Secrecy came naturally to John le Carré, and there were some secrets that he fought fiercely to keep. Adam Sisman's definitive biography, published in 2015, provided a revealing portrait of this fascinating man. Yet some aspects of his subject remained hidden. Nowhere was this more so than in his private life. Apparently content in his marriage, the novelist conducted a string of love affairs over five decades. To these relationships, he brought much of the tradecraft that he had learned as a spy. In trying to manage his biography, the novelist engaged in a succession of skirmishes with his biographer. While he could control what Sisman wrote about him in his lifetime, he accepted that the truth would eventually become known. Following his death in 2020, what had been withheld can now be revealed.

Adrien Villere suspects he is not like other boys. For years, he desperately locks away his feelings and fears --- but eventually, tragedy and loss drive him to seek solace from his mentor, young neighbor Jacob Hart. However, Jacob’s betrayal of Adrien’s trust results in secret abuse, setting off a chain of actions from which neither Adrien’s wise sister, Bernadette, nor his closest friend, Isaac, can turn him. AT WHAT COST, SILENCE? presents two contrasting plantation families in a society where strict rules of belief and behavior are clear, and public opinion can shape an entire life.

In HITCHCOCK’S BLONDES, Laurence Leamer offers an intimate journey into the lives of eight legendary actresses whose stories helped chart the course of Alfred Hitchcock’s career --- from his early days in the British film industry, to his triumphant American debut, to his Hollywood heyday and beyond. Through the stories of June Howard-Tripp, Madeleine Carroll, Ingrid Bergman, Grace Kelly, Janet Leigh, Kim Novak, Eva Marie Saint and Tippi Hedren --- who starred in 14 of Hitchcock’s most notable films and who bore the brunt of his fondness and sometimes fixation --- we can finally start to see the enigmatic man himself. After all, “his” blondes (as he thought of them) knew the truths of his art, his obsessions and desires, as well as anyone.

When NASA sent astronauts to the moon in the 1960s and 1970s, the agency excluded women from the corps, arguing that only military test pilots --- a group then made up exclusively of men --- had the right stuff. Eventually, though, NASA recognized its blunder and opened the application process to a wider array of hopefuls, regardless of race or gender. From a candidate pool of 8,000, six elite women were selected in 1978: Sally Ride, Judy Resnik, Anna Fisher, Kathy Sullivan, Shannon Lucid and Rhea Seddon. In THE SIX, acclaimed journalist Loren Grush shows these brilliant and courageous women enduring claustrophobic --- and sometimes deeply sexist --- media attention, undergoing rigorous survival training, and preparing for years to take multi-million-dollar payloads into orbit.

In over 40 books, in a career that spanned over 60 years, Larry McMurtry staked his claim as a superior chronicler of the American West, and as the Great Plains’ keenest witness since Willa Cather and Wallace Stegner. Tracy Daugherty's latest book traces his origins as one of the last American writers who had direct contact with this country’s pioneer traditions. It follows his astonishing career as bestselling novelist, Pulitzer Prize winner, author of the beloved LONESOME DOVE, Academy Award-winning screenwriter, public intellectual and passionate bookseller.

Growing up in the 1960s, Meg Kissinger’s family seemed to live a charmed life. With eight kids and two loving parents, the Kissingers radiated a warm, boisterous energy. But behind closed doors, a harsher reality was unfolding --- a heavily medicated mother hospitalized for anxiety and depression, a manic father prone to violence, and children in the throes of bipolar disorder and depression, two of whom would take their own lives. Through it all, the Kissingers faced the world with their signature dark humor and the unspoken family rule: never talk about it. WHILE YOU WERE OUT begins as the personal story of one family’s struggles and then opens outward, as Kissinger details how childhood tragedy catalyzed a journalism career focused on exposing our country’s flawed mental health care.

In 1950, three years after Jackie Robinson first walked onto the diamond at Ebbets Field, the all-white, upper-crust US Lawn Tennis Association opened its door just a crack to receive a powerhouse player who would integrate "the game of royalty." The player was a street-savvy young Black woman from Harlem named Althea Gibson, who was about as out-of-place in that rarefied and intolerant world as any aspiring tennis champion could be. But her astonishing performance on the court soon eclipsed the negative feelings being cast her way as she eventually became one of the greatest American tennis champions. In ALTHEA, Sally H. Jacobs tells the heart-rending story of this pioneer --- a trailblazer, a champion, and one of the most remarkable Americans of the 20th century.

Mary "Mae" Foley was a force to be reckoned with. On one hip, she held her makeup compact; on the other, her NYPD badge. When women were fighting for the vote, Mae was fighting crime in the heart of New York City --- taking down rapists, bootleggers, Nazis and serial killers. One of the first women to be sworn into the police force, Mae not only fought crime in the city that never sleeps, but also did something much bigger --- challenged the patriarchal systems that continually tried to shut her and other women down. The result of her efforts? A long career that helped over 2,000 women join her auxiliary police force, the “Masher Squad.” Mae Foley is proof that women can do anything men can do, all while wearing corsets and the perfect shade of rouge.

A founding member of the Grand Ole Opry and the program’s first Black star, DeFord Bailey (1899-1982) was among the Opry’s most popular early performers. Known as the “Harmonica Wizard” for his virtuosity on the instrument, he was also a singer, guitarist, banjoist and composer. For decades following his departure from the Opry, Bailey’s story was shrouded in mystery. This meticulously researched biography, long out of print, tells the story of a pioneering Black star in early country music in rich and fascinating detail. The book’s original publication in 1991 helped pave the way for Bailey’s election to the Country Music Hall of Fame in 2005.

1310, Berwick-upon-Tweed, England. Edward II knights Frederick Kohl for his bravery fighting the Scots. But Sir Frederick is not the man the king believes him to be; instead, it is his sister, Christina, who assumes her dead brother's identity. Still posing as Frederick, Christina escorts Lady Cecily, a young noblewoman joining Queen Isabella's court at Westminster Palace, to London. Unexpectedly, Christina and Cecily fall in love. But the wife of one of the wealthiest and most influential men in the city is Christina's bitter enemy. Katharine Volker, whose lascivious advances Christina rejects, goads her into voyaging from her London home to the Baltic waters of her birthplace. Christina journeys not to engage in trade. She sails for a far deadlier purpose --- to exact revenge on the pirates who killed her father and brother.