TheBestseller
Observatory

Best Sellers

Hardcover Fiction

Week of May 14, 2006

FictionNonfiction
WeekMonth
Jump to
1
TWO LITTLE GIRLS IN BLUE
Mary Higgins Clark
Cover of TWO LITTLE GIRLS IN BLUE

TWO LITTLE GIRLS IN BLUE

by Mary Higgins Clark · Simon & Schuster

4 wks at #1 · 4 on list

Queen of Suspense and #1 New York Times bestselling writer Mary Higgins Clark brilliantly weaves the mystery of twin telepathy into a mother’s search for a kidnapped child, presumed dead in this “riveting…suspense thriller [that] is certain to send terror into the heart of any parent” (Publishers Weekly). Hours after throwing a third birthday party for their twins Kathy and Kelly in their Connecticut home, Margaret and Steve Frawley return home from a dinner in New York to discover the police in the house, their daughters missing, and an eight million dollar ransom note. The Frawleys meet the kidnapper’s demands, but the abandoned car they’re led to contains only Kelly, the body of the driver, and a suicide note, saying he had inadvertently killed Kathy and dumped her body in the ocean. At the private memorial Mass for Kathy, Kelly tugs Margaret’s arm and says that her sister Kathy “wants to come home right now.” More unexplainable occurrences indicate that Kelly is in touch with Kathy, but no one except Margaret believes that Kathy is still alive. As Kelly’s warnings become increasingly specific and alarming, however, FBI agents set out on a search for the kidnappers as Kathy’s life hangs by a thread. Delving into the well-documented but still unexplained phenomenon of twin telepathy, worldwide #1 bestseller Mary Higgins Clark takes us deep into the minds of her characters while lifting us to the heights of suspense.

3
1
BLUE SHOES & HAPPINESS
Alexander McCall Smith
Cover of BLUE SHOES & HAPPINESS

BLUE SHOES & HAPPINESS

by Alexander McCall Smith · Pantheon

2 wks on list

Fans around the world adore the bestselling No. 1 Ladies’ Detective Agency series and its proprietor, Precious Ramotswe, Botswana’s premier lady detective. In this charming series, Mma Ramotswe—with help from her loyal associate, Grace Makutsi—navigates her cases and her personal life with wisdom, good humor, and the occasional cup of tea. Life is good for Mma Ramotswe as she sets out with her usual resolve to solve people’s problems, heal their misfortunes, and untangle the mysteries that make life interesting. And life is never dull on Tlokweng Road. A new and rather too brusque advice columnist is appearing in the local paper. Then, a cobra is found in the offices of the No. 1 Ladies’ Detective Agency. Recently, the Mokolodi Game Preserve manager feels an infectious fear spreading among his workers, and a local doctor may be falsifying blood pressure readings. To further complicate matters, Grace Makutsi may have scared off her own fiancé. Mma Ramotswe, however, is always up to the challenge. And Blue Shoes and Happiness will not fail to entertain Alexander McCall Smith’s oldest fans and newest converts with its great wit, charm, and great good will.

4
DARK HARBOR
Stuart Woods
Cover of DARK HARBOR

DARK HARBOR

by Stuart Woods · Putnam

3 wks on list

In this perfect mix of sexy intrigue and swift suspense in the #1 New York Times bestselling series, Stone Barrington investigates the suicide of a CIA officer—his own cousin... Stone Barrington hasn’t heard from his cousin, Dick Stone, in years. Then, an otherwise pleasant meal at Elaine’s is interrupted by the CIA with news of Dick’s death—apparently by his own hand. It seems that Dick Stone, a quiet family man who doubled as a CIA agent, methodically executed his wife, daughter, and then himself...or did he? Appointed executor of Dick’s will, Stone must settle the estate and—with the help of his ex-partner Dino and friend Holly Barker—piece together the elusive facts of his cousin’s life and death as a CIA operative. At every step, Stone knows he is being watched by Dick’s family—and one of them just may be the killer.

5
GONE
Jonathan Kellerman
Cover of GONE

GONE

by Jonathan Kellerman · Ballantine

5 wks on list

BONUS: This edition contains an excerpt from Jonathan Kellerman's Guilt. #1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER Missing acting students Dylan and Michaela are found in the remote mountains of Malibu, battered and terrified after a harrowing ordeal at the hands of a sadistic abductor. But forensic evidence soon exposes the incident as a hoax, and the kids are charged as criminals themselves. “Kellerman shows why he is called the ‘master of the psychological thriller.’”—Orlando Sentinel After examining Michaela, psychologist Alex Delaware is certain that there’s more to this sordid psychodrama, and his instincts prove dead-on when she is savagely murdered. Casting their dragnet into the murkiest corners of L.A., Delaware and homicide cop Milo Sturgis unearth more questions than answers—and a host of eerily identical killings. What bizarre and brutal epidemic is infecting the city with terror, madness, and sudden, twisted death?

6
NEW
SUSANNAH'S GARDEN
Debbie Macomber
Cover of SUSANNAH'S GARDEN
7
4
OAKDALE CONFIDENTIAL
Anonymous
Cover of OAKDALE CONFIDENTIAL
8
2
DARK TORT
Diane Mott Davidson
Cover of DARK TORT

DARK TORT

by Diane Mott Davidson · Morrow

3 wks on list

Goldy Schulz has a lucrative new gig, preparing breakfasts and conference-room snacks for a local law firm. It's time-consuming, but Goldy is enjoying it -- until the night she arrives to find Dusty, the firm's paralegal, dead. The poor young woman also happened to be Goldy's friend and neighbor, and now Dusty's grieving mother begs Goldy to find out who murdered her daughter. Just because the police are on the case doesn't mean Goldy can't do a little snooping herself. While catering a party at the home of one of the firm's lawyers, she manages to overhear an incriminating conversation and ends up discovering a few clues in the kitchen. Before long, Goldy is knee-deep in suspects, one of whom is incre-dibly dangerous and very liable to cook Goldy's goose.

9
2
THE DA VINCI CODE
Dan Brown
Cover of THE DA VINCI CODE

THE DA VINCI CODE

by Dan Brown · Doubleday

162 wks on list

THE #1 WORLDWIDE BESTSELLING PHENOMENON, WITH MORE THAN 85 MILLION COPIES SOLD “Blockbuster perfection . . . a gleefully erudite suspense novel.” —The New York Times “A pulse-quickening, brain-teasing adventure.” —People While in Paris, Harvard symbologist Robert Langdon is awakened by a phone call in the dead of the night. The elderly curator of the Louvre has been murdered inside the museum, his body covered in baffling symbols. As Langdon and gifted French cryptologist Sophie Neveu sort through the bizarre riddles, they are stunned to discover a trail of clues hidden in the works of Leonardo da Vinci—clues visible for all to see and yet ingeniously disguised by the painter. Even more startling, the late curator was involved in the Priory of Sion, a secret society whose members included Sir Isaac Newton, Victor Hugo, and Da Vinci, and he guarded a breathtaking historical secret. Unless Langdon and Neveu can decipher the labyrinthine puzzle—while avoiding the faceless adversary who shadows their every move—the explosive, ancient truth will be lost forever. Robert Langdon returns in The Lost Symbol, Inferno, Origin, and The Secret of Secrets (coming soon)!

10
NEW
EVERYMAN
Philip Roth
Cover of EVERYMAN

EVERYMAN

by Philip Roth · Houghton Mifflin

1 wks on list

Philip Roth's new novel is a candidly intimate yet universal story of loss, regret, and stoicism. The best-selling author of The Plot Against America now turns his attention from "one family's harrowing encounter with history" (New York Times) to one man's lifelong skirmish with mortality. The fate of Roth's everyman is traced from his first shocking confrontation with death on the idyllic beaches of his childhood summers, through the family trials and professional achievements of his vigorous adulthood, and into his old age, when he is rended by observing the deterioration of his contemporaries and stalked by his own physical woes. A successful commercial artist with a New York ad agency, he is the father of two sons from a first marriage who despise him and a daughter from a second marriage who adores him. He is the beloved brother of a good man whose physical well-being comes to arouse his bitter envy, and he is the lonely ex-husband of three very different women with whom he's made a mess of marriage. In the end he is a man who has become what he does not want to be. The terrain of this powerful novel -- Roth's twenty-seventh book and the fifth to be published in the twenty-first century -- is the human body. Its subject is the common experience that terrifies us all. Everyman takes its title from an anonymous fifteenth-century allegorical play, a classic of early English drama, whose theme is the summoning of the living to death.

12
6
CHASING DESTINY
Eric Jerome Dickey
Cover of CHASING DESTINY

CHASING DESTINY

by Eric Jerome Dickey · Dutton

3 wks on list

With prose “hot enough to scorch fingers,”* Eric Jerome Dickey has electrified readers with his New York Times bestsellers. In Chasing Destiny, he edges into dangerously sexy territory.... Billie is as notorious for her beauty as she is for the hot yellow Ducati motorcycle she rides down L.A.'s meanest streets. Tough and talented, she does things her way. Until an unplanned pregnancy spins her life out of control. Her problem: Her lover Keith's divorce decree has been revoked, forcing him to choose between Billie and his dangerously manipulative wife, Carmen, along with their troubled and deceptive daughter, Destiny, a fifteen-year-old dancing on the edge of womanhood. Horrific things happen when Keith's daughter disappears in the company of low friends in dark places. And in chasing Destiny, Billie, Keith, and Carmen find their lives inextricably linked by a dangerous and seductive pursuit-at any speed—at any cost.

14
NEW
VANISHED
Karen Robards
Cover of VANISHED

VANISHED

by Karen Robards · Putnam

1 wks on list

When she receives a call from a child who sounds exactly like her missing daughter Lexie, Sarah Mason turns to her closest friend in the world, P.I. Jake Hogan. Jake is convinced that someone is deliberately tormenting the grief-stricken mother. But as their friendship explodes into passion-and the torment escalates into murder-Jake is the only person who can keep Sarah safe in their horrifying search for the truth...

15
NEW
ELEMENTS OF STYLE
Wendy Wasserstein
Cover of ELEMENTS OF STYLE

ELEMENTS OF STYLE

by Wendy Wasserstein · Knopf

Elements of Style, the Pulitzer Prize—winning playwright Wendy Wasserstein’s first novel, is a scathing comedy about New York's high society facing the post—9/11 world. Francesca Weissman, an Upper East Side pediatrician rated number one by Manhattan magazine, floats on the fringes of the upper strata of privilege and aspiration. Through her bemused eyes we meet the thoroughbred socialite Samantha Acton; relentless social climber Judy Tremont; Barry Santorini, an Oscar-winning moviemaker accustomed to having his way; his supermarket heiress wife, Clarice; and more, tossed together in a frothy stew of outrageous conspicuous consumption and adulterous affairs that play out on Page Six. But when Wasserstein’s madcap tour of the social lives and mores of twenty-first-century Manhattan veers into tragedy, we finally see the true cost of her characters’ choices, and the beating heart of this dazzling novel.

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