The Art of The Hobbit (9780547928258 $40) ~ J.R.R. Tolkien

J.R.R. Tolkien’s complete artwork for “The Hobbit,” presented for the first time in celebration of the 75th anniversary
When J.R.R. Tolkien wrote “The Hobbit,” he was already an accomplished amateur artist, and drew illustrations for his book while it was still in manuscript. “The Hobbit” as first printed had ten black-and-white pictures, two maps, and binding and dust jacket designs by its author. Later, Tolkien also painted five scenes for color plates, which comprise some of his best work. His illustrations for “The Hobbit” add an extra dimension to that remarkable book, and have long influenced how readers imagine Bilbo Baggins and his world.
Written and edited by leading Tolkien experts Wayne G. Hammond and Christina Scull, “The Art of The Hobbit”"by J.R.R. Tolkien” showcases the complete artwork created by the author for his story–including related pictures, more than one hundred sketches, drawings, paintings, maps, and plans. Some of these images are published here for the first time, others for the first time in color, allowing Tolkien’s “Hobbit” pictures to be seen completely and more vividly than ever before.

San Miguel (9780670026241 $27.95) ~ T.C. Boyle

On a tiny, desolate, windswept island off the coast of Southern California, two families, one in the 1880s and one in the 1930s, come to start new lives and pursue dreams of self-reliance and freedom. Their extraordinary stories, full of struggle and hope, are the subject of T. C. Boyle’s haunting new novel.

Thirty-eight-year-old Marantha Waters arrives on San Miguel on New Year’s Day 1888 to restore her failing health. Joined by her husband, a stubborn, driven Civil War veteran who will take over the operation of the sheep ranch on the island, Marantha strives to persevere in the face of the hardships, some anticipated and some not, of living in such brutal isolation. Two years later their adopted teenage daughter, Edith, an aspiring actress, will exploit every opportunity to escape the captivity her father has imposed on her. Time closes in on them all and as the new century approaches, the ranch stands untenanted. And then in March 1930, Elise Lester, a librarian from New York City, settles on San Miguel with her husband, Herbie, a World War I veteran full of manic energy. As the years go on they find a measure of fulfillment and serenity; Elise gives birth to two daughters, and the family even achieves a celebrity of sorts. But will the peace and beauty of the island see them through the impending war as it had seen them through the Depression?Rendered in Boyle’s accomplished, assured voice, with great period detail and utterly memorable characters, this is a moving and dramatic work from one of America’s most talented and inventive storytellers.

The Diviners (9780316126113 $19.99) ~ Libba Bray

Evie O’Neill has been exiled from her boring old hometown and shipped off to the bustling streets of New York City–and she is pos-i-toot-ly thrilled. New York is the city of speakeasies, shopping, and movie palaces! Soon enough, Evie is running with glamorous Ziegfield girls and rakish pickpockets. The only catch is Evie has to live with her Uncle Will, curator of The Museum of American Folklore, Superstition, and the Occult–also known as “The Museum of the Creepy Crawlies.”
When a rash of occult-based murders comes to light, Evie and her uncle are right in the thick of the investigation. And through it all, Evie has a secret: a mysterious power that could help catch the killer–if he doesn’t catch her first.

The Oath: The Obama White House and the Supreme Court (9780385527200 $28.95) ~ Jeffrey Toobin

From the moment John Roberts, the chief justice of the United States, blundered through the Oath of Office at Barack Obama’s inauguration, the relationship between the Supreme Court and the White House has been confrontational. Both men are young, brilliant, charismatic, charming, determined to change the course of the nation–and completely at odds on almost every major constitutional issue. One is radical; one essentially conservative. The surprise is that Obama is the conservative–a believer in incremental change, compromise, and pragmatism over ideology. Roberts–and his allies on the Court–seek to overturn decades of precedent: in short, to undo the ultimate victory FDR achieved in the New Deal.
This ideological war will crescendo during the 2011-2012 term, in which several landmark cases are on the Court’s docket–most crucially, a challenge to Obama’s controversial health-care legislation. With four new justices joining the Court in just five years, including Obama’s appointees Sonia Sotomayor and Elena Kagan, this is a dramatically–and historically–different Supreme Court, playing for the highest of stakes.

Is Everyone Hanging Out Without Me? (And Other Concerns) (9780307886279 $14) ~ Mindy Kaling

Mindy Kaling has lived many lives: the obedient child of immigrant professionals, a timid chubster afraid of her own bike, a Ben Affleck-impersonating Off-Broadway performer and playwright, and, finally, a comedy writer and actress prone to starting fights with her friends and coworkers with the sentence “Can I just say one last thing about this, and then I swear I’ll shut up about it?”
Perhaps you want to know what Mindy thinks makes a great best friend (someone who will fill your prescription in the middle of the night), or what makes a great guy (one who is aware of all elderly people in any room at any time and acts accordingly), or what is the perfect amount of fame (so famous you can never get convicted of murder in a court of law), or how to maintain a trim figure (you will not find that information in these pages). If so, you’ve come to the right book, mostly!
In “Is Everyone Hanging Out Without Me?, “Mindy invites readers on a tour of her life and her unscientific observations on romance, friendship, and Hollywood, with several conveniently placed stopping points for you to run errands and make phone calls. Mindy Kaling really is just a Girl Next Door–not so much literally anywhere in the continental United States, but definitely if you live in India or Sri Lanka.

Winter of the World: Book Two of the Century Trilogy (9780525952923 $36) ~ Ken Follett

Ken Follett’s “Fall of Giants,” the first novel in his extraordinary new historical epic, The Century Trilogy, was an international sensation, acclaimed as “sweeping and fascinating, a book that will consume you for days or weeks” (“USA Today”) and “grippingly told and readable to the end” (“The New York Times Book Review”). “If the next two volumes are as lively and entertaining as “Fall of Giants,”" said “The Washington Post,” “they should be well worth waiting for.”
“Winter of the World “picks up right where the first book left off, as its five interrelated families–American, German, Russian, English, Welsh–enter a time of enormous social, political, and economic turmoil, beginning with the rise of the Third Reich, through the Spanish Civil War and the great dramas of World War II, up to the explosions of the American and Soviet atomic bombs.
Carla von Ulrich, born of German and English parents, finds her life engulfed by the Nazi tide until she commits a deed of great courage and heartbreak. . . . American brothers Woody and Chuck Dewar, each with a secret, take separate paths to momentous events, one in Washington, the other in the bloody jungles of the Pacific. . . . English student Lloyd Williams discovers in the crucible of the Spanish Civil War that he must fight Communism just as hard as Fascism. . . . Daisy Peshkov, a driven American social climber, cares only for popularity and the fast set, until the war transforms her life, not just once but twice, while her cousin Volodya carves out a position in Soviet intelligence that will affect not only this war–but the war to come.
These characters and many others find their lives inextricably entangled as their experiences illuminate the cataclysms that marked the century. From the drawing rooms of the rich to the blood and smoke of battle, their lives intertwine, propelling the reader into dramas of ever-increasing complexity.
As always with Ken Follett, the historical background is brilliantly researched and rendered, the action fast-moving, the characters rich in nuance and emotion. With passion and the hand of a master, he brings us into a world we thought we knew, but now will never seem the same again.

The Raven Boys (9780545424929 $18.99) ~ Maggie Stiefvater

It is freezing in the churchyard, even before the dead arrive.
Every year, Blue Sargent stands next to her clairvoyant mother as the soon-to-be dead walk past. Blue herself never sees them–not until this year, when a boy emerges from the dark and speaks directly to her.
His name is Gansey, and Blue soon discovers that he is a rich student at Aglionby, the local private school. Blue has a policy of staying away from Aglionby boys. Known as Raven Boys, they can only mean trouble.
But Blue is drawn to Gansey, in a way she can’t entirely explain. He has it all–family money, good looks, devoted friends–but he’s looking for much more than that. He is on a quest that has encompassed three other Raven Boys: Adam, the scholarship student who resents all the privilege around him; Ronan, the fierce soul who ranges from anger to despair; and Noah, the taciturn watcher of the four, who notices many things but says very little.
For as long as she can remember, Blue has been warned that she will cause her true love to die. She never thought this would be a problem. But now, as her life becomes caught up in the strange and sinister world of the Raven Boys, she’s not so sure anymore.
From Maggie Stiefvater, the bestselling and acclaimed author of the “Shiver” trilogy and “The Scorpio Races,” comes a spellbinding new series where the inevitability of death and the nature of love lead us to a place we’ve never been before.

Here Comes Trouble: Stories From My Life (9781455513079 $15.99) ~Michael Moore

Michael Moore-Oscar-winning filmmaker, bestselling author, and the nation’s official provocateur laureate-is back, this time taking on an entirely new role, that of his own meta-Forrest Gump. Smashing the autobiographical mold, Moore presents twenty-four far-ranging, irreverent, and stranger-than-fiction vignettes from his own early life. One moment he’s an eleven-year-old boy lost in the U.S. Senate and found by Bobby Kennedy; and in the next, he’s inside the Bitburg cemetery with a dazed and confused Ronald Reagan. Fast-forwarding to 2003, he stuns the world from the Oscar stage by uttering the words “We live in fictitious times . . . with a fictitious president” in place of the usual “I’d like to thank the Academy.” And none of that even comes close to the night the friendly priest at the seminary decides to show him how to perform his own exorcism. Capturing the zeitgeist of the past fifty years, yet deeply personal and unflinchingly honest, HERE COMES TROUBLE takes readers on an unforgettable, take-no-prisoners ride through the life and times of Michael Moore. Alternately funny, eye-opening, and moving, it’s the book he has been writing-and living-his entire life.

Walter the Baker (9781442449411 $7.99) ~ Eric Carle

With good humor and the vibrantly colored paper collages that are known and loved the world over, Carle has concocted a delicious book that kids will savor as much as they love eating pretzels!