simon & Schuster, 10/15)

    Christopher Varelas, How Money Became Dangerous: The Inside Story of our Turbulent Relationship with Modern Finance (Ecco, 10/16)

    Samuel Woolley, The Reality Game: How the Next Wave of Technology Will Break the Truth (PublicAffairs, 1/7)

    James D. Zirin, Plaintiff in Chief: A Portrait of Donald Trump in 3,500 Lawsuits (All Points, 9/24)

    Social Issues

    Cynthia Anderson, Home Now: How 6000 Refugees Transformed an American Town (PublicAffairs, 10/29)

    Martin Caparros, Hunger: The Oldest Problem (Melville House, 10/8)

    Lizabeth Cohen, Saving America’s Cities: Ed Logue and the Struggle to Renew Urban America in the Suburban Age (FSG, 10/1)

    Rachel Vorona Cote, Too Much: How Victorian Constraints Still Bind Women Today (Grand Central, 1/28)

    Ben Crump, Open Season: Legalized Genocide of Colored People (Amistad, 10/15)

    Marcel Danesi, The Art of the Lie: How the Manipulation of Language Affects Our Minds (Prometheus, 10/8)

    Johnny Dwyer, The Districts: Justice and Power in New York City (Knopf, 10/1)

    Tatyana Fazlalizadeh, Stop Telling Women to Smile: Stories of Street Harassment and How We’re Taking Back Our Power (Seal, 12/3)

    Christopher J. Ferguson, How Madness Shaped History: An Eccentric Array of Maniacal Rulers, Raving Narcissists, and Psychotic Visionaries (Prometheus, 1/07)

    America Ferrera, American Like Me: Reflections on Life Between Cultures (Gallery, 9/3)

    *B.J. Fogg, Tiny Habits: The Small Changes That Change Everything (HMH, 1/7)

    Deborah Frances-White, The Guilty Feminist: You Don’t Have to Be Perfect to Overthrow the Patriarchy (Seal, 10/15)

    Malcolm Gladwell, Talking to Strangers: What We Should Know about the People We Don’t Know (Little, Brown, 9/10)

    Ed Gordon, Conversations in Black: On Power, Politics, and Leadership (Hachette, 1/7)

    Matthew Gutmann, Are Men Animals?: How Modern Masculinity Sells Men Short (Basic, 11/5)

    Austen Ivereigh, Wounded Shepherd: Pope Francis and His Struggle to Convert the Catholic Church (Holt, 10/22)

    Shaun King, Make Change: How to Fight Injustice, Dismantle Systemic Oppression, and Own Our Future (HMH, 1/7)

    Nicholas Lemann, Transaction Man: The Rise of the Deal and the Decline of the American Dream (FSG, 9/10)

    Daniel Markovits, The Meritocracy Trap: How America’s Foundational Myth Feeds Inequality, Dismantles the Middle Class, and Devours the Elite (Penguin, 9/10)

    Reuben Jonathan Miller, Halfway Home: Race, Punishment, and the Afterlife of Mass Incarceration (Little, Brown, 2/4)

    Azadeh Moaveni, The Guest House for Young Widows: The Women of ISIS (Random House, 9/10)

    Douglas Murray, Madness of Crowds: Some Modern Taboos (Continuum, 9/17)

    Pamela Newkirk, Diversity, Inc.: The Failed Promise of a Billion-Dollar Business (Bold Type, 10/22)

    Mike Pearl, The Day It Finally Happens: The Good News About the Bad News—and the Bad News About the Good News (Scribner, 9/17)

    Imani Perry, Breathe: A Letter to My Sons (Beacon, 9/17)

    Christopher Ryan, Civilized to Death: What Was Lost on the Way to Modernity (Avid Reader, 10/1)

    A. K. Sandoval-Strausz, Barrio America: How Latino Immigrants Saved the American City (Basic, 11/12)

    Mychal Denzel Smith, Stakes Is High: Life After the American Dream (Bold Type, 1/21)

    Nico Tortorella, Space Between: Explorations of Love, Sex, and Fluidity (Crown, 9/17)

    Jeannie Vanasco, Things We Didn’t Talk About When I Was a Girl: A Memoir (Tin House, 10/1)

    Bari Weiss, How to Fight Anti-Semitism (Crown, 9/3)

    Lindy West, The Witches Are Coming (Hachette, 9/17)

    Science & Technology

    Kathryn Bowers and Barbara Natterson-Horowitz, Wildhood: The Epic Journey from Adolescence to Adulthood in Humans and Other Animals (Scribner, 9/17)

    Bill Bryson, The Body: A Guide for Occupants (Doubleday, 10/15)

    *Susannah Cahalan, The Great Pretender: The Undercover Mission That Changed Our Understanding of Madness (Grand Central, 11/5)

    Philippe J. Dubois and Elise Rousseau, A Short Philosophy of Birds (Dey Street, 9/17)

    Seth Fletcher, Einstein’s Shadow: A Black Hole, a Band of Astronomers, and the Quest to See the Unseeable (Ecco, 10/15)

    Florian Freistetter, Stephen Hawking: His Science in a Nutshell (Prometheus, 10/22)

    S. James Gates and Cathie Pelletier, Proving Einstein Right: The Daring Expeditions that Changed How We Look at the Universe (PublicAffairs, 9/24)

    Michael S. A. Graziano, Rethinking Consciousness: A Scientific Theory of Subjective Experience (Norton, 9/17)

    Rowan Hooper, Superhuman: Life at the Extremes of Our Capacity (Simon & Schuster, 9/17)

    Daphna Joel and Luba Vikhanski, Gender Mosaic: Beyond the Myth of the Male and Female Brain (Spark, 9/17)

    Raymond Kurzweil, The Singularity Is Nearer (Viking, 11/12)

    Bob McDonald, An Earthling’s Guide to Outer Space: Everything You Ever Wanted to Know About Black Holes, Dwarf Planets, Aliens, and More (Simon & Schuster, 10/22)

    Adam Minter, Secondhand: Travels in the New Global Garage Sale (Bloomsbury, 11/12)

    Donna Jackson Nakazawa, The Angel and the Assassin: The Tiny Brain Cell That Changed the Course of Medicine (Ballantine, 1/21)

    Alondra Oubre, Science in Black and White: How Both Nature and Nurture Influence Racial Differences (Prometheus, 11/19)

    Lydia Pyne, Genuine Fakes: How Phony Things Teach Us About Real Stuff (Sigma, 10/29)

    Gina Rippon, Gender and Our Brains (Pantheon, 8/27)

    Frank Ryan, Virusphere: From Common Colds to Ebola Epidemics--Why We Need the Viruses That Plague Us (Prometheus, 12/10)

    Janelle Shane, You Look Like a Thing and I Love You: How Artificial Intelligence Works and Why It’s Making the World a Weirder Place (Little, Brown, 11/5)

    David Sinclair, Lifespan: The Revolutionary Science of Why We Age––and Why We Don’t Have To (Atria, 9/10)

    Gaia Vince, Transcendence: How Humans Evolved through Fire, Language, Beauty, and Time (Basic, 11/12)

    Giles Whittell, Snow: A Scientific and Cultural Exploration (Atria, 11/19)

    Magdalena Zernicka-Goetz and Roger Highfield, The Dance of Life: The New Science of How a Single Cell Becomes a Human Being (Basic, 11/12)

    History and Crime

    Karen Abbott, The Ghosts of Eden Park: The Bootleg King, the Women Who Pursued Him, and the Murder That Shocked Jazz-Age America (Crown, 10/8)

    *Jake Anderson, Dark Waters: The Mysterious Death of Elisa Lam (Citadel/Kensington, 2/25)

    Tamim Ansary, The Invention of Yesterday: A 50,000-Year History of Human Culture, Conflict, and Connection (PublicAffairs, 10/1)

    Axton Betz-Hamilton, The Less People Know About Us: A Mystery of Betrayal, Family Secrets, and Stolen Identity (Grand Central, 10/15)

    Heidi Blake, From Russia With Blood: The Kremlin’s Ruthless Assassination Program and Vladimir Putin’s Secret War on the West (Mulholland, 9/24)

    David W. Blight, Frederick Douglass: Prophet of Freedom (Simon & Schuster, 10/29)

    Sidney Blumenthal, All the Powers of Earth: The Political Life of Abraham Lincoln Vol. III, 1856-1863 (Simon & Schuster, 9/3)

    H. W. Brands, Dreams of El Dorado: A History of the American West (Basic, 10/22)

    Richard Brookhiser, Give Me Liberty: A History of America’s Exceptional Idea (Basic, 11/5)

    Ethan Brown, Murder in the Bayou: Who Killed the Women Known as the Jeff Davis 8? (Scribner, 9/3)

    Louise Callaghan, Father of Lions: The Remarkable True Story of the Mosul Zoo Rescue (Forge, 9/17)

    Dan Carlin, Hardcore History: History at the Extremes (Harper, 10/8)

    Tom Chaffin, Revolutionary Brothers: Thomas Jefferson, the Marquis de Lafayette, and the Friendship that Helped Forge Two Nations (St. Martin’s, 11/26)

    Jung Chang, Big Sister, Little Sister, Red Sister: Three Women at the Heart of Twentieth-Century China (Knopf, 10/29)

    Gail Collins, No Stopping Us Now: A History of American Women, Age, and Expectations Defied (Little, Brown, 10/15)

    Becky Cooper, We Keep the Dead Close: A Murder at Harvard and a Half Century of Silence (Grand Central, 11/25)

    William Dalrymple, The Anarchy: The Rise and Fall of the East India Company (Bloomsbury, 10/22)

    Ed Darack, The Warriors of Anbar: The Marines Who Crushed Al-Qaeda––the Greatest Untold Story of the Iraq War (Da Capo, 11/5)

    Adam Davidson, The Passion Economy: The New Rules for Thriving in the Twenty-First Century (Knopf, 1/7)

    Dan Davies, Lying for Money: How Legendary Frauds Reveal the Working of Our World (Scribner, 10/22)

    Frank Dikötter, How to Be a Dictator: The Cult of Personality in the Twentieth Century (Bloomsbury, 12/3)

    Byron L. Dorgan, The Girl in the Photograph: The True Story of a Native American Child, Lost and Found in America (Thomas Dunne, 11/26)

    *Emma Copley Eisenberg, The Third Rainbow Girl: The Long Life of a Double Murder in Appalachia (Hachette, 1/21)

    Anthony Everitt, Alexander the Great: His Life and His Mysterious Death (Random House, 8/27)

    J. M. Fenster, Cheaters Always Win: The Story of America (Twelve, 12/3)

    Orlando Figes, The Europeans: Three Lives and the Making of a Cosmopolitan Culture (Metropolitan, 10/8)

    Peter Finn, A Guest of the Reich: The Story of American Heiress Gertrude Legendre and her Dramatic Captivity and Daring Escape from Nazi Germany (Pantheon, 9/24)

    Matthew Flinders, Gillian Dooley, and Philippa Sandall, Trim, The Cartographer’s Cat: The Ship’s Cat Who Helped Flinders Map Australia (Adlard Coles, 12/17)

    Eric Foner, The Second Founding: How the Civil War and Reconstruction Remade the Constitution (Norton, 9/17)

    Kim Ghattas, Black Wave: The Saudi-Iran Wars on Religion and Culture that Destroyed the Middle East (Holt, 10/8)

    Kristen R. Ghodsee, Why Women Have Better Sex Under Socialism (Bold Type, 11/20)

    James Glaisher, The Aeronauts: Travels in the Air (Melville House, 8/20)

    Stephen Harding, Escape from Paris: Aviators, Spies and Star-Crossed Lovers in Wartime France (Da Capo, 10/8)

    Robert Harms, Land of Tears: The Exploration and Exploitation of Equatorial Africa (Basic, 12/3)

    Tom Holland, Dominion: How the Christian Revolution Remade the World (Basic, 10/29)

    Nathalia Holt, The Queens of Animation: The Untold Story of the Women Who Transformed the World of Disney and Made Cinematic History (Little, Brown, 9/17)

    Holly Jackson, American Radicals: How Nineteenth-Century Counterculture Shaped the Nation (Crown, 10/8)

    Dan Jones, Crusaders: The Epic History of the Wars for the Holy Lands (Viking, 10/1)

    Phil Keith with Tom Clavin, All Blood Runs Red: The Legendary Life of Eugene Bullard—Boxer, Pilot, Soldier, Spy (Hanover Square, 11/5)

    Rashid Khalidi, The Hundred Years’ War on Palestine: A History of Settler Colonial Conquest and Resistance, 1917–2017 (Metropolitan, 9/24)

    Stephen Kinzer, Poisoner in Chief: Sidney Gottlieb and the CIA Search for Mind Control (Holt, 9/17)

    Mary M. Lane, Hitler’s Last Hostages: Looted Art and the Soul of the Third Reich (PublicAffairs, 9/10)

    Erika Lee, America for Americans: A History of Xenophobia in the United States (Basic, 11/26)

    Steven Levingston, Barack and Joe: The Making of an Extraordinary Partnership (Hachette, 10/29)

    Buddy Levy, Labyrinth of Ice: The Triumphant and Tragic Greely Polar Expedition (St. Martin’s, 12/3)

    Julia Lovell, Maoism: A Global History (Knopf, 9/3)

    *Heather Dune Macadam, 999: The Extraordinary Young Women of the First Official Jewish Transport to Auschwitz (Kensington, 12/31)

    Jessica McDiarmid, Highway of Tears (Atria, 11/12)

    Mo Moulton, The Mutual Admiration Society: How Dorothy L. Sayers and her Oxford Circle Remade the World for Women (Basic, 11/5)

    Steve Murphy and Javier F. Peña, Manhunters: How We Took Down Pablo Escobar, the World’s Most Wanted Criminal (St. Martin’s, 11/12)

    Simon Parkin, A Game of Birds and Wolves: The Young Women Who Played to Win World War II (Little, Brown, 1/28)

    Jeremy Popkin, A New World Begins: The History of the French Revolution (Basic, 12/10)

    Mira Ptacin, The In-Betweens: The Spiritualists, Mediums, and Legends of Camp Etna (Liveright, 10/29)

    Michael Pullara, The Spy Who Was Left Behind: Russia, the United States, and the True Story of the Betrayal and Assassination of a CIA Agent (Scribner, 11/19)

    Kassia St. Clair, The Golden Thread: How Fabric Changed History (Liveright, 11/12)

    Craig Shirley, Mary Ball Washington: The Untold Story of George Washington’s Mother (Harper, 11/5)

    Amity Shlaes, Great Society: A New History of the 1960s in America (Harper, 9/10)

    David J. Silverman, This Land is Their Land: The Wampanoag Indians, Plymouth Colony, and the Troubled History of Thanksgiving (Bloomsbury, 11/5)

    Brendan Simms, Hitler: A Global Biography (Basic, 10/1)

    Douglas Smith, The Russian Job: The Forgotten Story of How America Saved the Soviet Union from Ruin (FSG,11/5)

    Renia Spiegel, Renia’s Diary: A Holocaust Journal (St. Martin’s, 9/17)

    Steve Vogel, Betrayal in Berlin: The True Story of the Cold War’s Most Audacious Espionage Operation (Custom House, 9/24)

    Gene Weingarten, One Day: The Extraordinary Story of an Ordinary 24 Hours in America (Blue Rider Press, 10/22)

    Daniel H. Weiss, In That Time: Michael O’Donnell and the Tragic Era of Vietnam (PublicAffairs, 11/5)

    Patricia Wiltshire, The Nature of Life and Death: Every Body Leaves a Trace (Putnam, 9/3)

    Essays, Criticism, & More

    John Berger, What Time Is It? (NYRB, 9/24)

    Harold Bloom and David Mikics (Edited by), The American Canon: Literary Genius from Emerson to Le Guin (Library of America, 10/15)

    Anne Boyer, The Undying: Pain, Vulnerability, Mortality, Medicine, Art, Time, Dreams, Data, Exhaustion, Cancer, And Care (FSG, 9/17)

    Lydia Davis, Essays One: Reading and Writing (FSG, 10/22)

    Barbara Ehrenreich, Had I Known: Collected Essays (Twelve, 2/4)

    Ralph Ellison, The Selected Letters of Ralph Ellison: A Life in Letters (Random House, 12/3)

    Cameron Esposito, Save Yourself: Essays (Grand Central, 2/25)

    Nicola Gardini, Long Live Latin: The Pleasures of a Useless Language (FSG, 10/15)

    Leslie Jamieson, Make It Scream, Make It Burn: Essays (Little, Brown, 9/24)

    Radhika Jones and David Friend (Edited by), Vanity Fair’s Women on Women (Penguin, 10/29)

    C. S. Lewis, The Reading Life: The Joy of Seeing New Worlds Through Others’ Eyes (HarperOne, 9/24)

    Chris McCabe, Poems from the Edge of Extinction (Chambers, 12/10)

    Vladimir Nabokov, Think, Write, Speak: Uncollected Essays, Reviews, Interviews, and Letters to the Editor (Knopf, 11/12)

    Flannery O’Connor, Good Things Out of Nazareth: The Uncollected Letters of Flannery O’Connor and Friends (Convergent, 10/15)

    Darryl Pinckney, Busted in New York and Other Essays (FSG, 11/12)

    Jenny Slate, Little Weirds (Little, Brown, 11/5)

    Paul Theroux, On the Plain of Snakes: A Mexican Journey (Eamon Dolan, 10/8)

    J. R. R. Tolkien, A Secret Vice: Tolkien on Invented Languages (HarperCollins, 10/15)

    Kurt Vonnegut, Pity the Reader: On Writing With Style (Seven Stories, 11/5)

    Mary-Kay Wilmers, Human Relations and Other Difficulties: Essays (FSG, 10/8)

    Biography & Memoir

    Mitch Albom, Chika: A Little Girl, an Earthquake, and the Making of a Family (Harper, 11/5)

    Julie Andrews with Emma Walton Hamilton, Home Work: A Memoir of My Hollywood Years (Hachette, 10/15)

    Zulema Arroyo Farley, So Much More: A Poignant Memoir About Finding Love, Fighting Adversity, and Defining Life on My Own Terms in Spirit’s Presence (Atria, 9/17)

    *Nefertiti Austin, Motherhood So White: A Memoir of Race, Gender, and Parenting in America (Sourcebooks, 9/24)

    Deirdre Bair, Parisian Lives: Samuel Beckett, Simone de Beauvoir, and Me: A Memoir (Nan A. Talese, 11/12)

    Charles Barber, Citizen Outlaw: One Man’s Journey from Gangleader to Peacekeeper (Ecco, 10/15)

    Ady Barkan, Eyes to the Wind: A Memoir of Love and Death, Hope and Resistance (Atria, 9/10)

    Frank Bennack, Leave Something on the Table (Simon & Schuster, 10/8)

    Anthony Bozza, Not Afraid: The Evolution of Eminem (Da Capo, 9/10)

    Rachel Brathen, To Love and Let Go (Gallery, 9/17)

    *Adrienne Brodeur, Wild Game: My Mother, Her Lover, and Me (HMH, 10/15)

    Augusten Burroughs, Toil & Trouble: A Memoir (St. Martin’s, 10/1)

    Colin Butcher and Joanne Lake, Molly: The True Story of the Amazing Dog Who Rescues Cats (Celadon, 10/8)

    Erin Carlson, Queen Meryl: The Iconic Roles, Heroic Deeds, and Legendary Life of Meryl Streep (Hachette, 9/24)

    Francesca Cartier Brickell, The Cartiers: The Untold Story of the Family Behind the Jewelry Empire (Ballantine, 10/29)

    Molly Case, How to Treat People: A Nurse’s Notes (Norton, 9/10)

    Cassandra King Conroy, Tell Me a Story: My Life with Pat Conroy (William Morrow, 10/29)

    Robyn Crawford, A Song for You: My Life with Whitney Houston (Dutton, 11/5)

    Jon Dorenbos with Larry Platt, Life Is Magic: An Extraordinary True Story of Trauma and Transformation (Avid Reader, 11/5)

    Cameron Douglas, Long Way Home (Knopf, 11/5)

    Cyrus Grace Dunham, A Year Without a Name: A Memoir (Little, Brown, 10/15)

    Elvis Duran, Where Do I Begin?: Stories from a Life Lived Out Loud (Atria, 10/1)

    Sunil Dutta, Stealing Green Mangoes: Two Brothers, Two Fates, One Indian Childhood (Anthony Bourdain, 10/1)

    Christopher Edmonds with Douglas Century, No Surrender: The Story of an Ordinary Soldier’s Extraordinary Courage in the Face of Evil (Harper One, 10/15)

    Gavin Edwards, Kindness and Wonder: Why Mr. Rogers Matters Now More Than Ever (Dey Street, 10/15)

    Danny Fingeroth, A Marvelous Life: The Amazing Story of Stan Lee (St. Martin’s, 10/1)

    William Feaver, The Lives of Lucian Freud: The Restless Years, 1922-1968 (Knopf, 10/29)

    Flea, Acid for the Children: A Memoir (Grand Central, 11/5)

    Clyde W. Ford, Think Black: A Memoir of Sacrifice, Success, and Self-Loathing in Corporate America (Amistad, 9/17)

    Amaryllis Fox, Life Undercover: Coming of Age in the CIA (Knopf, 10/15)

    Adam Frankel, The Survivors: A Story of War, Inheritance, and Healing (Harper, 10/29)

    Jeannie Gaffigan, When Life Gives You Pears (Grand Central, 9/3)

    Amanda Yates Garcia, Initiated: Memoir of a Witch (Grand Central, 10/22)

    Holly George-Warren, Janis: Her Life and Music (Simon & Schuster, 10/15)

    Steve Gorman with Steven Hyden, Hard to Handle: The Life and Death of the Black Crowes––A Memoir (Da Capo, 9/24)

    Neil Gorsuch, A Republic, If You Can Keep It(Crown Forum, 9/10)

    Jen Gotch, The Upside of Being Down: A Memoir (Gallery, 10/15)

    Cate Haste, Passionate Spirit: The Life of Alma Mahler (Basic, 9/10)

    John Hodgman, Medallion Status: True Stories and Complimentary Upgrades (Viking, 10/15)

    Christopher Ingraham, If You Lived Here You’d Be Home By Now: Why We Traded the Commuting Life for a Little House on the Prairie (Harper, 9/10)

    Alexandra Jacobs, Still Here: The Madcap, Nervy, Singular Life of Elaine Stritch (FSG, 10/22)

    Karine Jean-Pierre, Moving Forward: A Story of Hope, Hard Work, and the Promise of America (Hanover Square, 11/5)

    Shaker Jeffrey and Katharine Holstein, Shadow on the Mountain: A Yazidi Memoir of Terror, Resistance and Hope (Da Capo, 2/18)

    Elton John, The Autobiography (Holt, 10/15)

    Booker T. Jones, Time Is Tight: An Autobiography (Little, Brown, 10/29)

    Saeed Jones, How We Fight for Our Lives (Simon & Schuster, 10/8)

    Sam Kashner, Life Isn’t Everything: Mike Nichols As Remembered By 103 Of His Closest Friends (Holt, 10/22)

    Adam Kay, This Is Going to Hurt: Secret Diaries of a Medical Resident (Spark, 12/3)

    Arthur Kleinman, The Soul of Care: The Moral Education of a Husband and a Doctor (Viking, 9/17)

    Peggy Wallace Kennedy, The Broken Road: George Wallace and a Daughter’s Journey to Reconciliation (Bloomsbury, 12/3)

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    Mimi Lemay, What We Will Become: A Mother, a Son, and a Journey of Transformation (HMH, 11/12)

    Marsha M. Linehan, Building a Life Worth Living: A Memoir (Random House, 1/7)

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    Peter McGough, I’ve Seen the Future and I’m Not Going: AIDS, the Art Scene, and Downtown New York in the 1980s (Pantheon, 9/18)

    *Ben Moon, Denali (Penguin, 1/14)

    Allison Moorer, Blood: A Memoir (Da Capo, 10/29)

    Edmund Morris, Edison (Random House, 10/22)

    Mark Morris with Wesley Stace, Out Loud: A Memoir (Penguin, 10/22)

    Benjamin Moser, Sontag: Her Life and Work (Ecco, 9/17)

    Alexander Norman, The Dalai Lama: An Extraordinary Life (HMH, 1/21)

    John O’Connell, Bowie’s Bookshelf: The Hundred Books that Changed David Bowie’s Life (Gallery, 9/10)

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    Liz Phair, Horror Stories: A Memoir (Random House, 11/5)

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    Buzz Books Authors Appearing At BookExpo

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    Aarti Namdev Shahani

    Part One: Fiction

    Jesse Ball, The Divers’ Game (Ecco)

    SUMMARY

    From the inimitable mind of award-winning author Jesse Ball, a novel about an unsettlingly familiar society that has renounced the concept of equality—and the devastating consequences of unmitigated power. The old-fashioned struggle for fairness has finally been abandoned. It was a misguided endeavor. The world is divided into two groups, pats and quads. The pats may kill the quads as they like, and do. The quads have no recourse but to continue with their lives. The Divers’ Game is a thinly veiled description of our society, an extreme case that demonstrates a truth: we must change or our world will collapse. What is the effect of constant fear on a life, or on a culture? The Divers’ Game explores the consequences of violence through two festivals, and through the dramatic and excruciating examination of a woman’s final moments.

    Brilliantly constructed and achingly tender, The Divers’ Game shatters the notion of common decency as the binding agent between individuals, forcing us to consider whether compassion is intrinsic to the human experience. With his signature empathy and ingenuity, Jesse Ball’s latest work solidifies his reputation as one of contemporary fiction’s most mesmerizing talents.

    EXCERPT

    Lethe! If we look for her, if we run up the stairs, cast open her door, and look in her bed, she is not there. If we dash down the steps, turn a corner, pass her befuddled father (who cannot see us), and go to the little table that she loves so well, the one by the window, she is not there! She is not there! A plate and some crumbs, an empty glass. Out we go into the street, and up ahead—can it be?—we see her, beneath linden trees, swaying as a child does, because the morning sways, because when it is the morning, isn’t everything swaying? It is only the old who are stiff, who can no longer feel the world’s slight breath.

    Lethe! She is looking at her feet as she walks, watching them—how unpredictable they are, are they hers?—and thinking—what will she do today? Her feet move beneath, and we with them, and suddenly we have reached the train. Nimbly up the steps she goes, the train doors open, and there is a place for her, between two men who stare straight ahead, as if into nothing. They are not alone. The train is full of such as they. Lethe takes her place among them. She looks straight ahead, but her mind is humming. This is a trip she takes each morning, and meanwhile, always meanwhile, she is elsewhere.

    The doors close, the train shoves forward, and over the loudspeaker comes a voice she has heard a thousand times. Instinctively, she grasps the gray rubber device on her belt and straightens up. She stares ahead, chin up, almost proudly. A deep and reassuring voice, the ever familiar voice, one she has heard her whole life, it shudders the speakers and everyone in the car chants softly:

    A citizen

    For the life of him

    Or her or he or she

    That keeps a mask

    On the belt or arm

    Need never fear the streets.

    If trouble comes

    Like quad scum—

    Your mask put on!

    Your mask put on!

    The gas shall flow

    A cloud to grow

    And lay them low

    The lowest at our feet.

    A chorus of horns plays, and the car is quiet again. It travels on, ever forward. That is the direction of society: forward. All those who try to send it back are ground beneath the wheels. Hasn’t it always been so?

    At every station, the joyful chorus peals. When you are so used to saying something—isn’t it a kind of gladness to let it roll unexamined from your lips? They stood in that tincture, a thin gladness to be sure—you could never touch it, or really feel it, until the train doors opened at the center exchange, and out the passengers poured, so many—you would never think the train could hold so many. They were not in wild colors, these citizens, although of course they wore the latest fashions. And each, to the last, bore a finely made mask upon the hip. Have you ever seen so many gas masks in one place? And every one nicely worn from use, every one the tool of an expert. It was a kind of modern-day Sparta, wouldn’t you say that? Wouldn’t you agree?

    And today, it was the day before Ogias’ Day. There hadn’t been an Ogias’ Day, not for fifty years. So no one knew how it would go.

    Lethe managed her way down the stairs from the platform, and ducked under a rail to take a shortcut along a green bank to a side street that ran out hurriedly from the rail exchange. This was the way to her school, for she was grown now, sixteen or seventeen, and could take her place at a college, where she would be taught everything a person might want to know, everything about anything. Lethe was the kind of clever that doesn’t say much. She was liked and praised and left alone. Her future was assured. But today she was late to school, only just late, and ran in the front door through a sort of absence—the throng had passed through three moments before. She could almost feel them there, a wild mass of arms and legs, of shoving and nearness. One, two, three—and then she!

    Into the classroom, and she sought for Lois. In her mind in the door she saw Lois, imagined her in some chair, with a free space beside her. Then, into the lecture hall, and Lois was there, just as she had seen it, just as Lois always was, beckoning with a thin arm, an arm that looked almost precisely like Lethe’s. I could not tell them apart, though they were not sisters. Have you ever met someone and felt they were some reflection of you? Have you felt reflected? Lethe and Lois sat and held hands beneath the desks, identical in gray skirts and dry yellow sweaters, bare at the shoulder. The light at the podium flickered on, and their lecturer, Mandred, was there. His old eyes raked the room, and he smiled slightly.

    And shall we begin?

    You all remember we were speaking last week about the circumstances that led to the transformation of our society. The famous influx of refugees—so many they could not help but change us. We were forced by them to change. Everyone remembers the lesson? How did we change?

    That’s right, the Firstmost Proposal. This was the subject of our test last week. Can someone tell me the substance of the Firstmost Proposal? You?

    That’s wrong. It’s not entirely right, and what we say is, what is entirely right is right, everything else is wrong. The Firstmost Proposal, I remind you, was made by Eavan Garing. A minor elected official at the time, he would later be chancellor. He said, we can welcome them, as long as we can tell them apart. As long as we can tell them apart. Many of them, wherever they were from, they had red hats, a kind of long knit hat, a red hat, no one remembers why, and so Garing said, This will be their symbol. We’ll tattoo the red hat on their cheeks, and then we’ll know who is who. Then we can welcome them.

    Did this work?

    Yes, it worked, the refugees were admitted, and they were told apart. What else did it mean? What else did the red hat mean?

    That’s right: They shall have red hats so you may know them, and they shall therefore have no legal standing as persons. It was the kindest thing that could be done, to admit them, because they had nowhere to go, but they were different than we are, and that fact couldn’t be forgotten.

    So then they were among us, and bore their red hats, but there was trouble. Who remembers what the trouble was?

    Yes, they had no safety; they were not persons, anything could be done to them. Certain low elements, citizens to be sure, but low elements, well, they were taking advantage. It was causing trouble. It wasn’t any good to see, especially not within the nation. And of course this made others become partisan. Some were actually sympathetic to the newcomers. Groups were organized, a kind of vigilante militia, to protect them, to protect the refugees from other citizens. Do you recall the names of any of them? This was material from a previous class. Someone should know it.

    That’s right, Lambert Ma. He was among the first. He murdered several citizens before he was arrested and executed. There was a good deal of blood shed, the blood of full citizens, as well as a great deal of attrition among the refugee group. Their population declined measurably at this time. But it did not go away.

    What happened then?

    Yes, the government suppressed these partisans, in effect supporting which position?

    That anything could be done to those without rights. There is a philosophical position that came into vogue, it is what we call in philosophy an awakening, a large-scale shift in belief: that things done to those beneath are not properly violence. It was a new definition of violence, and helped to create a vibrant morality, one that infuses our nation to this day. Our morality is what we do. Do you all understand that? But if what we do ceases to be violence, let us say it is the same, but it is no longer violence: then we are not violent; we are no longer doers of violence.

    Nonetheless we have hearts, we are a good and fair society. It was clear the refugees could not simply live amongst us without trouble. So someone thought of the first quad, the very first quadrant. The government at that time surveyed areas that they called quadrants, outside of each city, and within the quadrants, these who had no rights, the refugees—how did it go? Did they have rights? It was a new kind of land, one that had never existed before, a new designation. Did they have rights there?

    No, that’s correct, they did not gain rights within their quadrants, no, the quadrants were surrounded by walls, as they are today, with guards, to see that there could be no organized revolt. But the guards don’t keep anyone in place. Anyone can pass in and out, as you know, but within the walls, and here is the point—this is why there was suddenly safety, a kind of safety: within those walls, no one had any rights, not even a citizen. This was deemed precivilized space.

    And so those with the red hats, they have come to be known, vulgarly, as quads. And they may come out and take jobs in the nation, but they may remain within their quadrants if they like. The government provides them with food and clothing there, so they need not even work. And we as citizens, we who compose the nation, we may go where we like, even into the quads, but if something were to happen to us in a quadrant, what would it mean? If I went into a quad and someone murdered me, what would it mean?

    That’s right—it would mean nothing. It would have happened within precivilized space. There is no rule of law there. Of course, the guards can go in and effect searches, seizures, but that is a different matter, a military matter. In any case, let me ask you, how is this order preserved—how do the citizens stay safe? Why is it that we can master the quads when they come out into the nation, however many they are, whatever their intentions? What is our tool? What is it?

    He held up his mask, the mask that hung on his belt. It was an old-style mask, the one that is often shown on posters.

    Yes, yes, the gas. That was also Garing’s idea. Four colors of gas, each with a use, and the citizens protected, always protected from the gas. You have all lived your whole life in the comfort of the gas—with the freedom it affords you. You have walked down avenues beside running gas lines, every ten feet a junction head posted. You have been raised with the drills: don the mask, run to the pavement marked K. You know the beautiful feeling of safety. You understand the gas. Still, it was not so simple at first. There were many who stood against it.

    Today though we are speaking not about the Firstmost Proposal, not about the gas, but about the Secondmost Proposal. Does anyone know it?

    Lethe knew what the Firstmost Proposal was. She knew what the gas was, even some of its chemistry. Her father was a scientist. She knew the Secondmost Proposal, the basic history of the nation. But Lois beside her knew none of it. They had been raised rather differently. And so whereas Lois leaned forward, eager to hear what the Secondmost Proposal was, Lethe tapped an ankle nervously against the chair and drew whirligig circles on a sheet of paper. None were perfect. She thought about the thick rim of the wood desk and pressed her thumb against it. There was a sharp edge, and she found it, and played with it, pressing her arm there, a pressure just before she would be cut. Have you played this game as a child? Do you play it still? To test every sensation of the body? Lethe pressed and gritted her teeth.

    Lois on the other hand watched Mandred, and her expression was soft, lunar—distant but welcoming. She enjoyed her classes and was good at them but had never known a thing beforehand, the way Lethe did. Perhaps it could be said she was better than Lethe at learning things she didn’t know.

    What was he saying?

    Mandred was saying that it had once been true that criminals were sent to places called prisons. Prison, how would that be spelled? One s or two? Lois perked up her ears.

    The professor droned on:

    The Secondmost Proposal, yes, well, it did not immediately follow the first; it was years later, but it was the Secondmost because it was also made by Garing. He realized that the quads were working so well, we might expand them. Why should we send criminals, by the thousand and million, to penitentiaries, prisons, and jails when we could simply join them to the quad population? And so it was done. This problem that had troubled the nation for hundreds of years, done away with in a moment. The prisons were disbanded. Every prisoner was branded with the red hat, and every prisoner had the right thumb taken, so that the difference would be obvious, always obvious. For consistency, those in the quads also had to have their thumbs taken. This was the cause of a great deal of unrest, but of course it was easily suppressed. They cannot stand against the gas.

    Mandred pressed a button on the podium, and a screen rolled down behind him.

    Now we will watch the thumb-taking procedure—one that goes on even now, in this very city.

    He went and sat in the first row, and the light on the podium dimmed to nothing. Numbers appeared on the screen, counting down, and an image came, of a facility from above, a long, narrow black building, with a track outside, like a fairground. In the lines of tracks stood thousands of people. It was a film of that first day, and no one in that line knew what was going to happen. But everyone in the classroom knew. There was an expectation, like a spasm of joy. How much we like to be distinguished from those who are not our equals.

    Meanwhile, Lethe had left the class. She went out and sat by a tree. The day wasn’t cold at all; it was warm, and the sun was mocking the clouds, going in and out of them. The shadows on the ground moved this way and that, as if in response. A boy joined her there. She recognized him from somewhere, a long athletic type with a thin mouth. What was his name? Gerard?

    Hey Lethe.

    She nodded.

    You in Mandred’s.

    She nodded.

    He’s a drunk, did you know that?

    Shook her head.

    Yeah, his wife died last year. Since then (the boy mimed a person with a bottle).

    Why did she die?

    Dunno.

    They sat there for a few minutes, and trucks came and went on the avenue by the school.

    Gerard stood up.

    I think, I think it was. Someone told me she gassed herself. She didn’t want to live, and when Mandred found her, all he could do was hit the bottle from then on. He’s a drunk.

    Gerard laughed.

    Well, bye.

    He went inside, and Lethe sat a little longer. She thought about what it would mean to feel the gas, and shivered. She imagined it wouldn’t feel like anything at all, and she was right, partly. She thought about being alone in a room and feeling that extinguishing wildness that wants to end life. People are coming to help you, but they are on the stair, they are even behind the door, but there is not time to open it, for you have opened the canister, you have breathed the gas—like a wing’s flap your life has extended and elapsed, and it cannot be taken back.

    Inside, Lois was joined by Lethe. The film was proceeding at the minimum speed of illusion. They held hands again, and watched. Who could say what it was like to watch such a film? The girls’ eyes were full of it—the surface of the eyes received it all, admitted it all: a menagerie of trembling light as men in white uniforms—they looked like dairy workers or men at the butcher’s counter—caught and held down all kinds of people, every kind of person, men, women, boys, girls, people of every color, shape, size. The thumb-taking room seemed very clean and bare. It was a kind of theater. There was always one person to be held down,

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