The History of Love

By Nicole Krauss

The History of Love spans of period of over 60 years and takes readers from Nazi-occupied Eastern Europe to present day Brighton Beach. At the center of each main character's psyche is the issue of loneliness, and the need to fill a void left empty by lost love.

Rough and Tumble

By Mark Bavaro

Dominic Fucillo (tight end for the Giants) is having a bad week. The commissioner is fining him $50,000 for attacking a referee, his estranged girlfriend won't talk to him and the team doctor tells him that he has a hole in his knee that will need career-ending surgery after the season. Worse, Dominic's hopes of capping his career with a Super Bowl ring are threatened when star Giants linebacker James Moze, a drug user who consorts with gamblers, is found severely beaten. As the gamblers and other parasites circle the team, the Giants make an improbable run for a championship, with Dominic fighting all the way.

Sundays in America

By Suzanne Strempek Shea

It's a fascinating project: attend 52 different churches in one year and report your first impressions. Shea, a New England novelist and former Catholic, engagingly writes of her initial visits to all kinds of churches: Shaker and Baptist, evangelical and mainline, African-American and Caucasian. Sometimes, these well-written first impressions yield intriguing analysis.

-Publishers Weekly (Apr.)