Imagine living in a country in which women and girls are not allowed to leave the house without a man. Imagine having to wear clothes that cover every part of your body, including your face, whenever you go out.In this powerful and realistic tale, eleven-year-old Parvana lives with her family in one room of a bombed-out apartment building in Kabul, Afghanistan's capital city during the Taliban rule. Parvana's father- a history teacher until his school was bombed and his health dest...

Geraldine Brooks sits down with John Hockenberry to discuss her novel People of the Book. Rita Wolf reads an excerpt.

The acclaimed British novelist and short story master who "recruits admires with each book" (Hilary Mantel) discusses her latest novel with fellow author Colm Tóibín (House of Names). Ingeniously moving between past and present, Late in the Day exposes how infinite alternate configurations lie beneath the seemingly dependable arrangements we make for our lives. With a reading by Rita Wolf (An Ordinary Muslim).

Julie Otsuka sits down with David Rakoff to discuss her novel Buddha in the Attic. Rita Wolf reads an excerpt from the book.

Kate DiCamillo (Because of Winn-Dixie) sits down with Lisa Von Drasek to discuss her book The Magician's Elephant. Rita Wolf reads an excerpt.

Pam Munoz Ryan sits down with Madeline Cohen to discuss her book, The Dreamer. Rita Wolf reads an excerpt.

How do we find the courage to always be true to ourselves—even if we are unsure of who we are?That is the central question of international bestselling author Paulo Coelho’s profound new work, The Witch of Portobello. It is the story of a mysterious woman named Athena, told by the many who knew her well—or hardly at all. Like The Alchemist, The Witch of Portobello is the kind of story that will transform the way readers think about love, passion, joy, and...

Dark Stars, edited by John F.D. Taff, is a tribute to horror’s longstanding short fiction legacy, featuring 12 terrifying original stories from today's most noteworthy authors, with an introduction by bestselling author Josh Malerman and an afterword by Ramsey Campbell.Within these pages you’ll find tales of dead men walking, an insidious secret summer fling, an island harboring unspeakable power, and a dark hallway that beckons. You’ll encounter terrible monsters—both human and su...

From the former Prime Minister of Pakistan, who finished writing this extraordinary book just days before her assassination, comes a groundbreaking vision of how to bridge the widening gap between the Islamic world and the West.Benazir Bhutto returned to Pakistan in October 2007, after eight years of exile, hopeful that she could be a catalyst for change. Upon a tumultuous reception, she survived a suicide-bomb attack that killed nearly 200 of her countrymen. But she continued to f...

‘My life is dust and rocks and rude boys and skinny babies, and long days of searching for my mother when I don’t have the faintest idea where she might be.’Parvana is alone. Her father is dead. A refugee in a land full of dangers, she must travel across Afghanistan to find her mother and sisters.As she travels, Parvana finds friends — a starving, orphaned baby; a strange, hostile boy; a solitary girl who darts in and out of the minefields to find food....

“[Coelho’s] special talent seems to be his ability to speak to everyone at once. The kind of spirituality he espouses is to all comers. . . . His readers often say that they see their own lives in his own books.”—New YorkerFrom the bestselling author of The Alchemist, Paulo Coelho, comes an absorbing new novel that holds a mirror up to our culture’s obsession with fame, glamour, and celebrity.

What does it mean to be-in-kind with a nonhuman animal? Or, in Dr. Sean Kell-Luddon’s case, to be in-kind with one of the last remaining wild wolves? Using a neurological interface to translate her animal subject’s perception through her own mind, Sean intends to chase both her scientific curiosity and her secret, lifelong desire to experience the intimacy and freedom of wolfishness: to see the world through animal eyes; smell the forest, thick with olfactory messages; even taste the blood...