"I am stockpiling antibiotics for the Apocalypse, even as I await the blossoming of paperwhites on the windowsill in the kitchen," Anne Lamott admits at the beginning of ALMOST EVERYTHING. Despair and uncertainty surround us: in the news, in our families and in ourselves. But even when life is at its bleakest --- when we are "doomed, stunned, exhausted, and over-caffeinated" --- the seeds of rejuvenation are at hand. "All truth is paradox," Lamott writes, "and this turns out to be a reason for hope. If you arrive at a place in life that is miserable, it will change." That is the time when we must pledge not to give up but "to do what Wendell Berry wrote: 'Be joyful, though you have considered all the facts.'"

The lower classes must give 10 years in service to Britain’s powerfully gifted rulers. With one uprising crushed by the glittering elite, commoners and aristocrats alike now take sides for a final confrontation. At the center of it all are Abi Hadley and her brother, Luke. Each has reason to hate the ruling Jardine family. Abi, who was once their servant, now seeks revenge for a terrible wrong. Luke was imprisoned on their whim --- but his only hope may be an alliance with the youngest and most powerful of the clan, the cold and inscrutable Silyen Jardine. Risking everything to end a bright and shining tyranny, Abi, Luke and Silyen find themselves bound by a single destiny. Their actions will change their fates --- and the world --- but at a cost almost too terrible to contemplate.

On September 11, 2001, Joe Maio went to work in the north tower of the World Trade Center. He never returned, leaving behind a wife, Sharri, and 15-month-old son, Devon. Five years later, Sharri remarried, and Devon welcomed a new dad into his life. For thousands, the whole country really, 9/11 is a day of grief. For Adam and Sharri Maio Schefter and their family, it’s not just a day of grief, but also hope. This is a story of 9/11, but it’s also the story of 9/12 and all the days after. Life moved on. Pieces were picked up. New dreams were dreamed. The Schefters are the embodiment of that.

Mary Bennet possesses neither the beauty of her eldest sister, Jane, nor the high-spirited wit of second-born Lizzy. Even compared to her frivolous younger siblings, Kitty and Lydia, Mary knows she is lacking in the ways that matter for single, not-so-well-to-do women in 19th-century England who must secure their futures through the finding of a husband. As her sisters wed, one by one, Mary pictures herself growing old, a spinster with no estate to run or children to mind, dependent on the charity of others. At least she has the silent rebellion and secret pleasures of reading and writing to keep her company. But even her fictional creations are no match for the scandal, tragedy and romance that eventually visit Mary’s own life.

Still navigating the fallout from a shocking revelation that’s left a network of assassins’ crosshairs trained on her, Bianca St. Ives is ready to take fate into her own hands. But as Bianca races to outmaneuver her tireless pursuers, her father loops her in on a job that just might do the trick: recover King Priam’s Treasure, a collection of heavily guarded, priceless artifacts stolen by the Russians during World War II, and return it to Germany. Impossible? Maybe for some, but a high-risk heist is all in a day’s work for Bianca St. Ives, especially when there’s intel on the line --- intel that could finally bring down the shadowy forces seeking to bury Bianca for good.

Spanning the years of the first great settlement of the West, THE REMOVES tells the intertwining stories of 15-year-old Anne Cummins, frontierswoman Libbie Custer, and Libbie’s husband, the Civil War hero George Armstrong Custer. When Anne survives a surprise attack on her family’s homestead, she is thrust into a difficult life she never anticipated --- living among the Cheyenne as both a captive and, eventually, a member of the tribe. Libbie, too, is thrown into a brutal, unexpected life when she marries Custer. But when what Anne and Libbie have come to know is suddenly altered through tragedy and loss, they realize how indelibly shaped they are by life on the treacherous, extraordinary American plains.

THE PRESIDENT IS MISSING confronts a threat so huge that it jeopardizes not just Pennsylvania Avenue and Wall Street, but all of America. Uncertainty and fear grip the nation. There are whispers of cyberterror and espionage and a traitor in the Cabinet. Even the President himself becomes a suspect, and then he disappears from public view. Set over the course of three days, Bill Clinton and James Patterson's political thriller sheds a stunning light upon the inner workings and vulnerabilities of our nation.

In the summer of 2011, just after Nour loses her father to cancer, her mother moves Nour and her sisters from New York City back to Syria to be closer to their family. In order to keep her father’s spirit as she adjusts to her new home, Nour tells herself their favorite story --- the tale of Rawiya, a 12th-century girl who disguised herself as a boy in order to apprentice herself to a famous mapmaker. When a stray shell destroys Nour’s house and almost takes her life, she and her family are forced to choose: stay and risk more violence, or flee across seven countries of the Middle East and North Africa in search of safety --- along the very route Rawiya and her mapmaker took 800 years before in their quest to chart the world.

Part cookbook, part memoir, THE BEST COOK IN THE WORLD is Pulitzer Prize winner Rick Bragg’s loving tribute to the South, his family and, especially, to his extraordinary mother. Here are irresistible stories and recipes from across generations. They come, skillet by skillet, from Bragg’s ancestors, from feasts and near famine, from funerals and celebrations, and from a thousand tales of family lore as rich and as sumptuous as the dishes they inspired.

With an American president distracted by growing tensions in North Korea and Iran, an ominous new threat is emerging in Moscow. A czar is rising in the Kremlin, a Russian president feverishly consolidating power, silencing his opposition, and plotting a brazen and lightning-fast military strike that could rupture the NATO alliance and bring Washington and Moscow to the brink of nuclear war. But in his blind spot is the former U.S. Secret Service agent, Marcus Ryker, trained to protect but ready to kill to save his country.