Eclectic list to keep you up all night
Discover an eclectic book list to keep you up all night—from Michel Faber's *The Crimson Petal and the White* to Ken Follett's *The Pillars of the Earth* and Diana Gabaldon's *Outlander*. Featuring gripping historical fiction, frontier adventures, and paranormal thrillers, these page-turners span genres and eras. Perfect for binge-reading sessions, this curated selection mixes award-winning classics with immersive sagas that demand just one more chapter. Dive into unforgettable storytelling from John Irving, Charles Frazier, and Gary Jennings—your next all-night read awaits.
Book
Outlander
by Diana Gabaldon
#1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • The first book in Diana Gabaldon’s acclaimed Outlander saga, the basis for the Starz original series. One of the top ten best-loved novels in America, as seen on PBS’s The Great American Read! Unrivaled storytelling. Unforgettable characters. Rich historical detail. These are the hallmarks of Diana Gabaldon’s work. Her New York Times bestselling Outlander novels have earned the praise of critics and captured the hearts of millions of fans. Here is the story that started it all, introducing two remarkable characters, Claire Beauchamp Randall and Jamie Fraser, in a spellbinding novel of passion and history that combines exhilarating adventure with a love story for the ages. Scottish Highlands, 1945. Claire Randall, a former British combat nurse, is just back from the war and reunited with her husband on a second honeymoon when she walks through a standing stone in one of the ancient circles that dot the British Isles. Suddenly she is a Sassenach—an “outlander”—in a Scotland torn by war and raiding clans in the year of Our Lord . . . 1743. Claire is catapulted into the intrigues of a world that threatens her life, and may shatter her heart. Marooned amid danger, passion, and violence, Claire learns her only chance of safety lies in Jamie Fraser, a gallant young Scots warrior. What begins in compulsion becomes urgent need, and Claire finds herself torn between two very different men, in two irreconcilable lives.
Book
The Pillars of the Earth
by Ken Follett
Nominated as one of America’s best-loved novels by PBS’s The Great American Read #1 New York Times Bestseller Oprah's Book Club Selection The “monumental masterpiece” (Booklist) that changed the course of Ken Follett’s already phenomenal career. Look out for the prequel, The Evening and the Morning, coming from Viking in September 2020. “Follett is a master,” extolled the Washington Post on the release of The Pillars of the Earth. A departure for the bestselling thriller writer, the historical epic stunned readers and critics alike with its ambitious scope and gripping humanity. Today, it stands as a testament to Follett’s unassailable command of the written word and to his universal appeal. The Pillars of the Earth tells the story of Philip, prior of Kingsbridge, a devout and resourceful monk driven to build the greatest Gothic cathedral the world has known . . . of Tom, the mason who becomes his architect—a man divided in his soul . . . of the beautiful, elusive Lady Aliena, haunted by a secret shame . . . and of a struggle between good and evil that will turn church against state and brother against brother. A spellbinding epic tale of ambition, anarchy, and absolute power set against the sprawling medieval canvas of twelfth-century England, this is Ken Follett’s historical masterpiece.
Book
The Eight
by Katherine Neville
Computer expert Cat Velis is heading for a job to Algeria. Before she goes, a mysterious fortune teller warns her of danger, and an antique dealer asks her to search for pieces to a valuable chess set that has been missing for years...In the South of France in 1790 two convent girls hide valuable pieces of a chess set all over the world, because the game that can be played with them is too powerful....
Book
The Oracle Glass
by Judith Merkle Riley
"Open the pages, and out comes a whiff of brimstone, as The Oracle Glass transports you to the Paris of kings and witches, on a guided tour of corruption, love, and sorcery." --Diana Gabaldon Seventeenth-century Paris. Genevieve is a skinny, precocious girl with a mind full of philosophy and the remarkable power to read the swirling waters of an oracle glass. Left for dead by her family, she is taken in by the ingenious occultist La Voisin, who rules a secret society of witches that manipulates the rich and the scandalous all the way up to the throne. Tutored by La Voisin, Genevieve creates a new identity for herself--as the mysterious Madame de Morville, rumored to be one hundred fifty years old. Soon, even the reigning mistress of the Sun King himself consults Madame de Morville on what the future holds for her. And as Madame de Morville, Genevieve can revel in what women are usually denied--power, an independent income, and the opportunity to speak her mind. But beneath her intelligence and wit, and in the face of unexpected love, Genevieve is driven by the obsessed spirit of revenge.... "INTELLIGENT, WITTY AND ELEGANTLY WRITTEN." --San Francisco Chronicle "Judith Merkle Riley's novels are small jewels, smooth and polished, glowing with a light all their own....Merkle Riley has her own oracle glass--and she uses it to see as vividly into the past as her Genevieve sees into the future." --Detroit Free Press "Enlightening, enticing...The author's own alchemical skill is fully evident here as dashes of black magic and sorcery are added to spice the lively plot. Liberal sprinklings of wry wit and mordant humor help keep the narrative cauldron bubbling." --TheCleveland Plain Dealer
Book
Memoirs of a Geisha
by Arthur Golden
"Captivating, minutely imagined . . . a novel that refuses to stay shut" ("Newsweek"), "Memoirs of a Geisha" is now released in a movie tie-in edition.
Book
Into the Wilderness
by Sara Donati
Weaving a tapestry of fact and fiction, Sara Donati's epic novel sweeps us into another time and place...and into the heart of a forbidden affair between an unconventional Englishwoman and an American frontiersman. It is December of 1792. Elizabeth Middleton leaves her comfortable English estate to join her family in a remote New York mountain village. It is a place unlike any she has ever experienced. And she meets a man unlike any she has ever encountered--a white man dressed like a Native American, Nathaniel Bonner, known to the Mohawk people as Between-Two-Lives. Determined to provide schooling for all the children of the village, she soon finds herself locked in conflict with the local slave owners as well as her own family. Interweaving the fate of the Mohawk Nation with the destiny of two lovers, Sara Donati's compelling novel creates a complex, profound, passionate portrait of an emerging America.
Book
The Anubis Gates
by Tim Powers
Now celebrating 40 years in print—take a dazzling journey through time with Tim Power’s classic, Philip K. Dick Award-winning tale... “There have been other novels in the genre about time travel, but none with The Anubis Gates’ unique slant on the material, nor its bottomless well of inventiveness. It’s literally in a class by itself, a model for others to follow, and it's easy to see how it put Powers on the map.”—SF Reviews Brendan Doyle, a specialist in the work of the early-nineteenth century poet William Ashbless, reluctantly accepts an invitation from a millionaire to act as a guide to time-travelling tourists. But while attending a lecture given by Samuel Taylor Coleridge in 1810, he becomes marooned in Regency London, where dark and dangerous forces know about the gates in time. Caught up in the intrigue between rival bands of beggars, pursued by Egyptian sorcerers, and befriended by Coleridge, Doyle somehow survives and learns more about the mysterious Ashbless than he could ever have imagined possible...
Book
Naked in Death
by J. D. Robb
THE FIRST NOVEL IN J. D. ROBB’S #1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLING IN DEATH SERIES In the year 2058, technology completely rules the world. But for New York City Detective Eve Dallas, one irresistible impulse still rules the heart: passion… Eve Dallas is a New York police lieutenant hunting for a ruthless killer. In over ten years on the force, she's seen it all—and knows her survival depends on her instincts. And she's going against every warning telling her not to get involved with Roarke, an Irish billionaire—and a suspect in Eve's murder investigation. But passion and seduction have rules of their own, and it's up to Eve to take a chance in the arms of a man she knows nothing about—except the addictive hunger of needing his touch.
Book
A Widow for One Year
by John Irving
“A Widow For One Year will appeal to readers who like old-fashioned storytelling mixed with modern sensitivities. . . . Irving is among the few novelists who can write a novel about grief and fill it with ribald humor soaked in irony.”—USA Today In A Widow for One Year, we follow Ruth Cole through three of the most pivotal times in her life: from her girlhood on Long Island (in the summer of 1958) through the fall of 1990 (when she is an unmarried woman whose personal life is not nearly as successful as her literary career), and at last in the autumn of 1995, when Ruth is a forty-one-year-old widow and mother (and she’s about to fall in love for the first time). Both elegiac and sensual, A Widow for One Year is a multilayered love story of astonishing emotional force. Praise for A Widow for One Year “Compelling . . . By turns antic and moving, lusty and tragic, A Widow for One Year is bursting with memorable moments. . . . A testament to one of life’s most difficult lessons: In the end, you just have to find a way to keep going.”—San Francisco Examiner-Chronicle “A sprawling 19th-century production, chock full of bizarre coincidences, multiple plot lines, lengthy digressions, and stories within stories. . . . An engaging and often affecting fable, a fairy tale that manages to be old-fashioned and modern all at once.”—The New York Times “[Irving’s] characters can beguile us onto thin ice and persuade us to dance there. His instinctive mark is the moral choice stripped bare, and his aim is impressive. What’s more, there’s hardly a writer alive who can match his control of the omniscient point of view.”—The Washington Post Book World “In the sprawling, deeply felt A Widow for One Year, John Irving has delivered his best novel since The World According to Garp. . . . Like a warm bath, it’s a great pleasure to immerse yourself in.”—Entertainment Weekly “John Irving is arguably the American Balzac, or perhaps our Dickens—a rip-roaring storyteller whose intricate plot machinery is propelled by good old-fashioned greed, foolishness and passion.”—The Nation “Powerful . . . a masterpiece.”—St. Louis Post-Dispatch
Book
Cold Mountain
by Charles Frazier
Inman, an injured and disillusioned Confederate soldier, embarks on a harrowing journey home to his sweetheart, Ada, who herself is struggling to run the farm left her at her father's sudden death.
Book
The Crimson Petal and the White
by Michel Faber
Yearning to escape her life of prostitution in 1870s London, Sugar finds her fate entangled in the complicated family life of patron William, an egotistical perfume magnate.
Book
Year of Wonders
by Geraldine Brooks
"When an infected bolt of cloth carries plague from London to an isolated mountain village, a housemaid named Anna Frith emerges as an unlikely heroine and healer. Through Anna's eyes, we follow the story of the plague year, 1666, as her fellow villagers make an extraordinary choice. Convinced by a visionary young minister, they elect to quarantine themselves within the village boundaries to arrest the spread of the disease. But as death reaches into every household, faith frays. When villagers turn from prayers and herbal cures to sorcery and murderous witch-hunting, Anna must confront the deaths of family, the disintegration of her community, and the lure of a dangerous and illicit love. As she struggles to survive, a year of plague becomes, instead, annus mirabilis, a "year of wonders.' Inspired by the true story of Eyam, a village in the rugged mountain spine of England. Year of Wonders is a detailed evocation of a singular moment in history."--BOOK JACKET.Title Summary field provided by Blackwell North America, Inc. All Rights Reserved