A retired lawyer in Tel Aviv gives away his possessions to find his ancestral roots, while a novelist with writer's block explores self and story in a hotel. Both go on journeys that blur identity and reality.
James Wood analyzes the mechanics of literary craft, from character and detail to metaphor and realism, showing how fiction creates its lasting power and shapes our understanding of the world.
In the glittering decay of Parisian high society and the rising vulgarity of the new rich, a jealous narrator struggles with Albertine's elusive affections and Baron de Charlus's scandalous secrets, exposing hidden desires and societal hypocrisy.
In a small, gossiping Arkansas town, a grieving mother and a young prostitute forge an improbable friendship over sweet-potato pie, healing old wounds and transforming their community with forgiveness and grace.
A New York editor returns to his Southern home, summoned by his sisters who want him to stop their father's remarriage, leading him to confront family secrets and old resentments.
Decades after their student activism in 1970s Bombay, four women must confront buried secrets and shattered ideals when one faces a life-altering illness.
Through the eyes of his free-spirited wife, Elisabeth, 'The Man in the Wooden Hat' reveals the hidden depths and sad complexities of the reserved lawyer Filth's life, showing a marriage shaped by wit, resilience, and unspoken currents beneath a proper facade.
A fourteen-year-old bride from Ceylon moves to war-torn Malaysia, where she becomes a strong matriarch who battles a harsh world and historical trauma to secure her family's future.
In the final years of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, a brilliant but detached 'man without qualities' navigates Viennese high society's absurd efforts to celebrate an emperor's jubilee, as the world approaches a major shift.
In 1905 Princeton, a town of intellectuals like Woodrow Wilson and Upton Sinclair, a hushed-up lynching unleashes a demonic curse, twisting the privileged into psychological horror and supernatural dread.
Michael Cunningham's "Specimen Days" tells three connected stories: a grieving boy in 19th-century New York, a psychologist hunting terrorists in a modern city, and two beings navigating a distant future. The novel blends genres and explores life, loss, and the human spirit, all while echoing Walt Whitman's poetry.
In a remote Irish cottage, three generations of estranged women and two strangers gather to face the imminent death of Helen's brother from AIDS, navigating a difficult past and long-held secrets.
In 1979 Libya, a nine-year-old boy's innocent world shatters when he uncovers his father's dangerous secrets amidst the paranoia and brutal realities of Qaddafi's regime.
John Barth's "Lost in the Funhouse" blurs the lines between author, story, and reader, inviting you to enjoy the experimental nature of fiction itself.
In a sad Berlin rooming house, a young Russian émigré remembers his first love, Mary, only to find her unappealing husband is his next-door neighbor, waiting for her.
When Captain Chris Baldry returns from the WWI trenches with amnesia, his family faces a painful choice between his forgotten past and the harsh present, offering a hopeful look at healing.
Johannes and Victoria, childhood sweethearts from different social classes, are kept apart by duty and circumstance, their enduring love only revealed in Victoria's dying confession.
Anthony Doerr tells stories of forgotten pasts, lingering ghosts, and the human search for meaning and connection across continents and through history.
In a 1920s Nigerian village, an Ibo chief, torn between his priestly duties to an ancient deity and the encroaching British colonial power, inadvertently sacrifices his own son to the clash of worlds.
