books tagged “Fiction” (fiction)

books tagged “Fiction”

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Against Nature
by J.K. Huysmans, Margaret Mauldon, Nicholas White

ISBN 0192823671 (0-19-282367-1)
Softcover, Oxford Univ Pr

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Book summary:
Resisting the traditional model of nineteenth-century fiction, Joris-Karl Huysman produced in 1884 a novel unlike any other of his time. Against Nature is the story of Des Esseintes, an aesthete who attempts to escape Paris and, along with it, the vulgarity of modern life. As Des Esseintes hides away in his museum of high taste, Huysman offers the reader a treasury of cultural delights and anticipates many aspects of twentieth century modernism. Supplemented by notes and a critical introduction, this new translation is sure to engage today's reader. [via]
More editions of Against Nature:
- Against Nature: ISBN 0192823671 (0-19-282367-1)
  Softcover, Oxford Univ Pr
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Against the Grain: (A Rebours
by Joris Karl Huysmans

ISBN 0486221903 (0-486-22190-3)
Softcover, Dover Pubns

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Book summary:
Because of his extreme sensitivity to the absurd and grotesque in human affairs, the protagonist of this masterpiece of decadence has estranged himself from society and savors the most bizarre aspects of human existence in his quest for novelty. This landmark novel is filled with weird images and biting wit. Introduction by Havelock Ellis.
[via]
More editions of Against the Grain: (A Rebours:
- Against the Grain: (A Rebours: ISBN 0486221903 (0-486-22190-3)
  Softcover, Dover Pubns
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Alaska
by James A. Michener

ISBN 037576142X (0-375-76142-X)
Softcover, Random House Inc

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Book summary:
The high points in the story of Alaska since the American acquisition are brought vividly to life through more than 100 characters, real and fictional. [via]
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Archangel
by Robert Harris

ISBN 0515127485 (0-515-12748-5)
Softcover, Berkley Pub Group

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More editions of Archangel:
- Archangel: ISBN 0679428887 (0-679-42888-7)
  Hardcover, Random House Publishing Group
- Archangel: ISBN 0515127485 (0-515-12748-5)
  Softcover, Berkley Pub Group
Beauty's Punishment
by A.N. Roquelaure

ISBN 0525480927 (0-525-48092-7)
Softcover, Dutton

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More editions of Beauty's Punishment:
- Beauty's Punishment: ISBN 0525242619 (0-525-24261-9)
  Hardcover, Dutton
- Beauty's Punishment: ISBN 0525480927 (0-525-48092-7)
  Softcover, Dutton
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Beauty's Punishment
by Anne Rice, A.N. Roquelaure

ISBN 0452281431 (0-452-28143-1)
Softcover, Penguin Group USA

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Book summary:
The delicious and erotically charged sequel to The Claiming of Sleeping Beauty

This sequel to The Claiming of Sleeping Beauty, the first of Anne Rice's (writing as A.N. Roquelaure) elegantly written volumes of erotica, continues her explicit, teasing exploration of the psychology of human desire. Now Beauty, having indulged in a secret and forbidden infatuation with the rebellious slave Prince Tristan, is sent away from the Satyricon-like world of the Castle. Sold at auction, she will soon experience the tantalizing punishments of "the village," as her education in love, cruelty, dominance, submission, and tenderness is turned over to the brazenly handsome Captain of the Guard. And once again Rice's fabulous tale of pleasure and pain dares to explore the most primal and well-hidden desires of the human heart. Preceding the visceral eroticism of E.L. James Fifty Shades of Grey and Sylvia Day's Bared to You, and even more haunting than her own novel Belinda, this second installment is not to be missed.
[via]
More editions of Beauty's Punishment:
- Beauty's Punishment: ISBN 0452281431 (0-452-28143-1)
  Softcover, Penguin Group USA
Beauty's Punishment
by Rice Anne

ISBN 0452266629 (0-452-26662-9)
Softcover, Penguin USA

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More editions of Beauty's Punishment:
- Beauty's Punishment: ISBN 0452266629 (0-452-26662-9)
  Softcover, Penguin USA
Bonjour Tristesse
by Francoise Sagan

ISBN 0525480404 (0-525-48040-4)
Softcover, Penguin Group USA

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- Bonjour Tristesse: ISBN 0525480404 (0-525-48040-4)
  Softcover, Penguin Group USA
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The Broom of the System
by David Foster Wallace

ISBN 0380719916 (0-380-71991-6)
Softcover, HarperCollins Publishers

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Book summary:
Published when Wallace was just twenty-four years old, The Broom of the System stunned critics and marked the emergence of an extraordinary new talent. At the center of this outlandishly funny, fiercely intelligent novel is the bewitching heroine, Lenore Stonecipher Beadsman. The year is 1990 and the place is a slightly altered Cleveland, Ohio. Lenores great-grandmother has disappeared with twenty-five other inmates of the Shaker Heights Nursing Home. Her beau, and boss, Rick Vigorous, is insanely jealous, and her cockatiel, Vlad the Impaler, has suddenly started spouting a mixture of psycho-babble, Auden, and the King James Bible. Ingenious and entertaining, this debut from one of the most innovative writers of his generation brilliantly explores the paradoxes of language, storytelling, and reality.

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C Is for Corpse
by Sue Grafton

ISBN 0312939019 (0-312-93901-9)
Softcover, St Martins Pr

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Book summary:
Kinsey meets him in the local gym. Bobby Callahan is a scarred young man struggling back to life after a car forced his Porsche over the edge of a canyon, battering his body and muddling his memory. All he remembers is that someone, for some reason, tried to kill him. Desperate for clues about his own past life and certain he is being stalked, he asks Kinsey to protect him. Kinsey can't resist the brave kid - and neither can the killers. Three days late Bobby is dead. Kinsey Millhone never welshed on a deal. She'd been hired to stop a killing. Now she'd find the killer.

From the Paperback edition. [via]
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The Cave
by Jose Saramago, Margaret Jull Costa

ISBN 0156028794 (0-15-602879-4)
Softcover, Harvest Books

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Book summary:
José Saramago is a master at pacing. Readers unfamiliar with the work of this Portuguese Nobel Prize winner would do well to begin with The Cave, a novel of ideas, shaded with suspense. Spare and pensive, The Cave follows the fortunes of an aging potter, Cipriano Algor, beginning with his weekly delivery of plates to the Center, a high-walled, windowless shopping complex, residential community, and nerve center that dominates the region. What sells at the Center will sell everywhere else, and what the Center rejects can barely be given away in the surrounding towns and villages. The news for Cipriano that morning isn't good. Half of his regular pottery shipment is rejected, and he is told that the consumers now prefer plastic tableware. Over the next week, he and his grown daughter Marta grieve for their lost craft, but they gradually open their eyes to the strange bounty of their new condition: a stray dog adopts them, and a lovely widow enters Cipriano's life. When they are invited to live at the Center, it seems ungracious to refuse, but there are strange developments under the complex and a troubling increase in security, and Cipriano changes all their fates by deciding to investigate. In Saramago's able hands, what might have become a dry social allegory is a delicately elaborated story of individualism and unexpected love. --Regina Marler [via]
More editions of The Cave:
- The Cave: ISBN 0151004145 (0-15-100414-5)
  Hardcover, Harcourt
- The Cave: ISBN 0156028794 (0-15-602879-4)
  Softcover, Harvest Books
A Certain Justice
by P. D. James

ISBN 0345425324 (0-345-42532-4)
Softcover, Ballantine Books

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Book summary:
It begins, dramatically enough, with a trial for murder. The distinguished criminal lawyer Venetia Aldridge is defending Garry Ashe on charges of having brutally killed his aunt. For Aldridge the trial is mainly a test of her courtroom skills, one more opportunity to succeed--and she does. But now murder is in the air. The next victim will be Aldridge herself, stabbed to death at her desk in her Chambers in the Middle Temple, a bloodstained wig on her head. Enter Commander Adam Dalgliesh and his team, whose struggle to investigate and understand the shocking events cannot halt the spiral into more horrors, more murders...

A Certain Justice is P.D. James at her strongest. In her first foray into the strange closed world of the Law Courts and the London legal community, she has created a fascinating tale of interwoven passion and terror. As each character leaps into unforgettable life, as each scene draws us forward into new complexities of plot, she proves yet again that no other writer can match her skill in combining the excitement of the classic detective story with the richness of a fine novel. In its subtle portrayal of morality and human behavior, A Certain Justice will stand alongside Devices and Desires and A Taste for Death as one of P.D. James's most important, accomplished and entertaining works. [via]
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A Civil Campaign
by Lois McMaster Bujold

ISBN 0671578855 (0-671-57885-5)
Softcover, Baen Books

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Book summary:
If you relish costume adventure in an intergalactic society starring strong, convincing male and female characters, you'll adore the Vorkosigan Series. If you haven't met Miles Vorkosigan, whose brilliance, manic energy, and unstoppable determination make him a larger-than-life hero despite his dwarfish stature, pick up Komarr and A Civil Campaign. Read them, and then go back and catch the previous nine books (10 if you count Ethan of Athos, which features not Miles but his partner, Ellie Quinn); or read the series in order, starting with the romance of Miles's parents in Shards of Honor.
A Civil Campaign opens where Komarr ends, with Miles determined to court Ekaterin. Unfortunately, his approach is described as "General Romeo Vorkosigan, the one-man strike force." By his father. The potential for comic disaster increases when Miles's clone brother Mark arrives. He's brought a brilliant but scatterbrained scientist who's created a bug producing a perfect food: bug butter. They set up a lab in the basement of Vorkosigan House. Mark has also found a nice Barrayaran girl--she even likes the bugs--with whom he got together on the sexually liberated world of Beta. But now Kareen's living at home. Naturally, disaster strikes, repeatedly and on all fronts.
Bujold unfolds her comedy of manners while continuing to explore familiar themes: the difficulties in becoming a strong adult woman in a patriarchy, the need for trust and honesty in relationships between the sexes, the difference between appearance and identity, and the impact of advanced biotechnologies on society. A Civil Campaign is a sure-fire Hugo and Nebula nominee, likely to add another statue to Bujold's already full shelf. It's charming, touching, and quite funny too. --Nona Vero [via]
More editions of A Civil Campaign:
- A Civil Campaign: ISBN 0671578278 (0-671-57827-8)
  Hardcover, Pocket Books
- A Civil Campaign: ISBN 0671578855 (0-671-57885-5)
  Softcover, Baen Books
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Commodore Hornblower
by Cecil Scott Forester

ISBN 0316289388 (0-316-28938-8)
Softcover, Little Brown & Co

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Book summary:
These thrilling tales of high-seas adventure in the Napoleonic era, which Winston Churchill found "vastly entertaining" and Ernest Hemingway recommended to "every literate I know", are being eagerly embraced by a new generation of readers. Back Bay takes pleasure in reissuing these classic tales in handsome new trade paperback editions.
-- The Hornblower renaissance is in full sail with a nearly tenfold increase in sales: more than I5O, OOO Hornblower books sold in the first six months of 1999.
-- The A&E television network's series of original movies based on Hornblower's adventures have been tremendously successful -- praised by critics, enjoyed by hundreds of thousands of viewers, and winner of the Emmy Award for best miniseries.
-- Two new movies will be premiering in the spring on A&E.
-- Readers and booksellers who admire Patrick O'Brian's novels delight in discovering this "new" series of nautical adventure stories. [via]
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Cyrano De Bergerac
by Edmond Rostand

ISBN 0192836439 (0-19-283643-9)
Softcover, Oxford Univ Pr

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Book summary:
Rostand's masterpiece-and the ultimate triumph of the great french romantic tradition-is the magnificent hero-for-all-seasons, cyrano de bergerac [via]
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Cyrano De Bergerac
by Anthony Burgess, Edmond Rostand

ISBN 0679734139 (0-679-73413-9)
Softcover, Random House Inc

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Book summary:
Translated by Anthony Burgess. [via]
More editions of Cyrano De Bergerac:
- Cyrano De Bergerac: ISBN 0679734139 (0-679-73413-9)
  Softcover, Random House Inc
Cyrano De Bergerac
by Christopher Fry, Edmond Rostand, Nicholas Cronk

ISBN 0192824244 (0-19-282424-4)
Softcover, Oxford Univ Pr

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More editions of Cyrano De Bergerac:
- Cyrano De Bergerac: ISBN 0192824244 (0-19-282424-4)
  Softcover, Oxford Univ Pr
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Darwin's Radio
by Greg Bear

ISBN 0345435249 (0-345-43524-9)
Softcover, Ballantine Books

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Book summary:
All the best thrillers contain the solution to a mystery, and the mystery in this intellectually sparkling scientific thriller is more crucial and stranger than most. Why are people turning against their neighbors and their newborn children? And what is causing an epidemic of still births? A disgraced paleontologist and a genetic engineer both come across evidence of cover-ups in which the government is clearly up to no good. But no one knows what's really going on, and the government is covering up because that is what, in thrillers as in life, governments do. And what has any of this to do with the discovery of a Neanderthal family whose mummified faces show signs of a strange peeling?
Greg Bear has spent much of his recent career evoking awe in the deep reaches of space, but he made his name with Blood Music, a novel of nanotechnology that crackled with intelligence. His new book is a workout for the mind and a stunning read; human malignancy has its role in his thriller plot, but its real villain, as well as its last best hope, is the endless ingenious cruelty of the natural world and evolution. --Roz Kaveney, Amazon.co.uk [via]
More editions of Darwin's Radio:
- Darwin's Radio: ISBN 0613277864 (0-613-27786-4)
  Hardcover, Bt Bound
- Darwin's Radio: ISBN 0345435249 (0-345-43524-9)
  Softcover, Ballantine Books
Darwin's Radio : In the Next Stage of Evolution, Humans Are History
by Greg Bear

ISBN 0345459814 (0-345-45981-4)
Softcover, Random House Publishing Group

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More editions of Darwin's Radio : In the Next Stage of Evolution, Humans Are History:
- Darwin's Radio : In the Next Stage of Evolution, Humans Are History: ISBN 034542333X (0-345-42333-X)
  Hardcover, Random House Publishing Group
- Darwin's Radio : In the Next Stage of Evolution, Humans Are History: ISBN 0345459814 (0-345-45981-4)
  Softcover, Random House Publishing Group
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Get Shorty
by Elmore Leonard

ISBN 0385315678 (0-385-31567-8)
Softcover, Dell Publishing

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Book summary:
Nobody writes openings like Elmore Leonard. Case in point: "When Chili first came to Miami Beach twelve years ago they were having one of their off-and-on cold winters: thirty-four degrees the day he met Tommy Carlo for lunch at Vesuvio's on South Collins and had his leather jacket ripped off." You need to know about this because you need to know why there's bad blood between Chili Palmer and Ray Bones, the guy who stole his coat and is now his boss--and has ordered him to collect $4,200 from a dead guy. Except the guy didn't die; he went to Las Vegas with $300,000. So Chili goes to Las Vegas, one thing leads to another, and pretty soon he's in Los Angeles, hanging out with a movie producer named Harry Zimm and learning what it takes to be a player in Hollywood.
Get Shorty is classic Elmore Leonard: While other people write "crime fiction," Leonard's come up with a masterful social comedy that happens to be about criminals (and other fast operators). He's a master of snappy dialogue and dizzying plot twists. The best parts of Get Shorty move along so briskly you almost forget there's somebody with a firm control over the story. And you'll be rooting for Chili to get the money, the girl, and the studio deal. --Ron Hogan [via]
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Green Mansions
by W. H. Hudson

ISBN 0486259935 (0-486-25993-5)
Softcover, Dover Pubns

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Book summary:
Now that we are cool, he said, and regret that we hurt each other, I am not sorry that it happened. I deserved your reproach: a hundred times I have wished to tell you the whole story of my travels and adventures among the savages, and one of the reasons which prevented me was the fear that it would have an unfortunate effect on our friendship. That was precious, and I desired above everything to keep it. But I must think no more about that now. I must think only of how I am to tell you my story. I will begin at a time when I was twenty-three. It was early in life to be in the thick of politics, and in trouble to the extent of having to fly my country to save my liberty, perhaps my life. Every nation, someone remarks, has the government it deserves, and Venezuela certainly has the one it deserves and that suits it best. We call it a republic, not only because it is not one, but also because a thing must have a name; and to have a good name, or a fine name, is very convenient-especially when you want to borrow money. If the Venezuelans, thinly distributed over an area of half a million square miles, mostly illiterate peasants, half-breeds, and indigenes, were educated, intelligent men, zealous only for the public weal, it would be possible for them to have a real republic. [via]
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Hunger
by Knut Hamsun, Robert Bly, Paul Auster

ISBN 0374525285 (0-374-52528-5)
Softcover, Farrar Straus & Giroux

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Book summary:
This powerful, autobiographical novel by a Nobel Prize-winning author made literary history when it was first published in 1890. A modern classic about a penniless, unemployed young writer, the book paints an unforgettable portrait of a man driven to the edge of self-destruction by forces beyond his control.
[via]
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Ian Fleming's Moonraker
by Ian Fleming

ISBN 0425134938 (0-425-13493-8)
Softcover, Berkley Pub Group

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More editions of Ian Fleming's Moonraker:
- Ian Fleming's Moonraker: ISBN 0425134938 (0-425-13493-8)
  Softcover, Berkley Pub Group
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In Dubious Battle
by John Steinbeck, Warren G. French

ISBN 0143039636 (0-14-303963-6)
Softcover, Penguin Classics

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Book summary:
This 1936 novelset in the California apple countryportrays a strike by migrant workers that metamorphoses from principled defiance into blind fanaticism.

[via]
More editions of In Dubious Battle:
- In Dubious Battle: ISBN 0143039636 (0-14-303963-6)
  Softcover, Penguin Classics
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The Incredible Journey
by Sheila Burnford

ISBN 0440226708 (0-440-22670-8)
Softcover, Laurel Leaf

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Book summary:
Instinct told them that the way home lay to the west. And so the doughty young Labrador retriever, the roguish bull terrier and the indomitable Siamese set out through the Canadian wilderness. Separately, they would soon have died. But, together, the three house pets faced starvation, exposure, and wild forest animals to make their way home to the family they love. The Incredible Journey is one of the great children's stories of all time--and has been popular ever since its debut in 1961. [via]
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Inversions
by Iain M. Banks

ISBN 0671036688 (0-671-03668-8)
Hardcover, Simon & Schuster

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Book summary:
Iain M. Banks, the international bestselling author of "The Player of Games" and "Consider Phlebas," is a true original, a literary visionary whose brilliant speculative fiction has transported us into worlds of unbounded imagination. Now, in his acclaimed new novel, Banks presents an engrossing portrait of an alien world, and of two very different people bound by a startling and mysterious secret.
On a backward world with six moons, an alert spy reports on the doings of one Dr. Vosill, who has mysteriously become the personal physician to the king despite being a foreigner and, even more unthinkably, a woman. Vosill has more enemies than she first realizes. But then she also has more remedies in hand than those who wish her ill can ever guess.
Elsewhere, in another palace across the mountains, a man named DeWar serves as chief bodyguard to the Protector General of Tassasen, a profession he describes as the business of "assassinating assassins." DeWar, too, has his enemies, but his foes strike more swiftly, and his means of combating them are more direct.
No one trusts the doctor, and the bodyguard trusts no one, but is there a hidden commonality linking their disparate histories? Spiraling around a central core of mystery, deceit, love, and betrayal. "Inversions" is a dazzling work of science fiction from a versatile and imaginative author writing at the height of his remarkable powers. [via]
More editions of Inversions:
- Inversions: ISBN 0671036688 (0-671-03668-8)
  Hardcover, Simon & Schuster
Lunar Park
by Bret Easton Ellis

ISBN 0375727272 (0-375-72727-2)
Softcover, Random House Inc

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Book summary:

Book Description:
Imagine becoming a bestselling novelist, and almost immediately famous and wealthy, while still in college, and before long seeing your insufferable father reduced to a bag of ashes in a safety-deposit box, while after American Psycho your celebrity drowns in a sea of vilification, booze, and drugs.
Then imagine having a second chance ten years later, as the Bret Easton Ellis of this remarkable novel is given, with a wife, children, and suburban sobriety--only to watch this new life shatter beyond recognition in a matter of days. At a fateful Halloween party he glimpses a disturbing (fictional) character driving a car identical to his late father's, his stepdaughter's doll violently "malfunctions," and their house undergoes bizarre transformations both within and without. Connecting these aberrations to graver events--a series of grotesque murders that no longer seem random and the epidemic disappearance of boys his sons age--Ellis struggles to defend his family against this escalating menace even as his wife, their therapists, and the police insist that his apprehensions are rooted instead in substance abuse and egomania.
Lunar Park confounds one expectation after another, passing through comedy and mounting horror, both psychological and supernatural, toward an astonishing resolution--about love and loss, fathers and sons--in what is surely the most powerfully original and deeply moving novel of an extraordinary career.

A Tale of Two Brets: An Amazon.com Interview with Bret Easton Ellis
In his novel Lunar Park, Bret Easton Ellis takes first-person narrative to an extreme, inserting himself (and a host of real characters from the publishing world) into the haunting story of a drugged-out famous writer living in the suburbs trying to reconnect with his wife and son and reconcile his damaged past. Ellis is at the top of his game in Lunar Park, his first novel since 1999's Glamorama, delivering a disturbing and delirious novel about celebrity, writers, and fathers and sons (not to mention a cameo from notorious Ellis creation, Patrick Bateman). Amazon.com senior editor Brad Thomas Parsons spoke with Ellis in a Seattle to Los Angeles phone call to talk about the fact and fiction behind Lunar Park, New York versus LA, '80s music, and the whole "American Psycho thing."

Read the Amazon.com interview with Bret Easton Ellis

Less Than Zero (1985)
Published when Ellis was a junior at Bennington, Less Than Zero is the mesmerizing first-person chronicle of Clay, our laconic, zoned-out guide to a subculture of over-privileged nihilism in early '80s Los Angeles. He travels back home from Camden College (a thinly veiled Bennington) for Christmas break and re-enters his circle of jaded friends--including his ex-girlfriend Blair, and his best friend Julian, who's now hustling to support his drug habit--and a parade of Porches, late-night parties, cocaine, and casual destruction.
Ellis on Ellis: "I don't think it's a perfect book by any means, but it's valid. I get where it comes from. I get what it is. There's a lot of it that I wish was slightly more elegantly written. Overall, I was pretty shocked. It was pretty good writing for someone who was 19."

The Rules of Attraction (1987)
A line-up of Camden College students share the narrating duties in The Rules of Attraction, Ellis' sex-fueled, drug-baked second novel. There's Lauren (who's in the midst of losing her virginity as the book opens), who longs for her boyfriend Victor, currently traveling through Europe; Lauren's ex, Paul, a bisexual party boy who hooks up with hard-drinking closet-case Sean (surname Bateman--that's right, younger brother of Patrick), who also has the hots for Lauren. Less than Zero's Clay makes a cameo appearance as well as a passing glimpse of Ellis' Bennington classmate Donna Tartt's murderous Classics majors from The Secret History.
Ellis on Ellis: "It might be my favorite book of mine. I was writing that book while I was at college. Sort of like the best of times, the worst of times. There was a lot of elation, there was a lot of despair. It was just a really fun book to write. I loved mimicking all the different voices. The stream of conscious does get a little out of hand. I kind of like that about the book. It's kind of all over the place. It's casual. It's scruffy. That's the one book of mine that I have a very, very soft spot for."

American Psycho (1991)
Shopaholic sociopath Patrick Bateman's killer grip drags readers into a bloody, brand-name, urban nightmare as the 26-year-old Wall Street yuppie executes his grooming habits and eviscerates strangers with equal élan. Simon & Schuster dropped the too-hot-to-handle American Psycho which was then published as a paperback original by Vintage Books. Ellis received death threats while the book was boycotted, sliced up by reviewers, and went on to become a bestseller. Mary Harron's 2000 film version starred then little-known British actor Christian Bale, who would later suit up as the Dark Knight in 2005's Batman Begins.
Ellis on Ellis: "It was good. It was fun. It was not nearly as pretentious as I remember I wanted it to be when I was writing it. I found it really fast-moving. I found it really funny. And I liked it a lot. The violence was... it made my toes curl. I really freaked out. I couldn't believe how violent it was. It was truly upsetting. I had to steel myself to re-read those passages."

The Informers (1994)
Ellis returns to early '80s Los Angeles ennui with The Informers, a loosely connected collection of stories of the bored, rich, and morally depraved, written around the same time as Less than Zero. Sex, drugs, and gratuitous violence take center stage, with characters including an aging, predatory anchorwoman, a debauched rock star tearing through Japan, and a pick-up artist vampire. While some of the vignettes echo better Ellis works, ultimately the stories don't add to much as a whole. Book critics are less than receptive to Ellis' post-American Psycho offering.
Ellis on Ellis: "Those were written while I was at Bennington. I wrote a lot of short stories between 1981 or 1982 or so... The Informers more or less kind of represented probably the best of those stories. I wrote a lot of really bad ones, but those are the ones that worked the best together."

Glamorama (1999)
Actor-model Victor Ward (who first made an appearance in the Ellis oeuvre in The Rules of Attraction) is the narrator of Glamorama, Ellis longest novel yet. Ellis offers bold-faced names and celebrity skewering in the first half of the book as Victor tries to open a Manhattan club while cheating on his supermodel girlfriend and double-crossing his partner, but the second half takes a violent, paranoid turn as Victor is sent to England and unwittingly lured into a sadistic ring of international terrorists (posing as supermodels) leaving a bloody trail across the globe.
Ellis on Ellis: "[T]he book wasn't necessarily about terrorism to me. It was about a whole bunch of other stuff. It's definitely the book that I can tell--I don't know if other people can tell but I can tell as a writer--is probably the most divisive that I've written. It has an equal number of detractors as it does fans. It doesn't really hold true with the other books. It was the one that took the longest to write, and the one that seemed the most important at the time. It's an unwieldy book... I like it."

Ellis on DVD

Less Than Zero

American Psycho
The Rules of Attraction

Will the Real Bret Easton Ellis Please Stand Up?
Visit the author's Web site at www.2brets.com.

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More editions of Lunar Park:

Lunar Park: ISBN 0375412913 (0-375-41291-3)
Hardcover, Random House Inc

Lunar Park: ISBN 0375727272 (0-375-72727-2)
Softcover, Random House Inc
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Morbid Taste for Bones
by Ellis Peters

ISBN 0446400157 (0-446-40015-7)
Softcover, Grand Central Pub

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Book summary:
A delightful detective makes his appearance in the person of Brother Cadfael, in charge of the herb-gardens in the Benedictine Monastery of Shrewsbury. Cadfael is not very unwordly, since he entered the cloister late in life. But his role becomes a very vital one when his superiors become obsessed with the notion of acquiring the bones of an obscure saint from a remote Welsh village. Miraculous powers had been attributed to this saint, and it is thought the possession of her remains will add much to the prestige of the Shrewsbury Foundation - and of its prior. The ambitious prior leads a delegation into Wales to acquire these relics. They encounter many obstacles - the worst of them murder. Dissention, the tangled affairs of two pairs of lovers, a surfeit of unwelcome miracles and visitations plague them. But in the end Brother Cadfael gets all the bones and all the bodies into the most appropriate places and makes all the survivors happy. [via]
More editions of Morbid Taste for Bones:
- Morbid Taste for Bones: ISBN 0333223241 (0-333-22324-1)
  Hardcover, Macmillan
- Morbid Taste for Bones: ISBN 0446400157 (0-446-40015-7)
  Softcover, Grand Central Pub
Mountolive
by Lawrence Durrell

ISBN 0671451057 (0-671-45105-7)
Softcover, Pocket Books

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More editions of Mountolive:
- Mountolive: ISBN 0671451057 (0-671-45105-7)
  Softcover, Pocket Books
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N Is for Noose
by Sue Grafton

ISBN 0449223612 (0-449-22361-2)
Softcover, Ballantine Books

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Book summary:
"Suppose we could peer through a tiny peephole in time and chance upon a flash of what was coming up in the years ahead?" The questioner is Kinsey Millhone, middle-aged, two-time divorcee detective and junk food junkie star of Sue Grafton's popular "alphabet" mysteries; the book is 'N' Is for Noose. If Kinsey had had just a smidgen of foresight, she would never have taken her current case, handed down to her from her on-again, off-again flame and comrade in arms, Robert Dietz. We encounter the two this time out after Deitz's knee surgery, as Kinsey drives his "snazzy little red Porsche" back to Carson City, where she checks out his digs for the first time. To her surprise, he lives in a palatial penthouse, which--under the unspoken bylaws of investigative etiquette--she qualmlessly snoops through. They sit around for a fortnight playing gin rummy and eating peanut butter and pickle sandwiches together, but perennially single Kinsey grows wary: "It was time to hit the road before our togetherness began to chafe."
She heads off to meet Dietz's former client, Mrs. Selma Newquist, a devastated widow whose makeup tips seem to come from Tammy Faye Baker. Her husband Tom Newquist, a detective himself, had been working on a mysterious case when he abruptly died of a heart attack. Selma suspects foul play, but bless her, she isn't the brightest star in the sky and can't figure out what Tom was working on even though he's left behind enough paper to fill a recycling truck. Kinsey digs right in and roams the sleepy, one-horse town of Nota Lake for clues, interviewing a colorful cast of in-laws and locals. Beneath the quaint, quiet, country veneer, she unearths a bubbling hotbed of internal strife and familial double-dealing. Was Tom covering up for his partner? Is Selma protecting someone? Grafton's knack for gritty details and realistic characters ("[Selma's] skin tones suggested dark coloring, but her hair was a confection of white-blond curls, like a cloud of cotton candy"), coupled with the fast-paced, believable story line, makes for another delightful, entertaining read. --Rebekah Warren, Bestsellers editor [via]
More editions of N Is for Noose:
- N Is for Noose: ISBN 0449223612 (0-449-22361-2)
  Softcover, Ballantine Books
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No Great Mischief
by Alistair MacLeod

ISBN 0375726659 (0-375-72665-9)
Softcover, Vintage Books

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Book summary:
For the MacDonalds, the past is not a foreign country. This Cape Breton clan may have lived in the New World since 1779, when Calum Ruadh ("the red Calum") and his wife, 12 children, and dog landed. Scotland, however, remains their true home. So profound is their connection to their lost land that on brief visits they find themselves welcomed by strangers. When one descendent tells a Scotswoman that she's from Canada, she is offered a gentle rejoinder: "That may be.... But you are really from here. You have just been away for a while." In some ways this is unsurprising, since the MacDonalds either have deep black hair or their ancestor's coloring. And those with the latter have "eyes that were so dark as to be beyond brown and almost in the region of glowing black. Such individuals would manifest themselves as strikingly unfamiliar to some, and as eerily familiar to others." Another sport of nature? Many are fraternal twins, including Alistair MacLeod's narrator, Alexander, and his sister.
But No Great Mischief is far more than the straightforward saga of one family over the generations. Instead the author has created a painfully beautiful myth in which the long-ago is in many ways more present than modern existence. Even in the last decades of the 20th century, the MacDonalds fall into Gaelic--its inflections, rhythms, and song--with deep nostalgia. This is a family that is used to composing itself in the face of disaster. They often assure one another, "My hope is constant in thee," and in the light of their many losses, the clan must cling to its motto.
No Great Mischief begins with Alexander's visit to Toronto, where his eldest brother now subsists on a diet of drink and memories. The narrator, a successful orthodontist, doesn't have much to do with the former but is unable (or unwilling) to escape the latter. As the novel proceeds, Alexander fills in his family history, including such key episodes as his great-great-grandfather's self-exile from Scotland. Though Calum Ruadh had intended to leave his dog behind, it broke away and tried to catch up with him. MacLeod piercingly captures the animal's struggle as her master first tries to make her head for shore and then--realizing she won't desert him--spurs her on. Throughout No Great Mischief various people recall this incident, an emblem of intensity, hope, and dependence. A descendant of the bitch is also on hand when Alexander's parents and one of his brothers disappear under the ice on a cold spring night. She persists in searching for her people and tries to protect their lighthouse from the new keeper, receiving in return "four bullets into her loyal waiting heart." When Alexander's grandfather hears of her death, he uses a phrase that becomes one of the book's litanies, "It was in those dogs to care too much and to try too hard."
This is a MacDonald characteristic as well. A good deal of No Great Mischief's strength stems from scenes of longing and despair--for those who die for a lost cause, whether in 1692 when one leader is killed ("the redness of his hair dyed forever brighter by the crimson of his blood") or in an Ontario uranium mine where one brother is decapitated. MacLeod evokes his clan, and the elemental beauty of their landscape, in quiet, precise language that gains power with each repetition. (A sentence such as "All of us are better when we're loved" comes to acquire a near proverbial ring.) If he occasionally tips his hand too much, pressing home his point that present-day prosperity isn't all it's cracked up to be, no matter. I doubt that this inspired and elegiac novel will ever leave those who are lucky enough to read it--proving after all the persistence of the clann Chalum Ruaidh. --Kerry Fried [via]
More editions of No Great Mischief:
- No Great Mischief: ISBN 0393049701 (0-393-04970-1)
  Hardcover, W W Norton & Co Inc
- No Great Mischief: ISBN 0375726659 (0-375-72665-9)
  Softcover, Vintage Books
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Posies & Bouquets
by Malcolm Hillier

ISBN 067178983X (0-671-78983-X)
Hardcover, Simon & Schuster

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Book summary:
This book provides practical instructions in the making of posies and bouquets with descriptive captions, artwork borders and full-colour photographs throughout. Part of "The Little Scented Library" series, the book gives the reader a host of traditional recipes and gift suggestions as well as imaginative new variations. There are original and pretty ideas for creating a fresh wedding garland, or a Christmas wreath of scented foliage. Scented endpapers are a fragrant reminder that outlives the special occasion. By the author of "Arranging Dried Flowers", "Flowers", "Container Gardening" and co-author of "The Complete Book of Dried Flowers". [via]
More editions of Posies & Bouquets:
- Posies & Bouquets: ISBN 067178983X (0-671-78983-X)
  Hardcover, Simon & Schuster
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The Princess Diaries
by Meg Cabot

ISBN 0380814021 (0-380-81402-1)
Softcover, Harpercollins Childrens Books

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Book summary:
Mia Thermopolis is your average urban ninth grader. Even though she lives in Greenwich Village with a single mom who is a semifamous painter, Mia still puts on her Doc Martens one at a time, and the most exciting things she ever dreams about are smacking lips with sexy senior Josh Richter, "six feet of unadulterated hotness," and passing Algebra I. Then Mia's dad comes to town, and drops a major bomb. Turns out he's not just a European politician as he's always lead her to believe, but actually the prince of a small country! And Mia, his only heir, is now considered the crown princess of Genovia! She doesn't even know how to begin to cope: "I am so NOT a princess.... You never saw anyone who looked less like a princess than I do. I mean, I have really bad hair... and... a really big mouth and no breasts and feet that look like skis." And if this news wasn't bad enough, Mia's mom has started dating her algebra teacher, the paparazzi is showing up at school, and she's in a huge fight with her best friend, Lilly. How much more can this reluctant Cinderella handle?
Offbeat Mia will automatically win the heart of every teenage girl who's ever just wanted to fit in with as little fuss as possible. Debut author Meg Cabot's writing is silly and entertaining, with tons of pop culture references that will make teens feel right at home within her pages. This is a wonderfully wacky read. (Ages 12 and older) --Jennifer Hubert [via]
More editions of The Princess Diaries:
- The Princess Diaries: ISBN 0380978482 (0-380-97848-2)
  Hardcover, Harpercollins Childrens Books
- The Princess Diaries: ISBN 0380814021 (0-380-81402-1)
  Softcover, Harpercollins Childrens Books
The Prisoner of Zenda
by Anthony Hope

ISBN 0192839047 (0-19-283904-7)
Softcover, Oxford Univ Pr

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Five times made into film versions since its original publication in 1894, The Prisoner of Zenda is a perennially popular adventure and romance story. Hope's swashbuckling romance transports his English gentleman hero, Rudolf Rassendyll, from a comfortable life in London to fast-paced adventures in Ruritania, a mythical land steeped in political intrigue. Rassendyll must impersonate the rightful king in order to rescue him from the castle Zenda, all the while facing tests of honor with the beautiful Princess Flavia, and enduring tests of strength in his encounters with the villainous Black Michael and his handsome, debonair bodyguard, Rupert of Hentzau. [via]
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Rachel Papers
by Martin Amis

ISBN 0517567776 (0-517-56777-6)
Softcover, Harmony Books

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The Shell Seekers
by Rosamunde Pilcher

ISBN 0312961324 (0-312-96132-4)
Softcover, St Martins Pr

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Book summary:
#1 New York Times Bestseller
"The Shell Seekers is a deeply satisfying story, written with love and confidence."
Maeve Binchy, The New York Times Book Review
The Shell Seekers, the classic novel by acclaimed writer Rosamunde Pilcher, is now available in hardcover once more. This epic romance has sold over 3.5 million copies to date; her other bestsellers include Winter Solstice, Wild Mountain Thyme, and Coming Home.
Set in London and Cornwall from World War II to present, The Shell Seekers tells the story of the Keeling family, and of the passions and heartbreak that have held them together for three generations. The family centers around Penelope, and it is her love, courage, and sense of values that determine the course of all their lives, Deftly shifting back and forth in time, each chapter centers on one of the principal players in the family's history. the unifying thread is an oil painting entitled "The Shell Seekers," done by Penelope's father. It is this painting that symbolizes to Penelope the ties between the generations. But it is the fate of this painting that just may tear the family apart. [via]
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Stone of Tears
by Terry Goodkind

ISBN 0312857063 (0-312-85706-3)
Hardcover, St Martins Pr

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Book summary:
Kirkus called Wizard's First Rule, Book One of The Sword of Truth, "a wonderfully creative, seamless, and stirring epic fantasy debut." Piers Anthony lauded it as "a phenomenal fantasy, endlessly inventive, that surely marks the commencement of one of the major careers in the genre. It starts in early and keeps hitting you with new magical wonders, building into a truly gripping adventure."

In Wizard's First Rule, Richard Cypher's world was turned upside down. Once a simple woods guide, Richard was forced to become the Seeker of Truth, to save the world from the vile dominance of Darken Rahl, the most viciously savage and powerful wizard the world had ever seen. He was joined on this epic quest by his beloved Kahlan, the only survivor among the Confessors, who brought a powerful but benevolent justice to the land before Rahl's evil scourge. Aided by Zedd, the last of the wizards who opposed Rahl, they were able to cast him into the underworld, saving the world from the living hell of life under Rahl.

But the veil to the underworld has been torn, and Rahl, from beyond the veil, begins to summon a sinister power more dreadful than any he has wielded before. Horrifying creatures escape through the torn veil, wreaking havoc on the unsuspecting world above.

If Rahl isn't stopped, he will free the Keeper itself, an evil entity whose power is so vast and foul that once freed, it can never again be contained.

Richard and Kahlan must face Rahl and the Keeper's terrible minions. But first, Richard must endure the ministrations of the Sisters of the Light, or die from the pain of magic that is his birthright and his curse. While Richard undertakes the arduous journey to the forbidden city of the Sisters, Kahlan must embark upon a long and dangerous mission to Aydindril, citadel of the old wizards, where she hopes to find Zedd and the help only he can lend to their desperate cause.

War, suffering, torture, and deceit lie in their paths, and nothing will save them from a destiny of violent death, unless their courage and faith are joined with luck and they find the elusive...Stone of Tears.
[via]
More editions of Stone of Tears:
- Stone of Tears: ISBN 0312857063 (0-312-85706-3)
  Hardcover, St Martins Pr
The Sword in the Stone
by T.H. White, Dennis Nolan

ISBN 0399225021 (0-399-22502-1)
Hardcover, Philomel Books

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Book summary:
The Sword And The Stone recreates, against the background of magnificent pageantry and dark magic that was medieval England, the education and training of young King Arthur, who was to become the greatest of Britain's legendary rulers.

Growing up in a colorful world peopled by knights in armor and fair damsels, foul monsters and evil witches, young Arthur slowly learns the code of being a gentleman. Under the wise guidance of Merlin, the all-powerful magician for whom life progresses backwards, the king-to-be is trained in the gusty pursuits of falconry, jousting, hunting and sword play. He is even transformed by his remarkable old tutor into various animals, so that he may experience life from all points of view. In every conceivable and exciting way he is readied for the day when he, and he alone of all Englishmen, is destined to draw forth the marvelous sword from the magic stone and become the rightful King of' England. [via]
More editions of The Sword in the Stone:
- The Sword in the Stone: ISBN 0440984459 (0-440-98445-9)
  Softcover, Random House Children's Books
- The Sword in the Stone: ISBN 0399225021 (0-399-22502-1)
  Hardcover, Philomel Books
White Gold Wielder
by Stephen R. Donaldson

ISBN 0345348702 (0-345-34870-2)
Softcover, Ballantine Books

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Book summary:
Thomas Covenant knew that despite his failure on the Isle of The One Tree, he had to return to the Land and fight. After a long and arduous journey, fighting all the way, he readies himself for the final showdown with Lord Foul, the Despiser, and begins to understand things he had only just wondered about before....

From the Paperback edition. [via]
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