Zachary Ezra Rawlins is a graduate student in Vermont when he discovers a mysterious book hidden in the stacks. As he turns the pages, entranced by tales of lovelorn prisoners, key collectors and nameless acolytes, he reads something strange: a story from his own childhood. Bewildered by this inexplicable book and desperate to make sense of how his own life came to be recorded, Zachary uncovers a series of clues that lead him to a masquerade party in New York, to a secret club, and through a doorway to an ancient library hidden far below the surface of the earth. What Zachary finds is a place of lost cities and seas, lovers who pass notes under doors and across time, and of stories whispered by the dead.

The circus arrives without warning. No announcements precede it, no paper notices plastered on lampposts and billboards. It is simply there, when yesterday it was not. Both playful and seductive, THE NIGHT CIRCUS, Erin Morgenstern’s spell-casting debut, is a mesmerizing love story for the ages.

The circus arrives without warning. No announcements precede it, no paper notices plastered on lampposts and billboards. It is simply there, when yesterday it was not. Both playful and seductive, THE NIGHT CIRCUS, Erin Morgenstern’s spell-casting debut, is a mesmerizing love story for the ages.