Under the tutelage of Stone Barrington, Herbie Fisher has transformed from a bumbling sad sack into the youngest partner at the white-shoe law firm Woodman & Weld, and a man whose company is in high demand both because of his professional acumen and his savoir faire. But even his newly won composure and finely honed skills can't prepare him for the strange escapade he's unwittingly pulled into, and which --- unbeknownst to him --- has put him at the center of a bull's-eye. In the city that never sleeps there are always devious schemes afoot, and Herbie will have to be quick on his feet to stay one step ahead of his enemies...and they're closing in.

Chuck Klosterman has created an incomparable body of work in books, magazines, newspapers and on the Web. His writing spans the realms of culture and sports, while also addressing interpersonal issues, social quandaries and ethical boundaries. He has written nine previous books, and contributed profiles and essays to outlets such as GQ, Esquire, Billboard, The A.V. Club and The Guardian. Klosterman’s 10th book collects his most intriguing of those pieces, accompanied by fresh introductions and new footnotes throughout. He presents many of the articles in their original form, featuring previously unpublished passages and digressions.

Chicago celebrity Charles James can’t shake the nightmare that wakes him each night. He sees himself walking down a long, broken highway, the sides of which are lit in flames. Where is he going? Why is he walking? What is the wailing he hears around him? By day, he wonders why he’s so haunted and unhappy when he has all he ever wanted. But now, at the pinnacle of his career, he’s started to wonder if he’s wanted the wrong things. When he learns that one of his customers has committed suicide because of financial ruin, Charles is shaken. Then a twist of fate changes everything. Charles is granted something very remarkable: a second chance. The question is: What will he do with it?

In the aftermath of the War With No Name, the Colony has been defeated, its queen lies dead, and the world left behind will never be the same. In her madness, the queen used a strange technology to uplift the surface animals, turning dogs and cats, bats and bears, pigs and wolves into intelligent, highly evolved creatures who rise up and kill their oppressors. And now, after years of bloodshed, these sentient beasts must learn to live alongside their sworn enemies --- humans. Far removed from this newly emerging civilization, a housecat turned war hero named Mort(e) lives a quiet life with the love he thought he had lost, a dog named Sheba. But before long, the chaos that they escaped comes crashing in around them.

Christiane, 86 years old with a vibrant sense of humor, lives alone in a large apartment in the heart of Paris. Her daughter, Catherine, is her total opposite: sullen and uptight, filled with resentment toward her unfaithful Milanese husband. After discovering yet another affair, Catherine takes refuge in Paris at her mother’s home, accompanied by her own daughter, Luna. Christiane --- who, in spite of occasional dalliances on both sides, lived a beautiful love story with her late husband --- uses all of her freethinking charm in an effort to change Catherine’s rigid, self-pitying attitude.

Lucas Ray is shocked when an adorable puppy jumps out of an abandoned building and into his arms. Though the apartment he shares with his mother, a disabled veteran, doesn’t allow dogs, Lucas can’t resist taking Bella home. After Bella is picked up by Animal Control because pit bulls are banned in Denver, Lucas has no choice but to send her to a foster home until he can figure out what to do. But Bella, distraught over the separation, doesn’t plan to wait. With 400 miles of dangerous Colorado wilderness between her and her person, Bella sets off on a seemingly impossible and completely unforgettable adventure home.

Around midnight, three friends take their partying from bar to boat on a misty fall evening. Just as the weather deteriorates, one of them suddenly and confusingly goes overboard. Is it an accident? The result of an unwanted advance? His body disappears quickly, silently, into the dark water. The circumstances are murky, but what is clear is that the other two need to notify the authorities. Minutes become hours become days as they hesitate, caught up in their guilt and hope that their friend has somehow made it safely to shore. As valuable time passes, they find themselves deep in a moral morass with huge implications as they struggle to move forward and live with their dark secret.

Bob Lee Swagger has finally decided to sell the family homestead, but when the developers begin to tear down the house, they uncover a strongbox hidden in the foundation. Enclosed is an array of memorabilia dating back to 1934 --- a much-corroded federal lawman’s badge, a .45 automatic, a mysterious gun part, and a cryptic diagram --- all belonging to Charles Swagger, a World War I hero and sheriff of Polk County, Arkansas. Fascinated and puzzled by these newly discovered artifacts, Bob is determined to find out what happened to his grandfather. But he soon learns that someone is following him and shares his obsession with finding out what Charles Swagger really left behind.

It is deep winter, and the darkness is unending. A private detective named Jaycob Eklund has vanished, and Charlie Parker is assigned to track him down. Parker’s employer, Edgar Ross, an agent of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, has his own reasons for wanting Eklund found. Eklund is no ordinary investigator --- he is obsessively tracking a series of homicides and disappearances, each linked to reports of hauntings. Now Parker is drawn into Eklund’s world: a realm in which the monstrous Mother rules a crumbling criminal empire, in which men strike bargains with angels, and in which the innocent and guilty alike are pawns in a game of ghosts.

When a mysterious figure appears in Three Pines, Armand Gamache and the rest of the villagers are at first curious. Then wary. From the moment its shadow falls over the village, Gamache, now Chief Superintendent of the Sûreté du Québec, suspects the creature has deep roots and a dark purpose. Yet he does nothing. What can he do? Only watch and wait. And hope his mounting fears are not realized. But when the figure vanishes overnight and a body is discovered, it falls to Gamache to discover if a debt has been paid or levied. Months later, as the trial for the accused begins, Chief Superintendent Gamache continues to struggle with actions he set in motion, from which there is no going back.

Suburban divorcee Maggie Somerville was found murdered in her bedroom, her body covered with the dust from hundreds of emptied vacuum cleaner bags, all potential DNA evidence obscured by the calculating killer. Digging into Maggie’s cell phone records, private detective Nils Shapiro finds that the most frequently called number belongs to a mysterious young woman whose true identity could shatter the Somerville family. But could she be guilty of murder? After the FBI demands that Nils drop the case, Nils and neighboring Edina Police Detective Anders Ellegaard are forced to take their investigation underground. Is this a strange case of domestic violence or something with far-reaching, sinister implications?

It begins with a woman fleeing through Arizona with her kids in tow, trying to escape an abusive marriage. When she's pulled over by an unsettling local sheriff, things soon go awry and she is taken into custody. But when she gets to the station, her kids are gone. And then the cops start saying they never saw any kids with her; if they're gone, she must have done something with them. Meanwhile, halfway across the country, a man hears the frenzied news reports about the missing kids, which are eerily similar to events in his own past. As the clock ticks down on the search for the lost children, he, too, is drawn into the desperate fight for their return.

HILLBILLY ELEGY is a passionate and personal analysis of a culture in crisis --- that of white working-class Americans. The disintegration of this group, a process that has been slowly occurring now for more than 40 years, has been reported with growing frequency and alarm, but has never before been written about as searingly from the inside. J. D. Vance tells the true story of what a social, regional and class decline feels like when you were born with it hung around your neck.

A HOUSE AMONG THE TREES begins just after the sudden death of world-renowned children’s book author Mort Lear, who leaves behind a wholly unexpected will, an idyllic country house, and difficult secrets about a childhood far darker than those of the beloved characters he created for young readers of all ages. Left to grapple with the consequences of his final wishes are Tommy Daulair, his longtime live-in assistant; Merry Galarza, a museum curator betrayed by those wishes; and Nick Greene, a beguiling actor preparing to play Lear in a movie. When Nick pays a visit to Lear’s home, he and Tommy confront what it means to be entrusted with the great writer’s legacy and reputation.

A single mother turns up dead at the bottom of the river that runs through town. Earlier in the summer, a vulnerable teenage girl met the same fate. They are not the first women lost to these dark waters, but their deaths disturb the river and its history, dredging up secrets long submerged. Left behind is a lonely 15-year-old girl. Parentless and friendless, she now finds herself in the care of her mother's sister, a fearful stranger who has been dragged back to the place she deliberately ran from --- a place to which she vowed she'd never return.

Kate, Aubrey and Jenny first met as college roommates and soon became inseparable, despite being as different as three women can be. As an unlikely friendship formed, the three of them swore they would always be there for each other. But 20 years later, one of them is standing at the edge of a bridge, and someone is urging her to jump. How did it come to this? Kate married the gorgeous party boy, Aubrey married up, and Jenny married the boy next door. But how can these three women love and hate each other? Can feelings this strong lead to murder? When one of them dies under mysterious circumstances, will everyone assume, as is often the case, that it’s always the husband?

Orphaned at a young age, Edith Stuyvesant Dresser claimed lineage from one of New York’s best known families. She grew up in Newport and Paris, and her engagement and marriage to George Vanderbilt was one of the most watched events of Gilded Age society. But none of this prepared her to be mistress of Biltmore House --- the largest, grandest residence ever built in the United States. When fortunes shifted and changing times threatened her family, her home and her community, it was up to Edith to save Biltmore --- and secure the future of the region and her husband’s legacy.

Peter Guillam, a staunch colleague and disciple of George Smiley of the British Secret Service, otherwise known as the Circus, is living out his old age on the family farmstead on the south coast of Brittany when a letter from his old Service summons him to London. The reason? His Cold War past has come back to claim him. Intelligence operations that were once the toast of secret London, and involved such characters as Alec Leamas, Jim Prideaux, George Smiley and Peter Guillam himself, are to be scrutinized by a generation with no memory of the Cold War and no patience with its justifications.

On January 2, 1942, Japanese troops marched into Manila unopposed by U.S. forces. Manila was a strategic port, a romantic American outpost and a jewel of a city. Tokyo saw its conquest of the Philippines as the key in its plan to control all of Asia, including Australia. Thousands of soldiers surrendered and were sent on the notorious 80-mile Bataan Death March. But thousands of other Filipinos and Americans refused to surrender and hid in the Luzon hills above Bataan and Manila. MacARTHUR’S SPIES is the story of three of them, and how they successfully foiled the Japanese for more than two years, sabotaging Japanese efforts and preparing the way for MacArthur’s return.

Across seven tales, Haruki Murakami brings his powers of observation to bear on the lives of men who, in their own ways, find themselves alone. Here are lovesick doctors, students, ex-boyfriends, actors, bartenders and even Kafka’s Gregor Samsa, brought together to tell stories that speak to us all. In MEN WITHOUT WOMEN, Murakami has crafted another contemporary classic, marked by the same wry humor and pathos that have defined his entire body of work.

THE MINISTRY OF UTMOST HAPPINESS begins with Anjum --- who used to be Aftab --- unrolling a threadbare Persian carpet in a city graveyard she calls home. We encounter the odd, unforgettable Tilo and the men who loved her --- including Musa, sweetheart and ex-sweetheart, lover and ex-lover; their fates are as entwined as their arms used to be and always will be. We meet Tilo’s landlord, a former suitor, now an intelligence officer posted to Kabul. And then we meet the two Miss Jebeens: the first a child born in Srinagar and buried in its overcrowded Martyrs’ Graveyard; the second found at midnight, abandoned on a concrete sidewalk in the heart of New Delhi.

Constance Kopp is back --- with a badge and a taste for justice. She has finally earned her deputy sheriff’s badge and is ready to tackle a new kind of case: defending independent young women brought into the Hackensack jail on dubious charges of waywardness, incorrigibility and moral depravity. Such were the laws --- and morals --- of 1916. Constance uses her authority as deputy sheriff, and occasionally exceeds it, to investigate and support these women when no one else will. But it’s her sister Fleurette --- who runs away from their sleepy farm to join the glamorous world of vaudeville --- who puts Constance’s beliefs to the test. Is there a wayward girl in her own family?

The violent racism of the American South drove Wayne Flynt away from his home state of Alabama, but the publication of TO KILL A MOCKINGBIRD, Harper Lee’s classic novel about courage, community and equality, inspired him to return in the early 1960s and craft a career documenting and teaching Alabama history. His writing resonated with many Alabamians, in particular three sisters: Louise, Alice and Nelle Harper Lee. Beginning with their first meeting in 1983, a mutual respect and affection for the state’s history and literature matured into a deep friendship between two families who can trace their roots there back more than five generations.

A 46-year-old divorcee whose beloved only child has just left for college, Eve Fletcher is struggling to adjust to her empty nest when one night her phone lights up with a text message. Sent from an anonymous number, the mysterious sender tells Eve, “U R my MILF!” Over the months that follow, that message comes to obsess Eve, who can’t curtail her interest in MILFateria.com, which features the erotic exploits of ordinary, middle-aged women like herself. Meanwhile, Eve’s son Brendan discovers that his new campus isn’t nearly as welcoming to his hard-partying lifestyle as he had imagined. Both mother and son find themselves enmeshed in morally fraught situations that come to a head on one fateful November night.

When the most advanced aircraft ever designed vanishes over the South Pacific, Kurt Austin and Joe Zavala are drawn into a deadly contest to locate the fallen machine. But they know what others don’t --- that the X-37 is carrying a dangerous secret, a payload of exotic matter, extracted from the upper reaches of the atmosphere and stored at a temperature near absolute zero. As long as it remains frozen, the cargo is inert, but if it thaws, it will unleash a catastrophe of nearly unthinkable proportions. The entire NUMA team will risk everything in an effort to avert disaster…but they may be caught in a race that no one can win.

Cultural critic and bestselling author Roxane Gay collects original and previously published pieces that address what it means to live in a world where women have to measure the harassment, violence and aggression they face, and where they are “routinely second-guessed, blown off, discredited, denigrated, besmirched, belittled, patronized, mocked, shamed, gaslit, insulted, bullied” for speaking out. Contributions include essays from established and up-and-coming writers, performers and critics, including actors Ally Sheedy and Gabrielle Union and writers Amy Jo Burns, Lyz Lenz and Claire Schwartz.

David “Big Papi” Ortiz is a baseball icon and one of the most popular figures ever to play the game. A key part of the Boston Red Sox for 15 years, Ortiz helped to win three World Series, bringing back a storied franchise from “never wins” to “always wins.” He helped upend the doubters, the naysayers and the nonbelievers, and, as he launched balls into the stands again and again and again, he captured the imagination of millions of fans. Ortiz made Boston and the Red Sox his home, his place of work and his legacy. In PAPI, his ultimate memoir, Ortiz opens up as never before.

Father Greg Lockwood is unlike any Catholic priest you have ever met --- a man who lounges in boxer shorts, loves action movies, and constantly jams on the guitar. His daughter is an irreverent poet who long ago left the Church’s country. When an unexpected crisis leads her and her husband to move back into her parents’ rectory, their two worlds collide. In PRIESTDADDY, Patricia Lockwood interweaves emblematic moments from her childhood and adolescence with scenes that chronicle the eight-month adventure she and her husband had in her parents’ household after a decade of living on their own.

Joan Ashby is a brilliant and intense literary sensation acclaimed for her explosively dark and singular stories. When she finds herself unexpectedly pregnant, she is stunned by Martin’s delight, his instant betrayal of their pact (“work is paramount, absolutely no children”). She then makes a fateful, selfless decision to embrace her unintentional family. Challenged by raising two precocious sons, it is decades before she finally completes her masterpiece novel. Poised to reclaim the spotlight, to resume the intended life she gave up for love, a betrayal of Shakespearean proportion forces her to question every choice she has made.

When Nicholas Young hears that his grandmother, Su Yi, is on her deathbed, he rushes to be by her bedside. The entire Shang-Young clan has convened from all corners of the globe to stake claim on their matriarch’s massive fortune. As her relatives fight over heirlooms, Astrid Leong is at the center of her own storm, desperately in love with her old sweetheart Charlie Wu, but tormented by her ex-husband --- a man hell bent on destroying Astrid’s reputation and relationship. Meanwhile, Kitty Pong, married to China’s second richest man, billionaire Jack Bing, still feels second best next to her new step-daughter, famous fashionista Colette Bing.

Connie Kelly thought she’d found her perfect man on an online dating site. She fell so hard for M. Brooks Welles that she wrote him a check for almost $300,000, hoping for a big return on her investment. But within weeks, both Welles and her money are gone. Enter Spenser, who quickly discovers that everything about Welles is phony. But uncovering the truth won’t be easy, as he’ll have to keep the mystery man alive long enough to get back his client’s money. As the trail winds from Boston to backroads Georgia, Spenser will need help from trusted allies Hawk and Teddy Sapp to make sure Welles’ next con is his last.

In wartime Reykjavik, Iceland, a young woman is found strangled in “the shadow district,” a rough and dangerous area of the city. An Icelandic detective and a member of the American military police are on the trail of a brutal killer. A 90-year-old man is discovered dead on his bed, smothered with his own pillow. Konrad, a former detective now bored with retirement, finds newspaper cuttings reporting the WWII shadow district murder in the dead man’s home. It’s a crime that Konrad remembers, having grown up in the same neighborhood. Why, after all this time, would an old crime resurface? Did the police arrest the wrong man? Will Konrad's link to the past help him solve the case and finally lay the ghosts of WWII Reykjavik to rest?

Over a span of 20 years, four boys have been kidnapped from their bedrooms, suffocated and buried nearby in a shallow grave. Serial killer or coincidence? That’s the question investigative reporter Maxine Revere sets out to answer when an old friend begs her to help exonerate his wife, who has been charged with their son’s recent murder. But Max can do little to help because the police and D.A. won’t talk to her --- they think they have the right woman. Instead, Max turns her attention to three similar cold cases. If she can solve them, she might be able to help her friend.

SINCE WE FELL follows Rachel Childs, a former journalist who, after an on-air mental breakdown, now lives as a virtual shut-in. In all other respects, however, she enjoys an ideal life with an ideal husband. Until a chance encounter on a rainy afternoon causes that ideal life to fray. As does Rachel’s marriage. As does Rachel herself. Sucked into a conspiracy thick with deception, violence and possibly madness, Rachel must find the strength within herself to conquer unimaginable fears and mind-altering truths.

The hardscrabble Chase women --- Mary, Hannah and their mother Diane --- have been eking out a living running a tiny seaside motel that has been in the family for generations, inviting trouble into their lives for just as long. But when Diane dies in a car accident, Mary discovers the motel is worth less than the back taxes they owe. With few options, Mary’s finely tuned instincts for survival kick in. As the sisters begin a cross-country journey in search of a better life, she will stop at nothing to protect Hannah. But Mary wants to protect herself, too, for the secrets she promised she would never tell --- but now may be forced to reveal --- hold the weight of unbearable loss.

Lauren Marks was 27, touring a show in Scotland with her friends, when an aneurysm ruptured in her brain and left her fighting for her life. She woke up in a hospital soon after with serious deficiencies to her reading, speaking and writing abilities, and an unfamiliar diagnosis: aphasia. The way she perceived her environment and herself had profoundly changed, her entire identity seemed crafted around a language she could no longer access. She returned to her childhood home to recover, grappling with a muted inner monologue and fractured sense of self. Soon after, Lauren began a journal, to chronicle her year following the rupture. A STITCH OF TIME is the remarkable result.

Ronni Sunshine left London for Hollywood to become a beautiful, charismatic star of the silver screen. But at home, she was a narcissistic, disinterested mother who alienated her three daughters. Still, when Ronni discovers she has a serious illness, she calls her now-adult girls home to fulfill her final wishes. And though Nell, Meredith and Lizzy have never been close, their mother’s illness draws them together to confront the old jealousies and secret fears that have threatened to tear these sisters apart. As they face the loss of their mother, they will discover if blood might be thicker than water after all.

Harry Bosch is back as a volunteer working cold cases for the San Fernando Police Department and is called out to a local drug store where a young pharmacist has been murdered. Bosch and the town's three-person detective squad sift through the clues, which lead into the dangerous, big business world of pill mills and prescription drug abuse. Meanwhile, an old case from Bosch's LAPD days comes back to haunt him when a long-imprisoned killer claims Bosch framed him, and seems to have new evidence to prove it. The two unrelated cases wind around each other like strands of barbed wire. Along the way, Bosch discovers that there are two kinds of truth: the kind that sets you free and the kind that leaves you buried in darkness.

The Chemin, also known as the Camino de Santiago, is a centuries-old pilgrim route that ends in Santiago de Compostela in northwest Spain. Every year, thousands of walkers follow the route that wends through quaint small villages and along busy highways alike. Zoe, who’s still reeling from her husband’s sudden death, has impulsively decided to walk the Camino, hoping to find solace and direction. Martin is road-testing a cart of his own design and recovering from a messy divorce. Strangers and circumstances force Zoe to confront not just recent loss, but long-held beliefs. For Martin, the pilgrimage is a test of his skills and endurance but also of his willingness to trust others --- and himself --- again.

The Greenbrier Ghost is renowned in American folklore, but Sharyn McCrumb is the first author to look beneath the legend to unearth the facts. Using a century of genealogical material and other historical documents, McCrumb reveals new information about the story and brings to life the personalities in the trial: the prosecutor, a former Confederate cavalryman; the defense attorney, a pro-Union bridgeburner, who nevertheless had owned slaves; and the mother of the murdered woman, who doggedly sticks to her ghost story --- all seen through the eyes of a young black lawyer on the cusp of a new century, with his own tragedies yet to come.

Annie Darling’s friend and fellow shop owner Ves Roundtree is a very wealthy woman. Her rich brother entrusted her with his estate, and upon her death, his fortune is to be divided. Several cash-strapped islanders are in line to collect life-changing inheritances. The problem is that Ves is very much alive and hosts a dinner for the prospective beneficiaries. Not long after, she suffers a bad fall that was no accident. Everyone at the table had a motive, but not a shred of evidence was left behind. When one of the suspects is found floating in the harbor and Ves disappears, Annie and her husband Max spring into action to catch a calculating killer before greed takes another life.

Set in London of the 1660s and of the early 21st century, THE WEIGHT OF INK is the interwoven tale of two women of remarkable intellect: Ester Velasquez, an emigrant from Amsterdam who is permitted to scribe for a blind rabbi, just before the plague hits the city; and Helen Watt, an ailing historian with a love of Jewish history. When Helen is summoned by a former student to view a cache of newly discovered 17th-century Jewish documents, she enlists the help of Aaron Levy, an American graduate student as impatient as he is charming, and embarks on one last project: to determine the identity of the documents' scribe, the elusive "Aleph."

Six million acres of Adirondack forest separate Natalie and Doug Larson from civilization. For the newlyweds, an isolated backcountry honeymoon seems ideal. But just as Natalie and Doug begin to explore the dark interiors of their own hearts, as well as the depths of their love for each other, it becomes clear that they are not alone in the woods. As they struggle with the worst the wilderness has to offer, a man watches them, wielding the forest like a weapon. He wants something from them more terrifying than death. And once they are near his domain, he will do everything in his power to make sure they never walk out again.

Aviva Grossman, an ambitious congressional intern in Florida, makes the mistake of having an affair with her boss --- and blogging about it. When the affair comes to light, the beloved congressman doesn’t take the fall. But Aviva does, and her life is over before it hardly begins. She sees no way out but to change her name and move to a remote town in Maine. This time, she tries to be smarter about her life and strives to raise her daughter, Ruby, to be strong and confident. But when Aviva decides to run for public office herself, that long-ago mistake trails her via the Internet and catches up. It’s only a matter of time until Ruby finds out who her mother was and is forced to reconcile that person with the one she knows.