This book outlines the many experiences that I have been faced with in my life from birth to age 48. Several stories are quite comical, others are tragic and sad, but each and every one of them is true. It talks about my experiences with drugs, alcohol and death. It tells of my devotion to my family and to the less fortunate in this world. I have spent countless hours donating my rare blood, platelets, bone marrow and serums. This book tells the reason why I did this all my life, and what ...

Originally published in 1965, The Painted Bird established Jerzy Kosinski as a major literary figure. Called by the Los Angeles Times “one of the most imposing novels of the decade,” it was eventually translated into more than thirty languages. A harrowing story that follows the wanderings of a boy abandoned by his parents during World War II, The Painted Bird is a dark masterpiece that examines the proximity of terror and savagery to innocence and love. It is th...

In sinister industrial England, fifteen-year-old Gustine is a "dress lodger," a prostitute who rents a beautiful blue dress from her landlord to attract a higher class of clientele. By day a potter's assistant, by night a courtesan of the streets, Gustine works to support her fragile only child, born with a remarkable anatomical defect.Surgeon Henry Chiver is a prisoner of his own past, implicated in a series of killings in Edinburgh in which beggars were murdered so that the corps...

This Sequel to the Acclaimed Cult Novel Is Now a Major Motion PictureDarryl Ponicsan's debut novel The Last Detail was named one of the best of the year and widely acclaimed, catapulting him to fame when it was first published. The story of two career sailors assigned to escort a young seaman from Norfolk to the naval prison in Portsmouth, New Hampshire—and of the mayhem that ensues—it was made into an award-winning movie starring Jack Nicholson. Last Flag Flying, set thirty-four y...

New York Times bestselling author Alan Furst pens evocative and urbane novels of World War II espionage. Focusing on the European theater, Furst writes about ordinary people struggling to cope with the chaos of the world around them.In the autumn of 1941 as German tanks approach Moscow, Stalin issues a desperate order: all secret operatives behind enemy lines must strike no matter the cost. Into this fray comes Jean Casson—once a wealthy Parisian film producer, now penniless and wa...

The Acclaimed Novel That Was the Basis for the Classic Movie Starring Jack NicholsonUnlike other branches of the armed services, the Navy draws it police force from the ranks, as temporary duty called Shore Patrol. In this funny, bawdy, moving novel set during the height of the Vietnam War, two career sailors in transit in Norfolk, Virginia—Billy "Bad-Ass" Buddusky and Mule Mulhall—are assigned to escort eighteen-year-old Larry Meadows from Norfolk to the brig in Portsmouth, New Ha...

A young woman moves across an ocean to uncover the truth about her grandparents' mysterious estrangement and pieces together the extraordinary story of their wartime experiencesIn 1948, after surviving World War II by escaping Nazi-occupied France for refugee camps in Switzerland, Miranda's grandparents, Anna and Armand, bought an old stone house in a remote, picturesque village in the South of France. Five years later, Anna packed her bags and walked out on Armand...

NATIONAL BESTSELLER • Two sensational unsolved crimes—one in the past, another in the present—are linked by one man’s memory and self-deception in this chilling novel of literary suspense from National Book Award finalist Dan Chaon.NAMED ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR BYThe Wall Street Journal • NPR • The New York Times • Los Angeles Times • The Washington Post ...

"It was one thing to fantasize about evil, to reach into the darkness and play with it a little . . ."Rookie cop Carrie Santero has always been fascinated by serial killers. As a teenager, she wrote a letter to Charles Manson in prison—and received a chilling reply. Then she came face to face with a child murderer in her small Pennsylvania town, an encounter that haunts her to this day. Now, as a detective in training, she finally has her chance to make a differenc...

For fans of Dave Eggers and Kelly Link, an exhilarating collection of stories that explores the mysterious, often dangerous forces that shape our lives—from censorship and terrorism to technology and online dating.Spanning centuries, continents, and a diverse set of characters, these alluringly strange stories are united by each character’s struggle with fate. In a secret, subterranean world beneath the prairie of the Old West, a homesteader risks her life in searc...

National Book Award Finalist • Here is the unforgettable story of the Binewskis, a circus-geek family whose matriarch and patriarch have bred their own exhibit of human oddities—with the help of amphetamines, arsenic, and radioisotopes.One of The Atlantic**’s Great American Novels of the Past 100 Years**Their offspring include Arturo the Aquaboy, who has flippers for limbs and a megalomaniac ambition worthy of Geng...

Two decades before the Civil War, a middle-class farmer named Samuel Maddox lies on his deathbed. Elsewhere in his Virginia home, a young woman named Kitty knows her life is about to change. She is one of the Maddox family's slaves—and Samuel's biological daughter. When Samuel's wife, Mary, inherits her husband’s property, she will own Kitty, too, along with Kitty's three small children.Already in her fifties and with no children of her own, Mary Maddox has struggled to accept her ...