Obi Kaufmann has spent a lot of time thinking about California’s fires.

“There’s no way I can pull this punch: To live in California, you are going to live with fire,” says Kaufmann during an hour-long phone conversation. “Now, being forewarned is being forearmed.”

Kaufmann is best known for his California Field Atlas books, a ...Read more

For almost 30 years as host of “The Tonight Show,” Johnny Carson was the last face millions of viewers saw before they closed their eyes and went to sleep. Carson, the critic David Thomson once noted, was “an American ideal and a mystery man, agreeable and withdrawn … always there, never graspable.”

“Carson the Magnificent” was ...Read more

Maylis de Kerangal’s new story collection, “Canoes,” is a moving, surprising exploration of grief and friendship across seven short stories and one novella, set in France, Canada and the United States.

Beautifully translated from the French by Jessica Moore, the stories plunge the reader into the sensory experiences of varied protagonists...Read more

LAS VEGAS — It’s the old chew toys that really get you.

Lying on its side, encircled in stone, there’s Peaches’ green rubber porcupine, collecting desert dust for decades.

Beneath a cast-iron cactus, oxidized by the elements, sits a phalanx of Friskey’s stuffed cats.

A few steps away, a dog’s teddy bear — head gnawed off, wisps ...Read more

Minneapolis author Louise Erdrich found novel inspiration while writing her latest novel, “The Mighty Red,” in the form of an injured crow, rescued by her daughter Pallas.

“Today” host Jenna Bush Hager chose Erdrich’s new New York Times best seller as her October book-club selection. And in a recent “Today” interview, Erdrich ...Read more

CHICAGO — If there are ghosts, the ghost of writer Bill Zehme might be found within the Chicago tavern/restaurant Twin Anchors, where he spent many living days and nights and where his face still stares from photos on the walls and where one recent night his friend Mike Thomas was saying, “I miss Bill.”

When Zehme died on March 26, 2023, ...Read more

In Michael Connelly's new crime thriller, "The Waiting," Los Angeles police detective Renée Ballard's cold-case team takes on the decades-old case of the Pillowcase Rapist after a random DNA hit delivers a fresh clue.

When her badge and gun are stolen from her car while surfing at Staircase Beach in Malibu early one morning she turns for help ...Read more

CHICAGO — Word traveled fast that the owner of a nearly century-old bookstore had died.

Social media posts were made. A news article written. Emails sent.

When Rebecca George, the co-owner of a bookstore in Chicago's Wicker Park neighborhood, was told the owner of The Gallery Bookstore in Lakeview had died and left behind a store full of ...Read more

If you’re a reader, you might want to keep your fingers crossed for a rainy November.

That way, you’ll have plenty of time to stay indoors with the new books coming this month.

Lazarus Man, Richard Price

For the past decade or so, Price has been Mr. Prestige TV, writing for acclaimed crime shows “The Wire” and “The Night Of,” as ...Read more

Here are the bestsellers for the week that ended Saturday, Oct. 26, compiled from data from independent and chain bookstores, book wholesalers and independent distributors nationwide, powered by Circana BookScan © 2024 Circana.

(Reprinted from Publishers Weekly, published by PWxyz LLC. © 2024, PWxyz LLC.)

HARDCOVER FICTION

1. "In Too Deep: ...Read more

SACRAMENTO, Calif. — There’s a handwritten recipe framed on the wall of Tom Williams and Barbara Holmes’ home. They’ve never made it, but don’t think much of the creator’s cooking — or anything else about her, really.

Williams and Holmes live in the former home of Dorothea Puente, Sacramento’s notorious serial killer who lodged ...Read more

Its pages well-thumbed and portions underlined in ink, the book “Lost Chicago” sits on bookshelves across Chicago and continues to amaze and inspire.

It is a poetic photographic essay about our bygone public buildings and private residences. It is harshly critical of the city’s once cavalier attitude toward architecture, filled with 200-...Read more

These autumn months are a good time for the reader who comes in from the cold. There’s a new book about spies hitting shelves just about every week, including a sequel to “The Spy Who Came in From the Cold” called “Karla’s Choice.”

There’s something for just about every taste but, with so many spooks to choose from, it can be ...Read more

Anna Montague’s debut novel is a thoughtful and affecting story about wayward love, regret and missed opportunity. Judging by the bright jacket and snappy title, a reader would be forgiven for thinking that “How Does That Make You Feel, Magda Eklund?” might be similar to other novels that it looks like — “Where’d You Go, Bernadette?�...Read more

Listen up: A native of Zambia, Mubanga Kalimamukwento is a lawyer who recently took the bar exam so she can practice in Minnesota (she’s awaiting her scores). She’s a Fulbright scholar. She has a master’s of fine arts degree in creative writing and just began a doctoral program in feminist studies. She’s married, with two kids. Oh, and ...Read more

There was nothing quite so joyful during the darkest days of the pandemic as going to my mailbox and finding the latest installment of “Life at the Dumpling,” my friend Trisha Cole’s hand-drawn and written newsletter waiting for me.

“The Dumpling” refers to the little Los Angeles home she shares with her husband Bruce Walrath and ...Read more

This story hasn’t even started and already it’s wrong.

John Lee Clark, whose “Touch the Future,” is out in paperback, would prefer not to be identified by the photograph at the top of the story. The St. Paul, Minnesota, native, who is DeafBlind (the terminology and spelling he prefers), won a National Magazine Award for an essay called ...Read more

These hot new mysteries range from touching to terrifying:

I’m Starting to Worry About This Black Box of Doom, Jason Pargin.

The mysterious black box in Pargin’s novel is the size of “a footlocker.” Inside, it may contain something that triggers an American apocalypse, or, you know, it may just be a big old “nothingburger.” Either ...Read more

COLLINGSWOOD, N.J. -- On a Wednesday afternoon, Erika Nguyen walked through the heavy wooden doors of Collingswood’s newest bookstore. She wandered over to the dark romance section and picked up "Mercy" by Sarah Cate.

Something about the cover — a mirror in a dark room with “only she can bring him to his knees” written above it — drew...Read more