Adult

On May 25, 1977, a problem-plagued, budget-straining independent science-fiction film opened in a mere 32 American movie theaters. Conceived, written and directed by a little-known filmmaker named George Lucas, Star Wars reinvented the cinematic landscape, ushering in a new way for movies to be made, marketed and merchandised. Lucas went on to create the Indiana Jones series, transform the world of special effects, and forever change the way movies sound. His innovation and ambition forged some of today's most prominent companies, including Pixar, Lucasfilm, THX sound and Industrial Light & Magic. This acclaimed biography captures the life and times of a film icon whose influence is unmatched.

The body of high school senior Joy Enright is discovered in the woods at the edge of a pond. She had been presumed drowned, but an autopsy shows that she was, in fact, strangled. As the investigation unfolds, four characters tell the story from widely divergent perspectives: Susanne, Joy's mother and a professor at the local art college; Martin, a black graduate student suspected of the murder; Harper, Joy's best friend and a potential eyewitness; and Tom, a rescue diver and son-in-law of the town's police chief. As a web of small-town secrets comes to light, a dramatic conclusion reveals the truth about Joy's death.

Iris and Will have been married for seven years, and life is as close to perfect as it can be. But on the morning Will flies out for a business trip to Florida, Iris' happy world comes to an abrupt halt: Another plane headed for Seattle has crashed into a field, killing everyone on board --- and, according to the airline, Will was one of the passengers. Grief stricken and confused, Iris is convinced it all must be a huge misunderstanding. Why did Will lie about where he was going? And what else has he lied about? As Iris sets off on a desperate quest to uncover what her husband was keeping from her, the answers she finds shock her to her very core.

In Ulster, Northern Ireland, a petty criminal kills a woman in a drunken car crash. Her sons swear revenge. In London, Sean Dillon and his colleagues in the “Prime Minister's private army,” fresh from defeating a deadly al-Qaeda operation, receive a warning: You may think you have weakened us, but you have only made us stronger. In Washington, D.C., a special projects director with the CIA, frustrated at not getting permission from the President for his daring anti-terrorism plan, decides to put it in motion anyway. Soon, the ripples from these events will meet and overlap, creating havoc in their wake. Desperate men will act, secrets will be revealed --- and the midnight bell will toll.

Siri Hustvedt has always been fascinated by biology and how human perception works. She is a lover of art, the humanities and the sciences. She is a novelist and a feminist. Her lively, lucid essays in A WOMAN LOOKING AT MEN LOOKING AT WOMEN begin to make some sense of those plural perspectives. There has been much talk about building a beautiful bridge across the chasm that separates the sciences and the humanities. At the moment, we have only a wobbly walkway, but Hustvedt is encouraged by the travelers making their way across it in both directions.

Drawing on previously hidden historical documents and interviews with the long-silent "illegitimate" branch of the Roosevelt family, William J. Mann paints an elegant, meticulously researched and groundbreaking group portrait of this legendary clan. Mann argues that the Roosevelts’ rise to power and prestige was actually driven by a series of intense personal contests that at times devolved into blood sport. THE WAR OF THE ROOSEVELTS is the story of a family at war with itself, of social Darwinism at its most ruthless --- in which the strong devoured the weak and repudiated the inconvenient.

A massive data breach has compromised the personal information of millions of American military officers and intelligence agents. After several deadly attacks on off-duty personnel and their families, President Jack Ryan faces one of the greatest challenges of his career. Can he find the hackers and cap the flow of information before it’s too late?

Inventory at Chuck Dutton's Music City Salvage is running low, so he's thrilled when Augusta Withrow appears in his office offering salvage rights to her entire property. He assigns his daughter, Dahlia, to personally oversee the project, and the crew finds a handful of surprises, including a cemetery. When human remains turn up after bulldozing the property, Augusta goes missing and Dahlia's concerns grow. As things get even stranger, there's nowhere to go and no one she can call for help, even if anyone would believe that she and her crew are being stalked by a murderous phantom.

After the death of her beloved mother, Martha Jefferson spent five years abroad with her father, Thomas Jefferson, on his first diplomatic mission to France. Now, at 17, Jefferson’s eldest daughter is returning to the lush hills of the family’s beloved Virginia plantation, Monticello. While the large, beautiful estate is the same as she remembers, Martha has changed. The young girl who sailed to Europe is now a woman with a heart made heavy by a first love gone wrong. As her life becomes constrained by the demands of marriage, motherhood, politics, scandal and her family’s increasing impoverishment, Martha yearns to find her way back to the gentle beauty and quiet happiness of the world she once knew at the top of her father’s “little mountain.”

All her life, everyone has tried to protect Lady Ella Myerston from the realities of the world. But she knows very well how the dangerous Fire Eyes diamonds have haunted her brother and their friends, and she won't wait for peril to strike again. She intends to take action...and if that happens to involve an adventurous trip to the Cotswolds, then so much the better. Lord James Cayton has already broken two hearts, and now he's determined to live a better life. He does his best to remove the intriguing Lady Ella from danger, but the stubborn girl won't budge.