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From Raymond E. Feist new Firemane Saga to mega-award-winning Tor authors, speculative fiction for everyone.

Get serious at the beach with books ranging from promising debuters to Man Booker long-listed Clegg, MacArthur Fellow Li, Costa/Maugham winner O’Farrell, and other good stuff. 

Friends, family, lovers, and historical figures to keep you reading at the height of summer. 

An anonymous twitterer (Duchess Goldblatt), two Pulitzer Prize winners, struggling parents, struggling children, an African American woman who acts as an emergency room physician—all have stories to tell.

Baker probes the Freedom of Information Act, Conn offers a tale of two Syrian brothers, Deresiewicz assays the artist’s life in the 21st century, Lozado reads 150 books about Trump, and Thompson considers the issues surrounding the 2016 Dallas police shooting. Plus more public issues of importance. 

In July, police officers and private investigators from ancient Rome to the Amish community to Spain’s Basque region swing into action, but mystery really goes to the dogs with Spencer Quinn’s Of Mutts and Men and David Rosenfelt’s Muzzled.  

Jasper Dewitt’s debut about a terrifying mental patient was an optioned film idea before it became a book, Karin Slaughter brings back Georgia Bureau of Investigation agent Will Trent, Paul Tremblay gives us chills driven by a rabies-like epidemic, and Jen Waite's first thriller follows up her memoir of a manipulative husband. Note that supernatural thrills are becoming a standard on Prepub lists. 

Choosing 200 titles to represent an entire year’s worth of books is no easy task. Those here are suggested as the most important but also tell a story of where our interests lie as readers and a nation. Our newest residents, race relations, climate change, political tensions—all are issues reflected in 2020’s fiction and nonfiction.

This preholiday sneak peek of July fiction will get you set for the summer with some big-name popular fiction.

This preholiday sneak peek of July nonfiction will get you set for the summer with sure-to buzz books in political science and memoir. 

More literary titles to add to last week’s list, and no fiction reader can go wrong with works by the perennially best-selling Jill McCorkle and rising star Brit Bennett, plus a range of veterans and exciting newbies. 

Issue-oriented books like Michelle Bowdler Is Rape a Crime? and DW Gibson’s 14 Miles (of border wall). A strong showing in science (from evolution and neurology to nature and astrophysics). Some intriguing art titles, including coverage of pianos in Siberia. Titles to help and inspire, like Pittsburgh Steeler James Conner’s Fear Is a Choice. Plus Gerald Marzorati’s Seeing Serena. All big June nonfiction. 

June has a crowded pop fiction field, so big it's hard to pick picks. In women's fiction, stellar names like Jenny Colgan, Elin Hilderbrand, Kristan Higgins, and Danielle Steel come calling, while historical fiction focuses on World War II, and speculative fiction offers an all-star cast from Terry Brooks to Zoje Stage.

The “Jesus” trilogy wrap-up from Nobel laureate J.M. Coetzee, soulful drinking in Dublin with Roddy Doyle, memoirist Sam Lansky’s debut novel, elegant family saga from Martha McPhee, Stefano Massini’s novel behind the hit play, love likely lost from Spencer, and an idealist’s road trip from Tobar, plus more top literary fiction

Our white supremacist roots from National Book Award winner Edward Ball, Jewish women resistance fighters from Judy Batalion, Dan Hampton on killing Japanese admiral Isoroku Yamamoto, Jonathan Kaufman on the Jewish families who ruled early 20th-century Shanghai, Bob Schron on activist African American athletes, Tim Weiner on U.S. and Soviet/Russian political warfare, and more. 

Barry takes us on a wild ride with her second novel, while Connolly explains how his enduring Charlie Parker first got into the game. Hart exhibits his usual moral rigor in a thriller involving a Vietnam vet and his brother, accused of murder. Jones introduces two sisters to their half-sister, while in Mina’s new work, a woman seeks out her biological mother only to find that she was murdered. Plus a James Patterson doubleheader, veterans like Johansen and Woods, three high-print-run debuts, domestic suspense, and more.

David Adjmi considers growing up a gay Syrian Jew in Brooklyn before the borough got cool, journalist Diane Cardwell finds a new life and a new community by surfing at New York's Rockaway Beach, and linguist Deborah Tannen reconstructs the life of her inspiring father. In contrast, Hayden Herrera recounts a neglectful upbringing by art-besotted parents, and Dan Mathews examines life with an off-kilter mother only recently diagnosed with mental illness. Other stories of difficult parents come from Sara Faith Alterman, Stephanie Danler, and Vicki Laveau-Harvie. Finally, among top memoirs, former Navy SEAL Douglas Michael Day communicates a story of service and survival.

Icelandic crime king Jónasson wraps up his series starring Detective Inspector Hulda Hermannsdóttir with a visit to a snowed-in cabin, and Steiner continues her successful new series with Det. Manon Bradshaw of the Cambridgeshire police investigating a mysterious hanging. Plus multiple series starts from well-known authors (e.g., Hart, Sears), British-set work ranging from the medieval era to today, and more big chills. 

The late Rep. Elijah Cummings’s memoir, Thomas Frank with an unexpected view on populism, Bill Gates on the climate crisis, Litt on restoring our challenged democracy, and NBC/MSNBC’s Soboroff on the consequences of separating children and parents at the border. Plus more current affairs titles, with a strong selection of titles on racism and particularly white nationalism today. 

Max Brooks revisits Bigfoot, Christopher Moore revisits A Midsummer’s Night Dream, Kate Mosse revisits early France in religious turmoil, and Emma Straub revisits contemporary parent-child tensions. Amy Jo Burns follows her memoir Cinderland with the story of a teenager facing the world from which she’s been locked away, and Francesca Serritella detours from essay writing with mother Lisa Scottoline to encounter the Ghosts of Harvard. Plus historicals (e.g., Alison Weir), beach-based reads (e.g., Barbara Delinksy), and tales of love, family, and friendship (sometimes with suspense). 

Veteran journalist Steven Dudley on a notorious street gang, New York Times best-selling author Bruce Feiler on a new way of seeing our stories, Bay Area reporters Gee and Anguiano on the lethal Paradise Fire, award-winning novelist Laila Lalami on an immigrant’s sense of conditional citizenship, famed astrophysicist Mario Livio on Galileo defying the science deniers, the National Book Award–winning Charles Johnson with advice on grandparenting, and the New York Times best-selling Judith Warner on the travails of middle school. Plus self-help and newsworthy stories to wrap up the month. 

Gregory joins with drama critic Todd London to talk about his passion for performing, Windham-Campbell Prize winner Laing argues that today we need the arts more than ever, Lippman offers an essay collection reflecting on her life and work, and Perl wraps up his big Alexander Calder biography. Plus Fifth Harmony’s Ally Brooke on inspiration in her life, Talking Heads drummer Chris Frantz on his life in music, veteran journalist David Kamp on 1970s American children’s TV, and critic Wendy Lesser on Scandinavian crime fiction. 

Elliot Ackerman’s first fiction without a military setting, Richard Ford and Daniel Mason with short stories, Catherine Lacey with a stranger upending a Southern town, Eimear McBride with a disaffected young woman living in hotels, Micheline Aharonian Marcom on a young Guatemalan American’s struggle to return to America, Millet’s first novel since the National Book Award long-listed Sweet Lamb of Heaven, and Shriver on a couple undone by aging and exercise. Plus rising young writers, the moral consequences of World War II, and the immigrant’s life, touched by magic.

Just in for April: great fiction from National Book Foundation 5 Under 35 honoree Amity Gaige, breakout author Peter Geye, NYPL Young Lion Adam Levin, Booker Prize winner Graham Swift, and beloved best-selling author Anne Tyler. 

Celebrated historian Bernard Bailyn offers a career retrospective, Robert Dallek assays the presidency, Morgan Jerkins retraces her family’s steps during the Great Migration, and Matthew Van Meter recaps Duncan v. Louisiana, a significant case of the Civil Rights era. 

Books on James A. Baker III, John Maynard Keynes, and John McCain will keep biography fans busy in May. 

Scott Turow and Kimberley McCreight profile lawyers flummoxed by what they discover when trying to help a friend. Liv Constantine pits a jilted wife against a woman with a past, while Ivy Pochoda brings five women together to face a serial killer. Brian Panowich sets bad guys after a numbers-genius teen. And Stephen King offers four fresh novellas. Plus Jeffery Deaver, Janet Evanovich, James Patterson, and more. 

Jaouad recounts three and a half years spent conquering leukemia, then learning to live again, while Owusu unfolds a childhood fractured by family tragedy and constant travel to arrive at a coherent sense of self. Plus three more significant memoirs with larger context: comedian/storyteller Mike Birbiglia on becoming a parent, mountaineer/explorer Vanessa O’Brien on her worldview after scaling the heights, and journalist Schwarz on her grandparents’ guilt during World War II. 

The prolific and popular McCall Smith offers the second in his Swedish-set “Detective Varg” series, headlining a bunch of great series additions forthcoming from authors ranging from Rita Mae Brown to Martin Walker. In addition, Caroline Cooney, best known as a successful YA author, steps up with adult mystery.

Coverage of the news of the day includes presidential historian Holzer on fake news, plus Gellman on the surveillance state, Nossel on balancing free speech and inclusiveness, and Omar on her life before, during, and after being elected to Congress. Plus more on the Trump era and on key business factors today. 

Leading off with cautionary stories of children threatened (Beah and Dalcher) and reverberantly written historical fiction set in the late 1800s (Jiles, McGuire), many April titles will appeal broadly to readers of both literary and popular fiction. 

Veterans like Robyn Carr, Eric Jerome Dickey, and Brenda Novak are joined by newcomers with impressive first printings to offer expansive popular fiction reading in April. Including late thriller-author catch John Sandford.

There are lots of great nonfiction titles to wrap up April coverage, especially in the arts. Chantler offers a graphic novel about jazz great Leon “Bix” Beiderbecke, esteemed poet Mark Doty considers forebear Walt Whitman, and art critic Gopnik takes on Warhol. Plus a dog-loving memoir from Boylan, inspiration from two-time National Book Award winner Ward, and more. 

Alvarez features a writer/professor facing troubles in retirement; Barry, an orphaned Lakota child taking control of her life in post–Civil War Tennessee; and Sofer, an Iranian who works as an interrogator trying to mend fences with his family. Plus journeys to Korea, across an old American West inflected with Chinese symbolism, through the lives of immigrants and refugees, to a Texas town troubled during an oil boom. 

The Holocaust as all Europe’s responsibility, how America became a more equitable society in the early/mid-1900s and can do it again, the Enlightenment as more than a fount of reason, and how the CIA really works. Plus American adventures from Wyatt Earp to the Kennedys, globalization before 1000 CE, airplane vs. airships, and more. 

David Baldacci and Jack Carr are in the mix, but April thrillers are mostly by women, including Darcey Bell’s she-said, she-said mommy chiller, Cara Black’s trip to World War II Paris (no Aimée Leduc in sight), and Jennifer Hillier’s tale of a missing child. 

Albright makes the most of her final years, el Kaliouby reports on her work with Emotion AI, and Mockett encounters a new world traveling the heartland’s wheat fields. Plus TV celebrities, inspirational speakers, drag queens, and more. 

April showers must be bone-chilling enough, as there’s not a huge sweep of mysteries for the month, but what’s coming ranges nicely from Sara Paretsky’s Dead Land to Jeri Westerson’s Sword of Shadows. 

Washington Post editor Karen Attiah on working with Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi, leading national political journalist Molly Ball on Nancy Pelosi’s durability, Jeff Hobbs on four boys facing the college hunt, Macarthur Fellow Lauren Redniss with a graphic novel featuring an Apache family fighting to protect sacred land, and Walter Thompson-Hernandez on Compton, CA’s famous black cowboys. Plus Asian infighting, Kim Jong Un, ISIS, disinformation, refugees, homelessness, and Afropessimism.  

Multi-Hugo-Award-winning N.K. Jemisin launches a new series, Terry McMillan returns to warm our hearts after four years, Serle writes a second adult novel, Zigman fictionalizes middle-age slump, first novelists Jane Healey and Judith Rosner join TaraShea Nesbit to enhance the historical genre, and Michael Farris Smith gives us boundary-crossing literary chills. Plus great women’s fiction, romance, and sf/fantasy/horror.

Mark Bittman and David Katz join forces to tell us how best to eat, David Rohde considers whether there really is a deep state, James Shapiro shows what Shakespeare has meant (and continues to mean) to America, and David Sheff profiles a convicted man who finds enlightenment. Plus big-buzzing titles in business, science, and the arts, including music, literature, and architecture.

Taylor Brown with a defense-of-wild-animals story, Michael Christie with a family saga, Louise Erdrich inspired by her grandfather, Lily King with a heroine who commits to the creative life, James McBride on conflict in 1960s Brooklyn, Emily St. John Mandel on characters connected to a glass hotel, Hilary Mantel bidding adieu to Thomas Cromwell, Katy Simpson Smith moving through Rome over the ages, and Dennis E. Johnson with complex doings in and near an Ojibwe reservation. And that's just the beginning. 

History this month leads off with Dan Gretton’s magnum opus on the “desk killers” whose orders led to atrocities in the last century; Adam Hochschild on forgotten crusader Rose Pastor Stokes; Erik Larson on the interactions among Winston Churchill’s family, friends, and associates during the Blitz; and Bettye Kearse's investigation of evidence that places her among the descendants of President James Madison and an enslaved African woman.

Harlan Coben, Heather Graham, J.A. Jance, Kathy Reichs, and James Rollins are among the big-name authors competing for your attention this fall. But for fresh, edgy fun, take a special look at the protean Chris Bohjalian, tracking an unexpected disappearace in Vietnam; the booming team of Greer Hendricks & Sarah Pekkanen, Phillip Margolin with a magician who disappears, and Peter Swanson, portraying a mystery fan in trouble.  

Noé Álvarez and Cathy Park Hong wrestle with immigrant issues, Honor Moore and Fanny Singer profile remarkable mothers, Alex Halberstadt and Esther Safran Foer examine generations shaped by trauma, and a dozen other authors examine their lives, often highlighting family. 

Top picks come from Jussi Adler-Olsen, who folds our current refugee crisis into his latest mystery, and Donna Leon, whose visits to Venice with Comissario Guido Brunetti will never grow stale. In addition, check out sure-to-be-popular mysteries ranging from Christi Daugherty’s Revolver Road to Daniel Friedman’s Running Out of Road, plus works by Tom Bouman, Jude Deveraux, Deanna Raybourn, and others. 

Grabbed-from-the-headlines picks include Susan Fowler’s Whistleblower, about her challenge to Uber’s management; Adrienne Martin on running for local office and winning; Tanya Selvaratnam on her abuse by New York State Attorney General Eric Schneiderman; and independent reporter Frank Smyth on the NRA. More newsworthy titles include several election runup books on the liberal side and Ross Douthat representing a more conservative view about society today. 

Among strong sf/fantasy titles this month, Nebula, Hugo, and World Fantasy award winner Ken Liu’s new story collection stands out. In addition, Hannah Rothschild returns with castle-set family drama, while women’s fiction newbies Beth Morrey and Alexis Schaitkin lead a contingent of debut authors starting to buzz.

Ayaan Hirsi Ali on women’s rights within the framework of immigration, Vivian Gornick on the books that have shaped her life, Brian Greene on where the universe is going, Joshua Hammer on a big threat to rare raptors, and Mara Hvistendahl on industrial espionage by the Chinese, with a wide range of general fiction titles wrapping up February 2020 coverage.

Multi-award-winning Scottish-based Sudanese Leila Aboulela on women unknotting their lives, Man Booker Award winner Aravind Adiga on an undocumented refugee in Australia facing moral conundrum, top-notch short story writer Amy Bonnafons with her first novel, leading British children’s writer Kiran Millwood Hargrave with her first adult novel, and National Book Award winner Lily Tuck and multi-best-booked Lidia Yuknavitch with short stories. Plus a dozen debut and rising star authors. 

These 36 editors' picks for fall include political action, injustices fought, identities formed, invisible friends, kids bursting into flames, and much more. 

This month’s history picks have a strong focus on African American history, with titles including Kent Garrett and Jeanne Ellsworth’s The Last Negroes of Harvard, Jerry Mitchell’s Race Against Time: A Reporter Reopens the Unsolved Murder Cases of the Civil Rights Era, Jill Watts’s The Black Cabinet, and David Zucchino’s Wilmington’s Lie: The Murderous Coup of 1898 and the Rise of White Supremacy. Other key titles on this list feature the suffragist movement, the Revolutionary era, and Max Hastings's view of the RAF’s Operation Chastise. 

Featuring five author-editor teams: Leah Greenberg and Ezra Levin with Julia Cheiffetz (We Are Indivisible: A Blueprint for Democracy After Trump, One Signal: Atria), Andrew Krivak with Erika Goldman (The Bear, Bellevue Literary), E.R. Ramzipoor with Erika Imranyi  (The Ventriloquists, Park Row: Harlequin), Mychal Denzel Smith with Katy O'Donnell (Stakes Is High: Life After the American Dream, Bold Type: Hachette), and Kevin Wilson with Zachary Wagman (Nothing To See Here, Ecco: HarperCollins).

Picks Sophie Hannah, Jonathan Kellerman, Mary Kubica, Sarah Pinborough, and Lori Rader-Day, plus newcomer Heather Chavez, top a list of thrillers where much of the danger is close to home.
 

Memoir picks embrace literary lionesses Adrienne Miller and Elizabeth Tallent, Pulitzer Prize–winning critic Philip Kennicott on the comforts of Bach, playwright/Elle.com columnist R. Eric Thomas on the outsider’s life, Ginger Gaffney on horses as healers, and Eilene Zimmerman on her lawyer ex-husband’s hidden addiction. Plus more addiction memoirs, celebrities turns, hacktivists, historicals, and just living it up. 

In February nonfiction, Ehrenreich collects her foresightful essays, O’Brady re-creates his solo stalk across Antarctica, and Barnes assesses the French Belle Époque through the life of Dr. Samuel Pozzi. In fiction, Mosley brings back Leonid McGill, Offill introduces us to doubt-struck librarian Lizzie, Phillips has the only Muslim in 1601 England scouting out Elizabeth’s successor, and McCann imagines a Palestinian and an Israeli father united in grief.

This month’s mysteries travel from Victorian London and early 1900s Britain near Stonehenge to New York, Dallas, and an off-the-grid Canadian town to Iceland and the waters off Brittany.

Predictions for the future, several sharped-eyed looks at the Trump administration, black feminism, and more. 

National Book Foundation honorees, Man Booker Prize and International Prize claimants, and New York Times best-selling authors in fiction and nonfiction combine to create a long list of top reading for January 2020. 

From a Mexican family fleeing cartel violence in Jeanine Cummins's American Dirt to society panicked by a murderous robot in Joanna Kavenna's Zed, these are masterly stories of facing change. 

Featuring top authors like Robyn Carr, Charlaine Harris, and Danielle Steel, plus Karin Slaughter and Lee Child writing as a team. 

Revisiting World War II, the fate and impact of two war criminals, and social justice history involving landmark ACLU cases and affirmative action. 

In fiction, William Gibson offers futuristic thrills, Joe Ide continues the saga of Isaiah Quintabe (IQ), and Jayne Ann Krentz launches a new romantic suspense trilogy. In nonfiction, Nicholas D. Kristof and Sheryl WuDunn address working-class America; Orenstein, the issue of boys and sex today; and Ravitch, the failure of privatizing schools.

Big names like James Patterson and Lisa Gardner are joined by rising stars like Chad Dundas, Emily Elgar, Catherine Steadman, and Christian White to keep you reading indoors in January. 

Whether encountering a corpse in the ruins of Pompeii or trying to discover the identity of young women who may be human trafficking victims, this month’s mystery protagonists go for blood. 

This month’s batch of current-interest titles don’t just consider where we are now but look to the future, recommending political action (Eitan Hersh’s Politics Is for Power), considering how tomorrow’s economies may resemble today’s outlier models (Richard Davies’s Extreme Economies), explaining how we can feed nine billion people by mid-century (Caleb Harper’s The Future of Food), and showing how fast technology is evolving (Peter H. Diamandis & Steven Kotler 's The Future Is Faster Than You Think).

In the last weeks, working on Day of Dialog, the galley guides for BookExpo and the American Library Association conference in Washington, DC, and United for Libraries events at ALA, I encountered these terrific novels I would highly recommend.

In the last weeks, working on Day of Dialog, the galley guides for BookExpo and the American Library Association conference in Washington, and United for Libraries events at ALA, I encountered these impressive nonfiction titles, destined for your shelves. 

December is a slim month for publishing, and there aren't too many literary titles to recommend, but here are three works from award-winning authors that you’ll want to investigate.

Another medical thriller from Robin Cook, J.T. Ellison’s study of secrets at an elite girls school, Jeff Lindsay with a new protagonist after Dexter, paranormal romancer Nalini Singh trying out thrillerdom, and more.

From Pliny the Younger and God’s mission in America to the sinking of the Titanic and the tragic 1983 Beirut bombing of the U.S. Marines barracks.

LJ's annual ALA Galley & Signing Guide offers 200-plus titles you will find on the show floor. 

From Alice Blanchard, a winner of Katherine Anne Porter and Barnes & Noble Best Mystery honors, to Emily Littlejohn, author of the LJ-starred Lost Lake, to Helene Tursten, one of Soho Crime’s top sellers, scares for the holidays.

Best practices on forming habits and resisting negativity, diet tips from Wheat Belly author William Davis and Body Love author Kelly LeVeque, getting older but better the French way, and more. 

December is usually a thin month for publishers, at least in terms of numbers, so this week's Prepub showing is smaller than usual. In terms of quality, though, these picks remain tops: a stunning debut from Coville set in a Novia Scotia town settled by former slaves, Man Booker Prize winner Kenneally's fictional linke between prehistoric and contemporary Australia, and fan-favorite Williams's follow-up to The Wicked City.

Armstrong on how we misuse sacred texts, former North Dakota senator Dorgan on addressing the needs of Native American youth, Louv on what connecting with animals means to us, Pinckney with a wide-ranging essay collection, and a new Joy of Cooking for the 2020s. Plus the beloved Berg with a stand-alone grounded in Truluv territory.

Look for mystery from Rita Mae Brown and Anne Perry, a new thriller from best-selling UK author Tom Bradby, Bernard Cornwell with another great Saxon tale, Dexter Palmer and Danielle Steel in historical mode, and more.

Indigenous peoples, big tech's corrupted ideals, NXIVM exposure, U.S. military concern about climate change, the problem with money and banking, and women on a roll.

Volumes featuring Nabokov’s uncollected prose pieces, poet/essayist Thomas Lynch’s best and most recent essays, and actress/comedian Slate’s whimsies join Darryl Pinckney’s Busted in New York and Other Essays (see this week’s Picks) and a bumper crop of essay collections this fall. Plus Hardwick/Lowell correspondence and a biography of Elizabeth Bishop.

Beyond collections covered in LJ Reviews, here are key titles from presses large and small that every poetry reader will want—and every library should investigate.

With hot titles for the season still surfacing, two works here—Aciman’s follow-up to his stupendous Call Me by Your Name and John Le Carré’s next up-to-the-minute thriller—will actually be pubbing in October. Look also for Lemay’s memoir about a transgender child, World Fantasy Award winner North’s next scarefest, and the witty Wilson on children with a tendency literally to get all burned up.

Fans have been waiting for a sequel to Michael Crichton's The Andromeda Strain, and here it comes, written by Robopocalypse best-selling author Daniel H. Wilson. Plus a novella  helmed by John W. Campbell Award finalist Rivers Solomon and inspired by the Hugo Award–nominated song “The Deep” from Daveed Diggs’s rap group, Clipping.

The complete Larry Brown stories, the first Dale Peck collection, and books columnist Nina MacLaughlin’s feminist retelling of Ovid’s Metamorphoses, plus Mark Danielewski’s The Little Blue Kite and Peter Kuper’s graphic reimagining of Joseph Conrad’s Heart of Darkness, among other works. 

The history of a bejeweled family, businessmen aiming to do good, schooldays split between Africa and an elite education, and the military dog that helped bring down Osama bin Laden, recalled by his handler.

Peter Asher on the Beatles, Jeanine Basinger on Hollywood musicals, Robyn Crawford on Whitney Houston, Ari Herstand on making it in the music business, Sheila Weller on Carrie Fisher, and much more.

Intriguing history titles in November embrace exploration, fabric, and debutantes through the ages, but many of the titles focus on World War II and its aftermath.

My favorite thrillers this month lean heavily toward the historical, with Alan Furst plunging into the Resistance during World War II, Robert Harris taking us to 1468 England, and Joseph Kanon pursuing a postwar hunt for an escaped Nazi.

Greenidge chronicles the life of turn-of-the-20th-century black radical William Monroe Trotter, while Keith and Clavin give us Eugene Bullard, the world’s first African American pilot, plus a famed boxer, Paris nightclub impresario, and World War II spy. Myint-U gives context to Burma’s present crisis, Sciolino captures Paris history by sailing the Seine, and Secrest shows that Olivetti, not IBM et al., built the first desktop computer.

A brief list (thrillers are making their big showing earlier in the fall), no plot details for new works by David Baldacci and John Grisham, and both Grisham’s and Tess Gerritsen’s titles are just discovered October publications. But these nail biters are key for any thriller collection.

Mitch Albom offers his first nonfiction in over a decade, Deirdre Bair revisits the writing of her Beckett and de Beauvoir biographies, Susannah Cahalan examines an experiment that changed our understanding of madness, Karine Jean-Pierre encourages political engagement, and Riad Sattouf continues his best-selling graphic memoir. In fiction, Allen Eskens looks at a splintered Ozarks community, and Erin Morgenstern takes us to a magical, underground world through an ancient library.

Veterans from Spenser to Alex Cross, plus lots of female gumshoes (Agatha Raisin, Stephanie Plum, Lady Dunbridge).

Mega-hit comedy duo Rhett McLaughlin and Link Neal create Southern town with dark edges, Jojo Moyes does something a little different as she visits the Depression-era Horseback Librarians of Kentucky, and librarian and Alex Award winner Racculia takes her heroine on a wild treasure hunt.

Big-name authors from W. Bruce Cameron to Elin Hilderbrand to Danielle Steel keeps the pop fiction popping in October.

Spanning history from the Crusades to 20th-century China with award-winning authors.

From the Civil War to World War II to the 1983 Beirut bombing but also the Reverse Underground Railroad and kidnapping poor children for illegal adoptions.

The multi-million-copy best-selling Bill Bryson takes a walk around his own body, while Maria Goodavage follows up service dogs and soldier dogs with dogs as our doctors.

Studies of hearing and hearing loss, memory creation for happiness, and environmental economics, but we’ll all love the cats and dogs on this list.

This week’s fiction picks are a mix of literary fiction (Russo, Strout), thriller (newcomer Cockram, Denfeld, and Oates), and what looks to be an insightful blend of both genres by “Juniper Songs” author Cha.

Jack Reacher, Harry Bosch, Kellen Adams, Virgil Flowers, and the Women’s Murder Club are back, along with some surprising debuts and stand-alones. Christmas chills, too.

From England and Ireland to Texas and California, the holidays never arrive without a hitch. But in the end they will glow.