LITTLE ROCK — Fiction
THE RACKETEER, by John Grisham. An imprisoned ex-lawyer schemes to exchange information about a murdered federal judge for his freedom.
GONE GIRL, by Gillian Flynn. A woman disappears on her fifth anniversary; is her husband a killer?
THREAT VECTOR, by Tom Clancy with Mark Greaney. As China threatens to invade Taiwan, the covert intelligence expert Jack Ryan Jr. aids his father’s administration-but his agency is no longer secret.
NOTORIOUS NINETEEN, by Janet Evanovich. The New Jersey bounty hunter Stephanie Plum tracks down a con man who disappeared from a hospital.
THE FORGOTTEN, by David Baldacci. The military investigator John Puller, the protagonist of Zero Day, probes his aunt’s mysterious death in Florida.
MERRY CHRISTMAS, ALEX CROSS, by James Patterson. Detective Alex Cross confronts both a hostage situation and a terrorist act at Christmas.
THE CASUAL VACANCY, by J.K. Rowling. The sudden death of a parish councilman reveals bitter social divisions in an idyllic English town.
TWO GRAVES, by Douglas Preston and Lincoln Child. Special Agent Aloysius Pendergast pursues a serial killer as well as his abducted wife.
THE BLACK BOX, by Michael Connelly. The Los Angeles detective Harry Bosch links a recent crime to the killing of a photographer amid the 1992 race riots.
THE TWELVE TRIBES OF HATTIE, by Ayana Mathis. Fifty-some years in the life of an African-American family, starting with Hattie Shepherd, who leaves Georgia for Philadelphia in 1923.
Nonfiction
KILLING KENNEDY, by Bill O’Reilly and Martin Dugard. The host of “The O’Reilly Factor” recounts the events surrounding the assassination of John F. Kennedy.
THOMAS JEFFERSON, by Jon Meacham. The Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist celebrates Jefferson’s skills as a practical politician.
KILLING LINCOLN, by Bill O’Reilly and Martin Dugard. The host of “The O’Reilly Factor” recounts the events surrounding the assassination of Abraham Lincoln.
AMERICA AGAIN, by Stephen Colbert, Richard Dahm, Paul Dinello, Barry Julien, Tom Purcell et al. The mock pundit of Comedy Central’s “Colbert Report” tells how to bring America back from the brink.
NO EASY DAY, by Mark Owen with Kevin Maurer. An account by a former member of the Navy SEALs, written pseudonymously, of the mission that killed bin Laden.
THE SIGNAL AND THE NOISE, by Nate Silver. An examination of predictions, the ones that come true and the ones that don’t.
UNBROKEN, by Laura Hillenbrand. An Olympic runner’s story of survival as a prisoner of the Japanese in World War II A biography of Bruce Springsteen traces his climb from a working- class childhood to success and fame.
TAP DANCING TO WORK, by Carol J. Loomis. A collection of updated Fortune magazine articles on Warren Buffett, published between 1966 and 2012.
BRUCE, by Peter Ames Carlin. A biography of Bruce Springsteen traces his climb from a working-class childhood to success and fame.
ROLL ME UP AND SMOKE ME WHEN I DIE, by Willie Nelson. The musician muses on family, friends, Texas and life on the road.
Paperback fiction
FIFTY SHADES OF GREY, by E.L. James. An inexperienced college student falls in love with a tortured man who has particular sexual tastes; the first book in a trilogy.
LIFE OF PI, by Yann Martel. An allegory on the high seas, in which a teenage boy and a 450-pound tiger are thrown together in a lifeboat after a shipwreck.
FIFTY SHADES DARKER, by E.L. James. Daunted by Christian’s dark secrets, Anastasia ends their relationship-but desire still dominates her every thought; the second book in a trilogy.
FIFTY SHADES FREED, by E.L. James. Reunited, Anastasia and Christian face a world of possibilities, and unexpected challenges; the final volume in a trilogy.
THE PARIS WIFE, by Paula McLain. Hadley Richardson comes into her own as Ernest Hemingway’s long-suffering first wife in this novel, which chronicles their five-year marriage, much of it spent among aspiring writers in Paris.
Paperback nonfiction
PROOF OF HEAVEN, by Eben Alexander. A neurosurgeon recounts his near death experience during a coma.
TEAM OF RIVALS, by Doris Kearns Goodwin. The political genius of Abraham Lincoln.
HEAVEN IS FOR REAL, by Todd Burpo with Lynn Vincent. A boy’s encounter with Jesus and the angels.
THE ZOMBIE SURVIVAL GUIDE, by Max Brooks. The comedy writer offers a plan for safeguarding yourself from the living dead.
IN THE GARDEN OF BEASTS, by Erik Larson. William E. Dodd, the U.S. ambassador to Germany, and his daughter, Martha, in 1930s Berlin.
Perspective, Pages 71 on 12/30/2012