TheBestseller
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Best Sellers

Hardcover Fiction

Week of January 11, 2009

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1
SCARPETTA
Patricia Cornwell
Cover of SCARPETTA

SCARPETTA

by Patricia Cornwell · Putnam

3 wks at #1 · 4 on list

Cuarto título de Patricia Cornwell sobre la doctora forense Kay Scarpetta, contrinúa una de las series de novela criminal más exitosas de todos los tiempos. Ronnie Joe Waddell va a ser ejecutado por un crimen horrible y la doctora Scarpetta , particularmente inquieta frente a este hecho, espera para realizar la autopsia. Pocas horas después de la ejecución, la policía encuentra en la calle el cadáver de una adolescente con heridas similares a las que mostraba la supuesta víctima de Waddell. Scarpetta, que ya dudaba acerca de la culpabilidad del convicto, ve justificadas sus sospechas. La forense deberá enfrentarse a la investigación de un tercer crimen y, al mismo tiempo, a una persona que intenta sabotear su trabajo desde los oscuros pasillos del poder. Cruel y extraño ha obtenido los prestigiosos premios Edgar y Gold Dagger y su protagonista, la doctora forense Scarpetta, es uno de los grandes hallazgos de la novela policíaca estadounidense.

4
THE STORY OF EDGAR SAWTELLE
David Wroblewski
Cover of THE STORY OF EDGAR SAWTELLE

THE STORY OF EDGAR SAWTELLE

by David Wroblewski · Ecco

29 wks on list

A contemporary retelling of Hamlet of stark and striking brilliance set on a farm in remote northern Wisconsin. On a farm in remote northern Wisconsin the mute and brilliant Edgar Sawtelle leads an idyllic life with his parents Gar and Trudy. For generations, the Sawtelles have raised and trained a breed of dog whose thoughtful companionship is epitomised by Almodine, Edgar's lifelong companion. But when his beloved father mysteriously dies, Edgar blames himself, if only because his muteness left him unable to summon help. Grief-stricken and bewildered by his mother's desperate affair with her dead husband's brother, Edgar's world unravels one spring night when, in the falling rain, he sees his father's ghost. After a botched attempt to prove that his uncle orchestrated Gar's death, Edgar flees into the Chequamegon wilderness leading three yearling dogs. Yet his need to face his father's murderer, and his devotion to the Sawtelle dogs, turn Edgar ever homeward. When he returns, nothing is as he expects, and Edgar must choose between revenge or preserving his family legacy...

5
THE HOST
Stephenie Meyer
Cover of THE HOST

THE HOST

by Stephenie Meyer · Little, Brown

33 wks on list

The earth has been invaded by a species that take over the minds of their human hosts while leaving their bodies intact, and most of humanity has succumbed. But Melanie Stryder refuses to fade away. Wanderer, the invading "soul" who has been given Melanie's body, knew about the challenges of living inside a human: the overwhelming emotions, the too vivid memories. But there was one difficulty Wanderer didn't expect: the former tenant of her body refusing to relinquish possession of her mind. Melanie fills Wanderer's thoughts with visions of the man Melanie loves--Jared, a human who still lives in hiding. Unable to separate herself from her body's desires, Wanderer yearns for a man she's never met. As outside forces make Wanderer and Melanie unwilling allies, they set off to search for the man they both love.--From publisher description.

7
THE LUCKY ONE
Nicholas Sparks
Cover of THE LUCKY ONE

THE LUCKY ONE

by Nicholas Sparks · Grand Central

13 wks on list

In this stunning New York Times bestselling follow-up to The Notebook, a hardworking but distant husband vows to win back the love of his life by looking to Noah and Allie's legendary romance. After thirty years, Wilson Lewis is forced to face a painful truth: the romance has gone out of his marriage. His wife, Jane, has fallen out of love with him, and it is entirely his fault. Despite the shining example of his in-laws, Noah and Allie Calhoun, and their fifty-year love affair, Wilson himself is a man unable to express his true feelings. He has spent too little time at home and too much at the office, leaving the responsibility of raising their children to Jane. Now his daughter is about to marry, and his wife is thinking about leaving him. But if Wilson is sure of anything, it is this: His love for Jane has only grown over the years, and he will do everything he can to save their marriage. With the memories of Noah and Allie's inspiring life together as his guide, he vows to find a way to make his wife fall in love with him...all over again. In this powerfully moving tale of love lost, rediscovered, and renewed, Nicholas Sparks once again brings readers his unique insight into the only emotion that ultimately really matters.

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1
ARCTIC DRIFT
Clive Cussler and Dirk Cussler
Cover of ARCTIC DRIFT

ARCTIC DRIFT

by Clive Cussler and Dirk Cussler · Putnam

5 wks on list

Arctic Drift sees Clive Cussler's greatest hero, Dirk Pitt, fighting his enemies in the cruel Arctic. A foundered Victorian ship looking for the fabled Northwest Passage holds a secret in its icy grave . . . When Dirk Pitt of NUMA is almost blown to pieces in a lab explosion, he suspects sabotage. The lab in question belongs to a scientist hoping to use a rare mineral to combat greenhouse gases - but who would want to destroy our one chance to save the planet? But there are those who will do anything to control such a valuable prize. Pitt's investigations take him to the Arctic in search of a clue to the origins of this precious mineral. There he and NUMA colleague Al Giordino must battle for survival against the hostile elements and an evil megalomaniac who is about to plunge the North American continent into war . . . Arctic Drift is a white-knuckle ride of a novel that once picked up you won't want to put down. It is the twentieth of Clive Cussler's bestselling Dirk Pitt novels - the series that also includes Raise the Titanic!and his first novel, Mayday - and is co-authored with his son Dirk Cussler. Praise for Clive Cussler: 'Clive Cussler is hard to beat' Daily Mail

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1
DIVINE JUSTICE
David Baldacci
Cover of DIVINE JUSTICE

DIVINE JUSTICE

by David Baldacci · Grand Central

8 wks on list

Explosive and enthralling, David Baldacci's Divine Justice is the fourth novel in his bestselling Camel Club series. Known by his alias, 'Oliver Stone', John Carr is the most wanted man in America. With two pulls of the trigger, the men who hid the truth of Stone's past and kept him in the shadows were finally silenced. But Stone's freedom has come at a steep price; the assassinations he carried out have prompted the highest levels of the United States Government to unleash a massive manhunt. Joe Knox is leading the charge, but his superiors aren't telling him everything there is to know about his quarry – and their hidden agendas are just as dangerous as the killer he's trying to catch. Meanwhile, with their friend and unofficial leader in hiding, the members of the Camel Club must fend for themselves, even as they try to protect him. As Knox closes in, Stone's flight from the demons of his past will take him far from Washington, D.C., to the coal-mining town of Devine, Virginia – and headlong into a confrontation every bit as lethal as the one he is trying to escape. Divine Justice is followed by Baldacci's final Camel Club novel, Hell's Corner.

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2
A MERCY
Toni Morrison
Cover of A MERCY

A MERCY

by Toni Morrison · Knopf

7 wks on list

"In exchange for a bad debt, an Anglo-Dutch trader takes on Florens, a young slave girl, who feels abandoned by her slave mother and who searches for love--first from an older servant woman at her master's new home, and then from a handsome free blacksmith."--

12
YOUR HEART BELONGS TO ME
Dean Koontz
Cover of YOUR HEART BELONGS TO ME

YOUR HEART BELONGS TO ME

by Dean Koontz · Bantam

5 wks on list

A high-concept new thriller from the internationally acclaimed Dean Koontz about a young man who owes his life to a heart transplant ... but confronts an imminent and far darker death

13
THE GATE HOUSE
Nelson DeMille
Cover of THE GATE HOUSE

THE GATE HOUSE

by Nelson DeMille · Grand Central

9 wks on list

The upmarket and salubrious area of Long Island is the stamping ground for a dying breed of America's super-rich. It is also the residence of John Sutter, lawyer - very top-drawer, old money, right clubs - and his sensual wife, Susan. Their lives are about to be turned dramatically upside down by their new 'next-door' neighbour - a certain Mr Frank Bellarosa, top Mafia don and master manipulator. It is he who will impress upon them a rule much older than the archaic etiquette of the old-money set: a favour accepted is a favour owed. Twenty-five years after it was first published, Nelson DeMille's Gold Coast stands as a modern thriller classic, a stylish, compelling and provocative novel will grip readers from beginning to end.

14
NEW
THE CHARLEMAGNE PURSUIT
Steve Berry
Cover of THE CHARLEMAGNE PURSUIT

THE CHARLEMAGNE PURSUIT

by Steve Berry · Ballantine

3 wks on list

NEW YORK TIMES BESETSELLER • “Those who relish suspense in the Da Vinci Code vein will snap this one up, the best yet in the series.”—Publishers Weekly (starred review) As a child, former Justice Department agent Cotton Malone was told that his father died in a submarine disaster in the North Atlantic. But what he now learns stuns him: His father’s sub was a secret nuclear vessel lost on a highly classified mission beneath the ice shelves of Antarctica. Twin sisters Dorothea Lindauer and Christl Falk are also determined to find out what became of their father, who died on the same submarine–and they know something Malone doesn’t: Inspired by strange clues discovered in Charlemagne’s tomb, the Nazis explored Antarctica before the Americans. Now Malone discovers that cryptic journals penned in “the language of heaven,” conundrums posed by an ancient historian, and his father’s ill-fated voyage are all tied to a revelation of immense consequence for humankind. As Malone embarks on a dangerous quest with the sisters, he will finally confront the shocking truth of his father’s death and the distinct possibility of his own. BONUS: This edition contains an excerpt from Steve Berry’s The Columbus Affair and a Cotton Malone dossier.

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NEW
THE PRIVATE PATIENT
P. D. James
Cover of THE PRIVATE PATIENT

THE PRIVATE PATIENT

by P. D. James · Knopf

When the notorious investigative journalist Rhoda Gradwyn booked into Mr Chandler-Powell’s private clinic in Dorset for the removal of a disfiguring and long-standing facial scar, she had every prospect of a successful operation by a distinguished surgeon, a week’s peaceful convalescence in one of Dorset’s most beautiful manor houses and the beginning of a new life. She was never to leave Cheverell Manor alive. Dalgliesh and his team are called in to investigate the murder, and later a second death, which are to raise even more complicated problems than the question of innocence or guilt.A new detective novel by P. D. James is always keenly awaited and The Private Patient will undoubtedly equal the success of her worldwide bestseller The Lighthouse. It displays the qualities which P. D. James’s readers have come to expect: a masterly psychological and emotional richness of characterisation, a vivid evocation of place and a credible and exciting mystery. The Private Patient is a powerful work of contemporary fiction.

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