Week of Sept. 27, 2012
Fifty Shades of Grey
Growing out of a piece of fan fiction that recast Twilight's Bella and Edward in sexier scenarios, Fifty Shades of Grey tells the steamy affair of a student journalist and an intriguing young entrepreneur.
News and Reviews
Fifty Shades Darker
After a brief breakup, Anastasia and Christian change their arrangement, and both wrestle with their inner demons as Anastasia tries to make an important decision.
Fifty Shades Freed
Even though Christian and Anastasia are now a proper couple, they still have many obstacles to overcome, including Christian's past coming back to haunt Anastasia.
The Marriage Plot
Madeleine Hanna breaks out of her straight-and-narrow mold when she falls in love with charismatic loner Leonard Bankhead, while an old friend resurfaces, obsessed with the idea that Madeleine is his destiny.
News and Reviews
The Sense Of An Ending
Tony Webster is a retired divorced man in his mid-60s who, after receiving notice of an unexpected bequest, is pulled back into a "powerful recollection of strong emotions" from his past. This leads to a reassessment of the accuracy of his memories, a rueful realization of how much he'd gotten wrong, and a harsh re-evaluation of his passive approach to life.
News and Reviews
State of Wonder
A researcher at a pharmaceutical company, Marina Singh must step out of her comfort zone when she is sent into the heart of the Amazonian delta to check on a field team that has been silent for two years — a dangerous assignment that forces Marina to confront the ghosts of her past.
News and Reviews
Cloud Atlas
David Mitchell, author of Number9Dream, recounts the connected stories of people from the past and the distant future, from a 19th century notary and an investigative journalist in the 1970s to a young man who searches for meaning in a post-apocalyptic world.
News and Reviews
The Night Circus
Waging a fierce competition for which they have trained since childhood, circus magicians Celia and Marco unexpectedly fall in love and share a fantastical romance that manifests in fateful ways.
News and Reviews
Rules of Civility
A chance encounter with a handsome banker in a jazz bar on New Year's Eve 1938 catapults Wall Street secretary Katey Kontent into the upper echelons of New York society, where she befriends a shy multimillionaire, an Upper East Side ne'er-do-well and a single-minded widow.
News and Reviews
The Perks of Being a Wallflower
In a thought-provoking, coming-of-age novel, teenager Charlie struggles to cope with the complex world of high school. He deals with the confusions of sex and love, the temptations of drugs and the pain of losing a close friend and favorite aunt.
News and Reviews
The Language of Flowers
A Novel
Victoria, the orphaned heroine of Vanessa Diffenbaugh's debut novel, is privy to a secret language of flowers that dates to Victorian England.
News and Reviews
The Art of Fielding
A baseball star at a small college near Lake Michigan launches a routine throw that goes disastrously off course and inadvertently changes the lives of five people, including the college president, a gay teammate and the president's daughter.
News and Reviews
The Tiger's Wife
Tea Obreht's debut novel takes place in an unnamed Balkan country similar to the former Yugoslavia. Natalia, a young medical student, is on her way to an orphanage in enemy territory when she learns that her beloved grandfather has died. As his confidante, Natalia was not only aware of his cancer; she was also privy to his many incredible adventures, the two most fantastic being his stories of the Deathless Man and the Tiger's Wife.
News and Reviews
Caleb's Crossing
Forging a deep friendship with a Wampanoag chieftain's son on the Great Harbor settlement where her minister father is working to convert the tribe, Bethia follows her friend through his Ivy League education and his efforts to bridge cultures among the colonial elite.
News and Reviews
The Cat's Table
Boarding a 1950s ship and sequestered to an out-of-sight dining table with other marginalized children, an 11-year-old boy shares rollicking adventures while traveling to various world regions, learning about jazz, women and a shackled prisoner along the way.












