Russell Banks. Lost Memory of Skin,
published by Ecco, an imprint of HarperCollins Publishers
An intelligent and fearlessly sympathetic portrait of a group of society’s outsiders—sex offenders—that illuminates the moral complexities at the heart of our justice system.
Anne Enright. The Forgotten Waltz,
published by W. W. Norton & Company
The vicissitudes of extramarital love and the obstructions to its smooth flow—including spouses, children, and the necessary secrecy surrounding an affair—are charted in sharp yet supple prose.
Karen Russell. Swamplandia!,
published by Alfred A. Knopf, a division of Random House, Inc.
This dazzlingly inventive first novel introduces 12-year-old gator-wrestling Ava Bigtree and her eccentric family, whose lives (and the Florida theme park they run) straddle the boundaries between the real and the surreal.
James Gleick. The Information: A History, A Theory, A Flood,
published by Pantheon Books, a division of Random House, Inc.
A comprehensive study describing the melodious interplay between science and literature documents the transmission of human knowledge from talking drums to the Internet.
Manning Marable. Malcolm X: A Life of Reinvention,
published by Viking Penguin, a member of Penguin Group (USA)
This definitive work on the life of Malcolm X corrects previous misconceptions and offers new information about the charismatic leader’s life and death during the turbulent years of the civil rights era.
Robert K. Massie. Catherine the Great: Portrait of a Woman,
published by Random House, an imprint of the Random House Publishing Group
A compulsively readable biography of the fascinating woman who, through a combination of luck, personality, and a fine mind, rose from her birth as a minor German princess to become the Empress of all the Russias.
