Exploring Top Books of Shelfari

In his debut novel, The Kite Runner, Khaled Hosseini accomplishes what very few contemporary novelists are able to do. He manages to provide an educational and eye-opening account of a country's political turmoil--in this case, Afghanistan--while also developing characters whose heartbreaking struggles and emotional triumphs resonate with readers long after the last page has been turned over. And he does this on... (more)

A Yellow Raft in Blue Water: A Novel

by Michael Dorris

Michael Dorris has crafted a fierce saga of three generations of Indian women, beset by hardships and torn by angry secrets, yet inextricably joined by the bonds of kinship. Starting in the present day and moving backward, the novel is told in the voices of the three women: fifteen-year-old part-black Rayona; her American Indian mother, Christine, consumed by tenderness and resentment toward those she loves; and... (more)

The Corrections: A Novel

by Jonathan Franzen

After almost 50 years as a wife and mother, Enid Lambert is ready to have some fun. Unfortunately, her husband, Alfred, is losing his sanity to Parkinson's disease, and their children are all making catastrophes of their own lives. Enid however, has her heart set on one last family Christmas.

Girl with a Pearl Earring

by Tracy Chevalier

The runaway New York Times bestseller with over one million copies sold Now a major motion picture from Lions Gate Films opening November 2003 History and fiction merge seamlessly in Tracy Chevalier's luminous novel about artistic vision and sensual awakening. Through the eyes of sixteen-year-old Griet, the world of 1660s Holland comes dazzlingly alive in this richly imagined portrait of the young... (more)

Everything Is Illuminated

by Jonathan Safran Foer

With only a yellowing photograph in hand, a young man -- also named Jonathan Safran Foer -- sets out to find the woman who may or may not have saved his grandfather from the Nazis. Accompanied by an old man haunted by memories of the war; an amorous dog named Sammy Davis, Junior, Junior; and the unforgettable Alex, a young Ukrainian translator who speaks in a sublimely butchered English, Jonathan is led on a... (more)

The Pillars of the Earth

by Ken Follett

Published in 1989, The PIllars of the Earth follows the building of a cathedral in 12th-century Kingsbridge, England. It is Ken Follett's best-selling book and marked a major departure from the thrillers for which he was known.

How We Are Hungry (Vintage)

by Dave Eggers

"Another" "What It Means When a Crowd in a Faraway Nation Takes a Soldier Representing Your Own Nation, Shoots Him, Drags Him from His Vehicle and Then Mutilates Him in the Dust" "The Only Meaning of the Oil-Wet Water" "On Wanting to Have Three Walls Up Before She Gets Home" "Climbing to the Window, Pretending to Dance" "She Waits, Seething, Blooming" "Quiet" "Your Mother and I" "Naveed" "Notes for a... (more)

Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close

by Jonathan Safran Foer

Hotel of the Saints

by Ursula Hegi

The bestselling author of Stones from the River and The Vision of Emma Blau renews her reputation as an extraordinary writer of short stories in this major collection that balances her reader on the magical border of laughter and sorrow. In Hotel of the Saints, Hegi enters the perspectives of lovers and loners, eccentrics and artists, children and parents: a musician tries to protect her daughter from... (more)

Gone to Soldiers

by Marge Peircy

In a stunning tour-de-force, Marge Piercy has woven a tapestry of World War II, of six women and four men, who fought and died, worked and worried, and moved through the dizzying days of the war. A compelling chronicle of humans in conflict with inhuman events, GONE TO SOLIDERS is an unforgettable reading experience and a stirring tribute to the remarkable survival of the human spirit. "Panoramic...This is a... (more)

Range of Motion

by Elizabeth Berg

I can tell you how it happened. It's easy to say how it happened. He walked past a building, and a huge chunk of ice fell off the roof, and it hit him on the head. This is Chaplinesque, right? People start to laugh when I tell them...As Jay Berman lingers is a coma, his young wife, Lainey, is the only one who believes he will recover. While he lies motionless, she hopes to reach him by offering reminders of the... (more)

Icebergs: A Novel

by Rebecca Johns

A beautifully written, multigenerational story of love, war, and fate that spans WWII to the present. In World War II Canada, Walt Dunmore and Al Clark are the only members of their bomber crew to survive a plane wreck on Newfoundland’s Labrador coast—but now they must fight injuries and cold in the sub-zero wilderness. On the home front, in a small Canadian farming community, Walt’s young wife Dottie struggles... (more)

The Thin Place: A Novel

by Kathryn Davis

The prize-winning author of Versailles tells the story of a small New England village unsettled by a young girls unearthly gift. In Varennes, a town near the Canadian border, three girls come across the body of a dead man on the local lakes beach. Two of them run to get help, but twelve-year-old Mees Kipp stays with the body and somehow, inexplicably, brings it back to life. Her mysterious gift is at the center of... (more)

Love and Garbage

by Ivan Klima

From an internationally acclaimed Czech writer comes a shrewd, humane, and poignant novel, set in Prague before the Velvet Revolution, whose perceptions about love, conscience, and betrayal cut to the bone of life in both totalitarian and democratic societies. "A chilling story from the underground."--The New York Times.

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Tags: awesome new fiction

The Kite Runner

by Khaled Hosseini

A Yellow Raft in Blue Water: A Novel

by Michael Dorris

The Corrections: A Novel

by Jonathan Franzen

Girl with a Pearl Earring

by Tracy Chevalier

Everything Is Illuminated

by Jonathan Safran Foer

The Pillars of the Earth

by Ken Follett

How We Are Hungry (Vintage)

by Dave Eggers

Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close

by Jonathan Safran Foer

Hotel of the Saints

by Ursula Hegi

Gone to Soldiers

by Marge Peircy

Range of Motion

by Elizabeth Berg

Icebergs: A Novel

by Rebecca Johns

The Thin Place: A Novel

by Kathryn Davis

Love and Garbage

by Ivan Klima