TheBestseller
Observatory

Best Sellers

Hardcover Fiction

Week of February 5, 2012

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PRIVATE: #1 SUSPECT
James Patterson and Maxine Paetro
Cover of PRIVATE: #1 SUSPECT

PRIVATE: #1 SUSPECT

by James Patterson and Maxine Paetro · Little, Brown

2 wks at #1 · 3 on list

Former Marine Jack Morgan always uncovers the truth. But in James Patterson's unforgettable thriller, he faces his most shocking case yet. Since former Marine Jack Morgan started Private, it has become the world's most effective investigation firm--sought out by the famous and the powerful to discreetly handle their most intimate problems. Private's investigators are the smartest, the fastest, and the most technologically advanced in the world-and they always uncover the truth. When his former lover is found murdered in his bed, Jack Morgan is instantly the number one suspect. While Jack is under police investigation, the mob strong-arms him into recovering $30 million in stolen pharmaceuticals for them. And the beautiful manager of a luxury hotel chain persuades him to quietly investigate a string of murders at her properties. While Jack is fighting for his life, one of his most trusted colleagues threatens to leave Private, and Jack realizes he is confronting his cleverest and most powerful enemies ever. With more action, more intrigue, and more twists than ever before, Private: #1 Suspect is James Patterson at his unstoppable best.

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DEATH OF KINGS
Bernard Cornwell
Cover of DEATH OF KINGS

DEATH OF KINGS

by Bernard Cornwell · Harper/HarperCollins

1 wks on list

The story of Saxon claimants to the throne during the forming of England at the end of the ninth century continues as Alfred the Great lays dying and the fate of the Angles, Saxons, and Vikings hangs in the balance.

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BELIEVING THE LIE
Elizabeth George
Cover of BELIEVING THE LIE

BELIEVING THE LIE

by Elizabeth George · Dutton

2 wks on list

#1 New York Times bestselling author of The Punishment She Deserves Elizabeth George has millions of fans following her Inspector Lynley series. As USA Today put it, "It's tough to resist George's storytelling, once hooked." With Believing the Lie, she's poised to hook countless more. Inspector Thomas Lynley is mystified when he's sent undercover to investigate the death of Ian Cresswell at the request of the man's uncle, the wealthy and influential Bernard Fairclough. The death has been ruled an accidental drowning, and nothing on the surface indicates otherwise. But when Lynley enlists the help of his friends Simon and Deborah St. James, the trio's digging soon reveals that the Fairclough clan is awash in secrets, lies, and motives. Deborah's investigation of the prime suspect--Bernard's prodigal son Nicholas, a recovering drug addict--leads her to Nicholas's wife, a woman with whom she feels a kinship, a woman as fiercely protective as she is beautiful. Lynley and Simon delve for information from the rest of the family, including the victim's bitter ex-wife and the man he left her for, and Bernard himself. As the investigation escalates, the Fairclough family's veneer cracks, with deception and self-delusion threatening to destroy everyone from the Fairclough patriarch to Tim, the troubled son Ian left behind.

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DEATH COMES TO PEMBERLEY
P. D. James
Cover of DEATH COMES TO PEMBERLEY

DEATH COMES TO PEMBERLEY

by P. D. James · Knopf

7 wks on list

The world is classic Jane Austen. The mystery is vintage P.D. James. This enhanced ebook of Death Comes to Pemberley contains video and audio that can be viewed and heard on a tablet device such as the iPad. There is a video interview with P. D. James, a longer audio interview, and an audio author reading. The year is 1803, and Fitzwilliam Darcy and Elizabeth Bennet have been married for six years. There are now two handsome and healthy sons in the nursery, Elizabeth's beloved sister Jane and her husband Bingley live nearby and the orderly world of Pemberley seems unassailable. But all this is threatened when, on the eve of the annual autumn ball, the guests are preparing to retire for the night when a chaise appears, rocking down the path from Pemberley's wild woodland. As it pulls up, Lydia Wickham - Elizabeth Bennet's younger, unreliable sister - stumbles out screaming that her husband has been murdered. Two great literary minds - master of suspense P.D. James and literary icon Jane Austen - come together in Death Comes to Pemberley, a bestselling historical crime fiction tribute to Pride and Prejudice. Conjuring the world of Elizabeth Bennet and Mark Darcy and combining the trappings of Regency British society with a classic murder mystery, James creates a delightful mash-up that will intrigue any Janeite. From the bestselling author of The Murder Room, Children of Men and A Certain Justice, comes a wonderful mixture of the nation's greatest romance and best-loved crime fiction. In 2013, this novel was adapted as a miniseries by the BBC, starring Matthew Rhys as Darcy, Anna Maxwell Martin as Elizabeth Bennet and Jenna Coleman as Lydia Wickham.

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11/22/63
Stephen King
Cover of 11/22/63

11/22/63

by Stephen King · Scribner

On November 22, 1963, three shots rang out in Dallas, President Kennedy died, and the world changed. What if you could change it back? Stephen King’s heart-stoppingly dramatic new novel is about a man who travels back in time to prevent the JFK assassination—a tour de force. Following his massively successful novel Under the Dome, King sweeps readers back in time to another moment—a real life moment—when everything went wrong: the JFK assassination. And he introduces readers to a character who has the power to change the course of history. Jake Epping is a thirty-five-year-old high school English teacher in Lisbon Falls, Maine, who makes extra money teaching adults in the GED program. He receives an essay from one of the students—a gruesome, harrowing first person story about the night fifty years ago when Harry Dunning’s father came home and killed his mother, his sister, and his brother with a hammer. Harry escaped with a smashed leg, as evidenced by his crooked walk. Not much later, Jake’s friend Al, who runs the local diner, divulges a secret: his storeroom is a portal to 1958. He enlists Jake on an insane—and insanely possible—mission to try to prevent the Kennedy assassination. So begins Jake’s new life as George Amberson and his new world of Elvis and JFK, of big American cars and sock hops, of a troubled loner named Lee Harvey Oswald and a beautiful high school librarian named Sadie Dunhill, who becomes the love of Jake’s life—a life that transgresses all the normal rules of time. A tribute to a simpler era and a devastating exercise in escalating suspense, 11/22/63 is Stephen King at his epic best.

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RAYLAN
Elmore Leonard
Cover of RAYLAN

RAYLAN

by Elmore Leonard · Morrow/HarperCollins

1 wks on list

The star of JUSTIFIED returns in a stunning new novel from 'the greatest crime writer who ever lived' [Dennis Lehane]. US Marshal Raylan Givens, star of the series JUSTIFIED, and protagonist of RIDING THE RAP, PRONTO and the story 'Fire in the Hole', is back in action, this time with a federal warrant to serve on a dope dealer named Angel Arenas, a man 'born in the U.S. but a hundred percent of him Hispanic'. The state troopers are impressed when the marshal struts into the convict's hotel room without drawing his gun, but Raylan soon finds that Angel's already been the victim of another crime, one that's way bigger than a few pot plants, and clearly the work of a professional ... RAYLAN shows Elmore Leonard at the height of his powers, as we follow one of his favourite protagonists through a series of adventures with unlikely villains. As ever, the work is filled with unexpected twists and the most vibrant, crackling dialogue currently available in the English language.

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