Evergreen

Rebecca Rasmussen

Vintage

It is 1938 when Eveline, a young bride, follows her husband, Emil, into the Minnesota wilderness. Though their cabin is rundown, they have a river full of fish, a garden out back, and a baby boy named Hux. But when Emil leaves to take care of his sick father, a dangerous stranger arrives, fracturing their small family forever and leaving Hux to grow up wondering if the wrongs of the past can ever be mended. Set before a backdrop of vanishing forest, Rebecca Rasmussen has written a luminous and emotionally charged novel about how one defining moment can echo through generations.

Killing Monica

Candace Bushnell

Grand Central Publishing

Pandy "PJ" Wallis is a renowned writer whose novels about a young woman making her way in Manhattan have spawned a series of blockbuster films. After the success of the Monica books and movies, Pandy wants to attempt something different: a historical novel based on her ancestor Lady Wallis. But Pandy's publishers and audience only want her to keep cranking out more Monica-as does her greedy husband, Jonny, who's gone deeply in debt to finance his new restaurant in Las Vegas. When her marriage crumbles and the boathouse of her family home in Connecticut goes up in flames, Pandy suddenly realizes she has an opportunity to reinvent herself. But to do so, she will have to reconcile with her ex-best friend and former partner in crime, SondraBeth Schnowzer, who plays Monica on the big screen-and who may have her own reasons to derail Pandy's startling change of plan.

Music for Wartime: Stories

Rebecca Makkai

Viking

A reality show producer manipulates two contestants into falling in love, even as her own relationship falls apart. Just after the fall of the Berlin Wall, a young boy has a revelation about his father's past when a renowned Romanian violinist plays a concert in their home. When the prized elephant of a traveling circus keels over dead, the small-town minister tasked with burying its remains comes to question his own faith. In an unnamed country, a composer records the folk songs of two women from a village on the brink of destruction. These transporting, deeply moving stories some inspired by her own family history amply demonstrate Rebecca Makkai's extraordinary range as a storyteller, and confirm her as a master of the short story form.

The Rape of Europa: The Intriguing History of Titian's Masterpiece

Charles FitzRoy

Bloomsbury Publishing PLC

The Rape of Europa is a completely novel popular history of art book centering on one of Titian's most celebrated masterpieces. By telling the history of this painting from its origin to the present day, Charles FitzRoy includes fascinating accounts of King Philip II of Spain and how his art collecting reveals a dichotomy at its heart. The painting itself is an extremely erotic description of the famous classical myth based on the account in Ovid's Metamorphoses. It was commissioned as a wedding present for Charles I and his French queen Henrietta Maria, and was later copied by Rubens and exerted a strong influence on Velazquez. In the eighteenth century the painting was given by the King of Spain to the Duke of Orleans, brother of Louis XV. Orleans was the greatest art collector of his day, using the brilliant connoisseur and dealer Pierre Crozat as his agent. At this stage the story becomes one of skullduggery. The Rape of Europa painting is the most celebrated example of how rich Americans managed to purchase works of art from British collections and how Bernard Berenson made a huge fortune out of authenticating paintings for rich patrons, always purely for profit. This thrilling book is part art history and part detective story, and is an entirely original way of telling a story.

The Glass Sentence

S.E. Grove

Puffin Books

Boston, 1891. Sophia Tims comes from a family of explorers and cartologers who, for generations, have been traveling and mapping the New World a world changed by the Great Disruption of 1799, when all the continents were flung into different time periods. Eight years ago, her parents left her with her uncle Shadrack, the foremost cartologer in Boston, and went on an urgent mission. They never returned. Life with her brilliant, absent-minded, adored uncle has taught Sophia to take care of herself. Then Shadrack is kidnapped. And Sophia, who has rarely been outside of Boston, is the only one who can search for him. Together with Theo, a refugee from the West, she travels over rough terrain and uncharted ocean, encounters pirates and traders, and relies on a combination of Shadrack's maps, common sense, and her own slantwise powers of observation. But even as Sophia and Theo try to save Shadrack's life, they are in danger of losing their own.

Emma and the Blue Genie

Cornelia Funke

Yearling Books

One night, Emma finds a mysterious green bottle floating in the ocean. When she pulls out the stopper, she sets a blue genie free! Most genies grant three wishes, but Karim can't grant even one anymore. A yellow genie stole his magic nose ring, leaving him small, powerless, and trapped in that bottle. Emma and her noodle-tailed dog have to help Karim get his nose ring--and his magic--back!

The Key and the Flame

Claire Caterer

Margaret K. McElderry Books

Eleven-year-old Holly Shepard longs for adventure, some escape from her humdrum life. That is precisely what she gets when she is given an old iron key that unlocks a door--in a tree. Holly crosses the threshold into a stunning and magical medieval world, Anglielle. And as she does so, something unlocks within Holly: a primal, powerful magic. Holly is joined on her journey by two tagalongs--her younger brother Ben, and Everett, an English boy who hungers after Holly's newfound magic and carries a few secrets of his own. When Ben and Everett are sentenced to death by the royals, whose fear of magic has fueled a violent, systemic slaughter of all enchanted creatures, Holly must save them and find a way back home. But will she be able to muster the courage and rise above her ordinary past to become an extraordinary hero?

Escape to the World's Fair

Wendy McClure

Razorbill

The orphans of Wanderville have decided to never again let themselves be confused by adults offering them shiny red apples and warm beds. They re going to make their way to California and establish a more permanent spot for Wanderville. But when they re suddenly left without means of transportation, the orphans must find a new way of getting to their town. Enter a dandy motorist with a proposition: If the orphans agree to take a mysterious artifact to the 1904 St. Louis World's Fair on his behalf, they will receive a handsome reward that will allow them to book passage west. The citizens of Wanderville conclude that this is their best bet. What they don t realize, however, is just how treacherous the journey to the fair will be and how much they will need to sacrifice to finally find themselves a new home.