All Stars 2005

Fiction titles which received three or more starred reviews from major review sources.

• Epileptic
  Author: B., David
  Publisher: Pantheon $ 25 ISBN: 0375423184 Date: 2005
  PW Kirkus Booklist
  With stunning black-and-white illustrations, a noted cartoonist chronicles growing up with an epileptic older brother. The author charts his complicated relationship with his brother from childhood to adulthood, and the effects of the illness on the entire family.
  Updated 12.27.04
• Adored
  Author: Bagshawe, Tilly
  Publisher: Warner $ 23.95 ISBN: 0446576883 Date: 2005
  Kirkus PW LJ
  In the grand tradition of Sidney Sheldon and other masters of epic women's fiction comes a larger-than-life tale of a Hollywood dynasty, written by Tilly Bagshawe, a 31-year-old Cambridge graduate who has brilliantly revived the genre.
  Updated 4.19.05
• Black Hole
  Author: Burns, Charles
  Publisher: Pantheon $ 24.95 ISBN: 037542380x Date: 2005
  PW Booklist SLJ
  From one of the most fiercely admired graphic artists at work today comes a gothic masterpiece of existential fear and loathing, more than a decade in the making and already being hailed as a classic. Set in suburban Seattle in the mid-1970s, it is a horror tale unlike any other.
  Suggested Reading: Graphic Novels/Nonfiction and Comics Stars
  Updated 8.8.05
• 72 Hour Hold
  Author: Campbell, Bebe Moore
  Publisher: Knopf $ 24.95 ISBN: 1400040744 Date: 2005
  Kirkus LJ PW
  In this novel of family and redemption, Campbell draws on the powerful emotions of her own experience and African-American roots in this story of a mother who struggles to save her 18-year-old daughter from the devastating consequences of mental illness by forcing her to deal with her bipolar disorder.
  Suggested Reading: African American Stars
  Updated 5.23.05
• The March
  Author: Doctorow, E.L.
  Publisher: Random $ 25.95 ISBN: 0375506713 Date: 2005
  Kirkus PW Booklist
  In the last years of the Civil War, Gen. William Tecumseh Sherman marched 60,000 Union troops through Georgia and the Carolinas, cutting a 60-mile wide swath of pillage and destruction. That event comes back to life in this magisterial novel.
  Suggested Reading: Civil War Stars | Sherman Stars
  Updated 8.15.05
• The Painted Drum
  Author: Erdrich, Louise
  Publisher: HarperCollins $ 25.95 ISBN: 0060515104 Date: 2005
  Kirkus Booklist PW
  Faye Travers discovers a rare Native American drum while appraising an estate in New Hampshire. The drum's passage is traced both forward and backward in time, revealing how it changed the lives of those whose paths it crossed.
  Updated 6.29.05
• A Sudden Country
  Author: Fisher, Karen
  Publisher: Random $ 24.95 ISBN: 1400063221 Date: 2005
  PW Kirkus LJ
  A vivid and revelatory novel based on actual events of the 1847 Oregon migration, A Sudden Country follows two characters of remarkable complexity and strength in a journey of survival and redemption. - Publisher Marketing
  Suggested Reading: Western Stars | Debuts | Oregon Trail
  Updated 7.12.05
• Beasts of No Nation
  Author: Iweala, Uzodinma
  Publisher: HarperCollins $ 16.95 ISBN: 006079867x Date: 2005
  Kirkus Booklist LJ
  A harrowing, utterly original debut novel about the life of Agu, a child soldier in a war town African country. In a powerful, strikingly original voice, Iweala leads the reader through the random travels, betrayals and violence that mark Agu's new community. - Publisher Marketing.
  Suggested Reading: Child Soldiers | Debuts
  Updated 9.17.05
• The Historian
  Author: Kostova, Elizabeth
  Publisher: Little Brown $ 25.95 ISBN: 0316011770 Date: 2005
  PW Kirkus Booklist
  In this riveting debut novel, a young girl discovers her father's darkest secret and embarks on a harrowing journey across Europe to complete the quest he never could--the quest to find history's most legendary fiend: Dracula.
  Suggested Reading: Debuts
  Updated 4.25.05
• Sightseeing: Stories
  Author: Lapcharoensap, Rattawut
  Publisher: Grove $ 22 ISBN: 0802117880 Date: 2005
  Kirkus PW Booklist
  Set in contemporary Thailand and written with a grace and sophistication that belie the age of its young author, this masterful new collection contains generous, tender tales of family bonds, youthful romance, generational conflicts, and cultural shifts beneath the glossy surface of a warm setting.
  Updated 12.27.04
• The Pride of Carthage: A Novel of Hanibal's War
  Author: Durham, David Anthony
  Publisher: Doubleday $ 26.95 ISBN: 0385506031 Date: 2005
  PW LJ Booklist
  Featuring a vast cast of characters and nationalities, twists of fate, and tales of inspired leadership, this epic work of literary fiction chronicles the superb military leader of Carthage, Hannibal Barca, and his struggle against the mighty Roman Republic.
  Suggested Reading: All Stars | African American Stars
  Updated 1.18.05
• Veronica
  Author: Gaitskill, Mary
  Publisher: Pantheon $ 23 ISBN: 0375421459 Date: 2005
  Kirkus PW Booklist LJ
  The long-awaited novel from the acclaimed author of Bad Behavior is a dark fairy tale set in Paris and Manhattan in the 1980s--a story about beauty, narcissism and appetite, transience, aging and mortality.
  Suggested Reading: AIDS
  Updated 10.24.05
• Making It Up
  Author: Lively, Penelope
  Publisher: Viking $ 24.95 ISBN: 0670034479 Date: 2005
  Booklist Kirkus LJ
  New from the award-winning author of Moon Tiger comes a masterly crafted exploration of the myriad answers to the question, "What if . . ."
  Updated 10.11.05
• Dancing in the Dark
  Author: Phillips, Caryl
  Publisher: Knopf $ 23.95 ISBN: 1400043964 Date: 2005
  Booklist PW LJ
  This novel reimagines the remarkable, tragic, little-known life of Bert Williams, the first black entertainer in the U.S. to reach the highest levels of fame and fortune. W.C. Fields called him "the funniest man I ever saw, and the saddest man I ever knew."
  Suggested Reading: African American Stars | Biographical Fiction | Historical Fiction
  Updated 7.11.05
• Changed Man
  Author: Prose, Francine
  Publisher: HarperCollins $ 24.95 ISBN: 0060196742 Date: 2005
  Booklist PW Kirkus
  Masterfully plotted, darkly comic, A Changed Man illuminates the everyday transactions in lives, exposing what remains invisible in plain sight in America's drug-addicted and media-driven culture.
  Updated 1.5.05
• On Beauty
  Author: Smith, Zadie
  Publisher: Penguin $ 25.95 ISBN: 1594200637 Date: 2005
  Kirkus PW LJ
  Smith's third novel is an analysis of family life, the institution of marriage, and an honest look at people's deceptions. An infidelity, a death, and a legacy set in motion a chain of events that forces everyone to examine the assumptions which underpin their lives.
  Updated 8.24.05