Sometimes the gravest dangers—and the darkest souls—live right beside us….In the span of twenty-four hours, everything Laurel Shields believes about her life and her marriage to a prominent doctor will be shattered—if she survives a terrifying ordeal. The day begins with the jarring discovery that, soon after ending an affair, Laurel is pregnant. But when she returns home to find her husband ashen, unkempt, and on the brink of violence, a nightmare quickly unfolds....

1816 was a remarkable year—mostly for the fact that there was no summer. As a result of a volcanic eruption at Mount Tambora in Indonesia, weather patterns were disrupted worldwide for months, allowing for excessive rain, frost, and snowfall through much of the Northeastern US and Europe in the summer of 1816.In the US, the extraordinary weather produced food shortages, religious revivals, and extensive migration from New England to the Midwest. In Europe, the cold and wet summer l...

Abridged EditionCurated Selections from the definitive, career-spanning collection of writing from Anthony Bourdain, assembled for the first time and read by Tony with Dion Graham, Kimberly Witherspoon, Kaleo Griffith, David Colacci, and Chris Patton.Anthony Bourdain represented many things to many people—and he had many sides. But no part of his identity was more important to him, and more longlasting, than that of a writer. The Anthon...

Winner of the CWA Macallan Silver Dagger for Fiction, Friends in High Places is the ninth novel in Leon's bestselling and highly acclaimed Commissario Guido Brunetti series.“Leon tells the story as if she loves Venice as much as her detective does, warts and all. The plot and subplots unfold elegantly; beauty and the beast march hand in hand, and the result is rich entertainment.” —The Sunday Times (London)In Donna Leon’s ...

From the Pulitzer Prize–winning author of American Pastoral: Like a latter-day Gregor Samsa, Professor David Kepesh wakes up one morning to find that he has been transformed—into a 155-pound breast. What follows is “terrific…inventive and sane and very funny (The New York Times Book Review).A deliriously funny yet touching exploration of the full implications of David Kepesh’s metamorphosis—a daring, heretical book that brings us face to face with...

Relic, a Douglas Preston and Lincoln Child thriller that introduces FBI Special Agent PendergastJust days before a massive exhibition opens at the popular New York Museum of Natural History, visitors are being savagely murdered in the museum's dark hallways and secret rooms. Autopsies indicate that the killer cannot be human...But the museum's directors plan to go ahead with a big bash to celebrate the new exhibition, in spite of the murders.Museum research...

There is little violent crime in Venice, a serenely beautiful floating city of mystery and magic, history and decay. But the evil that does occasionally rear its head is the jurisdiction of Guido Brunetti, the suave, urbane vice-commissario of policeand a genius at detection. Now all of his admirable abilities must come into play in the deadly affair of Maestro Helmut Wellauer, a world-renowned conductor who died painfully from cyanide poisoning during an intermission at La Fenice.

Donna Leon’s novels have won her countless fans, heaps of critical acclaim, and a place among the top ranks of international crime writers. Through the warmhearted, perceptive, and principled Commissario Guido Brunetti, Leon’s bestselling books have explored Venice in all its aspects: history, tourism, high culture, food, family, but also violent crime and political corruption.In About Face, Leon returns to one of her signature subjects: the environment, which has reached ...

Jonas Quarrel has tracked Verity from Mexico to Northern California. Just what is he after?Verity Ames finds herself fighting an attraction to Jonas from the moment he knocks on the door of the No Bull Café. He seems far too good to be true.Together they will discover a shared passion and a shared danger.

Energy is the only universal currency; it is necessary for getting anything done. The conversion of energy on Earth ranges from terra-forming forces of plate tectonics to cumulative erosive effects of raindrops. Life on Earth depends on the photosynthetic conversion of solar energy into plant biomass. Humans have come to rely on many more energy flows—ranging from fossil fuels to photovoltaic generation of electricity—for their civilized existence. In this monumental history, Vaclav Smil p...

“Commissario Guido Brunetti’s fourteenth case may be his best yet.” —Kirkus Reviews (starred review)On a cold Venetian night shortly before Christmas, a street vendor is killed in a scuffle in Campo San Stefano. The closest witnesses to the event are the tourists who had been browsing the fake designer handbags that the man was selling. The dead man is one of the many African immigrants purveying goods outside normal shop hours and trading without a work p...

In the sixteenth novel in Donna Leon’s bestselling Commissario Guido Brunetti series, a mysterious kidnapping leads the Venetian detective into the darkest corners of the medical establishment.“Donna Leon is the undisputed crime fiction queen...[Her] ability to capture the city’s social scene and internal politics is first-rate, as always, but this installment carries extra gravity and welcome plot twists that make it one of the series’ better efforts.” —Sa...