Top books 2015 biography list

This exhaustively researched novel elucidates not just the Mexican drug wars but the consequences of our own disastrous year "war on drugs. The book is harsh and unforgiving, but regardless of your views on Kissinger, it's a fascinating work. Deft characterization, high stakes, and unabashed sexual hunger drive the gripping fast-paced story.

At the core of this first novel is a lively, wry first-person narrator called the Captain, a half-Vietnamese double agent who barely escapes the fall of Saigon in Germany, however, was determined to change the rules of the game, and Walther Schwieger, the captain of Unterseeboot, was happy to oblige. An oddball masterpiece that begins with thumb-sucking nudist August Engelhardt fleeing Germany in to establish a South Seas utopia—one in which coconuts are the only food.

Daoud's novel reimagines Camus's The Stranger from the Arab perspective. As Lewis engages with depictions of black female bodies in Western art, she wrestles with constructs of blackness and gender, alienation and self-formation. In these stories, readers will find an underpants scheme, an extreme germophobe, and even a story from the perspective of a dog.

It's a story that moves as quickly as the athletes at its center, and Jamieson's clean, bright illustrations are equally successful at capturing roller-derby action and her characters' emotional highs and lows. Journalist Charlotte "Charlie" Cates—the heroine of Young's haunting, heartbreaking, yet ultimately hopeful debut—has disturbing dreams in which unknown children appeal for help.

Famous biographies in english literature

Ananthaswamy leads a tour through a range of disorders—both commonplace and bizarre—and those who suffer them, complicating our notions of what a self really is. That's just one of many ideas readers can glean from Lawson and Smith's wordless tale, something of a small miracle itself, which traces a father and daughter's travels through gray city streets that gain color through acts of kindness and reverence.

Moody, eloquent, and witty, it's a "ghost story" for any time of day, any time of year. Cool, elegant art understates the frustration of angry white men and the world they can't understand, in Tomine's devastating short story anthology. She writes with a reporter's passion for details and a novelist's sense of story. Click here to see our best Middle Grade and Young Adult books.

This beautiful book follows the work of Dutch landscape designer Oudolf, the man behind the plantings at New York City's High Line park, beginning with the creation of Hummelo, the garden he began 30 years ago with his wife, Anja, to supply the plants required for his designs. When Solomonov developed a passion for Israeli cooking and wanted to show the full breadth of the cuisine, he started his own restaurant, Zahav, in Philadelphia in Originally published in Germany, this thought-provoking picture book consists of a series of encounters between a king and various people, objects, and intangible forces, which offer profoundly revealing insights on the nature and limitations of power.

McCrea's debut is a historical novel told through the unforgettable voice of Lizzie Burns, the longtime lover of Frederick Engels. However, he never forgets his chief purpose in life: exacting retribution on those responsible for his father's downfall. In a hard-hitting story of prejudice and triumph set in WWII England, Ada Smith and her younger brother flee London and their cruel mother as part of the evacuation of children to the British countryside.

Best novels of 2015

Welcome back. Via his neural implants, an artificial intelligence called the Red keeps him out of harm's way, perhaps saving him for a greater purpose in which nonstop action, incisive political commentary, and fascinatingly plausible technology combine in a near-future thriller. Along the way, our hero loses an eye at the Battle of Five Forks, meets Walt Whitman, and is assigned as bugler for Lincoln's funeral train.

Opening Round: Nov 03 - 08 Voting opens to 15 official nominees, and write-in votes can be placed for any eligible book see eligibility below. This is an unshakable plunge into madness. Through the disappearance of a young woman named Roza, Ruby spins an unpredictable, magic-tinged rural mystery, one that is reluctant to give up its secrets.