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NPR’s Book Concierge

Our Guide To 2013’s Great Reads

by Jeremy Bowers, Nicole Cohen, Danny DeBelius, Camila Domonoske, Rose Friedman, Christopher Groskopf, Petra Mayer, Beth Novey and Shelly Tan

Choose your own adventure! Use the categories below to search through more than 200 standout titles selected by NPR staff and critics. (You can also combine categories!) Then click on the books' covers to find out why we love them.

(But wait! No best-of lists this year? Here's why we decided to try something new.)

Want even more recommendations? Check out our favorite books from 2014, 2012, 2011, 2010, 2009, 2008

 

“After covering daily news from Syria for more than two years, there are times I read history as a guide to the outcome: In the Middle East, it's bad, ...”
Read Deb Amos'
full recommendation »
Lawrence In Arabia: War, Deceit, Imperial Folly And The Making Of The Modern Middle East
“Eleanor & Park is a book about two teenagers who fall in love. But more than that, it's about feeling lost — because of bullying, because of ...”
Read Linda Holmes'
full recommendation »
Eleanor & Park
“Daniel Woodrell is best-known for dark tales of the Ozarks (think Winter's Bone). This book, also set in the Ozarks, is a fictional account of an ...”
Read Lynn Neary's
full recommendation »
The Maid's Version: A Novel
“This is one of the best books about sex, and having babies, you're likely to read. I'm not saying ignore the Kama Sutra, What to Expect or even Fifty ...”
Read Alison Richards'
full recommendation »
How We Do It: The Evolution And Future Of Human Reproduction
“In this thrilling and complex first novel from Ann Leckie, we plunge into a world of astro-political intrigue. Our hero is on a vendetta to destroy ...”
Read Annalee Newitz's
full recommendation »
Ancillary Justice
“Jesmyn Ward writes to keep her heart from exploding. Men We Reaped, an accounting of the deaths, in four years, of five men close to her, is ...”
Read Luis Clemens'
full recommendation »
Men We Reaped: A Memoir
“You might know David Wiesner from his slightly off-kilter picture books about ...”
Read Becky Hersher's
full recommendation »
Mr. Wuffles!
“Award-winning journalist David Finkel's book Thank You For Your Service is a startlingly intimate and moving portrait of the "after-war" — the ...”
Read Bilal Qureshi's
full recommendation »
Thank You for Your Service
“It's hard to write well about modern friendship — as hard, perhaps, as it is to nurture one. Meg Wolitzer's latest — and probably finest ...”
Read Barrie Hardymon's
full recommendation »
The Interestings
“It's probably not an exaggeration to say that most Americans aren't even aware that Founding Father Benjamin Franklin had a sister at all. ...”
Read Michael Schaub's
full recommendation »
Book Of Ages: The Life And Opinions Of Jane Franklin
“Love Is Power, Or Something Like That — a collection of arresting stories by A. Igoni Barrett — is so much more than its lyrical language, ...”
Read Ofeibea Quist-Arcton's
full recommendation »
Love Is Power, Or Something Like That: Stories
“The book should come with a warning label for football fans: Watching a game will never be the same after you read it. The authors tell painful ...”
Read David Greene's
full recommendation »
League Of Denial: The NFL, Concussions And The Battle For Truth
“In The Circle, David Eggers thankfully doesn't slam you over the head with WHAT'S WRONG WITH THE KIDS TODAY. Instead, he walks you through a ...”
Read Audie Cornish's
full recommendation »
The Circle
“A writer, a painter, a composer. Two of them famous; the third not so much. All died before age 40, leaving masterpieces of art (well, the writer and ...”
Read Susan Stamberg's
full recommendation »
The Art Of Youth: Crane, Carrington, Gershwin, And The Nature Of First Acts
“A dirty little secret of being an NPR host (OK, for me anyway) is that we read what we have to read, not necessarily what we want to read. But when I ...”
Read Michel Martin's
full recommendation »
The Burgess Boys: A Novel
“Claire lives in a village by the sea with her beloved father. Every year on her birthday they visit the grave of her mother, who died giving ...”
Read Lynn Neary's
full recommendation »
Claire Of The Sea Light
“I grew up during the golden era of Broadway choreography, enamored of Michael A Chorus Line Bennett's leaps and extensions, Gower 42nd ...”
Read Bob Mondello's
full recommendation »
Fosse
“I have met the pomegranate lady, and you may have as well. If you've ever made a disarmingly intimate connection with a stranger while traveling, ...”
Read Arun Rath's
full recommendation »
The Pomegranate Lady And Her Sons: Selected Stories
“Bake baklava? Forget it. Mine always comes out gummy and sodden, unlike the crisply perfumed trays I get UPS'd from Detroit's Shatila ...”
Read Neda Ulaby's
full recommendation »
Sweet Delights From A Thousand And One Nights: The Story Of Traditional Arab Sweets
“In a far-future, post-nuclear-apocalypse Brazil, artist June and her best friend, Gil, find their lives upended when Gil falls in love with ...”
Read Petra Mayer's
full recommendation »
The Summer Prince
“Do you like food? Do you like gossip? Do you like TV? Terrific. Fire up the slow cooker and open up a copy of Allen Salkin's From Scratch: Inside the ...”
Read Barrie Hardymon's
full recommendation »
From Scratch: Inside The Food Network
“This novel, by Mohsin Hamid, employs the conceit of a how-to book for South Asians. Its exemplar is a country boy on the make, a serious character ...”
Read Alan Cheuse's
full recommendation »
How To Get Filthy Rich In Rising Asia
“Five people make the journey from Malaysia to Shanghai. One is a rising pop star; another, a businesswoman with a surprising past. There's the country ...”
Read Rose Friedman's
full recommendation »
Five Star Billionaire: A Novel
“David Rakoff's posthumous first novel, written in rhyming verse that's more akin to Dr. Seuss than T.S. Eliot, is a seductive heartbreaker. ...”
Read Heller McAlpin's
full recommendation »
Love, Dishonor, Marry, Die, Cherish, Perish: A Novel
“Infographics, which utilize eye-popping design to convey data with cleverness and clarity, are, let's admit, a fairly ...”
Read Glen Weldon's
full recommendation »
Super Graphic: A Visual Guide To The Comic Book Universe
“My Education can be roughly described as an academic novel, but unlike many books in that category, it's thrilling and edgy. There's no school song ...”
Read Meg Wolitzer's
full recommendation »
My Education
“He was born into a fabulously wealthy family in 1783. He drove the Spanish monarchy out of Venezuela, Colombia, Panama, Ecuador, Bolivia and ...”
Read Marcela Valdes'
full recommendation »
Bolivar: American Liberator
“Ayana Mathis' debut novel lays out the lives of the Shepherd family -- two parents and nine children, each drawn with tenderness and complexity. ...”
Read Jean Zimmerman's
full recommendation »
The Twelve Tribes Of Hattie
“A terrifically thought-provoking and entertaining novel — the author's fourth work of fiction and third novel, it features Ifemelu, a ...”
Read Nancy Pearl's
full recommendation »
Americanah: A Novel
“George Saunders continues to reinvent the short story in this rambunctious and compassionate fourth collection. He offers wildly absurd ...”
Read Jane Ciabattari's
full recommendation »
Tenth Of December: Stories
“A novelist named Ruth finds the diary of a Japanese schoolgirl, washed up in the wake of the tsunami and the Fukushima disaster, on the beach of her ...”
Read Alan Cheuse's
full recommendation »
A Tale For The Time Being
“Good artists make good art; great artists change the way we think and talk about it. Charlie Parker was great, and his effect on jazz was so ...”
Read Michael Schaub's
full recommendation »
Kansas City Lightning: The Rise And Times Of Charlie Parker
“Following the success of Jerusalem and Plenty, Yotam Ottolenghi's signature cookbook, originally published in England in 2008, is ...”
Read Heller McAlpin's
full recommendation »
Ottolenghi: The Cookbook
“I gave this book to every cat-loving friend of mine this year, and to judge by the number of times they've quoted it back to me, Cat Sense is an ...”
Read Petra Mayer's
full recommendation »
Cat Sense: How The New Feline Science Can Make You A Better Friend To Your Pet
“Ursula Todd is born, lives and dies, and then repeats the process over and over, as even the smallest choices change her fate completely (or not). ...”
Read Emily Ecton's
full recommendation »
Life After Life
“You may know the story of John Brown's unsuccessful raid on Harpers Ferry, but author James McBride's retelling of the events leading up to it is so ...”
Read Barrie Hardymon's
full recommendation »
The Good Lord Bird
“As a writer who knows just how much sweat goes into making even a single joke flow from the page, I can only step back in admiration when ...”
Read Alaya Dawn Johnson's
full recommendation »
Gorgeous
“Lucy Knisley's comic memoir Relish contains a series of stories from her life in the culinary world interspersed with some of her favorite ...”
Read Glen Weldon's
full recommendation »
Relish: My Life In The Kitchen
“Not so much an encyclopedia as a compendium of funny, sad and surprisingly moving fables from the pre-history of the world, featuring ...”
Read Glen Weldon's
full recommendation »
The Encyclopedia Of Early Earth: A Graphic Novel
“In this humorous sequel to The Writing Class (but it's not at all necessary to read it first), Amy Gallup (who taught the aspiring would-be authors in ...”
Read Nancy Pearl's
full recommendation »
Amy Falls Down: A Novel
“At 70 years old, poet Nikki Giovanni is loved around the world for her beautiful writing about home, family and food. ...”
Read Amita Parashar's
full recommendation »
Chasing Utopia: A Hybrid
“Humor, tragedy and beautiful writing mark this series of stories chronicling events in the first three decades or so of professional bird-watcher ...”
Read Nancy Pearl's
full recommendation »
Snapper
“The rise of Middle Eastern cookbooks in the last decade has benefited few cuisines more than that of Iran. Once-scarce ...”
Read T. Susan Chang's
full recommendation »
The New Persian Kitchen
“In succinct diary entries set against stark white on black drawings, Edward, a depressive, ...”
Read Heller McAlpin's
full recommendation »
Diary Of Edward The Hamster 1990-1990
“James More, a British secret agent, has been captured by a Somali desert affiliate of al-Qaida. He is sustained in his captivity by the memory of a ...”
Read Alan Cheuse's
full recommendation »
Submergence: A Novel
“After rescuing her abducted sister and two others from a brothel, Abigail Chantry loses her position as a governess. The four women must figure out how to ...”
Read Bobbi Dumas'
full recommendation »
The Autumn Bride
“So what would you do if you knew that Earth was going to be destroyed by an asteroid in less than three months? Would you go through your bucket list ...”
Read Nancy Pearl's
full recommendation »
Countdown City: The Last Policeman Book II
“After a global tragedy reveals the existence of paranormal beings, these "Others" must defend themselves against a rising tide of hostility and violence. PR ...”
Read Bobbi Dumas'
full recommendation »
Going Under
“Marisa Silver's Mary Coin pulls you into the story behind — and beyond — photographer Dorothea Lange and the subject of her iconic, ...”
Read Heller McAlpin's
full recommendation »
Mary Coin
“The moment this book arrived, I knew it was the real thing: the long-awaited, carefully assembled, ...”
Read T. Susan Chang's
full recommendation »
Indian Cooking Unfolded: A Master Class In Indian Cooking, With 100 Easy Recipes Using 10 Ingredients Or Less
“Nathan Rabin, head writer for The A.V. Club, spent a few years immersing himself in the subcultures centered on two of the most different bands in ...”
Read Petra Mayer's
full recommendation »
You Don't Know Me But You Don't Like Me: Phish, Insane Clown Posse, And My Misadventures With Two Of Music's Most Maligned Tribes
“Nevermore shall you wonder what it might have been like to fall deeply in love with Edgar Allan Poe. In 1845 Manhattan, the author was the ...”
Read Jean Zimmerman's
full recommendation »
Mrs. Poe
“There are memoirs that suffuse you in the events of the author's life. And then there is the rare memoir that simply soaks you in the soul of the ...”
Read Barrie Hardymon's
full recommendation »
I Hate To Leave This Beautiful Place
“Early in the 20th century, Typhoid Mary was an iconic figure. In this fictive treatment Mary Mallon, a cook, becomes suspect when families she has ...”
Read Jean Zimmerman's
full recommendation »
Fever
“This exciting debut novel from futurist Ramez Naam is about a group of graduate students who create an incredible new technology called Nexus that ...”
Read Annalee Newitz's
full recommendation »
Nexus
“Former Chez Panisse chef and columnist David Tanis has a gift for sure-footed, pleasurable kitchen moments. One Good Dish is an ...”
Read T. Susan Chang's
full recommendation »
One Good Dish
“Jeopardy! champ Tom Nissley has created the world's least useful, most wonderful reference book, a masterpiece with a wry sensibility. He ...”
Read Camila Domonoske's
full recommendation »
A Reader's Book Of Days: True Tales From The Lives And Works Of Writers For Every Day Of The Year
“When it comes to British royal history, most Americans' memories extend from Lady Diana to young Prince George, and not too much before ...”
Read Michael Schaub's
full recommendation »
Queen Anne: The Politics Of Passion
“Not many books are simultaneously hilarious and terrifying, but Maureen Johnson pulled off the trick in her previous book, The Name of the Star. In ...”
Read Alaya Dawn Johnson's
full recommendation »
The Madness Underneath
“It might sound counterintuitive, but there's at least one way that politics is like art: There are never, ever, any easy answers, no matter how much ...”
Read Michael Schaub's
full recommendation »
Wilson
“Over five years, Cris Beam follows 22 foster children as they search for the holy grail: adoption into a stable, loving home. But as the kids and the ...”
Read Nicole Cohen's
full recommendation »
To The End Of June
“Belle epoque Paris springs to life under the sure hand of Cathy Marie Buchanan, who delivers a world in The Painted Girls that is earthy, delicate and ...”
Read Jean Zimmerman's
full recommendation »
The Painted Girls
“A thoroughly satisfying crime novel — even if you didn't know it was really written by J.K. Rowling. Set in London, with a private investigator ...”
Read Ellah Allfrey's
full recommendation »
The Cuckoo's Calling
“The prolific science-fiction writer Charles Stross is so famous for his speculative economic tales that even Nobel laureate Paul Krugman is a fan. And ...”
Read Annalee Newitz's
full recommendation »
Neptune's Brood: A Space Opera
“Jessica Francis Kane's second collection is filled with uncertain women adrift in an increasingly complicated world. Kane explores the ...”
Read Jane Ciabattari's
full recommendation »
This Close: Stories
“This is a mystery worth disconnecting all electronic devices and staying home for. How the Light Gets In is the ninth novel in Louise Penny's ...”
Read Maureen Corrigan's
full recommendation »
How The Light Gets In: A Chief Inspector Gamache Novel
“If you've grown up with certain ideas — maybe certain bland, beige ideas — about Midwestern food, ...”
Read T. Susan Chang's
full recommendation »
The New Midwestern Table: 200 Heartland Recipes
“What if the X-men were real? They'd probably have powers a lot like Marcus Sakey's "brilliants" — endowed not with disbelief-straining flight ...”
Read Petra Mayer's
full recommendation »
Brilliance
“David Rosenfelt is the author of the funny and suspenseful Andy Carpenter thrillers, and he's just as funny in this nonfiction account of his move ...”
Read Emily Ecton's
full recommendation »
Dogtripping: 25 Rescues, 11 Volunteers, And 3 RVs On Our Canine Cross-Country Adventure
“The titular phrase of Tom Gauld's precise and wryly hilarious ...”
Read Glen Weldon's
full recommendation »
You're All Just Jealous Of My Jetpack: Cartoons
“Mason Currey details the work habits of dozens of modern artists (painters, sculptors, composers, choreographers, filmmakers, scientists and ...”
Read Alan Cheuse's
full recommendation »
Daily Rituals: How Artists Work
“This singular collection kicks off with a title story that does the near impossible: It makes me care about vampires — a breed more ...”
Read Maureen Corrigan's
full recommendation »
Vampires In The Lemon Grove: Stories
“It's traditional for fantasy heroes to leave their small towns for great adventures. But a series of disasters, from failing crops to falling fairies, ...”
Read Alaya Dawn Johnson's
full recommendation »
A Corner Of White
“Is it cheating to pick everyone's favorite book of 1973 as a favorite in 2013? Who cares, when that book is the 40th anniversary edition of Fear of ...”
Read Barrie Hardymon's
full recommendation »
Fear Of Flying: A Novel
“It's hard to talk about J.F. Powers, the Catholic writer who crafted a modern American classic with his 1962 novel, Morte d'Urban, without ...”
Read Michael Schaub's
full recommendation »
Suitable Accommodations: An Autobiographical Story Of Family Life: The Letters Of J.F. Powers, 1942-1963
“Law professor Antonio Yammara thinks he's indifferent to Colombia's history of drug-related violence. Then a motorcycle roars by, a stray bullet ...”
Read Marcela Valdes'
full recommendation »
The Sound Of Things Falling
“Martha Ronk has been an experimental poetry darling for years, but this may indeed be her breakthrough: It's a series of prose meditations on objects ...”
Read Craig Morgan Teicher's
full recommendation »
Transfer Of Qualities
“Written entirely through letters, this novel chronicles the correspondence of two very different women who help each other through the trials, ...”
Read Bobbi Dumas'
full recommendation »
I'll Be Seeing You
“Dash Shaw makes comics that set out to unsettle, using the unique tools the medium provides to expose discomfiting truths about ...”
Read Glen Weldon's
full recommendation »
New School
“Do you need another book claiming to offer quick weeknight dinners? Well, you need this one. Keepers is highly focused ...”
Read T. Susan Chang's
full recommendation »
Keepers: Two Home Cooks Share Their Tried-And-True Weeknight Recipes And The Secrets To Happiness In The Kitchen
“This delightful alternate history takes place in a Victorian England where naturalists are eagerly creating phylogenies of dragons. It's the ...”
Read Annalee Newitz's
full recommendation »
A Natural History Of Dragons: A Memoir By Lady Trent
“Johnny Cash became a legend long before he died, and there's no doubt that he's one of the most iconic American musicians of all time. Figures as ...”
Read Michael Schaub's
full recommendation »
Johnny Cash: The Life
“Shortlisted for the 2013 Man Booker Prize, this astonishing debut is narrated by Darling, a young girl from Zimbabwe. She is feisty, knowing and ...”
Read Ellah Allfrey's
full recommendation »
We Need New Names: A Novel
“YOU is a surreal, melancholy character study of a group of high school gamers who grow up to be semi-legendary videogame developers. Austin Grossman ...”
Read Annalee Newitz's
full recommendation »
YOU
“Stephen Burt is the leading poetry critic of his generation, one of contemporary poetry's most well-known advocates, but he is also a formidable poet ...”
Read Craig Morgan Teicher's
full recommendation »
Belmont: Poems
“Charles Simic is justifiably famous, having taken poetry by storm in the late '60s and '70s with compact lyrics that combine a wry, Eastern European ...”
Read Craig Morgan Teicher's
full recommendation »
New And Selected Poems: 1962-2012
“Jillian Weise, who won this year's Laughlin Award for an outstanding second book of poetry, is a force of nature. This collection follows up her ...”
Read Craig Morgan Teicher's
full recommendation »
The Book Of Goodbyes
“Rebecca Lee is a virtuoso — ironic, original, cosmopolitan. Standouts in this first collection are "Fialta," about a love triangle set ...”
Read Jane Ciabattari's
full recommendation »
Bobcat And Other Stories
“The title is hard to wrap your mind around. It comes from a medical textbook's definition of "life." Set during Chechnya's wars for independence from ...”
Read Lynn Neary's
full recommendation »
A Constellation Of Vital Phenomena: A Novel
“You wouldn't necessarily expect the story of a dye manufacturing facility to be one of intrigue, insurrection, deception and death. But Dan Fagin's ...”
Read Andrew Prince's
full recommendation »
Toms River: A Story Of Science And Salvation
“As you read this weird and mesmerizing collection you find Yoko Ogawa ascending into an orbit at least as high as Haruki Murakami's — ...”
Read Alan Cheuse's
full recommendation »
Revenge: Eleven Dark Tales
“Set sail with uptight chef Owen Wedgwood and rowdy pirate "Mad Hannah" Mabbot for a rollicking tale of haute cuisine on the high seas. Wedgwood is a ...”
Read Petra Mayer's
full recommendation »
Cinnamon And Gunpowder: A Novel
“In his latest collection of comics mini-stories, the creator of the brilliant Julius Knipl, Real ...”
Read Glen Weldon's
full recommendation »
Hand-Drying In America: And Other Stories
“One of the great living masters of contemporary poetry, Frank Bidart is at the height of his powers in this extraordinary new book of short, midlength ...”
Read Craig Morgan Teicher's
full recommendation »
Metaphysical Dog
“Marissa Meyer's debut, Cinder, retold Cinderella with a resourceful cyborg mechanic who left her foot on the palace stairs. I wasn't sure how I felt ...”
Read Alaya Dawn Johnson's
full recommendation »
Scarlet
“A marvelous, career-crowning, 80-poem anthology with brief essays and headnotes offers Robert Pinsky's account of how he learned to write (and read) ...”
Read Alan Cheuse's
full recommendation »
Singing School: Learning To Write (And Read) Poetry By Studying with the Masters
“What this nontraditional memoir taught me: My anguish makes others suffer, especially when I can't communicate. And: Just because I can't stop doing ...”
Read Philipp Goedicke's
full recommendation »
The Reason I Jump: The Inner Voice Of A Thirteen-Year-Old Boy With Autism
“Three kids who run a professional ghost hunting company have been hired to investigate a house that's so haunted and dangerous, no other team has ever ...”
Read Emily Ecton's
full recommendation »
The Screaming Staircase
“We've seen the character Julio before — he was introduced in the second volume of Gilbert and Jamie Hernandez's groundbreaking "Love ...”
Read Glen Weldon's
full recommendation »
Julio's Day
“Even if you are not familiar with the prodigious — and prolific — talent of Neil Gaiman, you'll want to spend a novella's worth of time ...”
Read Barrie Hardymon's
full recommendation »
The Ocean At The End Of The Lane
“Patricia Volk's grandfather introduced pastrami to America -- a story she told in her evocative 2002 memoir, Stuffed.. Volk introduces ...”
Read Maureen Corrigan's
full recommendation »
Shocked: My Mother, Schiaparelli, And Me
“Even if you're not part of the enormous following her Web comic spawned, you might have seen Allie Brosh's instantly recognizable, candy-colored ...”
Read Barrie Hardymon's
full recommendation »
Hyperbole And A Half: Unfortunate Situations, Flawed Coping Mechanisms, Mayhem, And Other Things That Happened
“One of the great masterpieces of 2013, the latest novel from Jane Austen Book Club author Karen Joy Fowler is based on several experiments in the ...”
Read Annalee Newitz's
full recommendation »
We Are All Completely Beside Ourselves
“Two years ago, psychic Gwen Frazier was nearly the victim of a serial killer in Wilby, Ore. She has returned to investigate the death of her mentor, and once ...”
Read Bobbi Dumas'
full recommendation »
Dream Eyes
“Read this book anywhere … except, say, if you're alone and snowbound in a vacant, isolated hotel. Yes, Stephen King brings us the sequel to The ...”
Read David Greene's
full recommendation »
Doctor Sleep: A Novel
“The House Girl's premise is compelling. It's easy to get swept up in this quietly dramatic novel, an interwoven depiction of two heroines separated by ...”
Read Jean Zimmerman's
full recommendation »
The House Girl: A Novel
“In All That Is, James Salter's version of a contemporary American War and Peace, the war — World War II in this instance — comes ...”
Read Alan Cheuse's
full recommendation »
All That Is: A Novel
“Nathaniel Rich focuses on a Midwestern mathematician named Mitchell Zukor, who develops a wild talent for seeing worst-case scenarios about climate ...”
Read Alan Cheuse's
full recommendation »
Odds Against Tomorrow
“Everyone in London is astounded when Felix Rivendale, the Marquess of Wrenworth, pursues Louisa Cantwell — she's charming enough, perhaps, but a complete ...”
Read Bobbi Dumas'
full recommendation »
The Luckiest Lady In London
“Foodies and Francophiles alike will relish this debut novel about Jean-Marie d'Aumout, whom we first meet crunching beetles as a starving orphaned son ...”
Read Jean Zimmerman's
full recommendation »
The Last Banquet
“Paul Pope's art churns on the page with grim intent; it is messily, gorgeously, impatiently alive. With the long-awaited Battling Boy, the ...”
Read Glen Weldon's
full recommendation »
Battling Boy
“Tom Barbash is a master of the intriguing first sentence: "My son, Rajiv, is sleeping with a student from my Dante class." "Kistler's second winter in ...”
Read Jane Ciabattari's
full recommendation »
Stay Up With Me
“In Kent Wascom's The Blood of Heaven, the aging slave trader Angel Woolsack confides his story of coming to manhood on the unruly American frontier in ...”
Read Jean Zimmerman's
full recommendation »
The Blood Of Heaven
“This big, inventive novel is about the dark secrets of a creepy film director, Stanislav Cordova, his mysterious daughter who has fallen to ...”
Read Meg Wolitzer's
full recommendation »
Night Film: A Novel
“"You put together two things that have not been put together before. And the world is changed." In this meditation on love, destiny and ...”
Read Ellah Allfrey's
full recommendation »
Levels Of Life
“This book serves as a portal in prose, through which readers fully enter bloody, raucous England seven years after the undoing of the ...”
Read Alan Cheuse's
full recommendation »
The Daylight Gate
“I enjoy the occasional poop joke, and books about living in the moment. You might say I prefer — wait for it — scatology to eschatology. ...”
Read Philipp Goedicke's
full recommendation »
Zen Confidential: Confessions Of A Wayward Monk
“Anchee Min's follow-up to her memoir, Red Azalea, about her life in China under the Cultural Revolution, picks up the narrative 20 years later — ...”
Read Barrie Hardymon's
full recommendation »
The Cooked Seed: A Memoir
“After Code Name Verity, Elizabeth Wein has returned to the world of civilian aircraft pilots in World War II England. Rose Justice is an American ...”
Read Alaya Dawn Johnson's
full recommendation »
Rose Under Fire
“Alice McDermott's latest, quietly luminous novel is near-perfect, an extraordinary book about an absolutely ordinary Irish-American woman ...”
Read Heller McAlpin's
full recommendation »
Someone
“The final book in a trilogy that began with Oryx and Crake has all the uncompromising indictment and wild, biting wit of Margaret Atwood's ...”
Read Ellah Allfrey's
full recommendation »
MaddAddam: A Novel
“Benjamin Percy surpasses the considerable promise of his earlier works in this story of werewolves, extremism and revolution. When new regulations ...”
Read Ellah Allfrey's
full recommendation »
Red Moon
“This novel is the fifth and last in the brilliant series by Edward St. Aubyn. They are all astonishing in their wit and honesty and virtuosity. As St. ...”
Read Meg Wolitzer's
full recommendation »
At Last: A Novel
“Laura van den Berg writes risky stories about the secrets we keep from each other, and from ourselves. Her settings evoke mysterious yearnings. A ...”
Read Jane Ciabattari's
full recommendation »
The Isle Of Youth: Stories
“It's not easy being Goat, especially when that stupid unicorn is running around turning things into gold and making it ...”
Read Emily Ecton's
full recommendation »
Unicorn Thinks He's Pretty Great
“A perfect book for the beach, plane or coffee table — and, most especially, for anyone who loves hanging out in bars but can't quite put their ...”
Read David Greene's
full recommendation »
Drinking With Men: A Memoir
“It feels like cheating to put Donna Tartt's extraordinary third novel in a "books of the year" list. And yet, there are few 800-page novels in the ...”
Read Barrie Hardymon's
full recommendation »
The Goldfinch
“Gregory Orr is a kind of oracular bard, praising, in short lyrics that comprise three long sequences in this book, the enduring capacity of the poetic ...”
Read Craig Morgan Teicher's
full recommendation »
River Inside The River: Three Lyric Sequences
“Anais Hendricks is only 15, but she's been in trouble for years. She has a serious drug habit, she's been in foster homes since birth, and ...”
Read Barrie Hardymon's
full recommendation »
The Panopticon: A Novel
“Welcome back the other kind of vampire: Mad, bad and dangerous to know, Gavriel is a worthy successor to Lord Byron (the supposed real-life inspiration for 19th ...”
Read Alaya Dawn Johnson's
full recommendation »
The Coldest Girl In Coldtown
“Imagine a Jane Austen novel set in one of Philip K. Dick's media-saturated worlds, and you've got the idea behind Love Minus Eighty. Will ...”
Read Annalee Newitz's
full recommendation »
Love Minus Eighty
“Don't think poetry: think biopic. This collection is ripped from the history books, but not limited to the facts; it's suspenseful, even when we all ...”
Read Camila Domonoske's
full recommendation »
The Big Smoke
“Carla Kaplan's revelatory cultural history explores the lives of white women — collectively known to Harlemites by the nickname of "Miss Anne" ...”
Read Maureen Corrigan's
full recommendation »
Miss Anne In Harlem: The White Women Of The Black Renaissance
“In her first book set in the U.S., South African novelist Lauren Beukes defies genre, and she dazzles as she does it. The Shining Girls is a murder ...”
Read Ellah Allfrey's
full recommendation »
The Shining Girls
“At first glance, Gene Luen Yang's clean lines and expressive, humorous cartooning style might make it seem as if his tale of the Boxer Rebellion has been ...”
Read Glen Weldon's
full recommendation »
Boxers & Saints
“Activism pervades Brenda Hillman's work, nowhere more than in this collection — the fourth and final installment in her series of elemental ...”
Read Craig Morgan Teicher's
full recommendation »
Seasonal Works With Letters On Fire
“Popular culture has never really done justice to the brilliant philosophical novel that is Mary Shelley's Frankenstein. Yeah, there's a reanimated ...”
Read Arun Rath's
full recommendation »
Gris Grimly's Frankenstein
“Forget every stereotype you have about librarians. Josh Hanagarne, who works in the Salt Lake City Public Library, is 6 feet, 7 inches and can tear a telephone ...”
Read Michael Schaub's
full recommendation »
The World's Strongest Librarian: A Memoir Of Tourette's, Faith, Strength And The Power Of Family
“Tess Delaney's life is upended when she discovers a family she never knew she had and a long-lost heirloom that could save their land and the business ...”
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full recommendation »
The Apple Orchard
“Abigail Harewood never wants to get married, but she aims to live life to the fullest — which includes taking a lover. She sets her sights on the Duke of ...”
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full recommendation »
A Duke Never Yields
“Twelve-year-old chemist and detective Flavia de Luce is just fun to read about. In her latest book (the fifth in the series), she tries to unravel a ...”
Read Emily Ecton's
full recommendation »
Speaking From Among The Bones: A Flavia De Luce Novel
“Of all the novels I've reviewed in 2013, this is the one that everyone — from my middle-aged friends to my hip graduate student TAs — ...”
Read Maureen Corrigan's
full recommendation »
The Love Affairs Of Nathaniel P.: A Novel
“Eight years after the allegations of possible euthanasia at hospitals in the wake of Hurricane Katrina, Sheri Fink grippingly describes the ...”
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full recommendation »
Five Days At Memorial
“In Khaled Hosseini's best novel yet, nine characters must decide what they would (and wouldn't) do for the happiness of their family. Among the ...”
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full recommendation »
And The Mountains Echoed
“The town of Oakpine, Wyo., doesn't exist on maps, but in this new book, Ron Carlson has done a splendid job of making a reader feel at home there. ...”
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full recommendation »
Return To Oakpine: A Novel
“Where did this strange, sad, gorgeous book come from? Matt Rasmussen is a new poet, but also a founder of Birds LLC, one of the hip, up-and-coming ...”
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full recommendation »
Black Aperture: Poems
“When it comes to gay identity, race, city life, approaching middle age and family, Aaron Smith is writing some of the best new poems around. He's got ...”
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full recommendation »
Appetite
“I have a boy, and although I gave birth to him and love him dearly, I sometimes look at him and wonder what alien spaceship dropped him off. So the ...”
Read Michel Martin's
full recommendation »
Masterminds And Wingmen: Helping Our Boys Cope With Schoolyard Power, Locker-Room Tests, Girlfriends And The New Rules Of Boy World
“Nora Ephron began her writing career as a cub reporter for The New York Post, and during her lifetime she was a journalist, essayist, ...”
Read Meg Wolitzer's
full recommendation »
The Most Of Nora Ephron
“This House Is Haunted draws on some of the great ghost-loving writers of the past, Charles Dickens and Henry James foremost among them. It's 1867, ...”
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full recommendation »
This House Is Haunted
“Beyond true crime, Oscar Martinez's tremendous investigative report on how thousands of Central American migrants travel through Mexico to ...”
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full recommendation »
The Beast: Riding the Rails And Dodging Narcos On The Migrant Trail
“It's a shame novelist and nonfiction author Bob Shacochis isn't already a household name among readers of literary fiction, but I'm hoping ...”
Read Nancy Pearl's
full recommendation »
The Woman Who Lost Her Soul
“All those Vikings who've been taking over mystery fiction can now go jump in a fjord! Brooklyn-born author, Sara Gran, has reintroduced a distinctive ...”
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full recommendation »
Claire DeWitt And The Bohemian Highway
“It's 32,000 years ago and an adolescent — Kim Stanley Robinson calls him Loon — who has been orphaned and taken under the wing of his ...”
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full recommendation »
Shaman
“Who was Michael Hainey's newspaper-reporter father really with on the night he dropped dead? His sons were told one thing; their father's obit alluded ...”
Read Rose Friedman's
full recommendation »
After Visiting Friends: A Son's Story
“"I worry I broke your kneecaps when I cut you down," writes the artist Karen Green in her debut book. "I keep hearing that sound." ...”
Read Michael Schaub's
full recommendation »
Bough Down
“Jamie Quatro brings a fresh, frank voice to these linked stories set around Lookout Mountain, Ga. Several feature a character with a husband, family, ...”
Read Jane Ciabattari's
full recommendation »
I Want To Show You More
“Talk about reflected glory: As Ms. Marvel, Air Force Major Carol Danvers has been kicking around the Marvel Universe for decades, ever since acquiring ...”
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full recommendation »
Captain Marvel Vol. 1: In Pursuit Of Flight
“If Agatha Christie had adored Michel de Montaigne and Honore de Balzac, she might have produced something like this deliciously deep murder ...”
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full recommendation »
The Infatuations
“A religious book for a secular America, this is among the most arresting and inventive collections of the past few ...”
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full recommendation »
Incarnadine
“Writing well about mental illness is a feat. The writer needs to bring readers into a world that they might be reluctant to enter. Juliann Garey draws ...”
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full recommendation »
Too Bright To Hear Too Loud To See
“Peter "Hooky" Hook was a self-described working-class thief who taught himself to play the bass. His Manchester, England, band, Stiff ...”
Read Neda Ulaby's
full recommendation »
Unknown Pleasures: Inside Joy Division
“If you've ever wondered whether echinacea can really ward off infections, or whether shark cartilage truly prevents cancer, this is the book for you. ...”
Read Jon Hamilton's
full recommendation »
Do You Believe In Magic? The Sense And Nonsense Of Alternative Medicine
“Brenna Yovanoff's previous The Space Between lit fireworks in my heart (two words: demon baby), and she handles the very different material in Paper ...”
Read Alaya Dawn Johnson's
full recommendation »
Paper Valentine
“Storytelling carves a way out of a dead end in the opening story in this award-winning first collection, as a 15-year-old girl and her brother, 16, ...”
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full recommendation »
Thieves I've Known
“Despite its nominations for multiple prizes, including the Booker and the National Book Award, Jhumpa Lahiri's second novel has provoked ...”
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full recommendation »
The Lowland
“This intimate, dishy biography of the notoriously private and priapic artist Lucian Freud (grandson of Sigmund) is a rare case in ...”
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full recommendation »
Breakfast With Lucian: The Astounding Life And Outrageous Times Of Britain's Great Modern Painter
“I understand that a book about the role of women in the Third Reich may not be exactly the nonfiction you're hoping to delve into over the holidays. ...”
Read Barrie Hardymon's
full recommendation »
Hitler's Furies: German Women In The Nazi Killing Fields
“With an enigmatic narrator and constant reminders that this adventure does not end well, Daniel Alarcon's latest book is his strongest yet. It tells ...”
Read Ellah Allfrey's
full recommendation »
At Night We Walk In Circles: A Novel
“Timothy Hallinan, an accomplished mystery writer (check out his series set in Bangkok, featuring an American travel writer named Poke ...”
Read Nancy Pearl's
full recommendation »
Little Elvises: A Junior Bender Mystery
“Laura, a middle-aged British woman, buys a quaint holiday home in Gost, Croatia, and arrives one summer to fix it up. She doesn't ask why ...”
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full recommendation »
The Hired Man
“Lady Philippa (Pippa) Marbury is headed into marriage with a limited understanding of what is expected in the marriage bed, so she approaches the most notorious ...”
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full recommendation »
One Good Earl Deserves A Lover
“Another book on the financial crisis and its aftermath? To borrow a phrase, "This time is different." Neil Irwin of The Washington Post reinvigorates ...”
Read Neal Carruth's
full recommendation »
The Alchemists: Three Central Bankers And A World On Fire
“Fourteen years ago, bad-boy hockey star Billy Wilkins ruined his marriage to Maddy, the only girl he ever loved. Now he's in Dallas, facing the end of his ...”
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full recommendation »
Crazy Thing Called Love
“Three years ago, Faith Holland left her hometown after being abandoned at the altar. Now she's back, summoned by her family to help at their winery, and she's ...”
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full recommendation »
The Best Man
“Working for Wait Wait … Don't Tell Me! I sometimes forget not everything's a laugh riot. So to get my fix of the current depressing state of American ...”
Read Eva Wolchover's
full recommendation »
The Unwinding: An Inner History Of The New America
“In the latest novel from Australian master of subversive science fiction Max Barry, we get a magical realist take on surveillance and propaganda. ...”
Read Annalee Newitz's
full recommendation »
Lexicon: A Novel
“Lea Carpenter weaves the story of the love and respect between a mother and her grown son — despite the differences in many of their ...”
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full recommendation »
Eleven Days: A Novel
“Mark Twain wrote Advice for Little Girls as a tongue-in-cheek manners manual for young ladies. Now, it's being published for the ...”
Read Becky Hersher's
full recommendation »
Advice To Little Girls
“Maile Meloy is one of my favorite adult writers, so I was thrilled in 2011 when she published The Apothecary, a book I could read with my daughters. ...”
Read Justine Kenin's
full recommendation »
The Apprentices
“The only thing better than a great book is an amazing follow-up. This year Erica Perl brings us Aces Wild, which matches the magic of her 2011 novel, ...”
Read Justine Kenin's
full recommendation »
Aces Wild
“Curiosity and creativity collide in this exuberant biography of Albert Einstein. Silent as ...”
Read Lisa Yee's
full recommendation »
On A Beam Of Light: A Story Of Albert Einstein
“After tween music superstar Elvis Ruby freezes onstage, he can't face his fans. So he alters his looks, and changes his name to Aaron, and hides out ...”
Read Lisa Yee's
full recommendation »
Hiding Out At The Pancake Palace
“When a childless young couple discover an abandoned boy on their porch, they open their home and their hearts to him. Though Jacob does not ...”
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full recommendation »
The Boy On The Porch
“The year is 1871, the setting is rural Wisconsin, and the unidentifiable dead body is not Agatha Burkhardt -- or so believes her 13-year-old sister, ...”
Read Lisa Yee's
full recommendation »
One Came Home
“In Counting By 7s, 12-year-old Willow Chance knows that she's odd. Being a genius, she thinks she has everything figured out. However, when her ...”
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full recommendation »
Counting By 7s
“The day comic book aficionado Flora Belle Buckman saves a squirrel from death-by-vacuum cleaner, a new superhero emerges ... and ...”
Read Lisa Yee's
full recommendation »
Flora And Ulysses: The Illuminated Adventures
“Lonely in her sepia-colored room, a young girl breaks through the boredom by ...”
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full recommendation »
Journey
“Mo the monster has a mustache, and he looks marvelous! Soon all the other monsters are sporting mustaches, too. So Mo ...”
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full recommendation »
Mo's Mustache
“Hey, kids! Time to count the monkeys! This turns out to be a little harder than advertised, because ...”
Read Mara Alpert's
full recommendation »
Count The Monkeys
“Nothing says spring like baseball, no matter where you are. This little boy is ...”
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full recommendation »
Take Me Out To The Yakyu
“The Great Plains narrow-mouthed toad sings "BUZZBUZZBUZZ," while in northeastern Australia, the ...”
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full recommendation »
Frog Song
“Meet Elizabeth Blackwell, who was never particularly interested in healing or medicine (she hid herself away when she ...”
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full recommendation »
Who Says Women Can't Be Doctors?: The Story Of Elizabeth Blackwell
“Poor Duck has lost his new blue socks. He searches through his toy box, asks various pals, like Fox (who sits ...”
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full recommendation »
Have You Seen My New Blue Socks?
“The classic nursery rhyme gets an exciting makeover. We all know the ...”
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full recommendation »
This Little Piggy
“A short dog (a dachshund — very short, indeed) looks up — way, way up, at a giraffe so tall you ...”
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full recommendation »
Animal Opposites
“Many children (and grown-ups) dream of being able to leap and twirl and pose with the grace of a trained dancer ... or, ...”
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full recommendation »
Flora And The Flamingo
“Who wouldn't want the opportunity to take a tree from a bare trunk to spring blossoms, to fruitful ...”
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full recommendation »
Tap The Magic Tree
“It should come as no surprise that the truly subversive Jon Scieszka and Mac Barnett are responsible for one of the funniest (and most ...”
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full recommendation »
Battle Bunny
“That's a good question, and the truth is, dinosaurs came in all shapes and sizes. Meet Microraptor, ...”
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full recommendation »
How Big Were Dinosaurs?
“Steve Jenkins has written and gorgeously illustrated more than 30 books about the natural world and shares some 300 of ...”
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full recommendation »
The Animal Book: A Collection Of The Fastest, Fiercest, Toughest, Cleverest, Shyest -- And Most Surprising -- Animals On Earth
“Barbara Kerley presents the natural world to children in this beautifully orchestrated book, which marries really good ...”
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full recommendation »
The World Is Waiting For You
“Billy Miller is a bit of a worrier. He worries that the bump on his head from a vacation accident may make him not smart enough for the ...”
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full recommendation »
The Year Of Billy Miller
“Fuchsia Dunlop's books on Chinese cooking are authentic, accessible and fun to read. Her latest, Every Grain Of Rice, is sort of ...”
Read Brian Boyer's
full recommendation »
Every Grain Of Rice: Simple Chinese Home Cooking
“In the tiny Spanish village of Guzman, there are hill caves dating back to Roman times. And in these caves, the locals built "telling rooms," places ...”
Read Petra Mayer's
full recommendation »
The Telling Room: A Tale Of Love, Betrayal, Revenge, And The World's Greatest Piece Of Cheese