Alison Anderson

What if Anton Chekhov, undisputed master of the short story, actually wrote a novel—and the manuscript  still existed? This tantalizing possibility drives The Summer Guest, a spellbinding narrative that draws together, across two centuries, the lives of three women through the discovery of a diary.

During the long, hot summer of 1888, an extraordinary friendship blossoms between Anton Chekhov and Zinaida Lintvaryova,

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The authors guide your through the process, from collection through cooking and bottling. With a family tradition as syrup makers, the Andersons have first-hand knowledge of commercial production: cooking with evaporators, grading the syrup, building a sugarhouse, pricing, and marketing. They share all this and more in their beginner's guide to the rustic tradition of making syrup.

A French food critic faces his mortality in an "entertaining [and] witty" novel by the New York Times–bestselling author of The Elegance of the Hedgehog (Newsday).
In the heart of Paris, in the same posh building made famous in The Elegance of the Hedgehog, Pierre Arthens, the greatest food critic in the world, is dying. Revered by some and reviled by many, Monsieur Arthens has been lording it over the world's...

In her twenty-eighth novel in as many years, best-selling Belgian novelist and international literary superstar Amélie Nothomb takes on a story for the ages: the life of Jesus. In a first-person voice as droll and irreverent as it is wise, Nothomb narrates Jesus's final days, from his trial to his crucifixion to the resurrection. Amid asides about his relationships with his mother and Judas, his love for Mary Magdalene, and his many miracles, we...

""You did nothing." Christine Steinmeyer thought the anonymous suicide note she found in her mailbox on Christmas Eve wasn't meant for her. But the man calling in to her radio show seems convinced otherwise. Bit by bit, strange things keep happening--it's as if someone has taken control of her life. Everything holding Christine's life together crumbles until all that is left is an unimaginable nightmare. Martin Servaz is on leave in a clinic for depressed...

Cécile, a stylish forty-seven-year-old, has spent the weekend visiting her parents in a provincial town southeast of Paris. By early Monday morning, she's exhausted. These trips back home are always stressful and she settles into a train compartment with an empty seat beside her. But it's soon occupied by a man she instantly recognizes: Philippe Leduc, with whom she had a passionate affair that ended in her brutal humiliation thirty years ago. In...

Alejandro de Yepes and Jes's Rocamora, young officers in the Spanish regular army, are stationed alone at Castillo when, out of nowhere, a friendly redhead appears to them in the cellar. There is something magnetic and deeply mysterious about this Petrus. Alejandro and Jes's are bewitched, and, in the middle of the sixth year of the longest war humankind has ever endured, they abandon their post to follow him across a bridge only he can see. Petrus...

Four adult siblings reconnect on a brief adventure through the Loire Valley in this international-bestselling novel by the beloved French author of Billie. Simon and his two sisters, Garance and Lola, flee their cousin's dull wedding-and Simon's judgmental wife-to visit their younger brother, Vincent, who is working as a guide at a château in the heart of the enchanting Tours countryside. For a few hours, they forget about kids, spouses, and work,...

"Winner of the 2001 French Human Rights Prize, French-Iranian author Fariba Hachtroudi's English-language debut explores themes as old as time: the crushing effects of totalitarianism and the infinite power of love. She was known as "Bait 455," the most famous prisoner in a ruthless theological republic. He was one of the colonels closest to the Supreme Commander. When they meet, years later, far from their country of birth, a strange, equivocal relationship...

After Helen, nearly 80, unexpectedly encounters her long-ago lover Frank Appledore in London, she begins a monologue directed at Frank of their meeting in 1950s Rome, where their diplomat parents were stationed. After Helen leaves for Amsterdam to study literature, she invites Frank to stay with her. In their 20s, Helen dedicates herself to a publishing career, while Frank drifts until he finally attempts painting at 28. Despite periodic sex and Helen's...