Americanah by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie. Knopf. (978-0-30727108-2). The nuances and challenges of race, emigration, and cultural identification are explored through the lives of two Nigerian lovers.

Life After Life by Kate Atkinson. Reagan Arthur. (978-0-31617648-4). What would happen if death were just a new beginning?

Claire of the Sea Light by Edwidge Danticat. Knopf. (978-0-30727179-2). A bittersweet fable of modern Haiti told in luminous prose.

Too Bright to Hear Too Loud to See by Juliann Garey. Soho Press. (978-1-61695129-0). The fragmented and unsettling perspective of a man grappling with mental illness.

Enon by Paul Harding. Random House. (978-1-40006943-9). A father struggles with the accidental death of his fifteen year-old daughter. Grief on paper.

Unchangeable Spots of Leopards by Kristopher Jansma. Viking. (978-0-67002600-5). Around the world with a charmingly unreliable narrator in this coming-of-age tale.

The Dinner by Herman Koch. Hogarth. (978-0-77043785-5). If they sat next to us in a restaurant, we would do well to simply study our forks.

Constellation of Vital Phenomena by Anthony Marra. Hogarth. (978-0-77043640-7). An affirmation of life amid the chaos of war-torn Chechnya.

The Woman Upstairs by Claire Messud. Knopf. (978-0-30759690-1). A taut psychological drama of slow-burning anger.

Tale for the Time Being by Ruth Ozeki. Viking. (978-0-67002663-0). Tokyo meets Sunnyvale and British Columbia through a purple gel pen, a tsunami, and a Hello Kitty lunchbox with a side of quantum physics.

The Goldfinch by Donna Tartt. Little Brown. (978-0-31605543-7). A terrorist bomb blows apart a thirteen-year-old boy’s world.

Lawrence in Arabia: War, Deceit, Imperial Folly and the Making of the Modern Middle East by Scott Anderson. Doubleday. (978-0-81121875-7). A biography of place viewed through some of its most enigmatic and iconic historical figures.

Year Zero: A History of 1945 by Ian Baruma. Penguin. (978-1-59420436-4). A fresh look at the aftermath of World War II challenges the traditional, heroic narrative.

On Paper: The Everything of Its Two-Thousand Year History by Nicholas Basbanes. Knopf. (978-0-30726642-2). The most valuable, useful, pervasive invention after the wheel and before the computer.

To the End of June: The Intimate Life of American Foster Care by Cris Beam. Houghton Mifflin Harcourt. (978-0-15101412-5). When every person and social system you’ve trusted has let you down, can there be happy endings for anyone involved?

The Boys in the Boat: Nine Americans and Their Quest for Gold at the 1936 Berlin Olympics by Daniel James Brown. Viking. (978-0-67002581-7). Eight oarsman and their coxswain struggle to overcome the choppy waters and the hardships of the Great Depression in their pursuit of glory.

Five Days at Memorial: Life and Death in a Storm-Ravaged Hospital by Sheri Fink. Crown. (978-0-30771896-9). After Hurricane Katrina, systematic failures lead to morally ambiguous decisions.

The Riddle of the Labyrinth: the Quest to Crack an Ancient Code by Margalit Fox. Harper Collins. (978-0-06222883-3). Unsung classicist Alice Kober’s research provides the key to unlock “Linear B,” a 3,500 year-old language.

On the Map: A Mind-Expanding Exploration of the Way the World Looks by Simon Garfield. Gotham Books. (978-1-59240779-8). Wherever you go, you are here.

Johnny Cash: The Life by Robert Hilburn. Little, Brown. (978-0-31619475-4). The Man in Black in full color.

The Skies Belong to Us: Love and Terror in the Golden Age of Hijacking by Brendan I. Koerner. Crown. (978-0-30788610-1). High-flying tale of twisted romance and seventies politics.

Animal Wise: The Thoughts and Emotions of our Fellow Creatures by Virginia Morell. Crown. (978-0-30746144-5). No critters were harmed in the making of this book.

Command and Control: Nuclear Weapons, the Damascus Accident, and the Illusion of Safety by Eric Schlosser. Penguin. (978-1-59420227-8). An expose of dropped wrenches and lost bombs. Whoops!

Faraway Nearby by Rebecca Solnit. Viking. (978-0-67002596-1). Apricots and Alzheimer’s come together in a meditation on how lives are created and sustained through story.

The Ogre’s Wife: Poems by Ron Koertge. Red Hen. (978-1-59709723-9). Odd, eclectic, and magical verse.

Hum by Jamaal May. Alice James. (978-1-93858402-2). Detroit cityscapes resonate with the pulse of machinery and silence.