Adult

When 11-year-old Cornelius Vanderbilt began to work on his father’s small boat ferrying supplies in New York Harbor at the beginning of the 19th century, no one could have imagined that one day he would build two empires --- one in shipping and another in railroads --- that would make him the richest man in America. His staggering fortune was fought over by his heirs after his death in 1877, sowing familial discord that would never fully heal. Though his son Billy doubled the money left by “the Commodore,” subsequent generations competed to find new and ever more extraordinary ways of spending it. Now, the Commodore’s great-great-great-grandson, Anderson Cooper, joins with historian Katherine Howe to explore the story of his legendary family and their outsized influence.

Madame Burova --- beloved Tarot reader, palmist and clairvoyant --- is retiring and leaving her booth on the Brighton seafront. After a lifetime of keeping other people’s secrets, she is ready to have a little piece of life for herself. But she still has one last thing to do --- to fulfill a promise made in the 1970s, when she and her girlfriends were carefree, with their whole lives still before them. In London, it is time for another woman to make a fresh start. Billie has lost her university job, her marriage and her place in the world when a sudden and unlikely discovery leaves her very identity in question. Determined to find answers, she must follow a trail…which leads to Brighton, the pier and directly to Madame Burova’s door.

As a barrister, Ingrid Lewis is used to dealing with tricky clients, but no one has ever come close to John Webster. After Ingrid defended Webster against a stalking charge, he then turned on her --- following her, ruining her relationship, even destroying her home. Now, Ingrid believes she has finally escaped his clutches. But when one of her colleagues is run down on a busy London road, Ingrid is sure she was the intended victim. And then Webster shows up at her door. Webster claims Ingrid is in danger --- and that only he can protect her. Stalker or savior? Murderer or protector? The clock is ticking for Ingrid to decide. Because the killer is ready to strike again.

In a bunker deep below Berlin’s Old Reich Chancellery, Adolf Hitler and his new bride, Eva Braun, took their own lives just after 3:00 p.m. on April 30, 1945 --- Hitler by gunshot to the temple, Braun by ingesting cyanide. But the Führer’s suicide did not instantly end either Nazism or the Second World War in Europe. Far from it: the eight days that followed were among the most traumatic in modern history, witnessing not only the final paroxysms of bloodshed and the frantic surrender of the Wehrmacht, but the total disintegration of the once-mighty Third Reich. In EIGHT DAYS IN MAY, Volker Ullrich draws on an astonishing variety of sources, including diaries and letters of ordinary Germans, to narrate a society’s descent into Hobbesian chaos.

George Washington claimed that anyone who attempted to provide an accurate account of the war for independence would be accused of writing fiction. At the time, no one called it the “American Revolution”: former colonists still regarded themselves as Virginians or Pennsylvanians, not Americans, while John Adams insisted that the British were the real revolutionaries, for attempting to impose radical change without their colonists’ consent. With THE CAUSE, Joseph J. Ellis takes a fresh look at the events between 1773 and 1783, recovering a war more brutal than any in American history save the Civil War and discovering a strange breed of “prudent” revolutionaries, whose prudence proved wise yet tragic when it came to slavery.

Ever since she was adopted from a Sri Lankan orphanage, Paloma has had the best of everything. Now at 30 years old and recently cut off from her parents’ funds, she decides to sublet the second bedroom of her overpriced San Francisco apartment to Arun, who recently moved from India. Arun eventually discovers Paloma's darkest secret, one that could jeopardize her own fragile place in this country. Before Paloma can pay Arun off, she finds him face down in a pool of blood. She flees the apartment, but by the time the police arrive, there's no body --- and no evidence that Arun ever even existed in the first place. Paloma is terrified that this is all somehow tangled up in the desperate actions she took to escape Sri Lanka so many years ago.

As a third-year Ph.D. candidate, Olive Smith doesn't believe in lasting romantic relationships. But her best friend does. Convincing Anh that Olive is dating was always going to take more than hand-wavy Jedi mind tricks: Scientists require proof. So, like any self-respecting biologist, Olive panics and kisses the first man she sees. That man is none other than Adam Carlsen, a young hotshot professor --- and well-known ass. Which is why Olive is positively floored when Stanford's reigning lab tyrant agrees to keep her charade a secret and be her fake boyfriend. But when a big science conference goes haywire, putting Olive's career on the Bunsen burner, Adam surprises her again with his unyielding support and even more unyielding...six-pack abs.

WINDSWEPT is a beautifully written meditation on connecting with the outdoors through the simple act of walking. In captivating and elegant prose, Annabel Abbs-Streets follows in the footsteps of women who boldly reclaimed wild landscapes for themselves, including Georgia O’Keeffe in the empty plains of Texas and New Mexico, Nan Shepherd in the mountains of Scotland, Gwen John following the French River Garonne, Daphne du Maurier along the River Rhône, and Simone de Beauvoir --- who walked as much as 25 miles a day in a dress and espadrilles --- through the mountains and forests of France.

Every year, as the anniversary of 9/11 inches closer on the calendar, Kit Capriol scans the memorials published in the New York Times. It's a simple thing to look up a name and phone number, and reach out to surviving family members who might still be yearning for connection with their lost loved one. After her husband went down in the North Tower, Kit scraped by as an actress. But now her daughter Zoey is in the hospital, bills are due and the acting work has dried up. Becoming a medium is almost too easy for someone used to pretending for a living. Now, though, something has changed. The seances Kit holds in her apartment are starting to feel unsettlingly real, and the intriguing man she met at a local bar could be more complicated than he seems.

In a village of only 400 inhabitants, life could seem unremarkable. Yet in this remote town, a new road to the city has change on everyone’s minds. There is the beautiful, elusive Elisabet who cuts a surprisingly svelte path at The Knitting Company. Neighbors Kristin and Kjartan who seem…normal, but for their explosive passion that bewilders even themselves (and ignites the spectacular revenge of Kjartan’s wife). And then the most successful businessman in town decides to ditch his Range Rover and glamorous wife in exchange for Latin books and stargazing.