Research Literature

Beneath the self-assured and serious faces we wear, every human life is full of longing, guesswork, and confusion—a scramble to do the best we can and make everything up as we go along. In these wide-ranging essays, Jon Mooallem chronicles the beauty of our blundering and the inescapability of our imperfections.

The first book in The Art Of series of books on the craft of writing, fiction writer and essayist Charles Baxter's The Art of Subtext discusses and illustrates the hidden subtextual overtones and undertones in fictional works haunted by the unspoken, the suppressed, and the secreted.

In 1943 John Steinbeck was on assignment for The New York Herald Tribune, writing from Italy and North Africa, and from England in the midst of the London blitz. In his dispatches he focuses on the human-scale effect of the war, portraying everyone from the guys in a bomber crew to Bob Hope on his USO tour and even fighting alongside soldiers behind enemy lines. Taken together, these writings create an indelible portrait of life in wartime.

Sandy Glass, a charismatic publicity-seeking oncologist, and Marion Mendelssohn, a pure, exacting scientist, are codirectors of a lab at the Philpott Institute dedicated to cancer research and desperately in need of a grant. Both mentors and supervisors of their young postdoctoral proteges, Glass and Mendelssohn demand dedication and obedience in a competitive environment where funding is scarce and results elusive.

Calvin Trillin has reported serious pieces across America for The New Yorker, covered the civil rights movement in the South for Time, and written comic verse for The Nation. But one of his favorite subjects over the years—a superb fit for his unique combination of reportage and humor—has been his own professional environment: the American press.

The first set of an extraordinary collection of 10 sets of personal letters written by Lord Chesterfield to his illegitimate son, young Philip Stanhope, then living abroad with his tutor to further his education. His Lordship, later secretary of state, hoped that his son would follow in his footsetps and took endless pains to instruct him on the essential and finer beharioral traits of a the aristocracy, which might lead him to such dizzying heights.

Following the success of several recent inspirational and practical books for would-be writers, Poemcrazy is a perfect guide for everyone who ever wanted to write a poem but was afraid to try. Writing workshop leader Susan Wooldridge shows how to think, use one's senses, and practice exercises that will make poems more likely to happen.

In a research hangar in Virginia, a Unit 51 team studies an ancient but long-dormant virus that can transform human physiology - and turn it into something else.... In the Amazon rain forest, a newly evolving life form known as Subject Z acquires the ability to think conceptually, build elaborate traps, create new carriers - and spawn a new race....

As anchor for the BBC's key political news programme, Newsnight, Emily Maitlis has interviewed some of the most powerful and controversial figures on the political scene. She plans each interview meticulously, knowing what she wants to ask and where she wants it to go, but as one of the most experienced journalists in her field she knows that no interview will ever go to plan....

For the last three decades Gary Younge has had a ringside seat during the biggest events and with the most significant personalities to impact the black diaspora: accompanying Nelson Mandela on his first election campaign, joining revellers on the southside of Chicago during Obama's victory, entering New Orleans days after hurricane Katrina or interviewing Archbishop Desmond Tutu, Maya Angelou and Stormzy. He has witnessed how much change is possible and the power of systems to thwart those aspirations.

Born in 1909 in Jackson, Mississippi, Eudora Welty shares details of her upbringing that show us how her family and her surroundings contributed to the shaping not only of her personality but of her writing as well. Everyday sights, sounds, and objects resonate with the emotions of recollection.

An audacious street rat, Pax scrambles to develop powerful and forbidden magic before his enemies can capture and ruin him. A monstrous beast, capable of shattering the city's defenses, is coming. Panic ensues, and the capital mobilizes for war, pushing Pax's strategic abilities to their limits. With time running out, the corrupt ruling families of the Astan Empire will stop at nothing to track down and extinguish any hint of rebellion. Pax races to strengthen his crew and navigate new alliances as the stakes skyrocket.

Pax, the audacious street rat turned mage, leads his eclectic crew into the heart of the Northern Purge—a wilderness expedition teeming with monsters and political adversaries. They develop their forbidden elemental powers in a race to gain power before their adversaries can destroy them. A frantic search unearths the ancient light mage headquarters, a trove full of treasures and fraught with dangers.

“I don’t want to be remembered for One Hundred Years of Solitude or for the Nobel Prize, but rather for my journalism,” Gabriel García Márquez said in the final years of his life. And while some of his journalistic writings have been made available over the years, this is the first volume to gather a representative selection from across the first four decades of his career - years during which he worked as a full-time, often muckraking, and controversial journalist, even as he penned the fiction that would bring him the Nobel Prize in 1982.

Pax and his friends are trapped in a deadly game, posing as empire loyalists in a double life secretly supporting the rebellion. Under the scrutiny of the empire’s elite, they collect crucial intel and perfect their formidable taming magic. But their deception is a precarious tightrope walk. When their cover is blown, Pax and his crew must escape with their crucial magic to the rebel headquarters.

Rick Bragg closes his circle of family stories with an unforgettable tale about fathers and sons inspired by his own relationship with his 10-year-old stepson.

When New York Times reporter Michael Finkel meets accused killer Christian Longo - who has taken on Finkel's identity - his investigation morphs into an unforgettable game of cat and mouse. True Story weaves a spellbinding tale of murder, love, deceit, and redemption, following Finkel's relentless pursuit of the shocking truth.

Spring is livening up Briar Creek after a long, cold winter, and newlyweds Lindsey and Sully could not be happier. Even though the upcoming mayoral election is getting heated, everything else in town is coming up daffodils...until a body is found. Ms. Cole, a librarian and current candidate for town mayor, is shocked when she opens her trunk to discover a murder victim who just so happens to be a guy she dated 40 years ago and the founder of the baking empire Nana's Cookies.

A compassionate and captivating examination of evolving attitudes toward mental illness throughout history and the fight to end the stigma. For centuries, scientists and society cast moral judgments on anyone deemed mentally ill, confining many to asylums. In Nobody’s Normal, anthropologist Roy Richard Grinker chronicles the progress and setbacks in the struggle against mental-illness stigma - from the 18th century, through America’s major wars, and into today’s high-tech economy.

In the wake of the September 11 attacks and the US-led invasion of Iraq, Suzy Hansen, who grew up in an insular conservative town in New Jersey, was enjoying early success as a journalist for a high-profile New York newspaper. Increasingly, though, the disconnect between the chaos of world events and the response at home took on pressing urgency for her. Seeking to understand the Muslim world that had been reduced to scaremongering headlines, she moved to Istanbul.