Adult

Land --- whether meadow or mountainside, desert or peat bog, parkland or pasture, suburb or city --- is central to our existence. It quite literally underlies and underpins everything. In LAND, Simon Winchester examines what we human beings are doing --- and have done --- with the billions of acres that together make up the solid surface of our planet. The book examines in depth how we acquire land, how we steward it, how and why we fight over it, and finally, how we can, and on occasion do, come to share it. Ultimately, Winchester confronts the essential question: Who actually owns the world’s land --- and why does it matter?

Trent Preszler thought he was living his best life in a seaside Long Island home and working as the C.E.O. of a winery. After 14 years of silence, his estranged father called to say his cancer had worsened, leading an uncertain Trent to return to South Dakota for Thanksgiving. It would be the last time he saw his father alive. His death left Trent, nearing forty, broken down, adrift and alone. He had left Trent only one item: a toolbox, an inheritance that befuddled him. But maybe that was the point. And with that came an epiphany: he would build something.

The girls of St John the Divine, an elite English boarding school, were notorious for flipping their hair, harassing teachers, chasing boys and chain-smoking cigarettes. For Josephine, now in her 30s, the years at St John were a lifetime ago. She hasn’t spoken to another Divine in 15 years, not since the day the school shuttered its doors in disgrace. Yet, Josephine now inexplicably finds herself returning to her old stomping grounds. The visit provokes blurry recollections of those doomed final weeks that rocked the community. With each memory that resurfaces, she circles closer to the violent secret at the heart of the school’s scandal. But the more Josephine recalls, the further her life unravels.

In an era in which “I have many black friends” is often a medal of Wokeness, Ben hilariously chronicles the experience of being on the receiving end of those fist bumps. He takes us through his immigrant childhood, from wanting nothing more than friends to sit with at lunch, to his awkward teenage years, to college in the age of Obama, and adulthood in the Trump administration --- two sides of the same American coin. Extremely timely, SURE, I’LL BE YOUR BLACK FRIEND is a conversational take on topics both light and heavy, universal and deeply personal, which reveals incisive truths about the need for connection in all of us.

When Frankie’s mother dies, she is sent to live with her Aunt Bet in the countryside. Life on their farm is happy --- for a while. But when World War II breaks out, Frankie must help her country by signing up to the women’s branch of the British Army. Soon, she meets Romare, an American doctor who has come to the UK after facing terrible racism at home. But trouble is stirring in Britain too, and Frankie must prepare for heartbreak. Can love triumph over a history of hate? Or will Frankie and Romare’s love pay the ultimate sacrifice?

Kabul, 1978: The daughter of a prominent family, Sitara Zamani lives a privileged life in Afghanistan’s thriving cosmopolitan capital. But her world is shattered when communists stage a coup, assassinating the president and Sitara’s entire family. Smuggled out of the palace by a guard named Shair, Sitara finds her way to the home of a female American diplomat, who adopts her and raises her in America. In her new country, Sitara takes on a new name --- Aryana Shepherd --- and throws herself into her studies, eventually becoming a renowned surgeon. New York, 2008: Forty years after that fatal night in Kabul, Aryana’s world is rocked again when an elderly patient appears in her examination room. It is Shair, the soldier who saved her, yet may have murdered her entire family.

Under Darius the Great, King of Kings, the mighty Persian army --- swollen by 10,000 warriors known as The Immortals --- have come to subjugate the Greeks. In their path, vastly outnumbered, stands an army of freeborn Athenians. Among them is a clever, fearsome and cunning soldier-statesman, Xanthippus. Against all odds, the Athenians emerge victorious. Ten years later, Xanthippus watches helplessly as Athens succumbs to the bitter politics of factionalism. Trust is at a low ebb when the Persians cross the Hellespont in ever greater numbers in their second attempt to raze Athens to the ground. Facing overwhelming forces by land and sea, the Athenians call on their Spartan allies for assistance --- to delay the Persians at the treacherous pass of Thermopylae.

Every night, as Faye puts her daughters to bed, she thinks of her own mother, Jeanie, who died when she was eight. The pain of that loss has never left her, and that’s why she wants her own girls to know how very much they are loved by her --- and always will be, whatever happens. Then one day, Faye gets her heart’s desire when she is whisked back into the past and is reunited not just with her mother but with her own younger self. Jeanie doesn’t recognize grown-up Faye as her daughter, but the two women become close friends and share all kinds of secrets --- except for the deepest secret of all, the secret of who Faye really is. Faye worries that telling the truth may prevent her from being able to return to the present day, to her dear husband and beloved daughters.

Present day: Emma Lovett has been tasked to restore the gardens of the famed Highbury House estate, designed in 1907 by her hero, Venetia Smith. 1907: When Venetia Smith is hired to design the gardens of Highbury House, she is determined to make them a triumph. 1944: When land girl Beth Pedley arrives at a farm on the outskirts of the village of Highbury, all she wants is to find a place she can call home. Cook Stella Adderton is desperate to leave Highbury House to pursue her own dreams. And widow Diana Symonds is anxiously trying to cling to her pre-war life. When war threatens Highbury House’s treasured gardens, these three very different women are drawn together by a secret that will last for decades.

Washington, DC, 2019: Laura Preston is a reclusive artist at odds with her older sister, Bea, as their elegant, formidable mother slowly slides into dementia. When a stranger contacts Laura claiming to be her brother who disappeared 40 years earlier when the family lived in Bangkok, Laura ignores Bea’s warnings of a scam and flies to Thailand to see if it can be true. But meeting him in person leads to more questions than answers. Bangkok, 1972: Genevieve and Robert Preston raise their three children with the help of a cadre of servants. Robert works for American intelligence, Genevieve finds herself drawn into a passionate affair with her husband’s boss, and their serene household is vulnerable to unseen dangers in a rapidly changing world and a country they don’t really understand.