In a remote Italian town, an unassuming cobbler is drawn into helping partisans fight against fascists and Nazis in Sacha Naspini’s novel "The Bishop’s Villa". Despite missing several fingers, René is the cobbler of Le Case. He’s... Read More

In Elizabeth Lowham’s enthralling fantasy novel "Casters and Crowns", a reverse Sleeping Beauty curse forces a princess to confront the truth about magic in her kingdom. Aria will inherit her father’s crown—if she can survive the... Read More

Visual anthropologist and filmmaker Sarah Thomas’s eloquent memoir-in-essays "The Raven’s Nest" covers her time in Iceland, where her views about people’s relationships to land and to each other sharpened. The book draws contrasts... Read More

In Peter Macsovszky’s philosophical novel "Making Skeletons Dance", a barfly takes on Amsterdam. As a struggling writer and relative newcomer to the Netherlands, Simon’s perspective on the place is different than most people’s. He... Read More

Gioia Diliberto’s "Firebrands" visits the Roaring Twenties and beyond, revealing how four women’s efforts shaped the course of American history. When American women won the right to vote in 1920, some politicians assumed they would... Read More

This picture book biography is the latest in a celebrated series, rooting adult successes in childhood lessons. Growing up, Antoine de Saint-Exupéry struggled in school; he failed his Naval Academy entrance exams and found little career... Read More

In Leslie Gentile’s sensitive novel "Elvis, Me, and the Postcard Winter", a girl’s relationship with her mother is centered. From the Eagle Shores Indian Reserve in Vancouver Island, twelve-year-old Truly settles into life with Andy... Read More

In Ellen Kirschman’s stunning mystery novel "Call Me Carmela", a police psychologist helps a teenager find her birth parents, exposing secrets that endanger everyone involved. Dot, a contract psychologist with the police department,... Read More