TheBestseller
Observatory

Best Sellers

Hardcover Fiction

Week of April 19, 2015

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THE GIRL ON THE TRAIN
Paula Hawkins
Cover of THE GIRL ON THE TRAIN

THE GIRL ON THE TRAIN

by Paula Hawkins · Riverhead

19 wks at #1 · 12 on list

THE RUNAWAY GLOBAL BESTSELLER 'Gripping, enthralling - a top-notch thriller and a compulsive read.' SJ Watson, bestselling author of BEFORE I GO TO SLEEP Rachel catches the same commuter train every morning. She knows it will wait at the same signal each time, overlooking a row of back gardens. She's even started to feel like she knows the people who live in one of the houses. 'Jess and Jason', she calls them. Their life - as she sees it - is perfect. If only Rachel could be that happy. And then she sees something shocking. It's only a minute until the train moves on, but it's enough. Now everything's changed. Now Rachel has a chance to become a part of the lives she's only watched from afar. Now they'll see; she's much more than just the girl on the train... ***PAULA HAWKINS' NEW ADDICTIVE THRILLER, THE BLUE HOUR IS AVAILABLE NOW***

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ALL THE LIGHT WE CANNOT SEE
Anthony Doerr
Cover of ALL THE LIGHT WE CANNOT SEE

ALL THE LIGHT WE CANNOT SEE

by Anthony Doerr · Scribner

48 wks on list

An imaginative and intricate novel inspired by the horrors of World War II and written in short, elegant chapters that explore human nature and the contradictory power of technology.

5
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THE PATRIOT THREAT
Steve Berry
Cover of THE PATRIOT THREAT

THE PATRIOT THREAT

by Steve Berry · Minotaur

1 wks on list

Steve Berry's New York Times bestseller, The Patriot Threat, finds Cotton Malone racing to stop a rogue ex-KGB agent plotting revenge against the United States. The 16th Amendment to the Constitution is why Americans pay income taxes. But what if there were problems associated with that amendment? Secrets that call into question decades of tax collecting? In fact, there is a surprising truth to this hidden possibility. Cotton Malone, once a member of an elite intelligence division within the Justice Department known as the Magellan Billet, is now retired and owns an old bookshop in Denmark. But when his former-boss, Stephanie Nelle, asks him to track a rogue North Korean who may have acquired some top secret Treasury Department files—the kind that could bring the United States to its knees—Malone is vaulted into a harrowing twenty-four hour chase that begins on the canals in Venice and ends in the remote highlands of Croatia. With appearances by Franklin Roosevelt, Andrew Mellon, a curious painting that still hangs in the National Gallery of Art, and some eye-opening revelations from the $1 bill, this riveting, non-stop adventure is trademark Steve Berry—90% historical fact, 10% exciting speculation—a provocative thriller posing a dangerous question: What if the Federal income tax is illegal?

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AT THE WATER'S EDGE
Sara Gruen
Cover of AT THE WATER'S EDGE

AT THE WATER'S EDGE

by Sara Gruen · Spiegel & Grau

1 wks on list

NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • “A daring story of adventure, friendship, and love in the shadow of WWII” (Harper’s Bazaar) from the renowned author of Ape House and Water for Elephants “Gripping, compelling . . . Gruen’s characters are vividly drawn and her scenes are perfectly paced.”—The Boston Globe In January 1945, when Madeline Hyde and her husband, Ellis, are cut off financially by his father, a retired army colonel who is ashamed of his son’s inability to serve, Ellis decides that the only way to regain his father’s favor is to succeed where the Colonel very publicly failed—by hunting down the famous Loch Ness monster. Leaving her sheltered world behind, Maddie reluctantly follows Ellis and his best friend, Hank, to a remote village in the Scottish Highlands. Gradually, the friendships Maddie forms with the townspeople open her up to a larger world than she knew existed. Maddie begins to see that nothing is as it first appears, and as she embraces a fuller sense of who she might be, she becomes aware not only of darker forces around her but of life’s surprising possibilities.

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A SPOOL OF BLUE THREAD
Anne Tyler
Cover of A SPOOL OF BLUE THREAD

A SPOOL OF BLUE THREAD

by Anne Tyler · Knopf

8 wks on list

The changing needs of aging parents impact a family gathering during which Abby Whitshank relates how her husband and she fell in love during the summer of 1959 and shared decades of marriage impacted by children and long-held secrets. Reading-group guide available. By the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of Breathing Lessons. 125,000 first printing.

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THE NIGHTINGALE
Kristin Hannah
Cover of THE NIGHTINGALE

THE NIGHTINGALE

by Kristin Hannah · St. Martin's

9 wks on list

The bestselling Reese Witherspoon Book Club Pick 'One of the greatest storytellers of our time' – Delia Owens, author of Where the Crawdads Sing Soon to be a major motion picture, The Nightingale is a multi-million copy bestseller across the world. It is a heart-breakingly beautiful novel that celebrates the resilience of the human spirit and the endurance of women. 'I always thought it was what I wanted: to be loved and admired. Now I think perhaps I’d like to be known' This story is about what it was like to be a woman during World War II when women’s stories were all too often forgotten or overlooked . . . Vianne and Isabelle Mauriac are two sisters, separated by years and experience, by ideals and passion and circumstance, each embarking on her own dangerous path towards survival, love and freedom in war-torn France. Kristin Hannah's The Nightingale is a novel for everyone, a novel for a lifetime. ‘A rich, compelling novel of love, sacrifice and survival’ - Kate Morton ‘Movingly written and plotted with the heartless skill of a Greek tragedy, you’ll keep turning the pages until the last racking sob’ - Daily Mail ‘I loved The Nightingale . . . great characters, great plots, great emotions, who could ask for more in a novel?’ - Isabel Allende, bestselling author of The House of the Spirits ‘A gripping tale of family, love, grief and forgiveness’ - Sunday Express The Nightingale has sold more than 4 million copies globally, TIME, February 2021

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THE BURIED GIANT
Kazuo Ishiguro
Cover of THE BURIED GIANT

THE BURIED GIANT

by Kazuo Ishiguro · Knopf

5 wks on list

*Kazuo Ishiguro's new novel Klara and the Sun is now available * The Romans have long since departed, and Britain is steadily declining into ruin. The Buried Giant begins as a couple, Axl and Beatrice, set off across a troubled land of mist and rain in the hope of finding a son they have not seen for years. They expect to face many hazards - some strange and other-worldly - but they cannot yet foresee how their journey will reveal to them dark and forgotten corners of their love for one another. 'A beautiful fable with a hard message at its core . . . There won't, I suspect, be a more important work of fiction published this year.' The Times 'An exceptional novel . . . The Buried Giant does what important books do: it remains in the mind long after it has been read, refusing to leave.' New York Times Book Review 'A beautiful, heartbreaking book about the duty to remember and the urge to forget.' Observer

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NYPD RED 3
James Patterson and Marshall Karp
Cover of NYPD RED 3

NYPD RED 3

by James Patterson and Marshall Karp · Little, Brown

3 wks on list

It's the start of Hollywood on Hudson, and New York City is swept up in the glamour. Every night, the red carpet rolls out for movie stars arriving at premieres in limos; the most exclusive restaurants close for private parties for wealthy producers and preeminent directors; and thousands of fans gather with the paparazzi, hoping to catch a glimpse of the most famous and beautiful faces in the world. With this many celebrities in town, special task force NYPD Red is on high alert-and they can't afford to make a single mistake. Then a world-renowned producer fatally collapses at his power breakfast, and top NYPD Red Detective Zach Jordan is the first one on the scene. Zach works with his beautiful new partner, Detective Kylie MacDonald-who also happens to be his ex-girlfriend-to discover who the murderer might be. But this is only the beginning: the most brutal, public, and horrifyingly spectacular crimes they've ever encountered are about to send all of New York into chaos, putting NYPD Red on the ropes. Zach and Kylie know there's no way of telling what a killer this deranged will do next. With the whole world watching, they have to find a way to stop a psychopath who has scripted his finale down to the last explosive detail. With larger-than-life action, relentless speed, and white-knuckle twists, NYPD Red is the next mega-blockbuster from "The Man Who Can't Miss." (TIME)

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CUBA STRAITS
Randy Wayne White
Cover of CUBA STRAITS

CUBA STRAITS

by Randy Wayne White · Putnam

2 wks on list

The remarkable new novel in the Doc Ford series by New York Times–bestselling author Randy Wayne White. Doc Ford’s old friend, General Juan Garcia, has gone into the lucrative business of smuggling Cuban baseball players into the U.S. He is also feasting on profits made by buying historical treasures for pennies on the dollar. He prefers what dealers call HPC items—high-profile collectibles—but when he manages to obtain a collection of letters written by Fidel Castro between 1960–62 to a secret girlfriend, it’s not a matter of money anymore. Garcia has stumbled way out of his depth. First Garcia disappears, and then the man to whom he sold the letters. When Doc Ford begins to investigate, he soon becomes convinced that those letters contain a secret that someone, or some powerful agency, cannot allow to be made public. A lot happened between Cuba and the United States from 1960–62. Many men died. A few more will hardly be noticed.

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THE FIFTH GOSPEL
Ian Caldwell
Cover of THE FIFTH GOSPEL

THE FIFTH GOSPEL

by Ian Caldwell · Simon & Schuster

5 wks on list

Ian Caldwell returns with a new intellectual thriller that confirms his place among the most ambitious popular storytellers working today, as a lost gospel, a relic, and a dying pope's final wish send two brothers - both Vatican priests - on a quest to untangle Christianity's biggest mystery. 2004. As Pope John Paul II's reign enters its twilight, a mysterious exhibit is under construction at the Vatican Museums. A week before it is scheduled to open, its curator is murdered. The same night, a violent break-in rocks the home of the curator's research partner, Father Alex Andreou, a Greek Catholic priest who lives inside the Vatican with his five-year-old son. When the papal police fail to identify a suspect in either crime, Father Alex, desperate to keep his family safe, undertakes his own investigation. To find the killer he must reconstruct the dead curator's secret. But just as he begins to understand the truth about his friend's death, and its consequences for the future of the world's two largest Christian Churches, Father Alex finds himself hunted down ...

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THE HARDER THEY COME
T. Coraghessan Boyle
Cover of THE HARDER THEY COME

THE HARDER THEY COME

by T. Coraghessan Boyle · Ecco/HarperCollins

1 wks on list

Sten Stenson, Vietnam veteran and retired school principal, and his wife, Carolee, are on a cruise in Costa Rica when their coach excursion is hijacked. Sten's military training overtakes him and within moments one of the attackers lies dead. The rest flee and Sten finds himself hailed a hero by the tour group and everyone back home.Meanwhile, in the redwood forests north of San Francisco, Sara - a farrier who refuses to recognize the authority of the government - is arrested after failing to cooperate with police at a routine stop. A chance meeting with twenty-five-year-old Adam, Sten and Carolee's unstable son, sparks a strange but passionate relationship fuelled by a mutual hatred of the law. Adam, an angry and misunderstood outsider, perennially dressed in camouflage and with his head shaved to the bone, has an unhealthy obsession with nineteenth-century mountain man John Colter. As Adam's views and behaviour become steadily more extreme, he descends into a spiral of fanatical violence that is impossible for his family or Sara to halt.The latest novel by internationally bestselling author T. C. Boyle, The Harder They Come is as timely as it is provocative. A deep and disturbing meditation on the roots of American gun violence, it explores the fine line between heroism and savagery, and just how far a parent can be held accountable for the actions of his child.

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THE SKULL THRONE
Peter V. Brett
Cover of THE SKULL THRONE

THE SKULL THRONE

by Peter V. Brett · Del Rey

1 wks on list

NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • NAMED ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR BY BUZZFEED The fourth volume in The Demon Cycle, the powerful saga of humans winnowed to the brink of extinction by night-stalking demons, and the survivors who fight back, from New York Times bestselling author Peter V. Brett The Skull Throne of Krasia stands empty. Built from the skulls of fallen generals and demon princes, it is a seat of honor and ancient, powerful magic, keeping the demon corelings at bay. From atop the throne, Ahmann Jardir was meant to conquer the known world, forging its isolated peoples into a unified army to rise up and end the demon war once and for all. But Arlen Bales, the Warded Man, stood against this course, challenging Jardir to a duel he could not in honor refuse. Rather than risk defeat, Arlen cast them both from a precipice, leaving the world without a savior and opening a struggle for succession that threatens to tear the Free Cities of Thesa apart. In the south, Inevera, Jardir’s First Wife, must find a way to keep their sons from killing one another and plunging their people into civil war as they strive for glory enough to make a claim to the throne. In the north, Leesha Paper and Rojer Inn struggle to forge an alliance between the duchies of Angiers and Miln against the Krasians before it is too late. Caught in the crossfire is the duchy of Lakton—rich and unprotected, ripe for conquest. All the while, the corelings have been growing stronger, and without Arlen and Jardir, there may be none strong enough to stop them. Only Renna Bales may know more about the fate of the missing men, but she, too, has disappeared. . . . Look for Peter V. Brett’s complete Demon Cycle: THE WARDED MAN • THE DESERT SPEAR • THE DAYLIGHT WAR • THE SKULL THRONE • THE CORE

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ENDANGERED
C. J. Box
Cover of ENDANGERED

ENDANGERED

by C. J. Box · Putnam

Don’t miss the JOE PICKETT series—now streaming on Paramount+ In this New York Times bestseller, Wyoming game warden Joe Pickett is determined to find out who put his daughter’s life in danger—even if it kills him. Joe Pickett had good reason to dislike Dallas Cates, and now he has even more—Joe’s eighteen-year-old daughter, April, has run off with him. And then comes even worse news: She has been found in a ditch along the highway—alive, but just barely, the victim of blunt force trauma. Cates denies having anything to do with it, but Joe knows in his gut who’s responsible. What he doesn’t know is the kind of danger he’s about to encounter. Cates is bad enough, but Cates’s family is like none Joe has ever met.

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