Collection: Adult

From bar bets to Nobel Prizes, viral outbreaks to lottery wins, how statistics shapes our choices, reveals hidden truths, and guides us toward certainty in uncertain times.

We live in an uncertain world. Morning commutes, natural disasters, global pandemics--our lives are riddled with events whose outcomes we can never know with certainty. In What Are the Odds? Mark Prell reveals how statistical thinking empowers us to navigate this uncertainty with clarity and confidence. Whether weighing the benefits of different medications or deciding if home insurance is worth the steep cost, Prell shows that just as important as asking what the data says is asking how reliable it is. Describing the core concepts and methods of statistical thinking, he teaches us how to extract meaningful information from raw data, and crucially, to recognize data that's been cherry-picked, fabricated, or is simply wrong. As we ask if survey responses are truthful, estimate the number of deaths from the Covid pandemic, and plan for retirement, we develop a skill set to test and update our assumptions, to make more accurate forecasts, and above all, to assess the certainty of our conclusions.

Through unforgettable stories of statistical ingenuity, Prell demonstrates that the underlying math can be intuitive and even fun. And as he turns us all into statisticians, he reminds us that statistics is about more than manipulating data--it's about joining a community of statisticians committed to truth and integrity.

"A book that will refresh your soul."--Carol Drinkwater, author of The Olive Farm: A Memoir of Life, Love, and Olive Oil in the South of France

A story of shelter, generosity and welcome--and a courageous leap into a new life.

In the summer of 2000, Julian Hoffman and his wife Julia found themselves disillusioned with city life. Overwhelmed by long commutes, they stumbled upon a book about Prespa, Greece--a remote corner of Europe filled with stone villages, snow-capped mountains and wildlife, which they would soon call home.

Prespa is a crossroads. Where three countries come together around two huge lakes, where limestone collides with granite and heat-pulsing Mediterranean ecosystems meet their colder, Balkan relatives. Here, languages, wartime histories and rivers converge, and pelicans, bears and people leave their footprints on the water's edge--next to unexploded bombs.

Lifelines is not only the tale of a courageous leap into a new life, but of seasons punctuated by unforgettable encounters, from a stare-down with a bear surrounded by spring wildflowers to a deep-winter meeting with fourteen wrens sheltering above a frozen doorway. And into this place encircled by mountains, Julian seamlessly weaves an intricate web of stories - of conflict and possibility; of refuge lost and found; of the wild lifelines that connect us all as we move through the world seeking a home.

SHOULD NONHUMANS HAVE RIGHTS IN LAW AND POLITICS?

Over the last twenty-five years, the concept of per-sonhood has become central to many contentious debates. Corporations have won free speech protections, as if they were individuals. The right to life or freedom has been claimed on behalf of fetuses, trees, and elephants. The fund of human rights is spilling over into the nonhuman.

The Problem of Personhood reveals the unsettling consequences of granting rights to imagined persons, such as Sophia the robot citizen or New Zealand's Whanganui River. Synthesizing the political and phil­osophical debates on personhood and drawing on a varied cast of thinkers that includes Simone Weil, Hannah Arendt, and Dr. Seuss, Lisa Siraganian un­covers the disturbing impact of this contemporary development. Awarding rights to robots and rivers all too easily becomes a legal tool to turn people into capital. When robot Sophia is made a citizen, "she" is transformed into a subject in the law without the corre­sponding legal duties that protect us from her.

At the root of this trend is the US Supreme Court's Citizens United ruling that grants First Amendment rights to corporations as if they were individuals. The result has not been the transformation of things into humans so much as humans into things, when animals and the environment would be better protected with reference to our humanity rather than to theirs.

"Unnervingly funny and subversive . . . this account of life under authoritarian siege is fiercely local and incontestably universal, harrowing and mutinously entertaining: a sure-fire Booker contender."--The Guardian

From the brilliant Booker-longlisted Mohammed Hanif comes a lively, rich novel about the power of language, friendship, and protest in the face of political turmoil

When Pakistan's first elected Prime Minister Zulfikar Ali Bhutto is hanged, the people of OK Town refuse to believe he is dead and fight to bring him back.

In the heart of the city, Sir Baghi is surprised by a knock at the door of the Rebel English Academy, his tuition center offering affordable English lessons. An unexpected visitor, Sabiha, seeks refuge at the Academy--her husband has just died in a house fire, and she is suspected of killing him, although she insists she only ran away from a burning building. Baghi encourages Sabiha to write, and a lifetime of secrets begin to unspool on the page.

Meanwhile Captain Gul, a disgraced intelligence officer, has been banished to OK Town, where he aims to squash the protesters wanting to bring Bhutto back from the dead. But his duties and romantic desires begin to overlap, and his already dubious power is threatened.

In Rebel English Academy, Pakistan is struggling under martial law after the execution of its former leader. Mohammed Hanif has constructed a vibrant cast of interconnected characters who face this changing landscape with violence, passion, and sharp humor. Wry, searing, and deeply relevant, Rebel English Academy is a triumphant new novel about political power, religion, education, sexuality, and perpetual dissent.

In the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, venereal disease, or the 'pox, ' was a dreaded diagnosis throughout Europe. Its ghastly marks, along with their inexorable link to sex, were so stigmatizing that it was commonly called 'the secret disease.' How do we capture everyday experiences of a disease that so few people admitted having? Olivia Weisser's remarkable history invites readers into the teeming, vibrant pox-riddled streets of early modern London. She uncovers the lives of the poxed elite as well as of the maidservants and prostitutes who left few words behind, showing how marks of the disease offered a language for expressing acts that were otherwise unutterable. This new history of sex, stigma, and daily urban life takes readers down alleys where healers peddled their tinctures, enters kitchens and gardens where ordinary sufferers made cures, and listens in on intimate exchanges between patients and healers in homes and in taverns.

Val Walker's profound journey through trauma and spiritual exploration is both heart-wrenching and inspiring. This book beautifully captures the resilience of the human spirit and the transformative power of connection and awe. A must-read for anyone seeking healing and understanding. -- Shari Botwin, LCSW, author of Thriving After Trauma and Stolen Childhoods
Val Walker's story of healing began in her darkest moment.

Homeless, running from a violent partner, and battling suicidal depression, she found herself sitting by a river holding a bottle of pills in one hand and a bottle of red wine to wash them down in the other. Out of the twilight sky a majestic blue heron circled and landed just a few feet away. Something in the heron's piercing eyes caused her to stop swallowing the pills. In that moment, she realized that there was just too much beauty and magic in the world to give up.

Thus began a decades long quest to understand how wondrous encounters can spark healing from trauma and grief. This inspiring guide shares healing stories sparked by wondrous experiences and unpacks the neuroscience that explains how wonder helps our brains and bodies heal.

The Analects of Confucius has been the bedrock of Chinese culture for over 2,500 years, shaping the trajectory of human history in ways unmatched by nearly any other secular philosophy. But until now, translations of this compendium of Confucian wisdom have forced women--half of humanity--into the philosophical background.

Renowned scholar Erin M. Cline boldly challenges this legacy, breathing new life into this monumental work with a fresh and accessible translation, presenting not only an innovative thematic structure but also a vital reinterpretation for modern readers. By employing gender-neutral language throughout, guided by the text itself, Cline dismantles patriarchal misinterpretations of the Analects, and in the process reveals a Confucius who speaks to everyone. This groundbreaking edition will redefine Confucian thought for a new generation of readers in English.

Originating nearly four thousand years ago in ancient Mesopotamia, the epic of Gilgamesh tells the story of a tyrannical king and his wild counterpart, Enkidu, spawned by the gods to rein in the king's cruel tendencies. They face off in a violent wrestling match, but the clash forges a bond between them. The deep, fiercely intimate camaraderie that emerges carries the two men through extraordinary adventures, from a bloody battle with the fearsome forest guardian, Humbaba, to a cataclysmic struggle with the Bull of Heaven. As the friends venture further into the unknown, they find themselves confronted with the ultimate, defining fate of all humankind.

At once a story about love among men and a timeless meditation on loss, grief, and the longing to outlast death, Gilgamesh is at its core one of the oldest and most majestic depictions of human resilience and dignity.

Now, in the hands of Simon Armitage, poet laureate of the United Kingdom, this primeval epic swells and flows in rhythmic, contemporary English with a vitality and immediacy that only a genuinely poetic rendering can achieve. Grounded in the latest scholarship but always propulsively readable, Armitage's version brings the ancient text to new life, offering a new generation of readers a thrilling portal into the very dawn of storytelling.

PRAISE FOR SIMON ARMITAGE
"Simon Armitage . . . continues the tradition of great poet-translators such as Edward FitzGerald, Arthur Waley, and Seamus Heaney."--John Ashbery

"He reminds me of early Auden, a comparison that doesn't strike me as extravagant."--Peter Sansom, The Poetry Business

"Simon Armitage's work is earthed--no matter what he is writing about, his poetry is never shallow-rooted." --Kate Kellaway, Guardian

Praise for Sir Gawain and the Green Knight
"Drives the force of the old poem through the green Armitage fuse. Highly charged work" --Seamus Heaney, Nobel Prize-winning translator of Beowulf

"Full of make-believe and festivity, this wonderful narrative poem possesses a Mozartean lightness and wit. . . . Deftly replicate[s] much of the feel and rhythm of the Middle English original." --Michael Dirda, Wall Street Journal

Praise for Pearl
"[Armitage] conveys that feeling of the almost-but-not-quite comprehensible, the feeling that can make medieval art at once eerie and wonderful."
--Jo Livingstone, The New Yorker

"Armitage continues to contribute the same service to culture as Carson, Heaney, Hughs and Graves; he gives blood transfusions to the texts which deserve preservation." --Huffington Post [UK]

A NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER! - A READ WITH JENNA TODAY SHOW BOOK CLUB PICK - A heartbreaking, empowering, often hilarious debut memoir about a mother's all-consuming love, a son's perilous quest to discover the world beyond the front door and the unregulated homeschool system that impacts millions like him

*A Top 10 Amazon Book of the Month Pick*
*A Washington Post Book to Read in January!*
*A Library Journal Big Book of the Week!*
*A BookRiot Best New Nonfiction of January!*

Stefan Merrill Block was nine when his mother pulled him from school, certain that his teachers were "stifling his creativity." Hungry for more time with her boy who was growing up too quickly, she began to instruct Stefan in the family's living room. Beyond his formal lessons in math, however, Stefan was largely left to his own devices and his mother's erratic whims, such as her project to recapture her twelve-year-old son's early years by bleaching his hair and putting him on a crawling regimen.
In this "stunning debut memoir" (Jenna Bush Hager, The Today Show), Block beautifully reflects on his experiences in both traditional and at-home education systems, delving into:

• The inception of the homeschooling movement and its massive rise throughout America
• Early memories of Block's mother, and a poignant look into their dysfunctional mother-son story
• Block's reentry into the public school system, both jarring yet insightful, and the bullying he withstood
• His emotional journey towards forgiveness, love, and hope as he becomes a parent himself

At once a novelistic portrait of mother and son, and an illuminating window into an overlooked corner of the American education system, Homeschooled is a moving, funny and ultimately inspiring story of a son's battle for a life of his own choosing, and the wages of a mother's insatiable love.

Praise for Homeschooled

"One of the most beautiful books I've ever read."--Jenna Bush Hager

"Absorbing."--Washington Post

"A revealing and deeply empathetic portrait of a complex relationship between mother and son." -BookPage, starred review

"Astonishing."--The New York Post

"Clearly told with the steadiness of a masterful writer."--Isaac Fitzgerald

*A NEXT BIG IDEA CLUB MUST-READ SELECTION!*
*A CrimeReads Best True Crime Book of 2026!*

An immersive, pulse-pounding exposé on the global rise of teenage hackers, offering an insider's portrait of the dark net and the key players who are disrupting corporations, government institutions and our everyday lives

Julius Kivimaki, aka Zeekill, is arguably the most hated hacker in history. In one of the world's cruelest cyberattacks, he blackmailed 30,000 psychotherapy patients with their stolen notes. Yet while the breach was singularly inhumane, Kivimaki's rise--from twelve-year-old hacking nuisance to Most Wanted criminal--is symptomatic of a larger trend. His story gives us vital insights into how hackers, many of whom are teenagers, find their feet and become dangerous criminals.

In this gripping true crime narrative, cybersecurity correspondent Joe Tidy reveals that there is one area of the criminal underworld that is being underestimated at our peril--the dark digital underbelly where teenage boys are reshaping cybersecurity, cryptocurrency and organized crime under the noses of their parents.

Propulsive, urgent and scrupulously reported, Ctrl + Alt + Chaos tracks the rise and fall of global hacking groups to ask the question: How can we stop the cycle of teenage boys hijacking life online?

"A morally complex and life-affirming exploration of what it means to be alive, and of the enduring power of love to transform, reanimate, and redeem." --Celeste Ng, New York Times-bestselling author of Our Missing Hearts

"The novel's immersive quality and intricate structure is reminiscent of Liz Moore's recent bestseller, The God of the Woods, while the boys' lyrical voices, told from an obscure afterlife, harken back to such contemporary classics as Alice Sebold's The Lovely Bones." --The Boston Globe

Caleb was driving home for Christmas. Steven was pounding beers at a local bar. Matthew was out looking for his ex-girlfriend. Leo was walking in the woods on a winter night. Then they disappeared.

Days, weeks, years later, their bodies turn up in icy rivers hundreds of miles apart. How did they get there? What, if anything, connects them? Some of their loved ones believe the official answers. Some are convinced the boys are victims of an insidious network called the Smiley Face Killers. Some are trying to forget them altogether. Meanwhile, Caleb, Steven, Matthew, and Leo find one other--and other boys like them--in the murky depths of the afterlife. Each tells his story in his own way, speaking his version of truth, confessing his desires and grievances and even his hopes for a future he still somehow believes belongs to him. Each revelation brings the reader deeper into their intertwined fates, along a journey through the landscapes of identity, intimacy, and the haunting echoes of unresolved grief.

"Dark and delectable. I gobbled this book up and enjoyed every last bite."
--Kirsten Miller, author of The Change and The Women of Wild Hill

The women in Cold Harbor all have something to prove, and they'll have to do it in a world full of monsters.

Something's not right in Cold Harbor--more so than usual. While this sleepy small town has seen its fair share of monsters in cheating husbands and leering bosses, none are as hungry as Mrs. Smith. The mysterious resident has finally emerged from her crumbling mansion on the hill, mesmerizing the townspeople with her beauty. Her secret? Nine human sacrifices to feed her immortality.

Natalie Scott is more worried about Mrs. Smith blocking her first real estate sale--the one that will take her from stay-at-home mom to working woman extraordinaire. She's eager to prove herself in a world where the social mores of 1980s suburbia reign, where she's expected to keep a magazine-perfect home and raise beautiful children, all while sticking to her husband's budget. Natalie's two best friends are facing their own demons, and Mrs. Smith and her deep, dark woods are an easy scapegoat for everyone's problems.

But Natalie's twelve-year-old daughter, Jill, and her Icelandic housekeeper, Una, can sense something deeper at play. Armed with library books and a whole lot of grit, Jill and Una team up to save the town once and for all. But as the rest of Cold Harbor sinks into anger, fear, and jealousy, they'll have to confront the question: What does it really mean to be a monster?

DE LA LÍDER DE LA BANDA INDIE POP JAPANESE BREAKFAST, UNA INOLVIDABLE HISTORIA SOBRE LA FAMILIA, LA COMIDA, EL DOLOR Y EL AMOR

«Desde que mi madre murió, lloro en H Mart.
H Mart es una cadena de supermercados especializada en comida asiática. La H es por han ah reum, una frase en coreano que podría traducirse como 'un brazo lleno de comestibles'. Mi madre expresaba su amor por medio de la comida. Por muy crítica o cruel que pudiera parecer --no dejaba de presionarme para que colmara sus utópicas expectativas--, yo siempre sentía que su afecto irradiaba de los platos que me preparaba exactamente como a mí me gustaban. Y si bien apenas hablo coreano, cuando estoy en H Mart es como si lo dominara. Acaricio los productos y digo los nombres en voz alta: melón chamoe, danmuji. Recuerdo las chucherías que mi madre me contaba que comía cuando era niña y el empeño que ponía yo en intentar imaginarla a mi edad. Quería que me gustaran todas las cosas que le gustaban a ella, quería ser ella».

La voz de Zauner, enérgica y directa, lírica y sincera, suena tan viva sobre el escenario como en cada una de estas páginas. Lágrimas en H Mart, un libro para disfrutar, compartir y releer, es su exquisito debut como escritora.