TheBestseller
Observatory

Best Sellers

Hardcover Fiction

Week of January 7, 2001

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THE BEAR AND THE DRAGON
Tom Clancy
Cover of THE BEAR AND THE DRAGON

THE BEAR AND THE DRAGON

by Tom Clancy · Putnam

6 wks at #1 · 18 on list

Time and again, Tom Clancy's novels have been praised not only for their big-scale drama and propulsive narrative drive but for their cutting-edge prescience in predicting future events.

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THE MARK
Tim LaHaye and Jerry B. Jenkins
Cover of THE MARK

THE MARK

by Tim LaHaye and Jerry B. Jenkins · Tyndale

6 wks on list

An evil world leader proclaims himself the Antichrist, drawing up plans to mark all human beings, but the members of the Tribulation Force are determined to stop him.

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1
ROSES ARE RED
James Patterson

ROSES ARE RED

by James Patterson · Little, Brown

5 wks on list

Facing a particularly vicious killer in his latest investigation, Alex Cross finds his family targeted by the vengeful Mastermind, a situation complicated by tension in his relationship with his girlfriend and his daughter's unexplained seizures.

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1
PRODIGAL SUMMER
Barbara Kingsolver
Cover of PRODIGAL SUMMER

PRODIGAL SUMMER

by Barbara Kingsolver · HarperCollins

10 wks on list

Wildlife biologist Deanna is caught off guard by an intrusive young hunter, while bookish city wife Lusa finds herself facing a difficult identity choice, and elderly neighbors find attraction at the height of a long-standing feud.

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2
DECK THE HALLS
Mary Higgins Clark and Carol Higgins Clark
Cover of DECK THE HALLS

DECK THE HALLS

by Mary Higgins Clark and Carol Higgins Clark · Scribner/ Simon & Schuster

9 wks on list

Mary Higgins Clark, America's beloved "Queen of Suspense," and her daughter, bestselling mystery novelist Carol Higgins Clark, team up to write a spine-tingling and heart-warming story. Combining Carol Higgles Clark's ongoing central character, the young and feisty Regan Reilly, and Mary Higgins Clark's Willy and Alvirah, featured earlier in the bestsellers The Lottery Winner and All Through the Night, the story begins when Regan's businessman father Luke Reilly goes missing just before Christmas, held hostage for ransom by his partner's angered and disinherited son. Regan turns for help to her parents' Central Park South neighbors, Willy and Alvirah, with whom she shares not only a talent for detection, but an unusually accommodating genius of a dentist who brings them together. Together, as New York City prepares for Christmas, the three of them join forces to find Luke, only to discover that he is not just missing, but kidnapped, along with the driver of the taxi in which he was riding, a Hispanic single mother of two. The result is a fast-moving novel of suspense for the Christmas season by a mother-daughter writing team that is bound to arouse enormous interest and to receive great publicity

6
JOURNEY
Danielle Steel

JOURNEY

by Danielle Steel · Delacorte Press

8 wks on list

In her 50th bestselling novel, Danielle Steel takes us behind the closed doors of a prominent marriage to explore the private secrets hidden behind public lives. Journey Everyone in Washington knows Madeleine and Jack Hunter. Maddy is an award-winning TV anchorwoman. Jack is the head of her network, an adviser to the President on media issues. To the world, theirs is a storybook marriage. Two brilliant careers. A long, loving partnership. But behind the locked doors of their lush Georgetown home, a very different story emerges. For as Maddy's career soars, a bitter edge has crept into Jack's words, a pattern of subtle put-downs, control, and jealousy that Maddy has always tried to ignore and deny. For Maddy, there are no bruises, no scars, only the daggers of fear, humiliation, and isolation. Their effect as powerful as the gun, the knife, or the fist, the wounds as deep. Through hard work, long years, and with Jack's help, Maddy has become a role model and a star. It seems impossible to believe that a woman the nation idolizes lives in degradation and fear. Only Maddy knows the terror in her heart. Her secrets are well kept, sometimes even from herself. Maddy's journey to healing begins when the President's wife offers an extraordinary opportunity, the chance to join her newly formed Commission on Violence Against Women. There, Maddy hears chilling stories from terrified wives and girlfriends that sound eerily familiar. And there she comes to know Bill Alexander, a distinguished scholar and diplomat who also works on the commission. Bill suspects that something is terribly wrong in Maddy's marriage and begs her to open her eyes. And as Maddy slowly, painfully takes the first steps toward freedom, as she and Bill grow closer, a remarkable series of events begins to unfold...a stranger from Maddy's past suddenly reappears...White House headlines bring the nation to a standstill...and a devastating tragedy occurs, forcing Maddy to realize just how much she has lost and how much has been taken from her--her confidence, her trust, her self-respect. As she is faced with the most difficult choice of her life, Maddy's extraordinary journey comes to a close, and with it comes a strength she never knew she had and a gift she never could have expected--a gift that will change her life forever. Set against a vivid backdrop of world-shattering events, Journey is a book about abuse, in its subtlest forms. The powerful effects that last a lifetime. With wisdom and compassion, bestselling novelist Danielle Steel reminds us that no one is exempt from the effects of this devastating disease, which crosses social borders, has no respect for money, power, or success. But at its core, Journey is a book about hope, about change, and about daring to be free.

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CODE TO ZERO
Ken Follett
Cover of CODE TO ZERO

CODE TO ZERO

by Ken Follett · Dutton

3 wks on list

In this classic Cold War thriller, #1 New York Times bestselling author Ken Follett puts his own electrifying twist on the space race between the U.S. and the Soviet Union. "Code to Zero's split-second suspense proves that... Follett is] a hell of storyteller."--Entertainment Weekly

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THE PROMETHEUS DECEPTION
Robert Ludlum

THE PROMETHEUS DECEPTION

by Robert Ludlum · St. Martin's

8 wks on list

Nicholas Bryson spent years as a deep cover operative for the American secret intelligence group, The Directorate. After a disastrous mission, Bryson was retired to a new identity. Now, years later, his cover is cracked and Bryson learns that The Directorate was not what it claimed to be - and that he was, in fact, a pawn being used against his country's interests. The Directorate is headed for a dangerous endgame, and the CIA recruits Bryson to stop them. But after years on the sidelines, Bryson's field skills are rusty, his contacts unreliable, his instincts suspect and he no longer knows who - if anyone - can be trusted.

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3
MERRICK
Anne Rice

MERRICK

by Anne Rice · Knopf

10 wks on list

Anne Rice's richly told new novel for the first time weaves together two irresistible worlds - the witches' world and the vampires' world - in a dance of seduction, death and rebirth. Lestat's mesmerizing friend Louis de Pointe du Lac is tortured by the memory of the child vampire Claudia, whom he loved and lost. With the help of David Talbot, vampire and ultimate fixer from the secret Talamasca organization, Louis appeals to Merrick, the beautiful, mixed-race, illegitimate daughter of the New Orleans Mayfair clan. Merrick must use her black witchcraft to call up the ghost of Claudia - however dangerous this may be - and her search takes her close to the edge, through blood and terror, voodoo and violence. Sweeping from New Orleans to the Guatemalan jungle, this is vampire literature at its most hypnotic, exotic and splendid.

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THE RESCUE
Nicholas Sparks
Cover of THE RESCUE

THE RESCUE

by Nicholas Sparks · Warner

14 wks on list

One of America's bestselling authors returns with a tale about the greatest commitment of all: loving someone forever. When a near-fatal car crash brings Taylor McAden together with Denise Holden, a new resident of Edenton, North Carolina, he must look into his past to see if it's not too late to take a chance on the future.

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NEW
SHOPGIRL
Steve Martin
Cover of SHOPGIRL

SHOPGIRL

by Steve Martin · Hyperion

With more than 340,000 copies in print, Steve Martins Shopgirl has landed on bestseller lists nationwide including: New York Times, Publishers Weekly, USA Today, Wall Street Journal, San Francisco Chronicle, Washington Post, and Los Angeles Times. Filled with the kind of witty, discerning observations that have brought Steve Martin incredible critical success, this story of modern day love and romance is a work of disarming tenderness.

Historical bestseller data sourced from the New York Times Book Review, archived by Hawes Publications.