BEA is almost here and that means learning about publishers' hopes and dreams for the seasons ahead. They've selected their important titles and set up events for their authors; this year, we've polled them, but put our own spin on the highlights for the 2011 Expo. Let the games begin.
Ace
Booth 3252, 3255
Those Across the River by Christopher Buehlman. $24.95, ISBN 978-0-441-02067-6; Sept.
A failed academic moves to a small Georgia town, where he plans to write of the horrors that once took place on his family's old plantation, little knowing that a terrible presence still lurks beneath the veneer of Southern charm. This supernatural horror debut is an unusual choice for Ace, which usually focuses on hard science fiction, and may signal an effort to branch out into the popular dark fantasy subgenre; "We have big plans for this book," says publicist Jodi Rosoff.
Algonquin
Booth 4152
When She Woke by Hillary Jordan. $24.95, ISBN 978-1-56512-629-9; Oct.
Jordan follows her Bellweather Prize–winning debut, Mudbound, with a politically charged novel set in a near future where the hottest thing on TV is the reality broadcast of the lives of convicts, or Chromes, whose skin has been colored to reflect their crime. Among them is Hannah, colored red for the murder of her unborn child. Says Algonquin publicity manager Kelly Bowen, "We plan to build upon the amazing success of Mudbound with Jordan's new book, which is equally stunning and establishes Jordan as a political writer."
Running the Rift by Naomi Benaron. $24.95, ISBN 978-1-61620-042-8; Jan.
Benaron won the 2010 Bellweather Prize for this novel, her first, about the Rwandan genocide, following the fortunes of a Tutsi Olympic contender who, torn in two directions—by a brother who fights for the rebel forces and a Hutu coach who secretly trains militia—must eventually run for his life, leaving behind the woman and the country he loves.
Until the Next Time by Kevin Fox. $24.95, ISBN 978-1-56512-993-1; Feb.
Algonquin's heavily behind this debut novel by TV writer Fox (Lie to Me), a love story–cum–mystery–cum–suspense novel steeped in Irishness that the indie powerhouse is comparing to The Time Traveler's Wife. The story follows a 21-year-old whose investigation into a family secret takes him from New York to Ireland and deep into himself. No word if there's a Jameson's sponsorship deal.
Baen
Booth 3653
1636: The Saxon Uprising by Eric Flint. $25, ISBN 978-1-4391-3425-2; Apr.
Flint's bestselling Ring of Fire alternate history continues with this mammoth volume, in which the West Virginia town of Grantville, torn from the 20th century and hurled back into 17th-century Europe, has allied with Gustavus Adolphus, king of Sweden, and the United States of Europe. While Gustavus invades Poland, he sends some of the time-lost Americans to sort out a burgeoning revolution in Saxony, but things don't go quite as planned on either front. Flint will be at BEA signing.
Ballantine
Booth 4420
The Language of Flowers by Vanessa Diffenbaugh. $25, ISBN 978-0-345-52554-3; Sept.
The story of a woman whose gift for flowers helps her change the lives of others as she struggles to overcome her own past was acquired in a fiercely fought auction that sparked heated auctions all over the world, with rights now sold in 25 countries. A major theme in this debut novel is the Victorian language of flowers, in which every flower corresponds to a specific meaning; a dictionary with nearly 300 definitions is included in the book.
Vanessa Diffenbaugh will be participating in the Library Journal Breakfast on Tuesday, May 24. She will also be doing a signing in the Random booth on Tuesday, May 24, at 10 a.m.
Bloomsbury
Booth 3358
What I Hate: From A to Z by Roz Chast. $15, ISBN 978-1-60819-689-0; Oct.
This book of epic horrors and daily unpleasantries from New Yorker cartoonist Chast, includes abduction, rabies, tunnels, and the triple-layered terror of Jell-O 1-2-3. With never-before-published, full-page cartoons for every letter and supplemental text delineating her heart's full hatred, Chast's alphabetical compendium should resonate with anyone sharing her healthy distastes and disinclinations.
A More Perfect Heaven by Dava Sobel. $24, ISBN 978-0-8027-1793-1; Sept.
This time out, the bestselling author of Longitude and Galileo's Daughter tells the story of Nicolaus Copernicus and the revolution he inspired. At the heart of the book is Sobel's play, And the Sun Stood Still, imagining Rheticus's struggle to convince Copernicus to let his manuscript see the light of day.
Chizine Publications
Booth 4838
The Fecund's Melancholy Daughter by Brent Hayward. $15.95 trade paper, ISBN 978-1-926851-13-6; June.
In the last days of a dying city, the decadent chatelaine chooses a forbidden lover, separating twin outcasts and setting them on independent trajectories that might finally bring down the palace. Then a lone god reappears and a limbless prophet delivers a message for all: beyond the city, something ancient and monumental has come awake. PW's starred review calls the novel "ambitious... beautifully written and morally ambivalent."
Counterpoint
Booth 4617
Apricot Jam and Other Stories by Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn. $28, ISBN 978-1-58243-602-9; Sept.
Short fiction from the late Solzhenitsyn—author of The Gulag Archipelago, Nobel laureate, famous anticommunist, and Soviet exile—available for the first time in English.
Crown
Booth 4127
In the Garden of Beasts by Erik Larson. $26, ISBN 978-0-307-40884-6; May.
Larson, whose Devil in the White City has sold more than a million copies, may have another serious success with his latest slice of history. Set in 1933 Berlin, the story of Ambassador William E. Dodd and his family's year in Hitler's Germany has all the elements of a first-rate thriller. To be featured at the May 26 breakfast, the book is already gathering starred reviews; PW's called it "a vivid, atmospheric panorama of the Third Reich and its leaders."
Ready Player One by Ernest Cline. $24, ISBN 978-0-307-8873-6; Aug.
Bought for a reported $500,000, with film rights sold and foreign rights to 14 countries so far, this debut "geek" novel is a cyber adventure billed as "part thriller, part love story, and part high-stakes quest through a virtual world with a teenage boy to set it all in motion." According to PW, "The science fiction, video game, technology, and geeky musical references pile up quickly, sometimes a bit much so, but sweet, self-deprecating Wade, whose universe is an odd mix of the real past and the virtual present, is the perfect lovable/unlikely hero." 5,000 galley giveaways.
Del Rey
Booth 4617
Dearly, Departed by Lia Habel. $16.99 trade paper, ISBN 978-0-345-52331-0; Oct.
Habel debuts with a steampunk romance between an upper-class teenager and a young army lieutenant infected with a disease that will slowly turn him into a zombie.
Doubleday
Booth 4617
Night Circus by Erin Morgenstern. $26.95, ISBN 978-0-385-53464; Sept.
Morgenstern's debut novel offers 19th-century magicians, star-crossed lovers, and a most unusual circus.
Zone One by Colson Whitehead. $25.95, ISBN 978-0-385-52807-8; Oct.
Whitehead takes a whack at zombies in this postapocalyptic horror novel set in Manhattan.
Ecco
Booth 3338, 3339
The Lost Memory of Skin by Russell Banks. $25.99, ISBN 978-0-06-185763-8; Sept.
We know that Banks can write relationships between men (think Affliction). In this novel, the men are back: a homeless young man living under a South Florida causeway, just out of prison for an encounter with an underage girl, and the university sociologist who thinks the young man would be perfect for a study of recidivism. Banks will sign galleys at the Harper booth.
Europa
Booth 3441
You Deserve Nothing by Alexander Maksik. $15 trade paper, ISBN 978-1-60945-048-9; Sept.
Europa launches its new imprint, Tonga, overseen by Alice Sebold, with this debut novel that was a highlight at Frankfurt, featuring an American in Paris: the story of a young teacher at an international high school set during the early years of the Iraq War. Galleys signed at the Europa booth.
Everything Happens Today by Jesse Browner. $15 trade paper, ISBN 978-1-60945-051-9; Oct.
One day in the life of 17-year-old Wes, a student at New York's Dalton School, which just happens to be the day after he's lost his virginity. Expected to have crossover appeal, Europa's touting it as "a classic story of family (with some really excellent food writing woven throughout)." Galleys signed at the booth.
Farrar, Straus and Giroux
Booth 3352
The Marriage Plot by Jeffrey Eugenides. $28, ISBN 978-0-374-20305-4; Oct.
Pulitzer Prize–winning Eugenides (Middlesex, 2003) is back with a novel about the glories and vicissitudes of young love. Chances are good that Eugenides will display his usual wit, and FSG is calling this one "a story so contemporary that it could very well read like an intimate journal of our own lives." Eugenides will be on the Book & Author BEA breakfast panel on Wednesday, May 25.
The Chairs Are Where the People Go: How to Live, Work, and Play in the City by Misha Glouberman and Sheila Heti. Faber and Faber. $14 trade paper, ISBN 978-0-86547-945-6; July
In short chapters, Glouberman and Heti tell us what he has learned about life, tackling the most trivial of questions alongside more important ones and revealing that they have more in common than you think. From conflict resolution in the Middle East to loud music in rowdy neighborhoods, "this could well be a guidebook for the times we live in."
Free Press
Booth 3652, 3653
The Magic of Reality: How We Know What's Really True by Richard Dawkins, illus. by Dave McKean. $29.99, ISBN 978-1-4391-9281-8; Oct.
Dawkins (The God Delusion) teams up with McKean (Coraline) to write a graphic science book examining some of nature's most fundamental questions from both mythical and scientific perspectives.
The 3rd Alternative: Solving Life's Most Difficult Problems by Stephen R. Covey. $28, ISBN 978-1-4423-4408-2; Oct.
From the bestselling author of The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People comes a guide to resolving conflict; "rather than agreeing to either "your" way or "my" way, the third alternative paves the way for creative problem solving."
Forge
Booth 3352
Emory's Gift by W. Bruce Cameron. $22.99, ISBN 978-0-7653-2781-9; Sept.
A Dog's Purpose spent 19 weeks on the New York Times bestsellers' lists, so there's high expectations for Cameron's return with this story of a 13-year-old boy who overcomes sadness and isolation after his mother dies, thanks to a grizzly bear: "an endearing, profound, and sometimes hilarious look at one boy's discovery of what really matters in life." 250 galley giveaways at the booth.
Angel by Nicole "Coco" Marrow. $14.99, ISBN 978-0-7653-3023-9; Sept.
Rapper and Law & Order star Tracy Marrow, better known as Ice-T, brings his street cred to a thriller about a crime boss who returns to New York City after 20 years in Attica, seeking revenge and a return to power. Ice-T's wife, actor and model Nicole "Coco" Marrow, features a sexy shape-shifting protagonist who survives a plane crash and has a shocking secret, in her novel.
Both having penned debut novels, Ice-T and Coco are set to appear together at Table 12 for a ticketed autographing.
Gallery Books
Booth 3652, 3653
The Taker by Alma Katsu. $25, ISBN 978-1-4391-9705-9; Sept.
A young woman is admitted to a hospital in rural Maine and proceeds to slice herself open with a scalpel—only for the wound to immediately heal in this debut novel that begins at the turn of the 19th century and continues into the 21st, billed as "part historical novel, part supernatural page-turner."
Grand Central
Booth 3620, 3621
Life Itself: A Memoir by Roger Ebert. $27.99, ISBN 978-0-446-58497-5; Sept.
The first film critic ever to win a Pulitzer Prize, Ebert has been a fixture on television for more than 30 years, co-hosting Siskel & Ebert at the Movies until Gene Siskel's death in 1999, and then with Richard Roper until 2006, when complications from thyroid cancer treatment resulted in the loss of his ability to eat, drink, or speak. Here he tells the full story of his life and career: his loves, losses, and obsessions; his recovery from alcoholism, his politics, and his spiritual beliefs. Ebert will be a breakfast speaker on Thursday, May 26.
Seriously... I'm Kidding by Ellen DeGeneres. $26.99, ISBN 978-0-446-58502-6, Oct.
The much-loved and hilarious entertainer riffs on many of her favorite topics—from hosting a talk show to what makes her happy.
DeGeneres will be appearing at the Thursday breakfast via recorded video.
Untitled by Shaquille O'Neal with Jackie MacMullan. $27.99, ISBN 978-1-4555-0441-1; Nov.
Shaq, famous for his engaging and sometimes provocative personality, has written, with Jackie MacMullan, this autobiography about his career. MacMullan's last book, When the Game Was Ours (Houghton, Mifflin, 2009), by Magic Johnson and Larry Bird, hit the New York Times bestseller list, selling 170,000 hardcover copies.
Graywolf
Booth 3581
Assumption by Percival Everett. $15 trade paper, ISBN 978-1-55597-598-2, Nov.
The sheriff of a small New Mexico town is investigating an elderly woman's murder—when he discovers his are the only footprints leading up to and away from her front door. Graywolf's director and publisher, Fiona McCrae says, "This is vintage Everett: brilliantly writing about race without writing about race."
The Convert: A Tale of Exile and Extremism by Deborah Baker. $23, ISBN 978-1-55597-582-1, May.
Margaret Marcus was a secular Jew who became enthralled with Islam and moved to Pakistan in 1962, adopting the name Maryam Jameelah. Baker delves into the archives and finds that Jameelah's denunciations of the U.S. and Israel might have influenced al-Qaeda and the Taliban today. From PW's starred review: "a stellar biography that doubles as a meditation on the fraught relationship between America and the Muslim world."
One Day I Will Write About This Place by Binyavanga Wainaina. $24, ISBN 978-1-55597-591-3, Aug.
The 2002 Caine Prize winner for African Writing offers a globe-trotting memoir and consideration of politics, literature, and belonging.
Grove Press
Booth 4621
I Married You for Happiness by Lily Tuck. $24, ISBN 978-0-8021-1991-9; Sept.
Tuck's first novel (and her first with Grove) since winning the National Book Award for the beautiful and graceful News from Paraguay, unfolds over a single night as a widow grieves her late mathematician husband and remembers their long life together.
Turn of Mind by Alice LaPlante. $24, ISBN 978-0-8021-1977-3; July.
This was one of the three talked about books from Winter Institute and is Grove's big summer book. When Dr. Jennifer White's best friend, Amanda, is murdered, Jennifer is the prime suspect. To complicate matters, Jennifer suffers from dementia and can't say for sure whether she did or didn't kill her friend. LaPlante will be doing an author signing at BEA on Tuesday, May 24.
Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
Booth 3438
We the Animals by Justin Torres. $21, ISBN 978-0-547-57672-5; Sept.
A debut literary novel about three brothers coming-of-age in upstate New York in a volatile, passionate family, by a Stegner Fellow, who, according to the publisher, survived his own difficult family. The book has bestseller written all over it (as well as a Michael Cunningham blurb). Selected for the Buzz Panel, Torres will be signing "piles" of galleys.
The Prague Cemetery by Umberto Eco. $28, ISBN 978-0-547-57753-1; Nov.
A lead fall title sure to generate gossip under the blowup poster at the HMH booth, Eco's new novel connects the world of conspiracies to a single evil genius in 19th-century Europe who set modern history on its terrifying path. A bestseller in France and Spain, the book has sold in 40 countries.
The Exegesis of Philip K. Dick, edited by Jonathan Lethem and Pamela Jackson. $40, ISBN 978-0-547-54925-5; Nov.
Writers leave voluminous pages behind and Dick was no exception. So how do you promote a book without an author? There will be flip-cam interviews with fans in HMH's booth and a giveaway with excerpt and postcards of backlist covers. Taken from Dick's mostly handwritten journals, this largely unpublished first of two volumes is a "great and calamitous sequence of arguments with the universe," according to Lethem, who'll tour with the book along with Dick's daughters.
Harlequin
Booth 4638, 4639, 4738
The Kingdom of Childhood by Rebecca Coleman. $15.95 trade paper, ISBN 978-0-7783-1278-9; Oct.
Sixteen-year-old Zach Patterson, uprooted after his mother's extramarital affair breaks up the family, is thrown together with Judy McFarland, a kindergarten teacher whose own family is unraveling, to organize a fund-raiser. Bonded by loneliness, they begin an affair that eventually corrupts them both. PW calls it "dark, fast-moving, and, for the most part, nicely creepy with a solid noirish vibe."
Until There Was You by Kristan Higgins. $7.99 mass market, ISBN 978-0-373-77611-5; Nov.
Divorce attorney Harper James is forced to make a cross-country road trip with her ex-hubby Nick, testing the patience and resolve of her new fiancé back home, who knows that for Nick, Harper has always been the one.
HarperCollins
Booth 3338, 3339
The Lantern by Deborah Lawrenson. $25.99, ISBN 978-0-06-204969-8; Sept.
There will be hundreds of galleys for booksellers of this gothic, which takes place in a crumbling house in the south of France complete with romances, disappearances, and bumps in the night. Lawrenson, a British author, actually has a crumbling house in the south of France and five previous novels; this is her first published in the U.S.
State of Wonder by Ann Patchett. $26.99, ISBN 978-0-06-204980-3; June.
The mistress is back with a wondrous Amazonian adventure set deep in the impenetrable, magically described jungles of Ecuador featuring the two best women protagonists since Thelma and Louise (minus the convertible; with men incidental) on "a juggernaut of a trip to the crossroads of science, ethics, and commerce that readers will hate to see end," according to PW's starred review.
Knopf
Booth 4617
Last Man in Tower by Aravind Adiga. $26.95, ISBN 978-0-307-59409-9; Sept.
The first novel from Man Booker–winner Adiga since the incendiary White Tiger pits a real estate developer against a retired schoolteacher, who's the only person in his ramshackle Mumbai apartment complex to refuse a buyout offer. Adiga's proven himself to be a sharp observer with no illusions about how power, wealth, and class can easily become a combustible mix; expect big things.
Girls in White Dresses by Jennifer Close. $24.95, ISBN 978-0-307-59685-7; Aug.
Knopf's big debut novel for the season follows three young women weathering that grim phase when it seems everyone you know is getting married, and you're still single and slogging to work at a job you hate.
Little, Brown
Booth 3627
The Art of Fielding by Chad Harbach. $25.99, ISBN 978-0-316-12669-4; Sept.
The debut novel from n+1 editor Harbach was bought by Little, Brown in a heated auction. It's a story of the upper Midwest, baseball, and five lives on a collision course. Harbach's contemporaries—Benjamin Kunkel, Keith Gessen—have had buzzy books, but mixed luck in the sales department. Maybe this can break the curse of the hyped young literary man.
Kill Alex Cross by James Patterson. $28.99, ISBN 978-0-316-19873-8; Nov.
The president's son and daughter are abducted; Washington, D.C.'s water supply is contaminated; and the U.S. might be facing its deadliest attack ever in this latest from the premier brand in mega-super-bestest-selling suspense fiction. Big galley giveaway.
Minotaur
Booth 3352
Back of Beyond by C.J. Box. $25.99, ISBN 978-0-312-36574-5; Aug.
Box, the author of the Edgar Award–winning Joe Pickett series, introduces a new cop hero, Cody Hoyt, who pursues a killer through the remotest parts of Yellowstone Park.
Operation Napoleon by Arnaldur Indridason. $24.99, ISBN 978-0-312-65910-3; Oct.
The crash of a German bomber into a glacier in Iceland in 1945 has serious political repercussions in the U.S. decades later in this stand-alone thriller from Icelandic author Indridason.
William Morrow
Booth 3338, 3339
Following Atticus by Tom Ryan. $25.95, ISBN 978-0-06-199710-5; Sept.
Set against the backdrop of New Hampshire's White Mountains, a little dog and a middle-aged, overweight newspaper editor with a paralyzing fear of heights in the mountains in winter provide "an epic adventure."
Graveminder by Melissa Marr. $22.99, ISBN 978-0-06-182687-0; May.
YA bestseller Marr (the Wicked Lovely series) goes for full-on creepy in her first book for adults. Returning home to Claysville for her grandmother's funeral, 23-year-old Rebekkah Barrow must take up the old woman's duties and make sure the deceased stay in their graves. From the PW review: "Not everything adds up in Marr's story, but the well-drawn characters and their dramatic interactions keep the tale loose and lively."
W.W. Norton
Booth 3424, 3425, 3524
The Forgotten Waltz by Anne Enright. $25.95, ISBN 978-0-393-07255-6; Oct.
Bestselling author Enright, who won the Booker Prize for The Gathering, presents a suburban Dubliner who recalls the trail of lust and happenstance that brought her to fall for a married man. Enright will be a breakfast speaker on Thursday, May 26.
Boomerang: Travels in the New Third World by Michael Lewis. $27.95, ISBN 978-0-393-08181-7; Oct.
The author of The Big Short, The Blind Side, Moneyball, and other bestsellers investigates bubbles beyond our shores—tracking the wave of cheap credit that rolled across the planet between 2002 and 2008.
Other Press
Booth 4421
Lamb by Bonnie Nadzam. $15.95 trade paper, ISBN 978-1-59051-437-5; Sept.
Other Press has been garnering attention and prizes with its very good taste, and this debut novel about a divorced middle-aged man with the best intentions who takes a lonely 11-year-old girl for a trip to the American West has suspense and a hint of Nabokov. There'll be galleys and a signing.
Calling Mr. King by Ronald De Feo. $14.95 trade paper ISBN 978-1-59051-475-7; Aug.
De Feo's debut novel features an American hit man in Europe who discovers art and architecture (not exactly an interest important to his career) while facing a difficult professional assignment and thinking that maybe it's time for a change. PW's forthcoming review cites De Feo's talent for "creating a remorseless psychopath you'd enjoy spending time with."
Pantheon
Booth 4617
Habibi by Craig Thompson, $29.95, ISBN 978-0-375-42414-4, Sept.
This much anticipated graphic novel tells the tale of Dodola and Zam, refugee child slaves bound together by chance, circumstance, and love. Thompson will be on a BEA panel; on Tuesday, May 24, he will be at the ALA breakfast and will sign at Random's booth at noon; there will be a giveaway.
Metamaus: A Look Inside a Modern Classic, Maus, by Art Spiegelman. $29.95, ISBN 978-0-375-42394-9; Oct.
On the 25th anniversary of his classic graphic novel Maus, Spiegelman re-enters the tale of his father's experience during the Holocaust, which has been haunting him since Maus's publication.
Pyr
Booth 4566
The Rift Walker by Clay Griffith & Susan Griffith. $16 trade paper, ISBN 978-1-61614-523-1; Sept.
The Griffiths follow The Greyfriar with another tale combining epic fantasy and steampunk. British vampires threaten the allied Equatorian Empire and American Republic, which respond with a plan of genocidal scale. PW called the first book "a tale of derring-do and star-crossed romance."
Random House
Booth 4617
Then Again by Diane Keaton. $26, ISBN 978-1-4000-6878-4; Nov.
The real Annie Hall finally lets us into her personal life—and the relationship that made her success possible (hint: it wasn't Warren or Woody). Keaton's a speaker at the Wednesday, May 25, BEA breakfast.
Nightwoods by Charles Frazier. $26, ISBN 978-1-4000-6709-1; Oct.
The Cold Mountain bestselling author returns with a novel set in small town North Carolina in the early 1960s. Frazier's publisher praises the book's "taut narrative" and the author's "virtuosic storytelling, and insights into human nature." Frazier will sign in the Random booth on Tuesday, May 24, at 10 a.m.
Rich Dad
Booth RC63
Midas Touch by Donald J. Trump and Robert T. Kiyosaki. $24.95, ISBN 978-1-61268-095-8; Oct.
Kiyosaki and Trump's first collaboration debuted at #1 on the New York Times bestseller list. Now they team up again with a look at the famous golden touch ("part intuition, part experience, part education") that true entrepreneurs possess. The authors promise to show readers how to "learn to see opportunities where others see obstacles, promise where others see problems."
It's Rising Time!: What It Really Takes to Reach Your Financial Dreams by Kim Kiyosaki. $16.95 trade paper, ISBN 978-1-61268-085-9; Nov.
The international bestselling author of Rich Woman (and wife of Robert), Kiyosaki returns with a book that will "help women to assess the risks inherent in their decisions and bolster their courage to choose the right path to their dreams."
Rowman & Littlefield
Booth 3604
Wine Wars: The Curse of the Blue Nun, the Miracle of Two Buck Chuck, and the Revenge of the Terroirists by Mike Veseth. $24.95, ISBN 978-0-7425-6819-8; June.
Veseth examines "the battle for the future, even the soul, of wine, with a lively look at the wine business today. PW calls it "by turns fascinating and frustrating.... While Veseth's analysis is provocative, he often takes a tone that is all too clever."
Hesitation Kills: A Female Marine Officer's Combat Experience in Iraq by Jane Blair. $24.95, ISBN 978-1-4422-0876-6; June.
"This riveting memoir is the first book written by a female Marine about the war in Iraq and one of the only books written by a woman who has experienced combat firsthand," claims the publisher.
St. Martin's
Booth 3352
The Leftovers by Tom Perrotta. $25.99, ISBN 978-0-312-35834-1; Aug.
The bestselling author of Little Children poses a question in his new novel—how would average men and women react if permanently separated from their loved ones—in an exploration that may remind some readers of what Margaret Atwood tackled in A Handmaid's Tale, or Kazuo Ishiguro in Never Let Me Go.
Across Many Mountains by Yangzom Brauen. $25.99, ISBN 978-0-312-60013-6; Sept.
"An extraordinary portrait" of three generations of Tibetan women—grandmother, mother, and granddaughter—whose lives are forever changed when Chairman Mao's Red Army crushes Tibetan independence, sending a young mother and her six-year-old daughter on a treacherous journey toward freedom.
Scribner
Booth 3653
The Dovekeepers by Alice Hoffman. $27.99, ISBN 978-1-4516-1747-4; Oct.
"The Dovekeepers is Alice Hoffman's Beloved," says S&S marketing director Wendy Sheanin. The story is based on the true events of Masada, when 900 Jews held out against the Romans for nearly two years.
The Visible Man by Chuck Klosterman. $25, ISBN 978-1-4391-8446-2; Oct.
New York Times bestselling author and cultural commentator Klosterman (Fargo Rock City) returns to fiction with an unlikely story about a therapist and her unusual patient, a man who can render himself invisible.
Simon & Schuster
Booth 3653
Feast Day of Fools by James Lee Burke. $26.99, ISBN 978-1-4516-4311-4; Sept.
Burke checks back in on sheriff Hackberry Holland as violence along the U.S.-Mexican border rages and notorious villain Preacher Jack Collins makes a comeback. Galleys available.
Rin Tin Tin: The Life and the Legend by Susan Orlean. $26.99, ISBN 978-1-4391-9013-5; Oct.
Orchid Thief Orlean trains her studious attentions on the world's first celebrity pooch, crafting a narrative history of a four-legged American icon born in the trenches of WWI France. Orlean will be signing galleys in the S&S booth on Wednesday, May 25, at 2 p.m.
Skyhorse
Booth 3427
The Last Word: My Indictment of the CIA in the Assassination of JFK by Mark Lane, intro. by Robert K. Tanenbaum. $24.95, ISBN 978-1-61608-428-8; Nov.
Lane, the New York Times bestselling author of Plausible Denial, returns to the subject that has occupied him for years. It's "the last word on the JFK assassination."
Lombardi and Landry: How Two of Football's Greatest Coaches Launched Their Legends and Changed the Game Forever by Ernie Palladino. $24.95, ISBN 978-1-61608-441-7; Sept.
In his first book, veteran sports journalist Palladino takes an in-depth look at the years that legendary football coaches Vince Lombardi and Tom Landry spent as young assistants with the New York Giants.
Sourcebooks
Booth 4356
The Virtuoso by Grace Burrowes. $6.99 mass market, ISBN 978-1-4022-4570-1; Nov.
Burrowes follows The Heir and The Soldier with a Regency romance starring a gifted musician who would rather spend hours at a piano than touch a woman, no matter how much his father, a duke, urges him to wed. PW called the previous books "luminous and graceful" and "captivating" in back-to-back starred reviews, and named The Heir one of the best books of 2010.
Spiegel & Grau
Booth 4420
Next to Love by Ellen Feldman. $25, ISBN 978-0-8129-9271-7; July.
A moving multigenerational novel that follows the lives of three young women and their men during WWII. Its publisher is calling it "powerful, moody, and marvelously ambitious." Feldman will be signing in the Random booth on Thursday, May 26, at 10:30 a.m.
Sterling
Meeting Room 1B02
I Can Make You Happy by Paul Mc-Kenna. $22.95, ISBN 978-1-4027-7909-1; Sept.
In his fifth book (I Can Make You Thin, etc.), McKenna shows that scientific research reveals that our levels of happiness aren't fixed: we can change them through our thoughts and actions. "Dr. McKenna has spent the past 25 years developing a system that will have an immediate, measurable impact on people's emotional well-being," per the publisher.
Beekman 1802 Heirloom Cookbook by Josh Kilmer-Purcell and Brent Ridge. $25, ISBN 978-1-4027-8709-6; Oct.
Stars of the hit show The Fabulous Beekman Boys (Planet Green TV), Josh and Brent have built a worldwide reputation for their goat's milk soaps and artisanal Blaak cheese. Together, they have created a cookbook that is "heirloom" in every sense of the word: heirloom fruits and vegetables, heirloom recipes, and a section in the back of each chapter where you can add your own "heirloom" recipes—and create a "unique keepsake to hand down to your family."
Cell 8 by Anders Roslund and Börge Hellström. $24.95, ISBN 978-1-4027-8715-7; Jan. 2012
A dead man walking; a drunken brawl on a cheap weekend cruise in the Baltic sea; a man without identity: detective Ewert Grens and his colleagues have a long way to go to solve the puzzle in front of them. In their third crime novel, Roslund and Hellström offer a look into the worst possible consequences of the death penalty, with repercussions that reach from death row in Utah to the Stockholm Police Headquarters
Tor
Booth 3352
Laddertop, Vol. 1, by Orson Scott Card and Emily Janice Card, illus. by Honoel A. Ibardolaza. $9.99 trade paper, ISBN 978-0-7653-2461-0; Oct.
Orson Scott Card and his daughter, a voice actor and audiobook reader, team up for their first science fiction manga series. Tiny aliens built four space stations, gave them to Earth, and then disappeared. Two 11-year-old girls hope to enter Laddertop Academy and be selected as crews for the stations, which only children can fit into. The elder Card's Hugo-winning novel Ender's Game has a similar theme of highly trained children going into space.