Cass Morgan’s The 100 (2013) is the first installment in a four-part series of young-adult dystopian novels. Through the experiences of four teenage protagonists, the story chronicles the efforts of a human space colony to recolonize Earth before oxygen levels on the space station drop too low to support life. Through an interwoven web of romantic relationships, friendships, personal trauma, and strife, the book explores the effect of oppression, the intersection of power and privilege... Read The 100 Summary

The 100-Year-Old Man Who Climbed Out the Window and Disappeared is the first novel by former Swedish journalist Jonas Jonasson. An action-adventure story with elements of comedy and historical fiction, the novel won the Swedish Booksellers Award in 2010; the German Pioneer Prize and the Danish Audiobook Award in 2011; and the Prix Escapades, an exclusive French literary competition, in 2012. Both critics and readers worldwide embraced the book. Within 12 years, it sold five... Read The 100-Year-Old Man Who Climbed Out the Window and Disappeared Summary

David Baldacci’s The 6:20 Man, first published in 2022, is a legal thriller marked by complex plotting and detailed character development. Baldacci examines Competitive Ambition, The Search for Truth, and Technology as a Double-Edged Sword as his protagonist, Travis Devine—a decorated US Army veteran who left the military under mysterious circumstances—learns to survive in a new profession as a low-level analyst in the competitive, cutthroat world of corporate finance in New York. While working for... Read The 6:20 Man Summary

The 7 1/2 Deaths of Evelyn Hardcastle (published as The Seven Deaths of Evelyn Hardcastle in Canada and the United Kingdom) is Stuart Turton’s first novel. The novel was first published in 2018 by Harper Collins; this guide references the first Canadian edition. The novel is primarily a mystery, with some elements of science fiction and fantasy. The plot features elements traditionally associated with the murder mystery genre made famous by Agatha Christie, since the... Read The 7½ Deaths of Evelyn Hardcastle Summary

The ABC Murders is a 1936 mystery novel by Agatha Christie. One of the leading writers of the Golden Age of detective fiction, Christie became known as the “Queen of Crime” and received a knighthood for her contributions to literature. She published over fifty novels in her lifetime and various short stories. The ABC Murders is her 13th novel featuring the Belgian private detective Hercule Poirot. This guide relies on the 2011 eBook edition. All... Read The ABC Murders Summary

The Abduction (2011) is a middle-grade legal thriller by John Grisham and the second installment in the Theodore Boone series. The novel follows 13-year-old legal prodigy Theodore “Theo” Boone after his best friend, April Finnemore, vanishes from her bedroom in the middle of the night. While the official police investigation focuses on an escaped convict with a connection to April, Theo uses his own knowledge of the law and his community to launch an independent... Read The Abduction Summary

The Academy (2025) is a young adult fiction novel written by Elin Hilderbrand and her daughter, Shelby Cunningham. It is the first book in a planned two-book series, with the second and final book planned to be released in 2026. The novel follows an academic year at Tiffin Academy, a prestigious boarding school in New England that gains attention when it moves to #2 in America Today’s rankings of top boarding schools in the country... Read The Academy Summary

The Acorn People is a short nonfiction memoir recounting how Ron Jones, a first-time camp counselor in the early 1970s, forms an unlikely bond with a group of children with disabilities at Camp Wiggin. Over five transformational days, the boys (Spider, Benny B., Aaron “Arid” Gerawlski, Thomas Stewart, and Martin) defy assumptions, forging their own team called the “Acorn People” and teaching Ron what true courage, creativity, and friendship look like. Set in an era... Read The Acorn People Summary

The Address Book is a work of nonfiction written by Deidre Mask and published in 2020. The book explores the history, cultural significance, and social implications of street names and addresses around the world. Mask is a lawyer, writer, and academic who has taught at Harvard and the London School of Economics; the book reflects this diverse background, incorporating a wide variety of academic fields and frameworks. Throughout the book, Mask blends historical research, personal... Read The Address Book Summary

The Adventures of Robin Hood is a retelling of extant medieval ballads and poems, as well as later stories and plays about the many adventures of the mythical English folk hero Robin Hood and his band of merry men. Written by Roger Lancelyn Green, the book is a purposefully collated collection of stories crafted into an episodic narrative and was originally published in 1956 by Penguin Publishing Group. A British biographer, children’s writer, and professional... Read The Adventures of Robin Hood Summary

Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s (1859-1930) The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes was published in 1892 as a collection of 12 short stories. The texts detail some of the earliest cases of the fictional detective Sherlock Holmes as narrated by his friend and collaborator, Doctor John Watson. The stories appear in the order in which they were originally published in The Strand Magazine.Conan Doyle was born in Edinburgh to Catholic parents, the second of 10 children. The... Read The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes Summary

The Alienist, by Caleb Carr, is a New York Times-bestselling historical thriller originally published in 1994 and adapted for television as a TNT series in 2018. A historian by trade, Carr applies his expertise to The Alienist as well as its sequels, The Angel of Darkness (1997) and Surrender, New York (2016). Set in New York City in 1896, The Alienist tells the story of Dr. Laszlo Kreizler, a psychologist (“alienist,” in the parlance of... Read The Alienist Summary

In The Alignment Problem: Machine Learning and Human Values, Brian Christian tackles the increasingly urgent issues that artificial intelligence (AI) poses to human ethics, public policy, and society at large. Published in 2020, the book falls within the nonfiction genre, focusing on technology, ethics, and computer science at Brown University and the University of Washington. Christian’s educational background combines degrees in computer science, philosophy, and poetry. His interdisciplinary background informs his exploration of the complex... Read The Alignment Problem Summary

Jeannette Haien’s debut novel, The All of It (1986), is a compact and philosophical literary novella set in rural Ireland. The story centers on Father Declan de Loughry, a Catholic priest whose faith and understanding are challenged by the story of his parishioner, Enda Dennehy. Following the death of Kevin Dennehy, the man the community believed to be her husband, Enda reveals their lifelong secret that they were siblings who survived a traumatic childhood together... Read The All of It Summary

The Alloy of Law (2011) is a fantasy novel by Brandon Sanderson. It is the first book in the Wax and Wayne series, which serves as the second era of his larger Mistborn saga, blending elements of the Western and detective mystery genres. The story follows Waxillium Ladrian, a lawman from the frontier “Roughs,” who returns to the industrial metropolis of Elendel to assume his duties as the head of a noble house, only to... Read The Alloy of Law Summary

The American Dream: A Short History of an Idea that Shaped a Nation, originally published in 2003 by Oxford University Press, is a popular history book by American cultural historian Jim Cullen. As an overview and critical analysis of the American Dream, this book adds some meat to the bones of a traditionally ambiguous concept. Cullen maintains an optimistic outlook about the usefulness of the various American Dreams and about the promise of America, despite... Read The American Dream Summary

Set in Monarch, Nebraska, and spanning 1992 to 2011, the story follows two intertwined lives across a decade of trauma, loss, and resilience. Each section takes place on May 1st, a date of devastating significance. The prologue shows an unnamed figure at Megan Tucker's grave, examining her driver's license and reflecting on the murder as their first kill.In 1992, Jules Delaney and Quinn Riley are eleventh-graders at Monarch High School. Jules is popular; Quinn is... Read The Anniversary Summary

Competitor... Read The Antidote Summary

The Armor of Light by Ken Follett is a 2023 historical epic set in the fictional English town of Kingsbridge at the dawn of the Industrial Revolution. The novel follows interconnected lives of the townsfolk as they face sweeping technological changes, class conflict, and the early rumblings of political reform. The Armor of Light is the fifth entry in the Kingsbridge series. This guide uses the 2024 Penguin edition of the novel.Content Warning: The source material... Read The Armor of Light Summary

The Art Forger is the fourth book from author B. A. Shapiro. With a PhD in sociology, Shapiro is well known for combining meticulous research with character-driven storytelling. Her academic background shapes her fiction; in The Art Forger, Shapiro approaches art and crime as social and philosophical questions as well as plot devices. Her characters explore questions about why society values certain objects and what the art world’s obsession with reputation and provenance mean about... Read The Art Forger Summary