Brett

Twelve miles above the Pacific Ocean, a missile strikes a jumbo passenger jet and leaves the flight crew either crippled or dead. This is the story of how three survivors must achieve the impossible and land the plane. Master storyteller Nelson DeMille and veteran pilot Thomas Block collaborated on Mayday, the most terrifyingly realistic air disaster thriller of all time. Also available abridged.

The year 2021...no human babies have been born for a quarter of a century, not since Year Omega, anywhere in the inhabited world. The very old succumb to despair and suicide; the final generation of the young are beautiful, but violent and cruel. The middle-aged try to sustain normality under the absolute rule of Xan Lyppiatt, the charismatic dictator and Warden of England. Lyppiatt's cousin, Theo Faron, lives a solitary, self-regarding life in this ominous atmosphere.

Why we think it’s a great listen: Some books are meant to be read; others are meant to be heard – Water for Elephants falls into the second group, and is one of the best examples we have of how a powerful performance enhances a great story. Nonagenarian Jacob Jankowski reflects back on his wild and wondrous days with a circus. It's the Depression Era and Jacob, finding himself parentless and penniless, joins the Benzini Brothers Most Spectacular Show on Earth.

Stoner knew. The fiery object hurtling toward the Earth was an alien spacecraft. But the world might never know. He was trapped in an iron cordon of secrecy, for the discovery had shattered the world power balance, setting off a brutal struggle for supremacy that raged from the sacred halls of the Vatican to the corridors of the Kremlin and the Pentagon. The forces of fear and treachery would use any weapon at their command, from mind war to sabotage, to keep the world in darkness.

In late 2003, in his column in Entertainment Weekly, Stephen King called The Memory of Running "the best novel you won't read this year." This glowing endorsement of the audiobook resulted in Ron McLarty receiving a $2 million two-book deal from Viking Penguin. Also, Warner Brothers has shelled out big bucks for the movie rights to The Memory of Running, for which McLarty will write the script.

Pi Patel has been raised in a zoo in India. When his father decides to move the family to Canada and sell the animals to American zoos, everyone boards a Japanese cargo ship. The ship sinks, and 16-year-old Pi finds himself alone on a lifeboat with a hyena, an orangutan, a zebra with a broken leg, and a 450-pound Bengal tiger. Soon it's just Pi, the tiger, and the vast Pacific Ocean - for 227 days. Pi's fear, knowledge, and cunning keep him alive until they reach the coast of Mexico, where the tiger disappears into the jungle.