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Born into an aristocratic German Jewish family, Ernst Baerwald is a gifted linguist, talented musician and fearless idealist. When he’s recruited in 1900 to become a spy, his life becomes an extraordinary adventure spanning two continents, two world wars and impossible choices that will haunt him forever. From Frankfurt to Milan to Tokyo, Ernst moves through a world of intrigue and passion. He battles Japan’s Yakuza while entertaining its royalty and hosts Europe’s most brilliant performers. He falls deeply in love...with two women. He witnesses the rise of fascism in both Japan and Germany. And when the forces of fascism in Japan meet the horrors of Hitler’s Germany, this German Jew faces an impossible choice: destroy the country he loves most or become complicit in unimaginable evil.

1933. America was still reeling from the crash. It was a newspaperman’s idea: The Game of the Century. Put the world’s best players on one field and let the public decide who belonged there. At a moment when some feared the national pastime would not survive the decade, Chicago would host the ballgame as the highlight of the 1933 World’s Fair. THE FIRST ALL-STAR GAME is the story of a nation and a sport at a crossroads and a sweeping look back at baseball’s early history and the America that shaped it. Deeply researched and filled with remarkable characters --- legendary players like Babe Ruth, Lou Gehrig and Lefty Grove rubbing shoulders with Bonnie and Clyde, Al Capone and Charles Lindbergh --- Randall Sullivan explores the history of an American obsession and captures the moment when both the sport and the nation found renewal in a single spectacle of hope. 

In THE MAGICAL GAME, journalist and converted baseball fan Addy Baird turns her reporter’s eye to her favorite sport, investigating the roots of these magical practices and telling the story of baseball’s long history of superstition, rituals, curses, jinxes, hoodoos and hexes. Spanning three centuries of baseball history and three dozen more of magical history, Baird takes readers through fascinating, forgotten tidbits in the sport, untangles the game’s legends, and considers baseball’s uncertain future. In the face of recent MLB rule changes and the rise of advanced statistics, Baird looks at the many decades of concern about baseball’s declining popularity and the evolution of the sport, as well as why and how a culture of magic has remained strong at the core of the game for so many years.

London, 1953. Buckingham Palace and its many employees find themselves in bedlam as the Queen’s coronation quickly approaches. Caroline, assistant dresser to the queen, is worn thin by her gambler husband. Can she, like the queen, find the strength to define her own future? Lucy, a junior wardrobe assistant, is eager to become a famous singer. A handsome, wealthy man at the palace promises to help her on her way to stardom, but he’s asking things of her that she’s not quite sure about. Miranda is a temporary secretary in the palace. The job is a perfect way to gather information for the article she’s writing about the coronation; the article that will keep her boss from firing her because of her gender. If they want to carve places for themselves in this world, they’ll have to do it together.

In this spirited and emotionally resonant collection, award-winning novelist Ruth Ozeki turns her singular gaze to the short story, exploring childhood ambition, youthful desire, midlife reinvention and the unsparing clarity of old age. A college student falls for her professor and learns to transmute longing into language. A disquieted husband watches with tenderness and unease as the ghost of his wife’s ambition roams the woods outside their home. A long-deceased Beat poet hijacks the mind of a young publishing assistant during a sales meeting, railing against the state of modern literature. A curious grandmother creates a fake online dating profile to spy on her granddaughter’s romantic life --- and sets in motion a deception she can’t control.

Anne of Brittany was a child when France invaded and drove her royal father to his death. Now she is a young woman and France means to crown their conquest by marrying her to their king. Anne refuses to be the last duchess of Brittany, so she arranges a secret betrothal to Charles of France’s greatest rival. But secrets are hard to keep in a world where rival courts spy on each other with diviners. The forest of Brocéliande was once the haunt of Merlin the Enchanter and the long-lost faerie queen. But magic is long gone from Broceliande, except for the occasional sight of a unicorn and one critical quirk: This ancient forest is completely hostile to divination. While pretending compliance with France, Anne plans a unicorn hunt in Brocéliande. A bit of pointless pageantry. A diversion so she can wed in secret. Or so she thinks.

THE WINDSOR AFFAIR recreates the cataclysmic events that nearly toppled the monarchy and incited the power struggle between Elizabeth Bowes-Lyon and Wallis Simpson. Told from the perspective of both women, the novel propels readers into the fabulous world of the debonair Prince of Wales, café society of the 1930s, and the glittering private lives of the Windsors. As Queen, Elizabeth would become the symbol of British courage during World War II and remain a British institution the rest of her long life. Wallis goes from being admired to vilified and, ultimately, pitied. Against the backdrop of the Abdication Crisis, World War II, coronations, funerals, births, and deaths, these two women maintain a biting, sharp-tongued feud --- until age and the long arm of history bring about a kind of understanding.

From the bestselling author of BLACK FLAGS, BLUE WATERS comes the story of the American whaleship Mentor, wrecked in 1832 on a remote reef in the western Pacific. With supplies dwindling, the 11 surviving crewmen face not only the miseries of shipwreck in unfamiliar territory but also the profound uncertainty of contact with the Indigenous people of the Micronesian archipelago of Palau, who within days approach the deserted men brandishing axes, clubs and spears. In this gripping saga of cultural collision, tribal wars and dashed hopes, award-winning historian Eric Jay Dolin vividly reconstructs the Mentor’s doomed voyage, the years of perilous captivity and the delicate negotiations and fraught naval rescue mission that followed.

It’s the fall of 2024, and 24-year-old Cat isn’t asking for too much: all she wants is three boyfriends, to write her little novels, and to survive another chaotic presidential election. She’s in an open relationship with her college sweetheart Jay, but nonmonogamy isn’t just a hot trend she’s trying. It’s her sliver of freedom in a world eager to wrestle it from her for being a Black woman going after what she wants with reckless abandon. While political tensions roil the campus where Cat is slowly earning her creative writing degree, she finds herself drawn to Jay’s best friend, Tristan, who’s smart, super hot, and…in a monogamous relationship. And then she meets Tristan’s girlfriend, Nia, a captivating art student with her own gravitational pull. Friends and family urge her to just be happy with Jay, but Cat is determined to have it all --- or blow up her life trying.

When Daphne Fuller and her husband Jonathan visit the Metropolitan Museum of Art, they notice an older, white-haired gentleman following them. The man turns out to be Eddie Triplett, her former stepfather, who had been married to her mother for a little more than year when Daphne was nine. Now 53, Daphne hasn’t seen Eddie for many years, not since the fateful event that changed the direction of both their lives. Meeting again, time falls away; while their relationship was brief, it had a profound impact on them both, and now that they are reunited, they have no intention of ever being separated again.

Famed children’s author Dame Eleanor Kingman has summoned her family and friends to her exquisite manor house on the cliffs. They're celebrating her birthday --- and her latest #1 bestseller in her series of books based on a mother fox and her cubs. But the night before the party, Eleanor receives an email that threatens to expose the lie she’s kept up for over half a century. Someone knows her secret. Is it her estranged literary agent? Is it her ex-husband? Is it the nanny she fired all those years ago? Or is it one of her three daughters, all of whom have a stake in the publishing empire she has built...With a television crew arriving to film a documentary of her life, Eleanor needs to find out who sent the email --- and preserve her legacy and multimillion-pound career. But when push comes to shove, and it's time to tell the truth will anyone actually believe her?

Holly arrives on a mission from her literary agent to write a bestselling book. But she’s not the only one with an agenda. Someone is watching Holly's every move from the shadows. The Watcher sees all and knows what Holly doesn’t. There's Gail, the property-obsessed realtor who introduces her to a handyman named Ethan. The local psychic, Serena, although she warns of impending danger. Then there's the young, mysterious Jade, a runaway teen. Jade has nowhere to go, so Holly takes her in. When Jade lands a job with the powerful Carmichael family, Holly feels overwhelmed with dread. The Carmichaels' influence in town has waned, but they have a dark connection to her tragic past. Their hidden secrets could endanger young Jade. As threats from the Watcher become increasingly sinister, Holly realizes that, even though the distant past is a faint echo, it is still close enough to be deadly

The Great Centennial Exhibition of 1876 attracted 10 million Americans --- nearly 20 percent of the population --- and visitors from around the world. On display were inventions that signaled the changing landscape of American life, from the typewriter to the telephone to Heinz Tomato Ketchup. This celebration of America’s first hundred years came at a moment when its future seemed more precarious than ever --- as big money threatened to overwhelm the government, underpaid workers waged the first national labor strike and Black Americans struggled to exercise their hard-won freedom. Looming over the fair was the presidential race of 1876 --- a highly contested election. Fergus Bordewich animates these converging crises through the lives of four protagonists, revealing a country striving to live up to the promise of its founders while bracing for the 20th century.

Ewer’s Rock, Virginia, 1917. Roy Young is restless, eager to leave this isolated rural valley for university and return with the technical knowledge to modernize his family’s farm. Samantha Hatton, Roy’s best friend since childhood, knows that both Roy and the town expect them to marry. But Samantha hungers for more. Above them on the mountain is silent Ennis Duke, the mysterious wild boy whose arrival in the valley will upend Ewer’s Rock. Within a year, the lives of these three young people will be dramatically transformed. America has joined the Great War, and Roy and Ennis feel duty-bound to join the fight. In the crucible of conflict, thousands of miles from the familiarity of home, the two men forge a fierce bond. Meanwhile, back in Virginia, Samantha’s love and courage endure unthinkable sacrifice in a corner of the world fractured by violence.

Cricket Dib, born on the American prairie, has no particular prospects or ambitions until, in grade school, he realizes he can draw. He soon meets a girl, Olympia Argyros, one year older, who is captivating and brilliant and far more worldly. Recognizing his talent, she convinces him to deface, with profound vulgarity, a popular playground. Under her direction, he does it willingly, already in love. Thus begins a 65-year entwining between Cricket and Olympia, encompassing friendship, working partnership and love affair. Together they go to art school --- an experience of dubious value --- and then navigate the art world for the next 50 years, together and apart.

Dusty Baker walked with baseball legends and became one himself. After he signed with the Braves in 1968 at the age of 19 against his father’s wishes, no less than the great Hank Aaron promised to take Baker under his wing. Baker became a premier hitter, helping take the Dodgers to a World Series victory in 1981. He would bookend this with another championship in 2022, this time as a manager helping guide and redeem a Houston Astros team humbled by a cheating scandal. Respected by generations across the game, Baker has come to embody the spirit of the sport --- and yet, to discuss his baseball career is only to scratch the surface of a remarkable life. A true American original, Baker weaves a spell of life at the crossroads, where fate turns on our decisions and the unexpected answers that sometimes seek us out when we least expect it.

In 1870, three Chinese women arrive in the small, dusty and violent pueblo of Los Angeles. Dove, the bound-footed daughter of an imperial scholar, is entrancing and innocent. These characteristics should bring her great rewards, beginning with her arranged marriage to a much older merchant. Petal, the big-footed daughter of peasants, has grown up hungry. In a moment of desperation, Petal’s father sells her to buy money for rice seed, and she is loaded onto a ship to the Gold Mountain --- America --- where she is once again sold. Moon is married to a doctor of traditional Chinese medicine, but her failed footbinding as a child has left her with a limp that lessens her value in the eyes of many. Anti-Chinese sentiment is strong in Los Angeles, and this eventually leads to the Night of Horrors during which all three women are challenged in ways they could not have imagined.

Special Agent Daniel Stansfield is ready for a change. Burnt out and defeated by the job, it’s his last day with the FBI. But before he can turn in his badge, he’s summoned back to Denver, the city he ran from four years ago, with a chilling message: it's happening again. Seemingly innocent people are waking up on the side of the highway, with no memory of how they got there, wearing the skin of victims they've allegedly never met. And they each share one haunting detail: a strand of a stranger’s hair is tied around their tongue. Now Daniel is pulled back into the gruesome cycle, and every clue leads him deeper into the shadows of his own past. He will have to confront the ghosts of his traumatic childhood and face what’s been hunting him all along before he and the people he loves become the next victims.

1990. In the myth-riddled woods of the New Jersey Pine Barrens, 16-year-old Annabelle Riley's twin sister, Sabrina, has been having an affair with a mysterious older man, and Annabelle is determined to uncover what's going on. Then, inexplicably, both sisters disappear. In this same town years later, newly instated police chief Callie Hauser makes an arrest that unexpectedly resurrects details from a heartbreaking cold case. As she digs deeper, the past and the present collide, challenging everything Callie believes about right and wrong, who she is, and the town she's always called home.

More than a century has passed since Asphodel Baker refined the process allowing her to imbue alchemically created life with power in a way no one else had ever been able to achieve. More than a century since she built the Impossible City on the ruins of Olympus, forging it from nothing more than imagination and spite, and penned it in plain view, enabling it to be read and cherished and believed by children the world over. And now, so long after her exit from the world, the descendants of her dark alchemy step into a place of birth, of discovery, of horror, to make amends for the sins of the past. Can the gods of today defeat the evils of their maker, or will the legacy of the most powerful alchemist the world has ever known prove to be their undoing?

Claire Shipman never imagined she'd be the single mom of a teenager, going through a contentious divorce and unexpectedly pregnant. On the bright side, at least she's on Nantucket, where she grew up, and where her mother and grandmother welcome her home with open arms. For years, Claire lived an enviable Manhattan lifestyle. Until her ex had a marriage-ending affair and also lost his job and all their money. Claire's high school friends invite her to their book club and an off-hand joke that she could sell one of her Hermes bags sparks a business idea. Her friend's brother, Cody, is a furniture builder with a spare storefront. He's initially skeptical about the prospects of a "used handbag shop." But Claire is determined. With the support of family, old friends and new, she begins to build a true second chance at a new life.

Stevie cannot escape her mother. Abandoning college to work a dead-end job, her days are a bore. Many dream of moving to L.A, but Stevie can’t wait to move away from it, and her mother’s orbit. Moon is many things: an out-of-work actress, a recovering addict, whatever a mistress becomes when she’s widowed, and a mother. Reeling in the aftermath of her lover and TV husband’s death, Moon struggles to process her grief. Now, neither Stevie nor Moon can afford to quit each other. And their cost of living forces them into a pool house in the backyard, while their home is rented out to pay bills. But when Adam, Moon’s former TV son and Stevie’s forever crush, arrives for the funeral, the three are pulled into a messy orbit, moving back into the ‘Big House’ and play-acting a picture-perfect family even as tensions rise and relationships unravel.

Reporter Clarence Thomas Jr. is looking for a great story, former teen star Faith Spack has parlayed her fame into a job at the White House, and the two-term incumbent president is campaigning for a constitutionally dubious third term. After an outbreak at a campaign rally, a mysterious new pandemic of “weeping sickness” sweeps the nation, threatening the president’s hold on the Oval Office. Desperate to retain power, he enlists the mystical pro wrestler Rasputin to help ensure his reelection and guarantee additional seasons of his presidential reality TV show. But as Rasputin’s appeal threatens to exceed the president’s, and the wrestler’s supposedly supernatural powers start to seem like the real thing, the campaign finds itself trapped in a spandex-clad destiny no number of executive orders can control, one in which both Clarence and Faith are compelled to play increasingly large parts.

It’s late October 1962. The Cuban Missile Crisis has just concluded. The Russkies blinked and pulled their ICBMs out of Cuba. Attorney General Robert Kennedy fears reprisals from seething commies. He orders a red probe and puts the LAPD on the job. Freddy Otash is injudiciously named the lead investigating officer. He’s a stone-cold criminal with police sanction and a harrowing dope habit. He homes in on a red-front trade union. There’s a murder on Halloween night. It may link to ex-VP and current gubernatorial candidate Richard Nixon and two commie snuffs from eight years back. Freddy’s running the probe, and Tricky Dick Nixon’s head goons have hired him to keep Nixon away from the smear-minded press.

Tensions simmer in small-town Connecticut. A city transplant is haunted by the deer carcass hanging in her neighbor’s garage. A psychiatric patient believes she’s becoming a bird. A disgraced oil executive invites his granddaughter’s kindergarten class to tour his home menagerie --- what could go wrong? THE ANIMAL ROOM delves deep into the town of Old Cranbury and its eclectic mix of residents. Incisive and moving, these stories chart the interconnected lives of neighbors, relatives, coworkers, enemies, lovers and the animals around them, turning an unflinching eye to the natural world to shed light on human nature.