Editor’sChoice
You Know When the Men Are Gone, by Siobhan Fallon.
The crucial role of military wives becomes clear in Fallon’s powerful, resonant debut collection, in which the women are linked by absence and a pervading fear that they’ll become war widows. Publishers Weekly
Fiction
To the End of the Land, by David Grossman.
Acclaimed Israeli author Grossman serves up a powerful meditation on war, friendship and family. Instead of celebrating her son Ofer’s discharge from the Israeli Army, Ora finds her life turned upside down and inside out when he re-enlists. Grossman, whose own son was killed during the 2006 Israel-Lebanon conflict, writes directly from the heart in this scorching antiwar novel. Booklist
Luka and the Fire of Life, by Salman Rushdie.
This entertaining fable, dedicated to Rushdie’s second son, is a stand-alone sequel to “Haroun and the Sea of Stories” (1990). Although the tone is fairly lighthearted overall, the triumphant finale is a fantastic tribute to the rich interior world of the story teller and the transformative power of his art. Booklist
Nonfiction
Inside the Dark Heart: The Rise and Fall of the Sicilian Mafia, by A.G.D. Maran.
Maran, a Scottish surgeon, has written a sweeping overview of the Sicilian Mafia, tracing its evolution through three periods. The current incarnation is waning; violence has slowed, people are less afraid to speak out, and the mob has lost its key role in worldwide drug trafficking. Library Journal
The Abacus and the Cross: The Story of the Pope Who Brought the Light of Science to the Dark Ages, by Nancy Marie Brown, $27.95.
The story of Gerbert of Aurillac, later Pope Sylvester II, not only is a rags- to-riches saga but also captures how the direction of history can be influenced by one person. Brown captures the court and church intrigues, disputes, politics, wars, marriages and backroom maneuvering that drove events before and after A.D. 1000 Library Journal
Cruel Creeds, Virtuous Violence: Religious Violence Across Culture and History, by Jack David Eller, $28.
Taking on a highly volatile subject with admirable objectivity, Eller has written a thorough academic study of religious violence from an anthropological and sociological perspective. Drawing extensively on examples from the history of various religions around the world, he covers the full range of religious violence, going well beyond the current hot topics of war and terrorism to include sacrifice, self-injury, persecution and ethno-religious conflict. Library Journal
Paperbacks
Lost and Found In Russia: Lives In a Post-Soviet Landscape, by Susan Richards.
Part travelogue, part contemporary history, Richards’ new work explores postcommunist Russia from the point of view of the Russian people affected by one of the 20th century’s most defining sociopolitical events, the collapse of the USSR. Publishers Weekly
Major Pettigrew’s Last Stand, by Helen Simonson, $15.
This thoroughly charming novel wraps Old World sensibility around a story of multicultural conflict involving two widowed people who assume they’re done with love. The result is a smart romantic comedy about decency and good manners in a world threatened by men’s hair gel, herbal tea and latent racism. Washington Post
The Angel’s Game, by Carlos Ruiz Zafon, $15.95.
Another delicious supernatural mystery from best- selling Catalan author Zafon (“The Shadow of the Wind,” 2005). Mix Edgar Allan Poe with Jorge Luis Borges, intellectual mysterian Arturo Perez-Reverte, and maybe add a dash of Stephen King, and you have some of the makings of Zafon’s sensibility. Kirkus
Coming up
The Sentry, by Robert Crais. In the third outing featuring PI Joe Pike, our hero is lured into a lethal gangland battle involving La Eme, the Mexican mafia and a Bolivian drug connection. (January)
