American Literature

When high school teacher Caelum Quirk and his wife, Maureen, move to Littleton, Colorado, they both get jobs at Columbine High School. In April 1999, while Caelum is away, Maureen finds herself in the library at Columbine, cowering in a cabinet and expecting to be killed. Miraculously, she...

In an effort to keep all forms of magic at bay, Jared, 17, has quit drugs and drinking. But his troubles are not over: now he's being stalked by David, his mom's ex - a preppy, khaki-wearing psycho with a proclivity for rib-breaking. And his mother, Maggie, a living, breathing badass as well as a witch, can't protect him like she used to because he's moved away from Kitimat to Vancouver for school. Even though he's got a year of sobriety under his belt (no thanks to his enabling, ever-partying mom), Jared also struggles with the temptation of drinking.

Having just celebrated her 26th birthday in 1976 California, Dana, an African-American woman, is suddenly and inexplicably wrenched through time into antebellum Maryland. After saving a drowning White boy there, she finds herself staring into the barrel of a shotgun and is transported back to the present just in time to save her life. During numerous such time-defying episodes with the same young man, she realizes she's been given a challenge.

Young listeners learn about the early traditions which have led to our present-day celebration of Thanksgiving.

Mercy Thompson's life has undergone a seismic change. Becoming the mate of Adam Hauptman—the charismatic Alpha of the local werewolf pack—has made her a stepmother to his daughter, Jesse, a relationship that brings moments of blissful normalcy to Mercy's life. But on the edges of humanity, what passes for a minor mishap on an ordinary day can turn into so much more.... After an accident in bumper-to-bumper traffic, Mercy and Jesse can't reach Adam—or anyone else in the pack for that matter. They've all been abducted.

In Just Kids, Patti Smith’s first book of prose, the legendary American artist offers a never-before-seen glimpse of her remarkable relationship with photographer Robert Mapplethorpe in the epochal days of New York City and the Chelsea Hotel in the late sixties and seventies. An honest and...

Throughout her life, Elissa Washuta has been surrounded by cheap facsimiles of Native spiritual tools and occult trends, "starter witch kits" of sage, rose quartz, and tarot cards packaged together in paper and plastic. Following a decade of abuse, addiction, PTSD, and heavy-duty drug treatment for a misdiagnosis of bipolar disorder, she felt drawn to the real spirits and powers her dispossessed and discarded ancestors knew, while she undertook necessary work to find love and meaning.

Finnegans Wake is the greatest challenge in 20th-century literature. Who is Humphrey Chimpden Earwicker? And what did he get up to in Phoenix Park? And what did Anna Livia Plurabelle have to say about it? In the rich nighttime and the language of dreams, here are history, anecdote, myth, folk tale and, above all, a wondrous sense of humor, colored by a clear sense of humanity. In this exceptional reading by the Irish actor Barry McGovern, with Marcella Riordan, the world of the Wake is more accessible than ever before.

1867, Richmond, Virginia: Though she wears the same low-cut purple gown that is the uniform of all the girls who work at Worsham's gambling parlor, Arabella stands apart. It's not merely her statuesque beauty and practiced charm. Even at seventeen, Arabella possesses an unyielding grit, and a resolve to escape her background of struggle and poverty. Collis Huntington, railroad baron and self-made multimillionaire, is drawn to Arabella from their first meeting. Collis is married and 30 years her senior, yet they are well-matched in temperament, and flirtation rapidly escalates into an affair.

In the late 1950s, Random House editor Jason Epstein would talk jazz with Ralph Ellison or chat with Andy Warhol while pouring drinks. By the 1970s, editors were poring over profit-and-loss statements. The electronics company RCA bought Random House in 1965, and then other large corporations purchased other formerly independent publishers. As multinational conglomerates consolidated the industry, the business of literature—and literature itself—transformed. Dan Sinykin explores how changes in the publishing industry have affected fiction, literary form, and what it means to be an author.

A Rainbow of Blood continues the epic, exciting story that began in Peter G. Tsouras’s previous alternate history, Britannia’s Fist. The Great War accelerates during a few desperate weeks in October 1863. From the bayous of Louisiana to the green hills of the Hudson Valley, from Chicago in flames to the gates of Washington itself, the conflict uncoils in ropes of fire. French and British armies are on the march, and heavy reinforcements have put to sea.

This audiobook, read by Audie award-winning narrators, includes unabridged recordings of all Mark Twains's greatest works: 12 novels; over 120 of his beloved short stories; Chapters From My Autobiography; 5 pieces of short non-fiction; and 6 pieces of his groundbreaking, wide-ranging travel writing.

In THE SECOND FOUNDATION, Isaac Asimov addresses the phenomenon of genetic mutation and its potential danger to a civilization. This novel tells of an overwhelmingly powerful mutant human being, born with the ability to mold men's emotions and minds. He has brought down the First Foundation, and...

Of best-selling husband-and-wife writing team W. Michael and Kathleen O’Neal Gear, Booklist proclaims that “nobody does Native Americana better than the Gears.” Coming of the Storm launches a series featuring Black Shell, a Chicazaclan trader, and his struggles with Hernando de Soto, an invader intent on spreading Catholicism at the point of his sword.

David Champlin is a Black man born into poverty in Depression-era New Orleans who achieves great success and then sacrifices everything to lead his people in the difficult, day-by-day struggle of the civil rights movement. Sara Kent is the beloved and vital White girl who loved David from the moment she first saw him, but they struggled over David's belief that a marriage for them would not be right in the violent world he had to confront.

Flight for Life is the heart-stopping account of one of the most gripping rescue missions in African history, told by a doctor involved in saving the lives of Nigerian workers who became victims of a tragic American chemical company explosion. Dr. Stewart and his colleague moved mountains and cut red tape to fly patients to one of the premiere burn centers in the United States.

Ethic has power, but love has always been evasive. After ordering the hit that mistakenly killed the love of his life, Ethic is haunted with guilt and refuses to love again. Focused on being a better man and keeping his family safe, he is raising three children, one of which is a defiant teenage girl, Morgan. No matter how hard he tries to keep Morgan away from the streets, she is determined to defy him. When Morgan finds herself in a vulnerable position, Ethic is pulled back into the deadly game where he was once king.

“Wild, mesmerizing, perversely witty….A Valentine from hell.” —Janet Maslin, New York Times The publication of Joe Hill’s beautifully textured, deliciously scary debut novel Heart-Shaped Box was greeted with the sort of overwhelming critical acclaim that is rare for a work of...

The Woos' neighbor, Mr. Kenji, is training to be a nurse. He has a big test coming up, and Katie has offered to help him get ready. Hopefully Katie’s help will lead to a high score on the big test for Mr. Kenji.

Smack in the middle of a cascade of unfortunate events, Amelia finds Calvin (derogatory)—cocky, annoying, too-often shirtless, and right next door (bummer). Sparked by an unfortunate habit of inside thoughts not staying that way (she’s working on it!), their petty back-and-forth banter easily—and a little too quickly—slides into something neither of them shake.