Theoretically, “Bandit Heaven” is about three bandit havens— Robbers Roost, Brown’s Hole and Hole in the Wall — in Wyoming and Utah. Canyons with only one way in, easily guarded by a few men from perches high above any approaches, they provided refuge for criminals on the run.

According to author Tom Clavin, these three were the most ...Read more

A 400-year-old spirit has been making its presence known. This voice from a long-gone past isn’t a Halloween haunt, though. It’s just never gone away.

Still, the spirit of William Shakespeare, who died in 1616, seems to be having an especially good time right now: In Washington D.C. over the summer, the Folger Shakespeare Library reopened �...Read more

Bestselling author Michael Connelly is grappling with real-life woes (his Siesta Key, Fla., house was pummeled by Hurricane Milton).

So are his characters.

“The Waiting,” Connelly’s 39th book and the sixth featuring cold-case cop Renee Ballard, finds Ballard’s team tackling multiple mysteries, including two that are ripped from the ...Read more

MINNEAPOLIS — It is no exaggeration to say that without “The Mary Tyler Moore Show,” writer Julie Marie Wade’s life might have turned out very differently.

Since the Florida professor discovered the classic sitcom in 1992 reruns, she has marked important points in her life by referencing similar moments from the show.

Wade, 45, ...Read more

Munich is notorious as a backdrop for historical events — the ascent of the Third Reich, the slaughter of Israeli athletes during the 1972 Olympics — but a lesser-known tragedy dominates David Peace’s electrifying novel, “Munichs.”

It’s the crash of a chartered propeller plane on February 6, 1958, just after a blizzardy take-off, ...Read more

I met Al Pacino one September afternoon long ago at the wedding of David Mamet and Rebecca Pidgeon at a place called Stillington Hall in Gloucester, Massachusetts, about an hour’s drive northeast of Boston. As the family gathered for pictures under a huge tree on the lawn, Pacino said, “C’mon, let’s get in on the pictures,” to me and ...Read more

Jamie Oliver has pulled his new children’s book from sale in response to claims it stereotypes Indigenous Australian people.

The celebrity chef, known for bestselling cookbooks, popular restaurants and long-running TV shows, got in front of the mounting controversy surrounding the recently released “Billy and the Epic Escape.”

The ...Read more

Here are the bestsellers for the week that ended Saturday, Nov. 2, compiled from data from independent and chain bookstores, book wholesalers and independent distributors nationwide, powered by Circana BookScan © 2024 Circana.

(Reprinted from Publishers Weekly, published by PWxyz LLC. © 2024, PWxyz LLC.)

HARDCOVER FICTION

1. "The Grey Wolf:...Read more

MINNEAPOLIS — Kate DiCamillo was walking down a south Minneapolis street when she realized she had to write “The Hotel Balzaar.”

It was in the early days of the pandemic, when we still hoped it was a short-term thing, but were all staying 6 feet apart. DiCamillo— a walker, as much as she’s a reader and a writer — was giving others ...Read more

Obi Kaufmann has spent a lot of time thinking about California’s fires.

“There’s no way I can pull this punch: To live in California, you are going to live with fire,” says Kaufmann during an hour-long phone conversation. “Now, being forewarned is being forearmed.”

Kaufmann is best known for his California Field Atlas books, a ...Read more

For almost 30 years as host of “The Tonight Show,” Johnny Carson was the last face millions of viewers saw before they closed their eyes and went to sleep. Carson, the critic David Thomson once noted, was “an American ideal and a mystery man, agreeable and withdrawn … always there, never graspable.”

“Carson the Magnificent” was ...Read more

Maylis de Kerangal’s new story collection, “Canoes,” is a moving, surprising exploration of grief and friendship across seven short stories and one novella, set in France, Canada and the United States.

Beautifully translated from the French by Jessica Moore, the stories plunge the reader into the sensory experiences of varied protagonists...Read more

LAS VEGAS — It’s the old chew toys that really get you.

Lying on its side, encircled in stone, there’s Peaches’ green rubber porcupine, collecting desert dust for decades.

Beneath a cast-iron cactus, oxidized by the elements, sits a phalanx of Friskey’s stuffed cats.

A few steps away, a dog’s teddy bear — head gnawed off, wisps ...Read more

Minneapolis author Louise Erdrich found novel inspiration while writing her latest novel, “The Mighty Red,” in the form of an injured crow, rescued by her daughter Pallas.

“Today” host Jenna Bush Hager chose Erdrich’s new New York Times best seller as her October book-club selection. And in a recent “Today” interview, Erdrich ...Read more

CHICAGO — If there are ghosts, the ghost of writer Bill Zehme might be found within the Chicago tavern/restaurant Twin Anchors, where he spent many living days and nights and where his face still stares from photos on the walls and where one recent night his friend Mike Thomas was saying, “I miss Bill.”

When Zehme died on March 26, 2023, ...Read more

In Michael Connelly's new crime thriller, "The Waiting," Los Angeles police detective Renée Ballard's cold-case team takes on the decades-old case of the Pillowcase Rapist after a random DNA hit delivers a fresh clue.

When her badge and gun are stolen from her car while surfing at Staircase Beach in Malibu early one morning she turns for help ...Read more

CHICAGO — Word traveled fast that the owner of a nearly century-old bookstore had died.

Social media posts were made. A news article written. Emails sent.

When Rebecca George, the co-owner of a bookstore in Chicago's Wicker Park neighborhood, was told the owner of The Gallery Bookstore in Lakeview had died and left behind a store full of ...Read more

If you’re a reader, you might want to keep your fingers crossed for a rainy November.

That way, you’ll have plenty of time to stay indoors with the new books coming this month.

Lazarus Man, Richard Price

For the past decade or so, Price has been Mr. Prestige TV, writing for acclaimed crime shows “The Wire” and “The Night Of,” as ...Read more