Sometimes, a sprawling historical novel is a perfect ticket to a pleasant escape. A gripping story, engaging characters and descriptions of other times...

Navigating one’s way in contemporary society is no longer merely a question of knowing which fork to use. Rather, as Robin Abrahams persuasively...

Readers hoping Rick Bass’ new work of nonfiction, “The Wild Marsh: Four Seasons at Home in Montana,“ would advocate on behalf of his...

TODAY Book Swap—Exchange of books and/or conversation, 3-5 p.m. at Book People, 536 Granite Ave. Free. 288-4346.  THURSDAY “The Lie”...

Summer’s here, and the time is right for reading by the sea. And if your tastes in holidays and fiction run together, each of these mysteries is...

JULY 5 Book Swap—Exchange of books and/or conversation, 3-5 p.m. at Book People, 536 Granite Ave. Free. 288-4346.  JULY 10 “Haunted Virginia:...

Colum McCann’s powerful new novel, “Let the Great World Spin,“ opens with a moment of lofty magic. It’s Aug. 7, 1974, and a man...

I would define, in brief, the Poetry of words as the Rhythmical Creation of Beauty. Its sole arbiter is Taste.—Edgar Allan Poe

Every age has its high-flying buccaneers, but few are as candid about their fall as publisher and journalist Neil White is in his affecting memoir, “In...

Don’t go out in the woods today,“ the song cautions us, but as Amy Stewart’s comprehensive and lavishly illustrated “Wicked Plants”...

FICTION Two new novels set in the developing world seek to explain social ills in human terms and to make subtle statements on the way to future human...

NONFICTION The latest book by Lawrence Block, author of more than 60 crime novels, is a memoir; and as he approaches his 71st birthday this month, the...

TOMORROW “Her Story: A Timeline of Women Who Changed America” by Jill Tietjen—Book signing at 6 p.m. at Barnes & Noble-Short Pump,...

NONFICTION While major golf championships end on spring and summer Sundays, for thousands of fans these tournaments aren’t really over until they...

NONFICTION Few homeowners facing foreclosure have had the opportunity to share their financial travails privately with Alan Greenspan, the former chairman...

Early-registration deadline for Hanover Book Festival workshops, to be held Aug. 1 at the VFW Post 9808 Building, 7168 Flag Lane, Mechanicsville. See

For a lifelong Richmonder, a move to the West Coast can be a culture shock equal to the eruption of Mount St. Helens. For FBI forensic geologist Raleigh...

Writer William Faulkner, by virtue of subject matter and residence, was most closely affiliated with Mississippi. His family history and local history...

In 1822, William Beaumont, a doctor stationed at Fort Mackinac, Mich., rushed to aid a man who had been accidentally shot in the abdomen. The wound was...

Loss of love and life is a familiar literary theme. The emphasis, though, is usually on the personal, but noted Canadian novelist and poet Anne Michaels,...

Escapee from a livestock truck. Unearther of a corpse. Catalyst for love. And now, in a new adventure, beholder of ghosts. It’s a porcine party in...

TODAY Book Swap—Exchange of books and/or conversation, 3-5 p.m. at Book People, 536 Granite Ave. Free. 288-4346.  TUESDAY “Lady Jasmine”...

Toward the end of his life, John Updike, who had been the voice of suburbia for four decades, turned away from middle-class angst and desire to explore...

FICTION Agood storyteller crosses borders with ease—even if it’s the line between Mexico and the United States that divides and binds us. In...

TODAY “The Sweet In-Between” by Sheri Reynolds—Book talk and signing, 2 p.m. at Hampton Public Library, 4207 Victoria Boulevard, Hampton....

To be bearable, wars need myths that celebrate heroes and sacrifice. And because World War II was one of those rare good wars, we have saluted its warriors...

The missing-child story has been done so often that it takes something extraordinary to make it rise above the commonplace. And that is what John Hart...

In 1973, Petersburg added to the Virginia history it had long been making by becoming the first city in the state to elect a majority-black City Council...

Imagine getting an urgent phone call while you’re on vacation with your family. The caller is your black-sheep cousin, and he’s got bad news....

The media are not always kind to our first ladies: Pat Nixon was derisively called “Plastic Pat,“ Rosalynn Carter was criticized for recycling...