At the center of everyone’s life is a mysterious garden where only red plants can grow, and where the truth can be found by those who dare to look. Beautifully crafted and shimmering with magic, The Red Garden is as unforgettable as it is moving. -Bookshop.org

Set first in Florida, then New York this moving story of a young man’s search for belonging and redemption has not a false note in it. Auster has a way of drawing you in seemingly without effort from page one. -David

Euphoria is Lily King’s novel of three young, gifted anthropologists of the 30’s caught in a passionate love triangle that threatens their bonds, their careers, and, ultimately, their lives. Inspired by events in the life of revolutionary anthropologist Margaret Mead. -Bookshop.org

The Art of Hearing Heartbeats is a best-seller in Germany, now beautifully translated into English for the first time. This is a mystical tale of an unlikely love affair that transcends time and distance. Set in Burma (now Myanmar) a daughter goes in search of her missing father and discovers a hidden life of love, loyalty, and sorrow. I was mesmerized by the ways in which suffering led to new levels of adaptation and intimacy. -Heidi

The Sandcastle Girls is an instructive, heartbreaking, beautifully written novel that opens our eyes to a part of the world we see mentioned often in the headlines but understand so little about. Chris Bohjalian does for Syria what Khaled Hosseini did for Afghanistan in The Kite Runner, he tells a very personal story against the complicated historical backdrop where war touches everything. -Heidi

Over the years people often asked our founder, Marilou Kelly, “what is your favorite book?” When she had to narrow her choice to only one book, that book was Housekeeping by Marilynne Robinson.  Published in 1980 and still in print, the story is about the free spirit of a young girl and her unusual aunt. We also celebrate Marilynne’s other novels:  Gilead, Home, Lila, and Jack. -David

Thanks to Heidi for introducing me to The Time of our Singing, a sweeping epic and deeply personal new novel by Richard Powers. David Strom, a German Jewish emigrant meets soprano Delia Daley, a “young Philadelphia Negro” at the infamous Marian Anderson concert on Washington Mall in 1939. Their mutual love of music and a connection much deeper brings them to marry and have three children, two of them musical prodigies, Jonah and Joseph. Theirs is a family story steeped in music, discovery and love, on the brink of the tumultuous early civil rights movement in America. Music is the star of the book. Whether Powers is giving an artful, detailed play by play description of two pianists improvising or describing Jonah’s sterling tenor voice, he manages to enthrall, delight, and impress me with his musical insights. A great story with a musical backdrop—what more can this music major turned bookseller ask for? -David

A book like Oystercatchers is the reason why I read, and I can’t wait to put it in the hands of every other thoughtful reader I know. Susan Fletcher, who wrote and won a Whitbread award for her first novel Eve Green, has written a mesmerizing second novel. There is so much beauty and grace in her prose that it strikes the reader as poetic, though the tension of its plot and depth of its characters remain strong and engaging throughout. Set in southwest Wales and along the east coast of England, an older sister sits at the bedside of her sixteen-year-old sister who lies in a coma as a result of a terrible accident. She spends the hours recounting her story and ultimately their shared story as it culminates in their fateful situation. Fletcher allows the reader into the deep interior life of Moira, a protaganist so flawed and real and yet so beautiful and alive to everything. Her dark anger, jealousy and lonliness, but also her love, intelligence, and sympathy. All judgements fall away in appreciation of being allowed to experience her so intimately. One of the finest books I have read in recent memory. -Heidi

This is an engaging first novel, strong in plot with characters I looked forward to rejoining each sitting. Spanning two continents over three fateful months of June, the story tells of a complex and intriguing, yet not melo-dramatic Scottish family, the McLeods. Paul, in part one comes to terms with widowhood while adventuring in Greece. Parts two and three feature eldest son Fenno, in Manhattan, and his younger twin brothers both back in Scotland. Like Jonathan Franzen’s The Corrections, the author skillfully uses the model of family with all its love, betrayal, joy and sadness to inspire each character’s personal growth and discovery. -David

The Kitchen Boy, a novel of the last Tsar, tells the story of the last days of Nicholas and his family, told through the eyes of a young kitchen boy. The family, after having been mysteriously spared by the Bolsheviks during the bloody Russian revolution, is held prisoner in a house in Siberia. There they await their fate with hope of rescue and fear of banishment or death. Alexander, a beautiful writer and scholar of Russian history, imaginatively dramatizes this fascinating family’s (unbeknownst to them) wait of execution while filling the story with rich historical detail. The result is a deftly told mystery, rich with sympathetic characters and exciting drama. Add missing jewels, secret letters being passed back and forth, mistaken identity and other unexpected twists, and you have a great historical mystery. I also recommend Alexander’s Rasputin’s Daughter which similarly explores the last days of Rasputin. -David

The Apple Lover’s Cookbook is, as the title would suggest, a veritable love song to the apple. The 100 recipes cover everything from soup and salad to ice cream, and with a guide to 59 apple varieties including helpful descriptions of flavor and recommendations for uses in cooking and baking, you’ll be sure to use the right one every time. The cookbook’s sweet recipes, like the Apple Bread Pudding with Salted Caramel Sauce and Blue Ribbon Deep Dish Apple Pie, and savory options such as Apple Squash Gratin and Duck Panzanella with Apples and Thyme, are delectable choices for every day, or for upcoming holiday meals. Additionally, throughout the book Amy delves into the histories of different apple varieties, while meeting farmers and apple lovers as she tours orchards and cider farms in Washington, New Mexico and around New England. By itself, or paired with a pretty pie plate, The Apple Lover’s Cookbook makes a great gift for bakers and apple enthusiasts, or treat yourself and invite family and friends to share a mulled apple cider and a scrumptious crisp or cobbler. -Sarah

The Thirteenth Tale is an impossible-to-put-down novel! It is a combination of mystery, fantasy and discovery of self. Vida Winter is an aging author with a mysterious past, made more so by the “missing 13th tale,” her last novel that was written but then suppressed. Margaret Lea is a rare book dealer chosen by Vida to tell her life story before she passes away. This book grabs you in such a way that it is hard not to sneak a premature peak at the ending, which the Miss Winter’s biographer admonishes the reader not to do. With a great twisting conclusion this is a one sure to keep you from your household chores and sleep. -Anne

The Maisie Dobbs series by Jacqueline Winspear is a perfect combination of psychology combined with investigation. A young London girl comes of age during the Great War, ten years later, in the spring of 1929, opens her own detective agency and faces the effects of the war as she solves mysteries. All in the series are perfectly done! Try: Birds of A Feather, Pardonable Lies, Messenger of Truth. -Anne

Our customers love to travel… both on the road and from the armchair. The Art of Travel by Alain de Botton is a beautifully packaged little book from the author of How Proust Can Change Your Life, de Botton explores what we seek through travel and guides us along into happier travels. -David

The poems gathered in this bilingual (Chinese/English) edition of Clouds Float North will be read again and again for their beauty. The works preserve Yu Xuanji’s passion, her sharp eye for detail, her often witty variations on familiar Chinese themes, all of which give the poems an immediacy one rarely finds in ancient, translated texts. -Bookshop.org