Buzz Books 2018: Fall/Winter: Exclusive excerpts from forthcoming titles by Stephen Carter, Jude Devereaux, Leif Enger, Barbara Kingsolver, Sarah Perry and 35 more

By Publishers Lunch

Buzz Books gives you 40 chances to find your next great reads, providing exclusive early looks at the next big thing from favorite authors and hot new discoveries.



From bestselling authors we have samples of new work from Barbara Kingsolver, Diane Chamberlain and Jude Devereaux, who breaks away from romance with her first mystery.



A rich selection of highly anticipated follow-up books is inside too: Sarah Perry’s Melmoth, a companion to The Essex Serpent; Elizabeth McCracken’s Bowlaway; and Leif Enger’s Virgil Wander.



This edition is packed with 16 big debut novels, including the highly-touted The Silent Patient by British screenwriter Alex Michaelides, already being adapted to film and posed to become an international bestseller, and Kathy Wang’s Family Trust, described as The Nest set in Silicon Valley.



In nonfiction, bestselling novelist and history author Stephen L. Carter writes about his grandmother in Invisible: The Forgotten Story Of The Black Woman Lawyer Who Took Down America’s Most Powerful Mobster. Journalist Stephanie Land describes her poverty-ridden early years in Maid: Hard Work, Low Pay, And A Mother’s Will To Survive, a Book Expo Buzz Editor’s Panel pick. Memoirs on two opposite ends of the spectrum include My Own Devices by rap singer Dessa and Witness: Lessons From Elie Wiesel’s Classroom by Ariel Burger.



Regular readers know that each Buzz Books collection is filled with early looks at titles that will go on to top the bestseller lists and critics' "best of the year" lists. And our comprehensive seasonal preview starts the book off with a curated overview of hundreds of notable books on the way later this year.



While Buzz Books feels like your own insider access to book publishing, these collections are meant to be shared, so spread your enthusiasm and "to be read" picks online. For still more great previews, check out our separate Buzz Books 2018: Young Adult Fall/Winter as well.



Finally, don’t miss our popular Buzz Books Monthly editions, available on Amazon, iBooks, and NetGalley, for up-to-the-minute monthly publication lists and excerpts.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Publishers Marketplace
• Release date: May 16, 2018
• ISBN: 9781948586047

Book preview

cover.jpg

Contents

Introduction

The Fall/Winter 2018 Publishing Preview

Part One: Fiction

Hiro Arikawa, The Travelling Cat Chronicles (Berkley)

Sarah Bird, Daughter of a Daughter of a Queen (St. Martin’s Press)

Patti Callahan, Becoming Mrs. Lewis (Thomas Nelson)

Diane Chamberlain, Dream Daughter (St. Martin’s Press)

Jude Deveraux, A Willing Murder (Mira)

Leif Enger, Virgil Wander (Atlantic Monthly Press)

Lisa Gabriele, The Winters (Viking)

Stephen Giles, The Boy at the Keyhole (Hanover Square Press)

Lynne Hugo, The Testament of Harold’s Wife (Kensington Books)

Barbara Kingsolver, Unsheltered (Harper)

Elizabeth McCracken, Bowlaway (Ecco)

Walter Mosley, John Woman (Grove Press)

John Jay Osborn, Listen to the Marriage (Farrar, Straus and Giroux)

Frances De Pontes Peebles, The Air You Breathe (Riverhead)

Micah Perks, True Love and Other Dreams of Miraculous Escape, (Outpost 19)

Sarah Perry, Melmoth (Custom House)

Sarah Pinborough, Cross Her Heart (William Morrow)

Rebecca Serle, The Dinner List (Flatiron)

Natasha Solomons, House of Gold (G.P. Putnam’s Sons)

Taylor Stevens, Liars’ Paradox (Kensington)

Part Two: Debut

Nana Kwame Adjei-Brenyah, Friday Black (Mariner)

Susana Aikin, We Shall See the Sky Sparkling (Kensington Books)

Jessica Barry, Freefall (Harper)

Chaya Bhuvaneswar, White Dancing Elephants (Dzanc Books)

Carrie Callaghan, A Light of Her Own (Amberjack)

Jack Ford, Chariot on the Mountain (Kensington Books)

Imogen Hermes Gowar, The Mermaid and Mrs. Hancock (Harper)

Edwin Hill, Little Comfort (Kensington Books)

Jamil Jan Kochai, 99 Nights in Logar (Viking)

T.M. Logan, Lies (St. Martin’s Press)

Sofia Lundberg, The Red Address Book (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt)

Wil Medearis, Restoration Heights (Hanover Square Press)

Alex Michaelides, The Silent Patient (Celadon Books)

Deb Spera, Alligator (Park Row Books)

Stuart Turton, The 7½ Deaths Of Evelyn Hardcastle, (Sourcebooks Landmark)

Kathy Wang, Family Trust (William Morrow)

Part Three: Nonfiction

Ariel Burger, Witness: Lessons From Elie Wiesel’s Classroom, (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt)

Stephen L. Carter, Invisible: The Forgotten Story of the Black, Woman Lawyer Who Took Down America’s Most, Powerful Mobster (Holt)

Dessa, My Own Devices (Dutton)

Stephanie Land, Maid: Hard Work, Low Pay, and, a Mother’s Will to Survive (Hachette Books)

Credits

Copyright

Introduction

Buzz Books gives you 40 chances to find your next great reads, providing exclusive early looks at the next big thing from favorite authors and hot new discoveries.

From bestselling authors you know and love we have the first pre-publication samples of new work from Barbara Kingsolver (Unsheltered), Diane Chamberlain (Dream Daughter) and Jude Devereaux, who breaks away from romance with her first mystery, A Willing Murder. Additional authors include Lisa Gabriele (with a contemporary version of the classic du Maurier Rebecca), Stephen Giles, Walter Mosley, John Jay Osborn, Sarah Pinborough, and Natasha Solomons, among many other popular novelists.

There’s a rich selection of highly anticipated follow-up books from literary favorites: Sarah Perry’s Melmoth, a companion to The Essex Serpent; Elizabeth McCracken’s Bowlaway; and Leif Enger’s Virgil Wander.

This edition is packed with 16 big debut novels, including the highly-touted The Silent Patient by British screenwriter Alex Michaelides, already being adapted to film and posed to become an international bestseller, and Kathy Wang’s Family Trust, described as The Nest set in Silicon Valley.

In nonfiction, bestselling novelist and history author Stephen L. Carter writes about his grandmother in Invisible: The Forgotten Story Of The Black Woman Lawyer Who Took Down America’s Most Powerful Mobster. Journalist Stephanie Land describes her poverty-ridden early years in Maid: Hard Work, Low Pay, And A Mother’s Will To Survive, a Book Expo Buzz Editor’s Panel pick. Memoirs on two opposite ends of the spectrum include My Own Devices by rap singer Dessa and Witness: Lessons From Elie Wiesel’s Classroom by Ariel Burger.

Regular readers know that each Buzz Books collection is filled with early looks at titles that will go on to top the bestseller lists and critics’ best of the year lists. And our comprehensive seasonal preview starts the book off with a curated overview of hundreds of notable books on the way later this year.

While Buzz Books feels like your own insider access to book publishing, these collections are meant to be shared, so spread your enthusiasm and to be read picks online. For still more great previews, check out our separate Buzz Books 2018: Young Adult Fall/Winter as well. For complete download links, lists and more, visit buzz.publishersmarketplace.com

.

Finally, don’t miss our popular Buzz Books Monthly editions, available on Amazon, iBooks, and NetGalley, for up-to-the-minute monthly publication lists and excerpts.

The Fall/Winter 2018 Publishing Preview

It’s another exciting season of new books ahead. Readers will find their way to many of the books previewed here and others yet to be discovered. To help you sift through the many thousands of planned fall and winter titles, we’ve selected what we think are among the most noteworthy literary, commercial, and breakout titles for adults, separated into four key categories.

You’ll be able to sample many of the highlighted titles right now in Buzz Books 2018: Fall/Winter; they are noted with an asterisk. And please remember: because we prepare this preview many months in advance, titles, content, and publication dates are all subject to change.

Fiction

Publishers normally save their most prominent literary titles for the fall, and this season is not lacking in notable names, including Kate Atkinson, Deborah Eisenberg, Haruki Murakami, Barbara Kingsolver, and more. Look out, too, for emerging voices such as Edward Carey, Idra Novey, and Eugenia Kim.

The Notables

Kate Atkinson, Transcription (Little, Brown, 9/25)

*Sarah Bird, Daughter of a Daughter of a Queen (St. Martin’s, 9/4)

William Boyd, Love Is Blind (Knopf, 10/9)

Leonard Cohen, The Flame: Poems and Notebooks – The final, posthumous writings of the legendary singer-songwriter, poet, and novelist.

Pat Barker, The Silence of the Girls (Doubleday, 9/11)

Deborah Eisenberg, Your Duck Is My Duck: Stories (Ecco, 9/25)

*Leif Enger, Virgil Wander (Atlantic Monthly, 10/2)

Nuruddin Farah, North of Dawn (Riverhead, 12/4)

Sebastian Faulks, Paris Echo (Henry Holt, 11/6)

Khaled Hosseini, Sea Prayer (Riverhead, 9/18)

Yu Hua, The Incident: Stories (Pantheon, 11/13)

Thom Jones, Night Train: New and Selected Stories (Little, Brown, 10/16) – A posthumous collection from the author of The Pugilist At Rest.

*Barbara Kingsolver, Unsheltered (Harper, 10/16)

Elinor Lipman, Good Riddance (HMH, 2/5)

*Elizabeth McCracken, Bowlaway (Ecco, 2/5)

Haruki Murakami, Killing Commendatore (Knopf, 10/9)

George Saunders, Fox 8: A Story (Random House, 11/13)

Helen Schulman, Come With Me (Harper, 11/27)

Gary Shteyngart, Lake Success (Random House, 9/4)

Sjon, CoDex 1962: A Trilogy (MCD/FSG, 9/11)

Jean Thompson, A Cloud in the Shape of a Girl (S&S, 10/9)

Highly Anticipated

Eliot Ackerman, Waiting For Eden (Knopf, 9/25)

Karen Bender, The New Order: Stories (Counterpoint, 11/13)

Edward Carey, Little (Riverhead, 10/23)

Tom Barbarsh, The Dakota Winters (Ecco, 12/4)

Lucia Berlin, Evening in Paradise: More Stories (FSG, 11/6)

Esi Edugyan, Washington Black (Knopf, 9/18) – New from the Giller-Prize winner.

Diana Evans, Ordinary People (Liveright, 9/11)

*Lisa Gabriele, The Winters (Viking, 10/16) – A reimagining of Rebecca by Daphne Du Maurier.

Louisa Hall, Trinity (Ecco, 10/16)

Laird Hunt, In the House in the Dark of the Woods (Little, Brown, 10/16)

Daniel Mason, The Winter Soldier (Little, Brown, 9/11)

Suzanne Matson, Ultraviolet (Catapult, 9/4)

Amelie Nothomb, Strike Your Heart (Europa Editions, 9/11)

Samuel Park, The Caregiver (S&S, 9/25)

*Sarah Perry, Melmoth (Custom House, 10/16) – The follow up to the bestselling The Essex Serpent.

Sam Savage, An Orphanage of Dreams (Coffee House, 1/8) – The final novel from the award-winning author of Firmin.

Roberto Saviano, The Piranhas (FSG, 9/4)

Daniel Torday, Boomer1 (St. Martin’s, 9/18)

Juan Gabriel Vasquez, The Shape of the Ruins (Riverhead, 9/25)

John Wray, Godsend (FSG, 10/9)

Emerging Voices

Dror Burstein, Muck (FSG, 11/13)

Lea Carpenter, Red, White, Blue (Knopf, 8/21)

Claudia Dey, Heartbreaker (Random House, 8/21)

Abby Geni, The Wildlands (Counterpoint, 9/4)

Alison Hagy, Scribe (Graywolf, 10/2)

Eugenia Kim, The Kinship of Secrets (HMH, 11/6) – The sophomore novel from the author of The Calligrapher’s Daughter.

Idra Novey, Those Who Knew (Viking, 11/6)

Chigozie Obioma, An Orchestra of Minorities (Little, Brown, 1/8)

*John Osborn, Listen To the Marriage (FSG, 10/2)

*Frances de Pontes Peebles, The Air You Breathe (Riverhead, 8/21)

Sarah Selecky, Radiant Shimmering Light (Bloomsbury, 12/4)

May-Lan Tan, Things To Make and Break (Emily Books/Coffee House, 10/2)

Debut Fiction

Fall and winter are generally designated for major literary titles, but there’s still plenty of room for new authors. We expect great things from debuts by Chaya Bhuvaneswar, Stuart Turton, Helen Cullen, and Katrina Carraso, and expect to hear similar plaudits about new works by Hank Green, Katrina Carrasco, Oliva Laing, Lydia Kiesling, and many more listed below:

*Nana Kwame Adje-Brenyah, Friday Black (Mariner, 10/23)

Oyinkan Brathwaite, My Sister, the Serial Killer (Doubleday, 11/13)

*Chaya Bhuvaneswar, White Dancing Elephants (Dzanc, 10/9)

*Carrie Callaghan, A Light of Her Own (Amberjack, 11/13)

Katrina Carrasco, The Best Bad Things (MCD/FSG, 11/6)

Helen Cullen, The Lost Letter of William Woolf (Graydon House, 9/4)

*Imogen Hermes Gowar, The Mermaid and Mrs. Hancock (Harper, 9/11)

Hank Green, An Absolutely Remarkable Thing (Dutton, 9/25)

JM Holmes, How Are You Going To Save Yourself: Stories (Little, Brown, 8/21)

Caroline Hulse, The Adults (Random House, 11/27)

*Jan Kochai Jamil, 99 Nights in Logar (Viking, 1/8)

Lydia Kiesling, The Golden State (MCD/FSG, 9/4)

Olivia Laing, Crudo (Norton, 9/11) – A debut novel from the acclaimed essayist.

John Larison, Whiskey When We’re Dry (Viking, 8/21)

*Sofia Lundberg, The Red Address Book (HMH, 1/15)

Marjorie Herrera Lewis, When All the Men Were Gone (William Morrow, 10/2)

Stephen Markley, Ohio (Simon & Schuster, 8/21)

*Wil Medearis, Restoration Heights (Hanover Square, 1/22)

*Alex Michaelides, The Silent Patient (Celadon, 1/15)

Xander Miller, Zo (Knopf, 2/5)

Wayetu Moore, She Would Be King (Graywolf, 9/11)

Heather Morris, The Tattooist of Auschwitz (Harper, 9/4)

Sarah Mueleman, Find Me Gone (Harper, 10/23)

Josie Silver, One Day in December (Crown, 10/16)

*Deb Spera, Alligator (Park Row, 9/4)

Preti Taneja, We Are That Young (Knopf, 8/21) – A modern-day King Lear set in contemporary India.

Sharlene Teo, Ponti (S&S, 9/4)

*Stuart Turton, The 7 1/2 Deaths of Evelyn Hardcastle (Sourcebooks, 9/18)

*Kathy Wang, Family Trust (William Morrow, 10/30)

Commercial Fiction

Our sampler alone is full of great commercial titles from Diane Chamberlain, Sarah Pinborough, Taylor Stevens, and Natasha Solomons. Keep an eye out in particular for new titles by William Gibson, Tana French, Liane Moriarty, and much more.

Mitch Albom, The Next Person You Meet in Heaven (Harper, 10/16)

Elizabeth Berg, Night of Miracles (Random House, 11/13)

Lou Berney, November Road (William Morrow, 10/2)

Pierce Brown, Dark Age (Del Rey, 9/4) – Book 5 in the Red Rising series.

*Diane Chamberlain, Dream Daughter (St. Martin’s Press, 10/2)

Lee Child, Past Tense (Delacorte, 11/5)

Jenny Colgan, Christmas on the Island (William Morrow, 10/16)

Michael Connelly, Dark Sacred Night (Little, Brown, 10/30)

*Jude Devereaux, A Willing Murder (Mira, 9/18) – The romance queen’s first mystery.

Allen Eskens, The Shadows We Hide (Mulholland, 11/13)

Janet Evanovich, Look Alive Twenty Five (Putnam, 11/13)

Christine Feehan, Dark Sentinel (Berkley, 9/4)

Jessica Fellowes, Bright Young Dead (Minotaur, 10/30)

Jeffrey Ford, Ahab’s Return, or The Last Voyage (William Morrow, 8/28)

Therese Ann Fowler, A Well-Behaved Woman: A Novel of the Vanderbilts (St. Martin’s, 10/16)

Tana French, The Witch Elm (Viking, 10/9)

James Frey, Katerina (Gallery/Scout Press, 9/11)

William Gibson, Agency (Berkley, 12/31)

Elly Griffiths, The Vanishing Box (HMH, 10/9)

John Grisham Untitled (Doubleday, 10/23)

Michael Harvey, Pulse (Ecco, 10/23)

Elin Hilderbrand, Welcome to Paradise (Little, Brown, 10/9)

Anne Hillerman, Cave of Bones (Harper, 12/24)

Tami Hoag, The Boy (Dutton, 12/4)

Anthony Horowitz, Forever and A Day (Harper, 11/6)

Andrew Michael Hurley, Devil’s Day (HMH, 10/2)

Joe Ide, Wrecked (Mulholland, 10/9)

Jo Jakeman, The Exes’ Revenge (Berkley, 9/11)

Beverly Jenkins, Second Time Sweeter (William Morrow, 8/28)

Jan Karon, Bathed in Prayer (Putnam, 10/30)

Stephen King, Elevation (Scribner, 10/30)

Jonathan Lethem, The Feral Detective (Ecco, 11/6) – Returning to detective fiction for the first time since Motherless Brooklyn.

Debbie Macomber, Alaskan Holiday (Ballantine, 10/2)

Kerry Maher, The Kennedy Debutante (Berkley, 10/2)

Sarah McCoy, Marilla of Green Gables (William Morrow, 10/23)

Mindy Mejia, Leave No Trace (Emily Bestler/Atria, 9/4)

Richard K. Morgan, Thin Air (Del Rey, 10/9)

Liane Moriarty, Untitled (Flatiron, 11/6) – A new novel from the author of Big Little Lies.

*Walter Mosley, John Woman (Atlantic Monthly, 9/4)

Lawrence Osborne, Only To Sleep: A Philip Marlowe Novel (Hogarth, 11/6) – A new novel featuring Raymond Chandler’s iconic detective at the age of 77.

Anne Perry, A Christmas Revelation (Ballantine, 11/6)

Jodi Picoult, A Spark of Light (Ballantine, 10/2)

David Peace, Patient X (Knopf, 8/21)

*Sarah Pinborough, Cross Her Heart (William Morrow, 9/4)

Anne Rice, Blood Communion (Knopf, 10/2) – A new Prince Lestat novel.

Tatiana de Rosnay, The Rain Watcher (St. Martin’s, 10/23)

Rebecca Serle, The Dinner List (Flatiron, 9/11)

*Natasha Solomons, House of Gold (Putnam, 10/23)

Danielle Steel, Beauchamp Hall (Delacorte, 11/20)

*Taylor Stevens, Liars’ Paradox (Kensington, 1/1)

Amy Stewart, Miss Kopp Just Won’t Quit (HMH, 9/11)

Dacre Stoker & JD Barker, Dracul (Putnam, 10/2) – An authorized prequel to Dracula by a descendant of Bram Stoker.

Victoria Thompson, City of Secrets (Berkley, 11/6)

J.R.R. Tolkien, The Fall Of Gondolin (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 8/30)

Adriana Trigiani, Tony’s Wife (Harper, 11/20)

Beatriz Williams & Lauren Willig, The Glass Ocean (William Morrow, 9/4) – A collaboration between two NYT bestselling historical fiction writers.

Lolly Winston, Me For You (Touchstone, 12/4)

Carlos Ruiz Zafon, The Labyrinth of the Spirits (Harper, 9/18)

Nonfiction

This fall, nonfiction excerpts in our collection include novelist and law professor Stephen Carter’s latest, Stephanie Land’s memoir Maid, and more. Also watch out for Michelle Obama’s memoir, essays by Glory Edim (of Well Read Black Girl fame) and Wesley Yang, plus books by Bernie Sanders, Rebecca Traister, Susan Orleans, Kiese Laymon, and more.

Politics & Current Events

Carol Anderson, One Person, No Vote: How Voter Suppression Is Destroying Our Democracy (Bloomsbury, 9/11)

Ben Bradlee, The Forgotten: How the People of One Pennsylvania County Elected Donald Trump and Changed America (Little, Brown, 10/16)

Ivo Daalder and James Lindsey, The Throne Is Empty: America’s Abdication of Global Leadership (PublicAffairs, 10/16)

Alan Greenspan and Adrian Wooldridge, Capitalism in America: A History (Penguin Press, 10/16)

Robert Kagan, The Jungle Grows Back: The Case for American Power (Knopf, 9/18)

Steve Kornacki, The Red and the Blue: The 1990s and the Birth of Political Tribalism (Ecco, 10/2)

Tim Marshall, The Age of Walls: How Barriers Between Nations Are Changing Our World (Scribner, 10/9)

David Montero, Kickback: Exposing the Global Corporate Bribery Network (Viking, 9/18)

Kevin Powell, My Mother. Barack Obama. Donald Trump. And the Last Stand of the Angry White Man.: An Autobiography of America (Atria, 9/4)

Bernie Sanders, Where We Go from Here (Thomas Dunne, 10/30)

Greg Sargent, An Uncivil War: How Rigged Elections, Shadowy Political Operatives, and Rampant Disinformation are Sabotaging American Democracy from Within (Custom House, 8/28)

Eli Saslow, Rising Out of Hatred: The Awakening of a Former White Nationalist (Doubleday, 9/18)

Ben Sasse Them: Why We Hate Each Other—and How to Heal (St. Martin’s Press, 10/16)

Anthony Scaramucci, Trump: The Blue Collar President (Center Street, 9/25)

Nikesh Shukla and Chimene Suleyman (Ed.), The Good Immigrant: 21 Writers Reflect on America (Little, Brown, 1/8)

Jason Stanley, How Fascism Works: The Politics of Us and Them (Random House, 9/11)

Craig Unger, House of Trump, House of Putin: The Untold Story of Donald Trump and the Russian Mafia (Dutton, 9/11)

Jose Antonio Vargas, Dear America: Notes of an Undocumented Citizen (Dey Street, 8/28)

Stephen M. Walt, The Hell of Good Intentions: America’s Foreign Policy Elite and the Decline of U.S. Primacy (FSG, 10/16)

Juan Williams, What the Hell Do You Have to Lose?: Trump’s War on Civil Rights (PublicAffairs, 9/25)

Social Issues

Shane Bauer, American Prison: A Reporter’s Undercover Journey into the Business of Punishment (Penguin Press, 9/18)

W. Thomas Boyce, The Orchid and the Dandelion: Why Some Children Struggle and How All Can Thrive (Knopf, 1/15)

Soraya Chemaly, Rage Becomes Her: The Power of Women’s Anger (Atria, 9/4)

Mick Cornett and Jayson White, The Next American City: The Big Promise of Our Midsize Metros (G.P. Putnam’s Sons, 9/25)

Benjamin Crump, Open Season: The Systemic Legalization of Discrimination (Amistad, 9/18)

Justin Driver, The Schoolhouse Gate: Public Education, the Supreme Court, and the Battle for the American Mind (Pantheon, 9/4)

Pope Francis, God Is Young (Random House, 10/2)

Francis Fukuyama, Identity: The Demand for Dignity and the Politics of Resentment (FSG, 9/11)

Deborah E. Lipstadt, Antisemitism: Here and Now (Shocken, 10/3)

Dan Lyons, Lab Rats: How Silicon Valley Made Work Miserable for the Rest of Us (Hachette, 10/23)

Chris McGreal, American Fix: The Opioid Tragedy in Three Acts (PublicAffairs, 11/13)

DeRay Mckesson, On the Other Side of Freedom: The Case for Hope (Viking, 9/4)

Alexandra Natapoff, Punishment Without Crime: How Our Massive Misdemeanor System Traps the Innocent and Makes America More Unequal (Basic, 12/31)

Marion Nestle, Unsavory Truth: How Food Companies Skew the Science of What We Eat (Basic, 10/3)

Jordan Shapiro, The New Childhood: How Kids Can Live, Learn, and Love in a Connected World (Little, Brown Spark, 1/1)

P. W. Singer and Emerson T. Brooking, LikeWar: The Weaponization of Social Media (Eamon Dolan/HMH, 10/2)

Kyle Swenson, Good Kids, Bad City: A Story of Race and Wrongful Conviction in America’s Rust Belt (Picador, 9/18)

Rebecca Traister, Good and Mad: How Women’s Anger is Reshaping America (Simon & Schuster, 10/2)

D. Watkins, The Message: A Word from the Black America You Forgot About (Atria, 1/8)

Heather Won Tesoriero, The Class: A Life-Changing Teacher, His World-Changing Kids, and the Most Inventive Classroom in America (Ballantine, 9/4)

Lindy West, Untitled Lindy West Book (Hachette, 2/26) – The follow up from the author of Shrill.

Ziauddin Yousafzai, What Love Teaches Me (Little, Brown, 11/6)

Science & Technology

Deborah Blum, The Poison Squad: One Chemist’s Single-Minded Crusade for Food Safety at the Turn of the Twentieth Century (Penguin Press, 9/25)

Jeremy Brown, Influenza: The Hundred Year Hunt to Cure the Deadliest Disease in History (Touchstone, 12/25)

John P. Carlin, The Code War: Inside the Fight to Secure the Digital World from America’s Enemies (PublicAffairs, 10/9)

Seth Fletcher, Einstein’s Shadow: A Black Hole, a Band of Astronomers, and the Quest to See the Unseeable (Ecco, 10/9)

Hannah Fry, Hello World: How Algorithms Will Define Our Future and Why We Should Learn to Live with It (Norton, 9/25)

Rowan Hooper, Superhuman: Life at the Extremes of Our Capacity (Simon & Schuster, 9/4)

Rose George, Nine Pints: A Journey Through the Money, Medicine, and Mysteries of Blood (Metropolitan, 10/23)

Sandeep Jauhar, Heart: A History (FSG, 9/18)

Christine Lagorio-Chafkin, We Are the Nerds: The Birth and Tumultuous Life of Reddit, the Internet’s Culture Laboratory (Hachette, 10/2)

Kai-Fu Lee, AI Superpowers: China, Silicon Valley, and the New World Order (HMH, 9/25)

Arnold van de Laar, Under the Knife: A History of Surgery in 28 Remarkable Operations (St. Martin’s, 10/2)

Hamish McKenzie, Insane Mode: How Elon Musk’s Tesla Sparked an Electric Revolution to End the Age of Oil (Dutton, 11/27)

Thomas Morris, The Mystery of the Exploding Teeth: And Other Curiosities from the History of Medicine (Dutton, 11/13)

Jeff Nesbit, This Is the Way the World Ends: How Droughts and Die-offs, Heat Waves and Hurricanes Are Converging on America (Thomas Dunne, 9/25)

Lauren E. Oakes, In Search of the Canary Tree: The Story of a Scientist, a Cypress, and a Changing World (Basic, 11/27)

Samuel I. Schwartz and Karen Kelly, No One at the Wheel: Driverless Cars and the Road of the Future (PublicAffairs, 11/13)

Neil deGrasse Tyson and Avis Lang, Accessory to War: The Unspoken Alliance Between Astrophysics and the Military (Norton, 9/11)

James Vlahos, Talk to Me: How Voice Computing Will Transform the Way We Live, Work, and Think (Eamon Dolan/HMH, 1/22)

History and Crime

Hugh Ambrose and John Schuttler, Liberated Spirits: Two Women Who Battled Over Prohibition (Berkley, 10/16)

Robert K. Brigham, Reckless: Henry Kissinger’s Responsibility for the Tragedy in Vietnam (PublicAffairs, 9/4)

Mikita Brottman, An Unexplained Death: The True Story of a Body at the Belvedere (Henry Holt, 11/6)

*Ariel Burger, Witness: Lessons from Elie Wiesel’s Classroom (HMH, 11/6)

Fox Butterfield, In My Father’s House: A New View of How Crime Runs in the Family (Knopf, 10/9)

*Stephen Carter, Invisible: The Forgotten Story of the Black Woman Lawyer Who Took Down America’s Most Powerful Mobster (Henry Holt, 10/9)

Gordon Corera, Operation Columba––The Secret Pigeon Service: The Untold Story of World War II Resistance in Europe (William Morrow, 10/16)

Andrew Delbanco, The War Before the War: Fugitive Slaves and the Struggle for America’s Soul from the Revolution to the Civil War (Penguin Press, 11/6)

Deborah Riley Draper, Blair Underwood, and Travis Thrasher, The Black Auxiliary: The Untold Story of 18 African Americans Who Defied Jim Crow and Adolf Hitler to Compete in the 1936 Berlin Olympics (Atria, 11/27)

Joanne B. Freeman, The Field of Blood: Violence in Congress and the Road to Civil War (FSG, 9/11)

Doris Kearns Goodwin, Leadership in Turbulent Times (Simon & Schuster, 9/18)

Max Hastings, Vietnam: An Epic Tragedy, 1945-1975 (Harper, 10/16)

Wil Haygood, Tigerland: The Miracle on East Broad Street (Knopf, 10/16)

Terry Golway, Frank and Al: FDR, Al Smith, and the Unlikely Alliance That Created the Modern Democratic Party (St. Martin’s, 9/11)

David S. Heidler and Jeanne T. Heidler, The Rise of Andrew Jackson: Myth, Manipulation, and the Making of Modern Politics (Basic, 10/23)

Karina Longworth, Seduction: Sex, Lies, and Stardom in Howard Hughes’s Hollywood (Custom House, 10/24)

Tilar J. Mazzeo, Eliza Hamilton: The Extraordinary Life and Times of the Wife of Alexander Hamilton (Gallery, 9/18)

Patricia Miller, Bringing Down the Colonel: A Sex Scandal of the Gilded Age, and the Powerless Woman Who Took On Washington (Sarah Chrichton, 11/13)

Tim Mohr, Burning Down the Haus: Punk Rock, Revolution, and the Fall of the Berlin Wall (Algonquin, 9/11)

Susan Orlean, The Library Book (Simon & Schuster, 10/16)

Jack Riley and Mitch Weiss, Drug Warrior: Inside the Hunt for El Chapo and the Rise of America’s Opioid Crisis (Hachette, 10/9)

Hallie Rubenhold, The Five: The Lives of Jack the Ripper’s Women (HMH, 2/19)

Amity Shlaes, Great Society: A New History of the 1960s in America (Harper, 10/17)

Brian VanDeMark, Road to Disaster: A New History of America’s Descent into Vietnam (Custom House, 10/2)

Sarah Weinman, The Real Lolita: The Kidnapping of Sally Horner and the Novel That Scandalized the World (Ecco, 9/11)

Helen Zia, Last Boat Out of Shanghai: The Epic Story of the Chinese Who Fled Mao’s Revolution (Ballantine, 1/22)

Essays, Criticism, & More

Glory Edim, Well-Read Black Girl: Finding Our Stories, Discovering Ourselves (Ballantine, 10/16)

Ralph Ellison, Ralph Ellison: A Life in Letters (Random House, 12/4)

Ben Fountain, Beautiful Country Burn Again: Democracy, Rebellion, and Revolution (Ecco, 9/25) - The first nonfiction book by the author of Billy Lynn’s Long Halftime Walk.

Jonathan Franzen, The End of the End of the Earth: Essays (FSG, 11/13)

Ross Gay, The Book of Delights: Essays (Algonquin, 2/12)

Heather Havrilesky, What If This Were Enough?: Essays (Doubleday, 10/2)

Lacy M. Johnson, The Reckonings: Essays (Scribner, 10/9)

Ellie Kemper, My Squirrel Days (Scribner, 10/9)

Anne Lamott, Almost Everything: Notes on Hope (Riverhead, 10/16)

John McPhee, The Patch (FSG, 11/13)

Camille Paglia, Provocations: Collected Essays (Pantheon, 10/9)

Sylvia Plath, The Letters of Sylvia Plath Vol 2 (Harper, 10/30)

Philip Pullman, Daemon Voices: On Stories and Storytelling (Knopf, 9/18) – The author of the His Dark Material trilogy explores the process of storytelling.

Phoebe Robinson, Everything’s Trash, But It’s Okay: Essays (Plume 10/16)

Lionel Trilling, Life in Culture: Selected Letters of Lionel Trilling (FSG, 9/25)

Ingrid Sischy, Nothing Is Lost: Selected Essays (Knopf, 11/13)

Colm Toibin, Mad, Bad, Dangerous to Know: The Fathers of Wilde, Yeats, and Joyce (Scribner, 10/23)

Wesley Yang, The Souls of Yellow Folk: Essays (Norton, 10/9)

Biography & Memoir

Jose Andres, We Fed an Island: The True Story of Rebuilding Puerto Rico, One Meal at a Time (Amistad/Ecco, 9/11)

Benjamin Balint, Kafka’s Last Trial: The Case of a Literary Legacy (Norton, 9/18)

Richard Beard, The Day That Went Missing: A Family’s Story (Little, Brown, 11/6)

Lucia Berlin, Welcome Home: A Memoir with Selected Photographs and Letters (FSG, 11/6) – Culled from the unfinished autobiography the late author was working on at the time of her death.

David W. Blight, Frederick Douglass: Prophet of Freedom (Simon & Schuster, 10/2)

Lisa Brennan-Jobs, Small Fry (Grove, 9/4) – A memoir from the daughter of Apple co-founder and visionary Steve Jobs.

Richard Brookhiser. John Marshall: The Man Who Made the Supreme Court (Basic, 11/6)

Nick Bunker, Young Benjamin Franklin: The Birth of Ingenuity (Knopf, 9/18)

Michael Caine, Blowing the Bloody Doors Off: And Other Lessons in Life (Hachette, 10/23)

Bill Cunningham, Fashion Climbing: A Memoir with Photographs (Penguin Press, 9/4)

Mark Dery, Born to Be Posthumous: The Eccentric Life and Mysterious Genius of Edward Gorey (Little, Brown, 11/13)

*Dessa, My Own Devices (Dutton, 9/18)

Liana Finck, Passing for Human: A Graphic Memoir (Random House, 9/18)

Flea, Acid for the Children: A Memoir (Grand Central, 9/25)

Casey Gerald, There Will Be No Miracles Here: A Memoir (Riverhead, 10/2)

Gary Giddins, Bing Crosby: Swinging on a Star: The War Years, 1940-1946 (Little, Brown, 11/13)

Ramachandra Guha, Gandhi: The Years That Changed the World (Knopf, 9/25)

Matthew D. Hockenos, Then They Came for Me: Martin Niemöller, the Pastor Who Defied the Nazis (Basic, 9/18)

Jane Sherron de Hart, Ruth Bader Ginsburg: A Life (Knopf, 10/16)

Sam Kashner and Nancy Schoenberger, The Fabulous Bouvier Sisters: The Tragic and Glamorous Lives of Jackie and Lee (Harper, 9/5)

Michael Katakis, Ernest Hemingway: Artifacts From a Life (Scribner, 10/23)

Karl Ove Knausgaard, Summer (Penguin Press, 8/21)

Ken Krimstein, The Three Escapes of Hannah Arendt: A Tyranny of Truth (Bloomsbury, 9/25) - A graphic biography by the New Yorker cartoonist.

Mark Lamster, The Man in the Glass House: Philip Johnson, Architect of the Modern Century (Little, Brown, 11/6)

*Stephanie Land, Maid (Hachette Books, 1/29)

Kiese Laymon, Heavy: An American Memoir (Scribner, 10/16)

Zachary Leader, The Life of Saul Bellow: Love and Strife, 1965-2005 (Knopf, 11/6)

Diarmaid MacCulloch, Thomas Cromwell: A Revolutionary Life (Viking 10/9)

Lisa McCubbin, Betty Ford: First Lady, Women’s Advocate, Survivor, Trailblazer (Gallery, 9/11)

Joe Namath, Legend: My Life in Football (Little, Brown, 10/30)

Jesse Norman, Adam Smith: Father of Economics (Basic, 9/18)

Philip Norman, Slowhand: The Life and Music of Eric Clapton (Little, Brown, 11/6)

Michelle Obama, Becoming (Crown, 11/13)

Nick Offerman and Megan Mullally, The Greatest Love Story Ever Told: An Oral History (Dutton, 10/2)

Andrew Roberts, Churchill: Walking with Destiny (Viking, 11/16)

Christopher Sandford, The Man Who Would Be Sherlock (Thomas Dunne, 12/4)

William Shatner, Live Long And . . .: What I Might Have Learned Along the Way (Thomas Dunne Books, 9/4)

Sarah Smarsh, Heartland: A Daughter of the Working Class Reconciles an American Divide (Scribner, 9/18)

Bob Spitz, Reagan: An American Journey (Penguin Press, 10/2)

Tina Turner, My Love Story: A Memoir (Atria, 10/9)

Alan Walker, Fryderyk Chopin: A Life and Times (FSG, 10/16)

R.J. Young, Let It Bang: A Young Black Man’s Reluctant Odyssey into Guns (HMH, 10/23)

Adam Zamoyski, Napoleon: A Life (Basic, 10/9)

Part One: Fiction

Hiro Arikawa, The Travelling Cat Chronicles (Berkley)

SUMMARY

An instant international bestseller, The Travelling Cat Chronicles has charmed readers around the world. With simple yet descriptive prose, this novel gives voice to Nana the cat and his owner, Satoru, as they take to the road on a journey with no other purpose than to visit three of Satoru’s longtime friends. Or so Nana is led to believe...

EXCERPT

Prologue

The Cat with No Name

I am a cat. As yet, I have no name. There’s a famous cat in our country who once made this very statement.

I have no clue how great that cat was, but at least when it comes to having a name I got there first. Whether I like my name is another matter, since it glaringly doesn’t fit my gender, me being male and all. I was given it about five years ago—around the time I came of age.

Back then, I used to sleep on the bonnet of a silver van in the parking lot of an apartment building. Why there? Because no one would ever shoo me away. Human beings are basically huge monkeys that walk upright, but they can be pretty full of themselves. They leave their cars exposed to the elements, but a few paw prints on the paintwork and they go ballistic.

At any rate, the bonnet of that silver van was my favourite place to sleep. Even in winter, the sun made it all warm and toasty, the perfect spot for a daytime nap.

I stayed there until spring arrived, which meant I’d survived one whole cycle of seasons. One day, I was lying curled up, having a snooze, when I suddenly sensed a warm, intense gaze upon me. I unglued my eyelids a touch and saw a tall, lanky young man, eyes narrowed, staring down at me as I lay prone.

‘Do you always sleep there?’ he asked.

I suppose so. Do you have a problem with that?

‘You’re really cute, do you know that?’

So they tell me.

‘Is it okay if I stroke you?’

No, thanks. I batted one front paw at him in what I hoped to be a gently threatening way.

‘Aren’t you a stingy one?’ the man said, pulling a face.

Well, how would you like it if you were sleeping and somebody came by and rubbed you all over?

‘I guess you want something in exchange for being stroked?’

Quick on the draw, this one. Quite right. Got to get something in return for having my sleep disturbed. I heard a rustling and popped my head up. The man’s hand had disappeared into a plastic bag.

‘I don’t seem to have bought anything cat-suitable.’

No sweat, mate. Feline beggars can’t be choosers. That scallop jerky looks tasty.

I sniffed at the package sticking out of the plastic bag and the man, smiling wryly, tapped me on the head with his fingers.

Hey there, let’s not jump the gun.

‘That’s not good for you, cat,’ he said. ‘Plus it’s too spicy.’

Too spicy, says you? Do you think a hungry stray like me gives a ratsmonkey about his health? Getting something into my stomach right this minute—that’s my top priority.

At last, the man liberated a slice of fried chicken from a sandwich, stripping off the batter, laying the flesh on his palm and holding it out to me.

You want me to eat right out of your hand? You think you’ll get all friendly with me by doing that? I’m not that easy. Then again, it’s not often I get to indulge in fresh meat—and it looks kind of succulent—so perhaps a little compromise is in order.

As I chomped down on the chicken, I felt a couple of human fingers slide from under my chin to behind my ears. He scratched me softly. I mean, I’ll permit a human who feeds me to touch me for a second, but this guy was pretty clever about it. If he were to give me a couple more tidbits, scratching under my chin would be up for grabs, too. I rubbed my cheek against his hand.

The man smiled, pulled the meat from the second half of the sandwich, stripped off the batter, and held it out. I wanted to tell him I wouldn’t be impartial to the batter, either. It would fill me up even more.

I let him stroke me properly to repay him for the food, but now it was time to close up shop.

Just as I began to raise a front paw and send him on his way, the man said, ‘Okay, see you later.’

He retrieved his hand and walked off, heading up the stairs of the apartment building.

That’s how we first met. It wasn’t until a little later that he finally gave me my name.

From that moment on, I found crunchy cat food underneath the silver van every night. One human fistful—a full meal for a cat—just behind the rear tyre.

If I was around when the man turned up to leave food, he’d wrest some touch-time from me, but when I wasn’t there he’d humbly leave an offering and disappear.

Sometimes, another cat would beat me to it, or the man would be away and I’d wait in vain till morning for my crunchies. But, by and large, I could count on him for one square meal a day. Humans are quite flighty, so I don’t rely on them a hundred per cent. A stray cat’s skill lies in building up a complex web of connections in order to survive on the streets.

Acquaintances who understood each other, that’s what the man and I had become. But when he and I had settled into a comfortable relationship, fate intervened to change everything.

And fate hurt like hell.

I was crossing the road one night when I became suddenly dazzled by a car’s headlights. I was about to dart away when a piercing horn sounded. And that’s when it all went wrong. Startled, I was a split second late in leaping aside, and bang! the car rammed into me and sent me flying.

I wound up in the bushes by the side of the road. The pain that shot through my body was like nothing I’d experienced before. But I was alive.

I cursed as I tried to stand up, and even let out a scream. Oww! Oww! My right hind leg hurt like you wouldn’t believe.

I sank to the ground and twisted my upper half to lick the wound, only to find—good Lord! A bone was sticking out!

Bite wounds and cuts I can mostly look after with my tongue, but this was beyond me. Through the wrenching pain, this bone protruding from my leg was making its presence known in no uncertain terms.

What should I do? What can I do?

Somebody, help me! But that was idiotic. Nobody was going to help a stray.

Then I remembered the man who came every night to leave me crunchies.

Maybe he could help. Why this thought came to me, I don’t know—we’d always kept our distance, with occasional stroking time in thanks for his offerings. But it was worth a try.

I set off along the pavement, dragging my right hind leg with the bone jabbing out. Several times my body gave out, as if to say, I can’t take it, it’s just too painful. Not one. More. Step.

By the time I reached the silver van, dawn was breaking.

I really couldn’t take another step. This is it, I thought.

I cried out at the top of my lungs.

Oww…owwwww!

Again and again I screamed, until my voice finally gave out. It killed me even to call out, to be honest with you.

Just then, I heard someone come down the stairs of the apartment building. When I looked up. I saw it was the man.

‘I thought it was you.’

When he saw me close up, he turned pale.

‘What happened? Were you hit by a car?’

Hate to admit it, but I messed up.

‘Does it hurt? It looks like it.’

Enough of the irritating questions. Have a little pity for a wounded cat, okay?

‘It sounded like you were desperate, the way you were screaming, and it woke me up. You were calling for me, weren’t you, cat?’

Yes, yes, I certainly was! But you took your time getting here.

‘You thought I might be able to help you, didn’t you?’

I guess so, Sherlock. Then the man started sniffing and snuffling. Why was he crying?

‘I’m proud of you, remembering me like that.’

Cats don’t cry like humans do. But—somehow—I sort of understood why he was weeping.

So you’ll do something to help, won’t you? I can’t stand the pain much longer.

‘There, there. You’ll be okay, cat.’

The man laid me gently in a cardboard box lined with a fluffy towel and placed me in the front seat of the silver van.

We headed for the vet’s clinic. That’s like the worst place ever for me, so I’d rather not talk about it.

I ended up staying with the man until my wounds healed. He lived alone in his apartment and everything was neat and tidy. He set out a litter tray for me in the changing room beside the bath, and bowls of food and water in the kitchen.

Despite appearances, I’m a pretty intelligent, well-mannered cat, and I worked out how to use the toilet right away and never once soiled the floor. Tell me not to sharpen my claws on certain places, and I refrain. The walls and doorframes were forbidden so I used the furniture and rug for claw-sharpening. I mean, he never specifically mentioned that the furniture and the rug were off limits. (Admittedly, he did look a little put out at first, but I’m the kind of cat who can pick up on things, sniff out what’s absolutely forbidden, and what isn’t. The furniture and the rug weren’t absolutely off limits, is what I’m saying.)

I think it took about two months to get the stitches out and for the bone to heal. During that time, I found out the man’s name. Satoru Miyawaki.

Satoru kept calling me things like ‘You’, or ‘Cat’ or ‘Mr Cat’ ? whatever he felt like at the time. Which is understandable, since I didn’t have a name at this point.

And even if I had had a name, Satoru didn’t understand my language, so I wouldn’t have been able to tell him. It’s kind of inconvenient that humans only understand each other. Did you know that animals are much more multilingual?

Whenever I wanted to go outside, Satoru would frown and try to convince me that I shouldn’t.

‘If you go out, you might never come back. Just be patient, little cat. Wait until you’re completely better. You don’t want to have stitches in your leg for the rest of your life, do you?’

By this time, I was able to walk a little, though it still hurt, but seeing how put out Satoru looked, I endured house confinement for those two months, and I figured there were other benefits. It wouldn’t do to be dragging my leg if a rival cat and I got into a scrap.

So I stayed put until my wound was at long last totally healed.

Satoru always used to stop me at the front door with a worried look, but now I stood there, meowing to be let out. Thank you for all you’ve done. I will be forever grateful. I wish you lifelong happiness, even if you never leave me another tidbit beneath that silver van.

Satoru didn’t look worried so much as forlorn. The same way he seemed about the furniture and the rug. It’s not totally off limits, but still … That sort of expression.

‘Do you still prefer to live outside?’

Hang on now—enough with the teary face. You look like that, you’ll start making me feel sad that I’m leaving.

And then, out of the blue, ‘Listen, cat, I was wondering if you would become my cat.’

I had never considered this as an option. Being a dyed-in-the-wool stray, the thought of being someone’s pet had never crossed my mind.

My idea was to let him look after me until I recovered, but I’d always planned to leave once my wound was healed. Let me rephrase that. I thought I had to leave.

As long as I was leaving, it would be a lot more dignified to slip out on my own rather than have someone shoo me away. Cats are proud creatures, after all.

If you wanted me to be your pet cat, then, well, you should have said so earlier.

I slipped out of the door that Satoru had reluctantly opened. Then I turned around and gave him a meow.

Come on.

For a human, Satoru had a good intuitive sense of cat language and seemed to understand what I was saying. He looked puzzled for a moment, then followed me outside.

It was a bright, moonlit night, and the town lay still and quiet.

I leapt on to the bonnet of the silver van, thrilled to have regained the ability to jump, and then back on to the ground, where I rolled and scratched for a bit.

A car drove by and my tail shot up, the fear of being hit again ingrained in me now. Before I knew it, I was hiding behind Satoru’s trousered legs, and he was gazing down at me, smiling.

I made one round of the neighbourhood with Satoru before returning to the apartment building. Outside the door of the stairway to the apartment on the second floor, I meowed. Open up.

I looked up at Satoru and saw he was smiling, but again in that tearful way.

‘So you do want to come back, eh, Mr Cat?’

Right. Yeah. So open up.

‘So you’ll be my cat?’

Okay. But sometimes let’s go out for a walk.

And so I became Satoru’s cat.

‘When I was a child, I had a cat that looked just like you.’

Satoru brought a photo album out of the cupboard.

‘See?’

The album was full of photos of a cat. I know what they call people like this. Cat fanatics.

The cat in the photos did indeed resemble me. Both of us had an almost all-white body, the only spots of colour being on our face and tail. Two on our face; our tail black and bent. The only difference was in the angle of our bent tails. The tabby spots on our faces, though, were exactly alike.

‘The two spots on its forehead were angled downwards, like the Chinese character hachi—eight—so I named him Hachi.’

If that’s how he comes up with names, what on earth is he going to choose for me?

After hachi comes kyu–nine. What if he picked that?

‘How about Nana?’

What? He’s subtracting? I didn’t see that coming.

‘It hooks in the opposite direction from Hachi, and from the top it looks like nana—the number seven.’

He seemed to be talking about my tail now.

Now wait just a second. Isn’t Nana a girl’s name? I’m a full-fledged, hot-blooded male. In what universe does that make sense?

‘You’re okay with that, aren’t you, Nana? It’s a lucky name ? Lucky Seven and all that.’

I meowed, and Satoru squinted and tickled me under my chin.

‘Do you like the name?’

Nope! But, well. Asking that while stroking my chin is playing foul. I purred in spite of myself.

‘So you like it. Great.’

I told you already—I do not.

In the end, I missed my chance to undo the mistake (I mean, what’s a cat going to do? The guy was cuddling me the whole time), and that’s how I ended up being Nana.

‘We’ll have to move, won’t we?’

His landlord didn’t allow pets in the apartment, but he’d made an exception for me, just until I got back on my feet.

So Satoru moved with me to a new place in the same town. Going to all that trouble to move just for the sake of one cat—well, maybe I shouldn’t say this, being a cat myself, but that was one fired-up cat lover.

And so began our new life together. Satoru was the perfect roommate for a cat, and I was the perfect roommate for a human.

We’ve got along really well, these past five years.

***

As a cat, I was now in the prime of life, and as Satoru was a little over thirty, I guess he was, too.

One day, Satoru patted my head apologetically.

‘Nana, I’m sorry.’

It’s okay, it’s okay. No worries.

‘I’m really sorry it’s come to this.’

No need to explain. I’m quick on the uptake.

‘I never intended to let you go.’

Life, be it human or feline, doesn’t always work out the way you think it will.

If I had to give up living with Satoru, I’d just go back to the way I was five years ago. Back when the bone was sticking out of my leg. If we’d said goodbye and I’d gone back to life on the streets, it would not have been a big deal. I could go back to being a stray tomorrow, no problem.

I didn’t lose anything. Just gained the name Nana, and the five years I’d spent with Satoru.

So don’t look so glum, chum.

Cats just quietly take whatever comes their way.

The only exception so far was the night I broke my leg and thought of Satoru.

‘Well, shall we go?’

It seemed Satoru wanted me to go with him somewhere. He opened the door of my cage and I got in without making a fuss. For the five years I’d lived with him, I’d always been a sensible cat. For instance, even when he took me to my bête noire, the vet, I didn’t stir up a racket.

Okay then—let’s go. As Satoru’s roommate, I had been a perfect cat, so I should be the perfect companion on this journey he seemed so intent on making.

My cage in hand, Satoru got into the silver van.

You’ve just read an excerpt from The Travelling Cat Chronicles.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Hiro Arikawa is a renowned author from Tokyo. Her novel The Travelling Cat Chronicles is a bestseller in Japan and is due to be published around the world.

Philip Gabriel is a highly experienced translator from Japanese, and best known for his translation work with Haruki Murakami.

IMPRINT: Berkley

PRINT ISBN: 9780451491336

PRINT PRICE: $20.00

EBOOK ISBN: 9780451491343

EBOOK PRICE: $10.99

PUBLICATION DATE: 10/23/18

Sarah Bird, Daughter of a Daughter of a Queen (St. Martin’s Press)

SUMMARY

The compelling, hidden story of Cathy Williams, a former slave and the only woman to ever serve with the legendary Buffalo Soldiers.

Here’s the first thing you need to know about Miss Cathy Williams: I am the daughter of a daughter of a queen and my Mama never let me forget it.

Missouri, 1864

Powerful, epic, and compelling, Daughter of a Daughter of a Queen shines light on a nearly forgotten figure in history. Cathy Williams was born and lived a slave—until the Union army comes and destroys the only world she’s known. Separated from her family, she makes the impossible decision—to fight in the army disguised as a man with the Buffalo Soldiers. With courage and wit, Cathy must not only fight for her survival and freedom in the ultimate man’s world, but never give up on her mission to find her family, and the man she loves. Beautiful, strong, and impactful, Cathy’s story is one that illustrates the force of hidden history come to light, the strength of women, and the power of love.

Christina Baker Kline says Daughter of a Daughter of a Queen is an epic page-turner and unforgettable.

EXCERPT

Chapter One

Here’s the first thing you need to know about Miss Cathy Williams: I am the daughter of a daughter of a queen and my Mama never let me forget it. That’s right. Royal blood runs purple through my veins. And I am talking real Africa blood. Not that tea water queens over in England have to make do with. My royal blood comes from my grandmother, my Iyaiya, as we called her in our Africa lingo. And don’t picture one of them sweet old grannies like you got nowadays with linty lemon drops tucked into her apron pocket for the grandkids. She was one of the Leopard King’s six thousand warrior wives. She had possum teeth, filed to points so, if need be, she could rip an enemy’s throat out.

Though I’m told I was born somewhere in the vicinity of 1844, my life, my real life, the one I was meant to have did not start until that August night in 1864, three years into the war, back in Missouri, when I watched the only world I’d ever known burn to the ground.

Silhouetted against this fiery blaze was a Yankee general astride a great black Morgan horse thundering down orders to his blue-jacketed soldiers. They were running every which way, torches held aloft, kerchiefs tied over their noses against the smoke that had tears streaming white down their soot-blackened faces. They were burning Old Mister’s tobacco crop and the smell could of collapsed a bull ox. It was worse than ten thousand men smoking cigars.

My little sister Clemmie’s eyes were wide orange pools of reflected flame. She trembled in terror against me for Old Mister had promised us that the Yankees were demons. They’ll slice you open, he had warned whenever the occasion presented itself. And many times when it didn’t. And let their dogs drag your guts out so you kin die watching your entrails being devoured.

Demon or not, I could not take my eyes off the general. When I separated him from his mount, I found I was looking at a squatty little fellow with black hair so short it looked painted on, a long body, strong, broad chest, short legs, not enough neck to hang him with, and arms so long that if his ankles itched he could scratch them without stooping.

He had a head like a bulldog, big and round, with a hard set to the jaws that signaled that once he sunk his teeth into a thing, either him or that thing’d be dead before he turned it loose. It was a head molded by the Creator to do one thing on this Earth. And that one thing was fight.

There wasn’t but one Yankee fit such a description, the dreaded General Philip Little Phil Henry Sheridan. Even the Feds called him Smash ’em Up as that’s what the young general was given to yelling as he rode, laughing, and cursing up a blue streak, into battle.

Old Mister and his Secesh friends despised Sheridan more than any other Federal. They called Sheridan’s habit of burning everything in his path despicable and unspeakable savagery and against every rule of civilized behavior. Unlike, say, shackling up humans and working, flogging, or starving them to death. All in all, I was inclined to like the man.

Burn it all, lads! Sheridan bellowed, loud as Lucifer over the sound of the flames crackling and roaring. Burn the ’Rebels’ food and burn what they’d sell to buy food! Burn every grain of rebel wheat and every kernel of rebel corn! Burn it to the ground! I want the crows flying overhead to have to carry their own rations!

Before that moment, I had never heard this exact brand of Yankee being spoke, and though it hit my ear like a handful of pebbles hurled against a window, I had to admit that the General could preach him some damnation.

Out beyond the dirt yard the soldiers had gathered us on, poking bayonets into those who lagged, flames flowed over the fields like a river of blazing orange spreading into an everlasting lake of fire. It roared so loud it took me a minute to make out the shrill cries of a screaming woman. It was Old Miss.

You are the devil, Phil Sheridan! Old Miss wailed, gathering her three wormy offspring in close. The very devil himself for only a demon of the lowest order would burn out a poor woman with a husband lying fresh dead in her parlor and leave her and these poor innocent children with nothing to eat!

Don’t ye be calling me a devil, woman, Sheridan said, his queer accent turning devil into divvel.

The Union Army has burned your crops, Madame, we have not slaughtered your sons. And we shall not be laying a hand upon your daughter.

He pointed a righteous finger toward the pasty-faced Little Miss, trembling in her pinafore worn now to a gray rag beside the two Young Sirs, bowlegged with rickets.

You traitorous Secessionists brought this miserable war on yourself. Insisted upon it. Sought to sunder our country in two with it. War is brutal, my good woman. I do not make it any more so than I must.

The three gray curls that hung down either side of Old Miss’ long face hopped around like fleas from her trembling as she’d had none of her nerve tonic for the three long years the Rebellion had been grinding on. We’ll starve! Old Miss cried, so pitiful you’d of never guessed at the blackness of her heart.

Never of imagined her looking bored and peevish when my grandmother was led away, naked but for a rag twixt her legs, in a coffle of other wore-out slaves, all chained together like fish on a trot line. Old Mister had sold her for ten dollar to a turpentine camp down in Alabama, where they’d squeeze the last bit of work and life out of the captured queen in a dank pine forest. Bored and peevish was also how Old Miss had looked when my Mama’s other babies were sold away from her. It was how she looked when Old Mister took Clemmie, my Mama’s last baby, up to the house to use as a man uses a wife.

You have left us nothing, Old Miss shrieked. Nothing!

Looking at Old Miss then, with all three of her children alive and clinging to her, their fine house standing untouched, I thought, Nothing? Why, that stupid woman hasn’t touched even the least little hem of ‘nothing.’ But she was starting to, and for that I was glad.

How will we feed ourselves? Old Miss pleaded.

Sheridan roared down at her, Rebel, don’t be adding lying to the crime of high treason against the United States of America. Feed yourselves with the silver you’ve buried.

That shut her up right quick. We all knew she’d had Old Mister bury her precious silver even before the war started.

Or would you prefer that I hogtie your youngest son? Sheridan asked And hold him over a fire until the fat and the truth renders out of him?

We had all heard about how bushwhackers had done just that over to Glen Eden plantation where they had strung Mister Pennebaker up over a low fire until they cooked the truth out of him, and he directed them to the fork above Perkins Creek where he’d buried his valuables in a barrel.

Might that not encourage you to reveal where you’ve hidden the spoils which, by all rights, belong now to the Union Army?

Old Miss’s jaw worked as she bit at the inside of her mouth. Her eyes twitched about in the rabbity way she had, but she didn’t answer.

Speak no more of the hardships you’ve endured, Sheridan thundered. Not with half a million souls, yours and ours, lying in their graves because, for the most selfish of reasons, you willful, prideful, ignorant, arrogant, traitorous rebels would destroy the finest country our almighty Lord ever set upon His benighted earth.

I could see from the jump that Phil Sheridan was a serious man.

With Old Miss shut up good and proper then, Sheridan demanded of one of his officers, Captain, have all the Contrabands been accounted for?

For the first time, the soldiers shone the torchlight upon our faces.

Mama, who was standing to my right, and Clemmie, to my left, huddled up closer against me. Fear was making my sweet little sister vibrate like a hive humming with bees. Old Mister’s nasty doings had taken all the starch out of her. And that is why I’d had to slip a brown recluse spider into his pocket to bite the hand that had interfered with my baby sister. The hand turned black and Old Mister had it cut off, but he died anyway. Day before last.

I wanted to tell Clemmie not to be afraid. That no one’s guts’d be getting dragged out by dogs. My little sister had never been able to fully understand that white folks generally preferred the more economically satisfactory practice of working us to death over outright killing.

Me? I was more excited than scared for, no matter how bad the Federals were, I saw no way they could be worse than what we had here.

Madame, Sheridan boomed down at Old Miss, are these all your Negroes?

All that your cowardly marauders and scavengers have left us, Old Miss sniffed, as though it wasn’t the Rebs and general riff-raff bushwhackers who’d carried off most of us.

A white soldier with silver bars on his shoulder straps stepped up and asked, Sir, should I confiscate the Contrabands?

The General had what you might call a salty vocabulary and he roared, Captain, need I remind you that we are on a ______ foraging mission? And it’s been a damn ______ miserable one so far? We’ve barely liberated provisions enough to keep our own ______ bellies full and you’re proposing we add a pack of ______ Negroes to the quartermaster’s load? No, Captain, I’ll send a detachment later to take them to a Freedman’s Camp. I’ve no intention of feeding every _______ pickaninny between here and Washington, D.C.

Begging the general’s pardon, sir, the captain went on. But your staff’s head cook did requisition a helper, sir.

Solomon? Solomon needs a helper?

Yessir. Cook’s helper, general. For the officers’ mess, sir.

What happened to? You know. He circled his hand, urging the name to come forth. Fat wench. Front teeth knocked out. You know.

Betsy? Betsy died of the bloody flux.

The General shook his head and sighed with annoyed regret. It’s what I have said from the start, The Almighty did not fashion woman for the life of a warrior. All right, requisition a cook’s helper. But I will have no more _____ females serving my staff, do you hear me?

Yessir, sir. No females, sir.

Don’t want to _____ see them. Won’t _____have them dying around me. The rigors of battle require a man’s strong constitution. What is needed is a darkie buck. Stout, husky one with the constitution of a ______ mule.

From atop his fine steed, Sheridan appraised us, his finger twitching back and forth as he passed over one slumped specimen quivering before him then the next. He passed over: Auntie Cherry, who was too blind and crippled up to do anything except stick a finger in the little ones’ mouths when they cried from hunger. Hettie, who, though still strong and able, had believed she was back in Georgie eating crowder peas ever since Old Mister laid into her with the singletree. Amos, whose fingers were knotted up like a corkscrew willow to where he couldn’t hold a chopping knife right. Even Maynard, a near-grown man-boy, who believed he should have been made overseer instead of Mama.

Then the General’s eye fastened on Mama and me for, as had become our habit since Old Mister’s arm turned black from the spider bite and Mama was made overseer, we were both wearing britches and, in no wise, gave off the look of females. I felt Mama stiffen at us being included in all this mule talk and her fury jumped into me like a spark off a fuse.

Being treated like beasts at auction didn’t bother the rest of them. They were all slouched over and beatdown-looking, trying not to attract attention. They didn’t know whether these white Yankee men wanted to free us slaves so they could roast us on spits the way our masters told us they planned on doing or if liberation really was at hand. It hardly mattered, though, for we all knew that, one way or the