World Fiction

In this incandescent novel, V.S. Naipaul takes us deeply into the life of one man, an Indian who, uprooted by the bloody tides of Third World history, has come to live in an isolated town at the bend of a great river in a newly independent African nation. Naipaul gives us the most convincing and disturbing vision yet of what happens in a place caught between the dangerously alluring modern world and its own tenacious past and traditions.

Since its debut in 1990, The Wheel of Time by Robert Jordan has captivated millions around the globe with its scope, originality, and compelling characters. In this series companion book, the listener will learn about the exotic beasts used by the Seanchan and hear of the rise and fall of Artur Hawking, and peruse the deeper story of the War of the Shadow. Here is the tale of the founding of the White Tower, and the creation of the Ajahs. The inner workings of the closed country, Shara, are revealed, as is the existence of a hitherto unknown continent, The Land of the Madmen.

In a time when our relationship to the natural world is ruled by the violence and greed of unbridled consumerism, Wendell Berry speaks out in these prescient essays, drawn from his 50-year campaign on behalf of American lands and communities. The writings gathered in The World-Ending Fire are the unique product of a life spent farming the fields of rural Kentucky with mules and horses, and of the rich, intimate knowledge of the land cultivated by this work.

Haunted by vivid nightmares, 17-year-old Clara Blackwell suffers a miserable and downtrodden life in Great Britain. When a simple act of kindness leads her astray, a chance encounter casts her across the dimensional barrier between worlds. Clara is thrust into a captivating realm of vampires and magic that is desperate to tear her apart. Awaking in a mysterious castle under a cosmic sky, she quickly learns that the beauty of this new world is matched only by its immense peril. If word of her arrival spreads, the entire world could erupt into a brutal war over Clara’s fate.

Anna is at a stage of her life when she's beginning to wonder who she really is. She has separated from her husband, her daughter is all grown up, and her mother - the only parent who raised her - is dead. Searching through her mother's belongings one day, Anna finds clues about the African father she never knew. His student diaries chronicle his involvement in radical politics in 1970s London. Anna discovers that he eventually became the president - some would say dictator - of a small nation in West Africa. And he is still alive.

Takumi is a wage slave who works overtime all the time. Only his little Maltese, Leo, can brighten his day. One day, however, he wakes up to find himself deep in an unknown forest. At his side is his pampered pup…who’s now a giant mythical wolf! With his silver fenrir companion and his mysterious new “Herb Cultivation” power, he’ll finally have the laid-back life he’s always dreamed of. Join Takumi and his giant fluffy hound in a carefree romp through this other world fantasy tale!

Chicago private investigator Kira Graceling should have just kept on walking. But her sense of duty refused to let her ignore the moans of pain coming from inside a warehouse just before dawn. Suddenly she finds herself in a world she’s only imagined in her worst nightmares.

Two expanding interstellar powers are about to meet in battle. After the collapse of the Cephalopod Kingdom, Humanity claimed the 300 rebellious worlds it left behind. But light years away on the far side of a disputed region, a rival power has begun to move. They're stealing our planets, one at a time. Earth Command decides to invade the center of the frontier to set up an advanced base. The mission to DARK WORLD is highly classified and deadly. Legion Varus spearheads the effort, and James McGill journeys to the stars again. How many ships do they have? How advanced is their tech?

When an accident kicks Sean Lawrence forward in time, he finds himself square in the apocalyptic end-times. The world is doomed, and he only has a mysterious guidebook, a leather jacket, and a homemade knife to keep him company. He could spend his days grinding low-level mobs, gathering rat pelts, and waiting for a chance to escape. Or he could rise up, slay dragons, and fight against the odds. Faced with a choice between the dead-end life he's been living and the possibility of greatness, Sean has to decide if he's willing to risk his life and more for a chance to save Earth itself.

There's a reason Emmeline Frothingham left her hometown of Creek Water, Missouri, as soon as humanly possible. That reason is small-minded, judgmental people. After graduating from college, Emmie gets her dream job in New York City. As the head buyer at Silver Spoons - a high-end boutique - and single girl about town, her life is ideal. That is, until the night of The Event, her company's annual awards ball at the Metropolitan Museum of Art. Facing the repercussions of her wild night, Emmie is forced to go home to work in her family's business.

Ada Sibelius is raised by David, a single father and head of a computer science lab in Boston. Homeschooled, she accompanies her loving father - brilliant, eccentric, socially inept - to work every day. By 12 she is a painfully shy prodigy. At the same time that the lab begins to gain acclaim, David's mind begins to falter, and his mysterious past comes into question. When her father moves into a nursing home, Ada is taken in by one of David's colleagues. She embarks on a mission to uncover her father's secrets.

At 18, Alexandra Wickham is presented to King George V and Queen Mary in an exquisite white lace and satin dress her mother has ordered from Paris. With her delicate blond looks, she is a stunning beauty who seems destined for a privileged life. But fate, a world war, and her own quietly rebellious personality lead her down a different path. By 1939, Europe is on fire and England is at war. From her home in idyllic Hampshire, Alex makes her way to London as a volunteer in the First Aid Nursing Yeomanry. But she has skills that draw the attention of another branch of the service.

Paralyzed in a workplace accident, Lox's life is looking bleak. He can't even use the cutting-edge hardware that would allow him to play in the full-immersion games that have become so popular. This all changes when he hears from New Universal Frontiers, the company with the best game out there: World of Magic. They offer him the ability to use their hardware despite his injuries, but at a cost...he can never leave the game.

When Isabelle Poole meets Dr. Preston Grind, she's just about out of options. She recently graduated from high school and is pregnant with her art teacher's baby. Her mother is dead, and her father is a drunk. The art teacher is too much of a head case to help raise the child. Izzy knows she can be a good mother, but without any money or prospects she's left searching. So when Dr. Grind offers her a space in The Infinite Family Project, she accepts. Housed in a spacious compound in Tennessee, she joins nine other couples, all with children the same age as her newborn son.

Legendary fashion designer Coco Chanel is revered for her sophisticated style - the iconic little black dress - and famed for her intoxicating perfume Chanel No. 5. Yet behind the public persona is a complicated woman of intrigue, shadowed by mysterious rumors. The Queen of Paris, the new novel from award-winning author Pamela Binnings Ewen, vividly imagines the hidden life of Chanel during the four years of Nazi occupation in Paris in the midst of WWII - as discovered in recently unearthed wartime files.

Two Native American boys have vanished into thin air, leaving a pool of blood behind them. Lieutenant Joe Leaphorn of the Navajo Tribal Police has no choice but to suspect the very worst, since the blood that stains the parched New Mexican ground once flowed through the veins of one of the missing, a young ZuNi. But his investigation into a terrible crime is being complicated by an important archaeological dig and a steel hypodermic needle.

In 1989 Ken Follett astonished the literary world with The Pillars of the Earth, set in 12th-century England. Readers and listeners ever since have hoped for a sequel. At last, here it is. Although the two novels may be listened to in any order, World Without End also takes place in Kingsbridge, two centuries after the townspeople finished building their exquisite Gothic cathedral. The cathedral is again at the center of a web of love and hate, greed and pride, ambition and revenge.

★★★★★ "The most engaging post apocalyptic/dystopian thriller I've ever read!" ★★★★★ "Holy Cow!" No Power. No Telephone. No internet. No T.V. No Transport. Nothing. What will you do when the world as we know it stops? For Kate Wolfe, the answer is simple - whatever it takes to protect her family. For Bob Jackson and his militia, it's the day they've been planning for. The day they take control. When the two collide, as the city of Boise falls to ruin, nobody can predict how things will end. ★★★★★ "I put Murray in the same class as Brad Thor, James Rollins, David...

The marines have seized control of the Japanese airfield on Guadalcanal, but this isn’t the end of their troubles…it’s only the beginning. The Japanese bomb them by day, attack from the forbidding darkness of the jungles by night, and their ships, like hungry sharks, prowl just offshore after the sun goes down. Whoever controls the canal controls the war. The Japanese know this, so they concoct a plan to send men and equipment ashore using fast destroyers—ships that can come by night and leave before the Cactus Airforce or Admiral Fletcher’s carrier planes can stop them.

Brooklyn's Hasidic community of Lubavitchers is turned upside down when family tragedy strikes and everyday life changes forever for Zev Altshul. He is first placed into the care of the closed and close-knit community where he grew up, but soon realizes he can't stay. His saving grace is handball, his gift from God, and the one thing he can rely on as he is shuttled, chased, and abandoned by trusted elders, family, and friends. Even as Zev never fully escapes from the guilt of his choices, he sets course across the United States to discover where loyalty really lies and what it means.