Paris, 1878. The Painted Girls is a tale of two remarkable sisters rendered uniquely vulnerable to the darker impulses of "civilized society." In the end, each will come to realize that her salvation--her survival, even--lies with the other.

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Kabul, 2007: The Taliban rules the streets. With a drug-addicted father and no brothers, Rahima and her sisters can rarely leave the house or attend school. Their only hope lies in the ancient Afghan custom of bacha posh, which allows young Rahima to dress and be treated as a son until she is of marriageable age. A century earlier, her great-great-grandmother Shekiba built a new life in the same way--the change took her on a journey from life in a rural village to the opulence of a king's palace in the bustling metropolis of Kabul. Crisscrossing in time, The Pearl That Broke Its Shell interweaves the stories of these two remarkable women who are separated by a century but share the same courage and dreams.

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An exquisitely beautiful young man in Victorian England retains his youthful and innocent appearance over the years while his portrait reflects both his age and evil soul as he pursues a life of decadence and corruption.

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In the Syrian city of Akka, Nathanael, a young Jewish doctor, and a Muslim girl called Zohra are about to fall in love, unaware that Jerusalem has just been taken by Saladin's army and that their city will soon be engulfed by war.

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In the last few decades what it means to be rich has changed dramatically; the wealthiest .01% are fast outpacing the rest of us. Chrystia Freeland, who has reported on the lives and minds of these new super-elites for nearly a decade, cracks open this tight-knit world. She grounds her interviews in the economics and history of modern capitalism.

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The Postmistress is an unforgettable tale of the secrets we must bear, or bury. It is about what happens to love during war­time, when those we cherish leave. And how every story-of love or war-is about looking left when we should have been looking right.

(13 copies)     Reserve