Best Selling Books by Jane Smiley

Promotional material intended for booksellers: 2 separately bound excerpts issued in a slipcase.

#1 NATIONAL BESTSELLER A NEW YORK TIMES NOTABLE BOOK "A WISE, SPIRITED NOVEL . . . [IN WHICH] SMILEY PLUMBS THE WONDROUSLY STRANGE WORLD OF HORSE RACING." --People "ONE OF THE PREMIER NOVELISTS OF HER GENERATION, possessed of a mastery of craft and an uncompromising vision that grow more powerful with each book . . . Racing''s eclectic mix of classes and personalities provides Smiley with fertile soil . . . Expertly juggling storylines, she investigates the sexual, social, psychological, and spiritual problems of wealthy owners, working-class bettors, trainers on the edge of financial ruin, and, in a typically bold move, horses." --The Washington Post "A NOVEL OF PASSION IN EVERY SENSE . . . [SHE DOES] IT ALL WITH APLOMB . . . WITH A DEMON NARRATIVE INTELLIGENCE." --The Boston Sunday Globe "WITTY, ENERGETIC . . . It''s deeply satisfying to read a work of fiction so informed about its subject and so alive to every nuance and detail . . . [Smiley''s] final chapters have a wonderful restorative quality." --The New York Times Book Review "RICHLY DETAILED, INGENIOUSLY CONSTRUCTED . . . YOU WILL REVEL IN JANE SMILEY''S HORSE HEAVEN." --San Diego Union-Tribune Chosen by the Los Angeles Times as One of the Best Books of the Year

Longlisted for the 2014 National Book Award From the winner of the Pulitzer Prize: a powerful, engrossing new novel--the life and times of a remarkable family over three transformative decades in America. On their farm in Denby, Iowa, Rosanna and Walter Langdon abide by time-honored values that they pass on to their five wildly different children: from Frank, the handsome, willful first born, and Joe, whose love of animals and the land sustains him, to Claire, who earns a special place in her father''s heart. Each chapter in Some Luck covers a single year, beginning in 1920, as American soldiers like Walter return home from World War I, and going up through the early 1950s, with the country on the cusp of enormous social and economic change. As the Langdons branch out from Iowa to both coasts of America, the personal and the historical merge seamlessly: one moment electricity is just beginning to power the farm, and the next a son is volunteering to fight the Nazis; later still, a girl you''d seen growing up now has a little girl of her own, and you discover that your laughter and your admiration for all these lives are mixing with tears. Some Luck delivers on everything we look for in a work of fiction. Taking us through cycles of births and deaths, passions and betrayals, among characters we come to know inside and out, it is a tour de force that stands wholly on its own. But it is also the first part of a dazzling epic trilogy--a literary adventure that will span a century in America: an astonishing feat of storytelling by a beloved writer at the height of her powers.

From the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of A Thousand Acres—and “one of her generation’s most eloquent chroniclers of ordinary familial love” (The New York Times)—comes two exquisite twin novellas that chronicle the difficult choices that reshape the lives of two very different families. In Ordinary Love, Smiley focuses on a woman’s infidelity and the lasting, indelible effects it leaves on her children long after her departure. Good Will portrays a father who realizes how his son has been affected by his decision to lead a counterculture life and move his family to a farm. As both stories unfold, Smiley gracefully raises the questions that confront all families with the characteristic style and insight that has marked all of her work.

Gee Whiz is a striking horse, and only part of that is because of his size. He is tall, but also graceful, yet his strides big but precise. At the same time, he keeps his eye on things, not as if he''s suspicious, but as if he''s curious. When Abby is confronted with an onslaught of reminders of just how little of the world she has seen, she finds herself connecting with Gee Whiz''s calm and curious nature, and his desire to know more. Her brother receives a draft notice to Vietnam, her friends return for the holidays with stories from their boarding school in Southern California, and the wise, lovable Brother Abner opens her eyes with tales of his many years spent traveling. At the same time, her beloved Jack and True Blue are both faced with opportunites to broaden their horizons away from the ranch. Will she let them go, with hopes that she might one day do the same?

From the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of A Thousand Acres comes an essential guide for writers and readers alike: an exhilarating tour through one hundred novels that "inspires wicked delight.” —Los Angeles Times Book Review From classics such as the thousand-year-old Tale of Genji to fiction by Zadie Smith, Jane Smiley explores the power of the form, looking at its history and variety, its cultural impact, and just how it works its magic. She invites us behind the scenes of novel-writing, sharing her own habits and spilling the secrets of her craft, and offering priceless advice to aspiring authors. Every page infects us anew with the passion for reading that is the governing spirit of this gift to book lovers everywhere.

The luminous novella and stories in The Age of Grief explore the vicissitudes of love, friendship, and marriage with all the compassion and insight that have come to be expected from Jane Smiley, the Pulitzer Prize—winning author of A Thousand Acres. In “The Pleasure of Her Company,” a lonely, single woman befriends the married couple next door, hoping to learn the secret of their happiness. In “Long Distance,” a man finds himself relieved of the obligation to continue an affair that is no longer compelling to him, only to be waylaid by the guilt he feels at his easy escape. And in the incandescently wise and moving title novella, a dentist, aware that his wife has fallen in love with someone else, must comfort her when she is spurned, while maintaining the secret of his own complicated sorrow. Beautifully written, with a wry intelligence and a lively comic touch, The Age of Grief captures moments of great intimacy with grace, clarity, and indelible emotional power.

From the bestselling, Pulitzer Prize–winning novelist, a rousing novel that follows two young women fleeing a divided America: one running toward a dazzling future and the other running from a troubled past Christmas, 1857. America''s future is precarious; civil war looms on the horizon. After her abolitionist husband is murdered in the lawless Kansas Territory, Lidie Newton returns, in mourning, to her hometown of Quincy, Illinois. But her sisters have little comfort to offer, and Lidie is haunted by the memories of her failures—until she takes an interest in her niece, Annie. Beautiful, self-assured, and mischievous, Annie sticks out in Quincy. She becomes an actress at the local theater, and when she is offered the opportunity to perform abroad, she decides to run away. But travel is dangerous for a young unmarried woman, so Lidie, armed with her pistol and her wit, goes with her. The two women embark on a perilous journey across the Atlantic, rushing toward an unknown future in England. Once they arrive in Liverpool, they vanish into new roles in the household of Annie''s benefactor, Mr. Mallory Cunningham. Annie takes a stage name and finds her way to a career, while Lidie becomes her lady''s maid. But will either of them be content with her new lot in life? Exuberant and riveting, a sly commentary on truth and beauty and fulfillment that resonates with our times, Lidie delivers a panoramic portrait of a volatile era and the headstrong women trying to live an honest life in it.

From the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of A Thousand Acres comes a brilliant literary thriller set in Manhattan that’s “as taut and chilling as anything Hitchcock put on film" (San Francisco Chronicle). “A first-rate cliffhanger.” —The New York Times Book Review Alice Ellis is a Midwestern refugee living in Manhattan. Still recovering from a painful divorce, she depends on the companionship and camaraderie of tightly knit circle of friends. At the center of this circle is a rock band struggling to navigate New York’s erratic music scene, and an apartment/practice space with approximately fifty key-holders. One sunny day, Alice enters the apartment and finds two of the band members shot dead. As the double-murder sends waves of shock through their lives, this group of friends begins to unravel, and dangerous secrets are revealed one by one. When Alice begins to notice things amiss in her own apartment, the tension breaks out as it occurs to her that she is not the only person with a key, and she may not get a chance to change the locks. Jane Smiley applies her distinctive rendering of time, place, and the enigmatic intricacies of personal relationships to the twists and turns of suspense. The result is a thriller that will keep readers guessing up to its final, shocking conclusion.

NATIONAL BESTSELLER • From the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of A Thousand Acres comes a “smashing...fascinating” novel (The New York Times Book Review) that conjures all the American obsessions of the 1980s: sex, greed, envy, real estate, and the American dream. In her subversively funny and genuinely moving new novel, Jane Smiley nails down several American preoccupations with the expertise of a master carpenter. Forthright, likable Joe Stratford is the kind of local businessman everybody trusts, for good reason. But it’s 1982, and even in Joe’s small town, values are in upheaval: not just property values, either. Enter Marcus Burns, a would-be master of the universe whose years with the IRS have taught him which rules are meant to be broken. Before long he and Joe are new best friends—and partners in an investment venture so complex that no one may ever understand it. Add to this Joe’s roller coaster affair with his mentor’s married daughter. The result is as suspenseful and entertaining as any of Jane Smiley’s fiction.

Offers a profile of Dickens''s life, interpretations of his major works, and a study of his narrative techniques, themes, characters, and style.

From the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of A Thousand Acres—and "a diverse and masterly writer” (The New York Times Book Review)—comes an enthralling epic tale, written in the tradition of the old Norse sagas, that takes us to fourteenth-century Greenland and tells the story of a proud landowner and his unforgettable family. Jane Smiley brings us to a farflung place of glittering fjords, blasting winds, sun-warmed meadows, and high, dark mountains. This is the story of one family: proud landowner Asgeir Gunnarsson; his daughter Margret, whose willful independence leads her into passionate adultery and exile; and his son Gunnar, whose quest for knowledge is at the compelling center of this unforgettable book. Jane Smiley immerses us in this world of farmers, priests, and lawspeakers, of hunts and feasts and long-standing feuds, and by an act of literary magic, makes a remote time, place, and people not only real but dear to us.

NATIONAL BESTSELLER • From the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of A Thousand Acres comes an irresistibly smart, witty, and engaging chronicle of a novelist''s lifelong obsession with horses. • "Exuberant...witty, completely delightful.... A kind of National Velvet for adults." —San Francisco Chronicle “Every horse story is a love story,” writes Jane Smiley, who has loved horses for most of her life and owned and bred them for a good part of it. To love something is to observe it with more than usual attention, and that is precisely what Smiley does in this In particular she follows a sexy filly named Waterwheel and a grey named Wowie (he “tells” a horse communicator that he wants it changed from Hornblower) as they begin careers at the racetrack. Filled with humor and suspense, and with discourses on equine intelligence, affection, and character, A Year at the Races is a winner.

From the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of A Thousand Acres comes the much-anticipated final volume in the acclaimed The Last Hundred Years Trilogy, following Some Luck and Early Warning. A richly absorbing new novel that is “a monumental portrait of an American family and an American century…. Smiley’s plot is a marvel of intricacy that’s full of surprises.” —Los Angeles Times It’s 1987, and the next generation of Langdons is facing economic, social, and political challenges unlike anything their ancestors have encountered. Michael and Richie, twin sons of World War II hero Frank, work in the high-stakes worlds of government and finance—but their fiercest enemies may be closer to home. Charlie, the charmer, struggles to find his way; Guthrie is deployed to Iraq, leaving the Iowa family farm in the hands of his younger sister, Felicity—who, as always, has her own ideas. Determined to help preserve the planet, she worries that her family farm’s land is imperiled, and not only by the extremes of climate change. Moving seamlessly from the power-brokered 1980s and the scandal-ridden ‘90s to our own present moment and beyond, Golden Age combines intimate drama, emotional suspense, and an intricate view of history, bringing to a magnificent conclusion the epic trilogy of one unforgettable family.