Alan Jacobs

Light Hardcover (1 lb or less)

South Carolina

A Reader's Guide to a More Tranquil Mind

"At a time when many Americans . . . are engaged in deep reflection about the meaning of the nation's history [this] is an exceptionally useful companion for those who want to do so with honesty and integrity." --Shelf Awareness

From the author of How to Think and The Pleasures of Reading in an Age of Distraction, a literary guide to engaging with the voices of the past to stay sane in the present

W. H. Auden once wrote that "art is our chief means of breaking bread with the dead." In his brilliant and compulsively readable new treatise, Breaking Bread with the Dead, Alan Jacobs shows us that engaging with the strange and wonderful writings of the past might help us live less anxiously in the present--and increase what Thomas Pynchon once called our "personal density."

Today we are battling too much information in a society changing at lightning speed, with algorithms aimed at shaping our every thought--plus a sense that history offers no resources, only impediments to overcome or ignore. The modern solution to our problems is to surround ourselves only with what we know and what brings us instant comfort. Jacobs's answer is the opposite: to be in conversation with, and challenged by, those from the past who can tell us what we never thought we needed to know.

What can Homer teach us about force? How does Frederick Douglass deal with the massive blind spots of America's Founding Fathers? And what can we learn from modern authors who engage passionately and profoundly with the past? How can Ursula K. Le Guin show us truths about Virgil's female characters that Virgil himself could never have seen? In Breaking Bread with the Dead, a gifted scholar draws us into close and sympathetic engagement with texts from across the ages, including the work of Anita Desai, Henrik Ibsen, Jean Rhys, Simone Weil, Edith Wharton, Amitav Ghosh, Claude Lévi-Strauss, Italo Calvino, and many more.

By hearing the voices of the past, we can expand our consciousness, our sympathies, and our wisdom far beyond what our present moment can offer.

Breaking Bread with the Dead

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Fonda Lee

Hardcover (1 to 2 lbs)

In Jade War, the sequel to the World Fantasy Award-winning novel Jade City, the Kaul siblings battle rival clans for honor and control over an Asia-inspired fantasy metropolis. On the island of Kekon, the Kaul family is locked in a violent feud for control of the capital city and the supply of magical jade that endows trained Green Bone warriors with supernatural powers they alone have possessed for hundreds of years. Beyond Kekon's borders, war is brewing. Powerful foreign governments and mercenary criminal kingpins alike turn their eyes on the island nation. Jade, Kekon's most prized resource, could make them rich - or give them the edge they'd need to topple their rivals. Faced with threats on all sides, the Kaul family is forced to form new and dangerous alliances, confront enemies in the darkest streets and the tallest office towers, and put honor aside in order to do whatever it takes to ensure their own survival - and that of all the Green Bones of Kekon. Jade War is the second book of the Green Bone Saga, an epic trilogy about family, honor, and those who live and die by the ancient laws of blood and jade. The Green Bone SagaJade CityJade War

Jade War

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David Damrosch

Heavy Hardcover (2 to 4 lbs)

A transporting and illuminating voyage around the globe, through classic and modern literary works that are in conversation with one another and with the world around them *Featured in the Chicago Tribune's Great 2021 Fall Book Preview* Inspired by Jules Verne’s hero Phileas Fogg, David Damrosch, chair of Harvard University’s department of comparative literature and founder of Harvard’s Institute for World Literature, set out to counter a pandemic’s restrictions on travel by exploring eighty exceptional books from around the globe. Following a literary itinerary from London to Venice, Tehran and points beyond, and via authors from Woolf and Dante to Nobel Prize–winners Orhan Pamuk, Wole Soyinka, Mo Yan, and Olga Tokarczuk, he explores how these works have shaped our idea of the world, and the ways in which the world bleeds into literature. To chart the expansive landscape of world literature today, Damrosch explores how writers live in two very different worlds: the world of their personal experience and the world of books that have enabled great writers to give shape and meaning to their lives. In his literary cartography, Damrosch includes compelling contemporary works as well as perennial classics, hard-bitten crime fiction as well as haunting works of fantasy, and the formative tales that introduce us as children to the world we’re entering. Taken together, these eighty titles offer us fresh perspective on enduring problems, from the social consequences of epidemics to the rising inequality that Thomas More designed Utopia to combat, as well as the patriarchal structures within and against which many of these books’ heroines have to struggle—from the work of Murasaki Shikibu a millennium ago to Margaret Atwood today. Around the World in 80 Books is a global invitation to look beyond ourselves and our surroundings, and to see our world and its literature in new ways.

Around the World in 80 Books

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R. J. Palacio

Born with a facial deformity that initially prevented his attendance at public school, Auggie Pullman enters the fifth grade at Beecher Prep and struggles with the dynamics of being both new and different, in a sparsely written tale about acceptance and self-esteem.

Wonder

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Patricia Reilly Giff

This Newbery Honor book about a girl who has never known family fighting for her first true home "will leave readers . . . satisfied" (Kirkus Reviews).
 
Hollis Woods
is the place where a baby was abandoned
is the baby's name
is an artist
is now a twelve-year-old girl
who's been in so many foster homes she can hardly remember them all.
 
When Hollis is sent to Josie, an elderly artist who is quirky and affectionate, she wants to stay. But Josie is growing more forgetful every day. If Social Services finds out, they'll take Hollis away and move Josie into a home. Well, Hollis Woods won't let anyone separate them. She's escaped the system before; this time, she's taking Josie with her. Still, even as she plans her future with Josie, Hollis dreams of the past summer with the Regans, fixing each special moment of her days with them in pictures she'll never forget.
 
Patricia Reilly Giff captures the yearning for a place to belong in this warmhearted story, which stresses the importance of artistic vision, creativity, and above all, family.

Pictures of Hollis Woods

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Rebecca Serle

Clean pages. Light shelf-wear (some sticker residue on front dust jacket).

A Novel

A NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER A Good Morning America, FabFitFun, and Marie Claire Book Club Pick “In Five Years is as clever as it is moving, the rare read-in-one-sitting novel you won’t forget.” —Chloe Benjamin, New York Times bestselling author of The Immortalists Perfect for fans of Me Before You and One Day—a striking, powerful, and moving love story following an ambitious lawyer who experiences an astonishing vision that could change her life forever. Where do you see yourself in five years? Dannie Kohan lives her life by the numbers. She is nothing like her lifelong best friend—the wild, whimsical, believes-in-fate Bella. Her meticulous planning seems to have paid off after she nails the most important job interview of her career and accepts her boyfriend’s marriage proposal in one fell swoop, falling asleep completely content. But when she awakens, she’s suddenly in a different apartment, with a different ring on her finger, and beside a very different man. Dannie spends one hour exactly five years in the future before she wakes again in her own home on the brink of midnight—but it is one hour she cannot shake. In Five Years is an unforgettable love story, but it is not the one you’re expecting.

In Five Years

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Willie Morris

The dog-loving author of North Toward Home and My Dog Skip describes life with a strong-willed cat named Spit McGee, exploring the dramatic ways that Spit has transformed his household and offering a close-up look at cats and their behavior, resourcefulness, and character. 35,000 first printing.

My Cat Spit McGee

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Leslye Walton

Born with bird wings into a family cursed to be foolish in love, sixteen-year-old Ava delves into her family's past hoping to understand her unusual nature and learn to fit in with her peers, but she is ill-prepared for what she discovers.

The Strange and Beautiful Sorrows of Ava Lavender

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"A book of precepts, with one saying for each day, from Auggie's teacher Mr. Brown"--

365 Days of Wonder: Mr. Browne's Book of Precepts

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Katherine Applegate

Ivan is an easygoing gorilla. Living at the Exit 8 Big Top Mall and Video Arcade, he has grown accustomed to humans watching him through the glass walls of his domain. He rarely misses his life in the jungle. In fact, he hardly ever thinks about it at all. Instead, Ivan thinks about TV shows he’s seen and about his friends Stella, an elderly elephant, and Bob, a stray dog. But mostly Ivan thinks about art and how to capture the taste of a mango or the sound of leaves with color and a well-placed line. Then he meets Ruby, a baby elephant taken from her family, and she makes Ivan see their home—and his own art—through new eyes. When Ruby arrives, change comes with her, and it’s up to Ivan to make it a change for the better. Katherine Applegate blends humor and poignancy to create Ivan’s unforgettable first-person narration in a story of friendship, art, and hope.

The One and Only Ivan

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Ann Voskamp

A Daring Path into the Abundant Life

In The Broken Way---the much anticipated sequel to One Thousand Gifts---bestselling author Ann Voskamp presents the gospel in a fresh way for desperate Christians in need of a renewed revelation of the grace of God. No matter how broken or sin-sick you are.

The Broken Way

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Alexandra Bracken

The galaxy is at war. Although the Rebel Alliance has won a few battles against the Empire, hope is fading. The Empire is about to finish building the greatest weapon the galaxy has ever seen-the Death Star. The rebels' only chance to defeat it now lies in the unlikely hands of a princess, a scoundrel, and a farm boy. . . . Acclaimed, New York Times bestselling author Alexandra Bracken delivers a captivating retelling of Star Wars: A New Hope like you've never experienced before. Since the premier of the original film, Princess Leia, Han Solo, and Luke Skywalker have become iconic, larger-than-life characters. The Princess, the Scoundrel, and the Farm Boy takes a deeper look at these three heroes as they join forces to defeat the evil that threatens their entire galaxy.

Star Wars: a New Hope the Princess, the Scoundrel, and the Farm Boy

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Ian Doescher

Verily, a New Hope

A retelling of Star wars in the style of Shakespeare, in which a wise Jedi knight, an evil Sith lord, a beautiful captive princess, and a young hero coming of age reflect the valor and villainy of the Bard's greatest plays.

William Shakespeare's Star Wars

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Khaled Hosseini

Propelled by the same superb instinct for storytelling that made The Kite Runner a beloved classic, the #1 New York Times bestseller A Thousand Splendid Suns is at once an incredible chronicle of thirty years of Afghan history and a deeply moving story of family, friendship, faith, and the salvation to be found in love. “Just as good, if not better, than Khaled Hosseini’s best-selling first book, The Kite Runner.”—Newsweek Khaled Hosseini returns with a beautiful, riveting, and haunting novel that confirms his place as one of the most important literary writers today. Born a generation apart and with very different ideas about love and family, Mariam and Laila are two women brought jarringly together by war, by loss and by fate. As they endure the ever escalating dangers around them-in their home as well as in the streets of Kabul-they come to form a bond that makes them both sisters and mother-daughter to each other, and that will ultimately alter the course not just of their own lives but of the next generation. With heart-wrenching power and suspense, Hosseini shows how a woman's love for her family can move her to shocking and heroic acts of self-sacrifice, and that in the end it is love, or even the memory of love, that is often the key to survival. A stunning accomplishment, A Thousand Splendid Suns is a haunting, heartbreaking, compelling story of an unforgiving time, an unlikely friendship, and an indestructible love.

A Thousand Splendid Suns

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Bram Stoker

Count Dracula has inspired countless movies, books, and plays. But few, if any, have been fully faithful to Bram Stoker's original, best-selling novel of mystery and horror, love and death, sin and redemption. Dracula chronicles the vampire's journey from Transylvania to the nighttime streets of London. There, he searches for the blood of strong men and beautiful women while his enemies plot to rid the world of his frightful power. Today's critics see Dracula as a virtual textbook on Victorian repression of the erotic and fear of female sexuality. In it, Stoker created a new word for terror, a new myth to feed our nightmares, and a character who will outlive us all. This book includes three novels: Dracula, The Jewel of Seven Stars and The Lair of the White Worm. It also includes a short fiction collection called Dracula's Guest and Other Stories: Dracula's Guest; The Judge's House; The Squaw; The Secret of Growing Gold; The Gipsy Prophecy; The Coming of Abel Behenna; The Burial of the Rats; A Dream of Red Hands; Crooken Sands; The Crystal Cup; The Chain of Destiny and The Dualitists.

Dracula and Other Horror Classics (Barnes and Noble Collectible Classics: Omnibus Edition)

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Michael Northrop

When Alex Sennefer's mother uses the Lost Spells from the Egyptian Book of the Dead to bring her son from the brink of dying, she also brings back five Death Walkers, leaving Alex and his best friend to find his mother and save the world.

Book of the Dead

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Arthur Doyle

Michael A. Cramer

No home library is complete without the classics! The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes and Other Stories brings together the essential works from Arthur Conan Doyle in an elegant, leather-bound, omnibus edition—a keepsake to be read and treasured. There is one literary detective who stands above all others, whose powers of deduction are known the world over, whose influence can still be felt in today's most modern whodunits. Who is it, you ask? Why, it's elementary! Sherlock Holmes, the famous gumshoe of 221B Baker Street. And Sir Arthur Conan Doyle--the man who made him famous in such tales as The Hound of the Baskervilles and A Study in Scarlet--changed the world of mysteries, inspiring legions of devoted fans. Whether you're a devotee or you've yet to be awed by Holmes's powers of deduction, you'll love this Canterbury Classics edition of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's famous works, including The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes, The Sign of Four, The Valley of Fear, The Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes, The Return of Sherlock Holmes, and The Casebook of Sherlock Holmes. The perfect book to complete any bookshelf, The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes and Other Stories features an eye-catching leather-bound cover with gold foil stamping, as well as fine ivory paper with gilded edges. You'll be spellbound by Conan Doyle's descriptive prose, and then delight in displaying this beautiful book in your home. A classic keepsake for fans of detective novels, as well as all great literature, The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes and Other Stories is the perfect addition to any library.

The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes and Other Stories

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Agatha Christie

A Treasury of Hercule Poirot Mysteries

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Leonard Cohen

A never-before-published early novel and stories by the legendary musician, songwriter, and poet Leonard Cohen

Before Leonard Cohen's worldwide fame expanded to fourteen studio albums, Grammy awards, and late-career global tours, he yearned for literary stardom. The Canadian songwriter of iconic hits like "Hallelujah," "Suzanne," and "Famous Blue Raincoat" first ventured into writing in his early twenties, and in A Ballet of Lepers: A Novel and Stories, readers will discover that the magic that animated Cohen's unforgettable body of work was present from the very beginning of his career. 

The pieces in this collection, written between 1956 and 1961 and including short fiction, a radio play, and a stunning early novel, offer startling insights into Cohen's imagination and creative process. Cohen explores themes that would permeate his later work, from shame and unworthiness to sexual desire in all its sacred and profane dimensions to longing, whether for love, family, freedom, or transcendence. The titular novel, A Ballet of Lepers--one he later remarked was "probably a better novel" than his celebrated book The Favourite Game--is a haunting examination of these elements in tandem, focusing on toxic relationships and the lengths to which one will go to maintain them, while the fifteen stories, as well as the playscript, probe the inner demons of his characters, many of whom could function as stand-ins for the author himself. Cohen's work is meditative and surprising, offering playful, provocative, and penetrating glimpses into the world-weary lives of his characters, and a window into the early art of a storytelling master. 

A Ballet of Lepers, vivid in its detail, unsparing in its gaze, reveals the great artist and visceral genius as never seen before.



A Ballet of Lepers

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Angeline Boulley

A REESE WITHERSPOON x HELLO SUNSHINE BOOK CLUB YA PICK An Instant #1 New York Times Bestseller Soon to be adapted at Netflix for TV with President Barack Obama and Michelle Obama's production company, Higher Ground. “One of this year's most buzzed about young adult novels.” —Good Morning America A 2021 Kids' Indie Next List Selection An Amazon Best Book of the Month for March Selection An Entertainment Weekly Most Anticipated Books of 2021 Selection A PopSugar Best March 2021 YA Book Selection With four starred reviews, Angeline Boulley's debut novel, Firekeeper's Daughter, is a groundbreaking YA thriller about a Native teen who must root out the corruption in her community, perfect for readers of Angie Thomas and Tommy Orange. Eighteen-year-old Daunis Fontaine has never quite fit in, both in her hometown and on the nearby Ojibwe reservation. She dreams of a fresh start at college, but when family tragedy strikes, Daunis puts her future on hold to look after her fragile mother. The only bright spot is meeting Jamie, the charming new recruit on her brother Levi’s hockey team. Yet even as Daunis falls for Jamie, she senses the dashing hockey star is hiding something. Everything comes to light when Daunis witnesses a shocking murder, thrusting her into an FBI investigation of a lethal new drug. Reluctantly, Daunis agrees to go undercover, drawing on her knowledge of chemistry and Ojibwe traditional medicine to track down the source. But the search for truth is more complicated than Daunis imagined, exposing secrets and old scars. At the same time, she grows concerned with an investigation that seems more focused on punishing the offenders than protecting the victims. Now, as the deceptions—and deaths—keep growing, Daunis must learn what it means to be a strong Anishinaabe kwe (Ojibwe woman) and how far she’ll go for her community, even if it tears apart the only world she’s ever known.

Firekeeper's Daughter

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Thomas D. Lee

An immortal Knight of the Round Table faces his greatest challenge yet--saving the politically polarized, rapidly warming world from itself--in this slyly funny contemporary take on Arthurian legend.

"A brilliant collision of ancient mysticism with modern madness."--Robert Jackson Bennett, bestselling author of the Founders Trilogy

Legends don't always live up to reality.

Being reborn as an immortal defender of the realm gets awfully tiring over the years--or at least that's what Sir Kay's thinking as he claws his way up from beneath the earth yet again.

Kay once rode alongside his brother, King Arthur, as a Knight of the Round Table. Since then, he has fought at Hastings and at Waterloo and in both World Wars. But now he finds himself in a strange new world where oceans have risen, the army's been privatized, and half of Britain's been sold to foreign powers. The dragon that's running amok--that he can handle. The rest? He's not so sure.

Mariam's spent her life fighting what's wrong with her country. But she's just one ordinary person, up against a hopelessly broken system. So when she meets Kay, she dares to hope that the world has finally found the savior it needs.

Yet as the two travel through this bizarre and dangerous land, they discover that a magical plot of apocalyptic proportions is underway. And Kay's too busy hunting dragons--and exchanging blows with his old enemy Lancelot--to figure out what to do about it. 

In perilous times like these, the realm doesn't just need a knight. It needs a true leader. 

Luckily, Excalibur lies within reach. 

But who will be fit to wield it? 

With a cast that includes Merlin, Morgan le Fay, the Lady of the Lake, and King Arthur himself--all reimagined in joyous, wickedly subversive fashion--Perilous Times is an Arthurian retelling that looks forward as much as it looks back . . . and a rollicking, deadpan-funny, surprisingly touching fantasy adventure.

Perilous Times

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Stefan Dziemianowicz

Clean pages. Light shelf-wear (slight sticker residue on front of dust jacket).

Oversized Hardcover (4 to 6 lbs)

This volume collects more than forty detective tales published in the same years that Sherlock Holmes earned his formidable reputation as the Great Detective. It includes stories by Edgar Allan Poe, Charles Dickens, Robert Louis Stevenson, and others that broke ground for the detective story, as well as featuring lady sleuths in stories by Wilkie Collins, Richard Marsh, Anna Katherine Green, and others. Also included are Sherlockian Satires and Homages, in the form of respectful and comic riffs on Sherlock Holmes and his methods by Henry, Bret Harte, Mark Twain, and others.

The Rivals of Sherlock Holmes

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Liane Moriarty

#1 New York Times Bestseller From Liane Moriarty, the #1 New York Times bestselling author of Big Little Lies and Nine Perfect Strangers, comes Apples Never Fall, a novel that looks at marriage, siblings, and how the people we love the most can hurt us the deepest. The Delaney family love one another dearly—it’s just that sometimes they want to murder each other . . . If your mother was missing, would you tell the police? Even if the most obvious suspect was your father? This is the dilemma facing the four grown Delaney siblings. The Delaneys are fixtures in their community. The parents, Stan and Joy, are the envy of all of their friends. They’re killers on the tennis court, and off it their chemistry is palpable. But after fifty years of marriage, they’ve finally sold their famed tennis academy and are ready to start what should be the golden years of their lives. So why are Stan and Joy so miserable? The four Delaney children—Amy, Logan, Troy, and Brooke—were tennis stars in their own right, yet as their father will tell you, none of them had what it took to go all the way. But that’s okay, now that they’re all successful grown-ups and there is the wonderful possibility of grandchildren on the horizon. One night a stranger named Savannah knocks on Stan and Joy’s door, bleeding after a fight with her boyfriend. The Delaneys are more than happy to give her the small kindness she sorely needs. If only that was all she wanted. Later, when Joy goes missing, and Savannah is nowhere to be found, the police question the one person who remains: Stan. But for someone who claims to be innocent, he, like many spouses, seems to have a lot to hide. Two of the Delaney children think their father is innocent, two are not so sure—but as the two sides square off against each other in perhaps their biggest match ever, all of the Delaneys will start to reexamine their shared family history in a very new light.

Apples Never Fall

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Lauren Friedman

(Fashion Books, Fall and Winter Fashion Books, Scarf Fashion Books)

From the Audrey to the Paris, the Top Down, or the Easy Breezy, there are 50 scarf styles in this book for any occasion or mood. Jaunty illustrations break down each step so stylistas can wrap, loop, and get out the door looking perfectly polished. Teens, young professionals, and moms alike will love playing around with the looks, including unexpected belts, sarongs, and topknots. Vibrantly illustrated and packaged as a compact hardcover, 50 Ways to Wear a Scarf begs to be gifted with a scarf and displayed on a dresser, plus it's small enough to take scarf shopping. Très chic!

Browse by categories

Alan Jacobs

Breaking Bread with the Dead

Fonda Lee

Jade War

David Damrosch

Around the World in 80 Books

R. J. Palacio

Wonder

Patricia Reilly Giff

Pictures of Hollis Woods

Rebecca Serle

In Five Years

Willie Morris

My Cat Spit McGee

Leslye Walton

The Strange and Beautiful Sorrows of Ava Lavender

R. J. Palacio

365 Days of Wonder: Mr. Browne's Book of Precepts

Katherine Applegate

The One and Only Ivan

Ann Voskamp

The Broken Way

Alexandra Bracken

Star Wars: a New Hope the Princess, the Scoundrel, and the Farm Boy

Ian Doescher

William Shakespeare's Star Wars

Khaled Hosseini

A Thousand Splendid Suns

Bram Stoker

Dracula and Other Horror Classics (Barnes and Noble Collectible Classics: Omnibus Edition)

Michael Northrop

Book of the Dead

Arthur Doyle; Michael A. Cramer

The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes and Other Stories

Agatha Christie

A Treasury of Hercule Poirot Mysteries

Leonard Cohen

A Ballet of Lepers

Angeline Boulley

Firekeeper's Daughter

Thomas D. Lee

Perilous Times

Stefan Dziemianowicz

The Rivals of Sherlock Holmes

Liane Moriarty

Apples Never Fall

Lauren Friedman

50 Ways to Wear a Scarf

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