Divorcing Jack - Colin Bateman

In "post-terrorist" Belfast, the old hatreds continue to fester, and the politics remain deeply personal. Anyone, at any moment, may decide the war's not yet over. When his wife catches Belfast journalist Dan Starkey wrapped in the arms of a woman he hardly knows, his troubles are only beginning. Within hours his virtually anonymous girlfriend has been murdered, and before anyone can sort out whether she was killed by the IRA, Protestant extremists, or a jealous beau, Starkey becomes the killer's next target. He had always kept himself above Belfast's violent fray with the cynical, beer-drenched wit that fueled his notorious column in a Protestant newspaper. But when the Belfast police mark Starkey as their prime suspect, his wits are suddenly all he has left to keep himself ahead of both sides of the law--and to win back his wife. As he seeks to solve the crime himself, his frantic pursuit of the only clues to the killer's identity leads him deep into the most guarded reaches of Northern Irish political power. Overflowing with crisp dialogue and taut with sinister violence, "Divorcing Jack," winner of the Betty Trask Prize for Fiction, is a novel you won't want to put down.

Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone - J.K Rowling

Harry Potter has no idea how famous he is. That's because he's being raised by his miserable aunt and uncle who are terrified Harry will learn that he's really a wizard, just as his parents were. But everything changes when Harry is summoned to attend an infamous school for wizards, and he begins to discover some clues about his illustrious birthright. From the surprising way he is greeted by a lovable giant, to the unique curriculum and colorful faculty at his unusual school, Harry finds himself drawn deep inside a mystical world he never knew existed and closer to his own noble destiny.

Cultures of War: Pearl Harbor/Hiroshima/9-11/Iraq - John Dower

Author of the Pulitzer Prize-winning Embracing Defeat, John W. Dower returns with a groundbreaking comparative study of the dynamics and pathologies of war in modern times, presenting a conceptual breakthrough in the ways we think about "culture" in general and "war" in particular. Immediately after the attacks, the US media proclaimed 11 September a "day of infamy" comparable to Pearl Harbor. Cultures of War takes this analogy as a point of departure for a vivid analysis of the war with Japan, the war on terror and the war with Iraq. Dower addresses institutional failures of intelligence and imagination, the "strategic imbecility" of Japan's and America's wars of choice in 1941 and 2003, terror bombing and the targeting of civilians since the Second World War and the driving forces behind Pan-Asian and Pan-Islam movements. A final section compares occupied Japan and occupied Iraq.

Perfidia - James Ellroy

It is December 6 1941. America stands at the brink of World War II. Last hopes for peace are shattered when Japanese squadrons bomb Pearl Harbor. Los Angeles has been a haven for loyal Japanese-Americans - but now, war fever and race hate grip the city and the Japanese internment begins. The hellish murder of a Japanese family summons three men and one woman. William H. Parker is a captain on the Los Angeles Police. He's superbly gifted, corrosively ambitious, liquored-up and consumed by dubious ideology. He is bitterly at odds with Sergeant Dudley Smith - Irish emigre, ex-IRA killer, fledgling war profiteer. Kay Lake is a 21-year-old dilettante looking for adventure. Hideo Ashida is a police chemist and the only Japanese on the L.A. cop payroll. The investigation throws them together and rips them apart. The crime becomes a political storm centre that brilliantly illuminates these four driven souls - comrades, rivals, lovers, history's pawns. Perfidia is a novel of astonishments. It is World War II as you have never seen it, and Los Angeles as James Ellroy has never written it before. Here, he gives us the party at the edge of the abyss and the precipice of America's ascendance. Perfidia is that moment, spellbindingly captured. It beckons us to solve a great crime that, in its turn, explicates the crime of war itself. It is a great American novel.

The 100-Year-Old Man Who Climbed Out the Window and Disappeared - Jonas Jonasson

A reluctant centenarian much like Forrest Gump (if Gump were an explosives expert with a fondness for vodka) decides it's not too late to start over . . .

After a long and eventful life, Allan Karlsson ends up in a nursing home, believing it to be his last stop. The only problem is that he's still in good health, and in one day, he turns 100. A big celebration is in the works, but Allan really isn't interested (and he'd like a bit more control over his vodka consumption). So he decides to escape. He climbs out the window in his slippers and embarks on a hilarious and entirely unexpected journey, involving, among other surprises, a suitcase stuffed with cash, some unpleasant criminals, a friendly hot-dog stand operator, and an elephant (not to mention a death by elephant).

It would be the adventure of a lifetime for anyone else, but Allan has a larger-than-life backstory: Not only has he witnessed some of the most important events of the twentieth century, but he has actually played a key role in them. Starting out in munitions as a boy, he somehow finds himself involved in many of the key explosions of the twentieth century and travels the world, sharing meals and more with everyone from Stalin, Churchill, and Truman to Mao, Franco, and de Gaulle. Quirky and utterly unique, The 100-Year-Old Man Who Climbed Out the Window and Disappeared has charmed readers across the world.

Sun in a Bottle - Charles Seife

Fifty years ago scientists and futurists glowingly predicted a future in which cars would run on little fusion cells and the world would extract deuterium from the oceans for an inexhaustible supply of energy. Like all too many shining visions, fusion turned out to be a mirage. Award-winning science journalist Seife (Zero) takes a long, hard look at nuclear fusion and the failure of one scheme after another to turn it into a sustainable energy source. Many readers will remember the 1989 cold fusion debacle, but Seife explains why tabletop fusion isn't all that difficult to achieve. The problem, as with all fusion devices except the hydrogen bomb, is to produce more energy than the fusion process consumes. The two most promising approaches today use plasma and lasers, but again, Seife reports, scientists have been repeatedly frustrated. The United States and several other industrial nations recently agreed optimistically to sink billions of dollars into a 30-year fusion power project. Seife's approachable book should interest everyone concerned about finding alternative energy sources