All Stars 2004

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

• The Darling
  Author: Banks, Russell
  Publisher: HarperCollins $ 25.95 ISBN: 0060197358 Date: 2004
  Kirkus PW Booklist
  Raising serious philosophical questions about terrorism, political violence, and the clash of races and cultures, this political/historical thriller is Russell Banks at his best.
  Updated 8.12.04
• The Inner Circle
  Author: Boyle, T.C.
  Publisher: Viking $ 25.95 ISBN: 0670033448 Date: 2004
  Booklist PW LJ
  Fresh on the heels of his bestselling Drop City, Boyle's tenth novel features fabulous characters, a rollicking plot, and more sex than pioneering researcher Dr. Alfred Kinsey ever dreamed of documenting . . . or almost.
  Updated 7.13.04
• The Lady and the Unicorn
  Author: Chevalier, Tracy
  Publisher: Dutton $ 23.95 ISBN: 0525947671 Date: 2004
  Booklist Kirkus PW
  An extraordinary story exquisitely told, Chevalier's The Lady and the Unicorn weaves history and fiction into a beautiful, timeless, and intriguing literary tapestry that rivals in grace and grandeur the masterpiece that inspired it.
  Suggested Reading: Historical Fiction Stars
  Updated 12.8.03
• Epicure's Lament
  Author: Christensen, Kate
  Publisher: Doubleday $ 23.95 ISBN: 0767910303 Date: 2004
  PW Kirkus LJ
  From the author of In the Drink, a compelling novel about a man smoking himself to death. A literary tour de force of bitter humor and gorgeously articulated misanthropy to rival the works of Martin Amis and John Lanchester.
  Suggested Reading: Black Humor | Cooked Books
  Updated 1.15.04
• Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell
  Author: Clarke, Susanna
  Publisher: Bloombury $ 29.95 ISBN: 1582344167 Date: 2004
  Kirkus Booklist PW LJ
  Sophisticated, witty, and ingeniously convincing, Clarke's magisterial novel weaves magic into a flawlessly detailed vision of historical England. She has created a world so thoroughly enchanting that it leaves readers longing for more.
  Suggested Reading: Magic & Magicians
  Updated 7.12.04
• Bad Ground
  Author: Cramer, W. Dale
  Publisher: Bethany $ 12.99 (paper) ISBN: 076422784x
  PW Booklist LJ
  To honor his mother's dying wish, 17-year-old Jeremy seeks out his bitter, estranged uncle. Despite his uncle's protests, he takes a job as a miner where his faith is tested by gritty coworkers, the threat of danger . . . and the possibility of love.
  Updated 6.1.04
• Dew Breaker
  Author: Danticat, Edwidge
  Publisher: Knopf $ 22 ISBN: 1400041147 Date: 2004
  LJ Kirkus Booklist
  From the acclaimed author of Breath, Eyes, Memory comes a powerful story of a man known as a "dew breaker," a Haitian torturer, whose past crimes lie beneath his new American reality.
  Updated 2.23.04
• Circus in Winter
  Author: Day, Cathy
  Publisher: Harcourt $ 23 ISBN: 015101048x
  Kirkus LJ PW
  From 1884 to 1939, the Great Porter Circus made the unlikely choice to winter in an Indiana town called Lima. Day follows a colorful cast of circus people into their everyday lives and brings the greatest show on earth to the page.
  Suggested Reading: Circus Stars
  Updated 5.17.04
• Celestial Harmonies
  Author: Esterhazy, Peter
  Publisher: Ecco $ 29.95 ISBN: 0060501049 Date: 2004
  Kirkus PW LJ
  A biographical, structurally innovative novel in the grand European literary tradition that spans multiple generations and three centuries of tumultuous Central European history.
  Updated 3.15.04
• Links
  Author: Farah, Nuruddin
  Publisher: Riverhead $ 24.95 ISBN: 1573222658 Date: 2004
  Kirkus PW Booklist
  Jeebleh is returning to Mogadiscio from New York for the first time in 20 years. It is not a nostalgia trip for him--Jeebleh's last residence here was a jail cell. Gripping, provocative, and revelatory, Links is the finest work yet from Nuruddin.
  Updated 3.22.04
• Confessions of Max Tivoli
  Author: Greer, Andrew Sean
  Publisher: FSG $ 23 ISBN: 0374128715 Date: 2004
  PW LJ Booklist
  A beautiful and daring feat of the imagination, The Confessions of Max Tivoli reveals the world through the eyes of "monster," a being who confounds the very certainties by which people live and in doing so embodies in extremis what it means to be human.
  Suggested Reading: Historical Fiction Stars
  Updated 2.5.04
• With
  Author: Harington, Donald
  Publisher: Toby $ 19.95 ISBN: 1592640508 Date: 2004
  Kirkus PW Booklist
  The newest novel from the master of Stay More, Harington's mythical village in the Arkansas Ozarks, in which a peaceable kingdom is created in isolation from a most bizarre abduction gone wrong.
  Updated 3.22.04
• An Unfinished Season
  Author: Just, Ward S.
  Publisher: Houghton Mifflin $ 24 ISBN: 0618036695 Date: 2004
  Kirkus PW Booklist
  The distinguished chronicler of American social history and political culture hauntingly captures the 1950s, a time when even the small-town family could not escape the nationwide suspicion and dread of "the enemy within."
  Updated 6.1.04
• Broken for You
  Author: Kallos, Stephanie
  Publisher: Grove $ 23 ISBN: 0802117791 Date: 2004
  Kirkus Booklist LJ
  Funny, heartbreaking and alive with a potpourri of eccentric and irresistible characters, this fresh and compulsively readable debut novel is about two women in self-imposed exile whose lives intersect, transforming both their worlds.
  Suggested Reading: Debuts
  Updated 8.16.04
• Aloft
  Author: Lee, Chang-Rae
  Publisher: Riverhead $ 23.95 ISBN: 1573222631 Date: 2004
  Kirkus Booklist PW
  Lee burst on the scene with Native Speaker, which won numerous awards, including the PEN/Hemingway Award. Now, with Aloft, Lee has expanded his range and proves himself a master storyteller, able to observe his characters' flaws and weaknesses and, at the same time, celebrate their humanity.
  Updated 3.1.04
• Bandbox
  Author: Mallon, Thomas
  Publisher: Pantheon $ 24.95 ISBN: 0375421165 Date: 2004
  Kirkus PW Booklist
  From the author of Henry and Clara comes a dazzling, hilarious novel that captures the heart and soul of New York in the Jazz Age. Mallon pens a madcap and poignant book that brilliantly portrays the gaudiest American decade of them all.
  Suggested Reading: Historical Fiction | Music & Fiction
  Updated 12.15.03
• The Madonna of Excelsior
  Author: Mda, Zakes
  Publisher: FSG $ 23 ISBN: 0374200084 Date: 2004
  Kirkus LJ PW
  A new novel by a towering presence in contemporary South African literature. By turns earthy, witty, and tragic, The Madonna of Excelsior is a brilliant depiction of life in South Africa and of the dramatic changes between the 1970s and the present.
  Updated 3.15.04
• An Evening of Long Goodbyes
  Author: Murray, Paul
  Publisher: Random $ 24.95 ISBN: 1400061164 Date: 2004
  Kirkus Booklist PW
  Vastly entertaining and outright hilarious, Paul Murray's debut heralds the arrival of a major new Irish talent. His protagonist is endearing and wildly witty-part P. G. Wodehouse's Bertie Wooster, with a cantankerous dash of A Confederacy of Dunces' Ignatius J. Reilly thrown in. With its rollicking plot and colorful characters, An Evening of Long Goodbyes is a delightful and erudite comedy of epic proportions.
  Updated 6.30.04
• Waterborne
  Author: Murkoff, Bruce
  Publisher: Knopf $ 25 ISBN: 1400040388 Date: 2004
  LJ PW Booklist
  A panorama of human desire and enterprise, this debut novel is exceptional for its ambition, generosity, characters and grasp of history.
  Suggested Reading: Debuts
  Updated 2.5.04
• Links
  Author: Nuruddin, Farah
  Publisher: Riverhead $ 24.95 ISBN: 1573222658 Date: 2004
  Kirkus PW Booklist
  Jeebleh is returning to Mogadiscio from New York for the first time in 20 years. It is not a nostalgia trip for him--Jeebleh's last residence here was a jail cell. Gripping, provocative, and revelatory, Links is the finest work yet from Nuruddin.
  Updated 3.22.04
• Heir to the Glimmering World
  Author: Ozick, Cynthia
  Publisher: Houghton $ 24 ISBN: 0618470492 Date: 2004
  Kirkus Booklist OW
  Ozick pays homage to the most beloved writers of the 19th century--Charles Dickens, the Brontes, George Eliot--in a story set on the outskirts of the Bronx in the 1930s.
  Updated 8.9.04
• The True and Outstanding Adventures of the Hunt Sisters
  Author: Robinson, Elizabeth
  Publisher: Little Brown $ 23.95 ISBN: 0316735027 Date: 2004
  Kirkus PW Booklist
  The bestselling status (and subsequent blockbuster film adaptations) of Bridget Jones's Diary and Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood is proof of the enduring strength of this category. Although the novel is invented, Robinson is a successful Hollywood producer whose credits include Braveheart and Last Orders.
  Suggested Reading: Debuts
  Updated 11.12.03
• The Plot Against America
  Author: Roth, Philip
  Publisher: Houghton $ 26 ISBN: 0618509283 Date: 2004
  Kirkus PW Booklist LJ
  In this alternate history, Pulitzer Prize-winner Roth considers what it would be like for his Newark family--and for a million such families all over the country--during the menacing years of a Charles Lindbergh presidency, when American citizens who happened to be Jews would have every reason to expect the worst.
  Updated 9.22.04
• The Confusion
  Author: Stephenson, Neal
  Publisher: Morrow $ 27.95 ISBN: 0060523867 Date: 2004
  Kirkus Booklist PW LJ
  In this profoundly compelling adventure, Stephenson brings to life a cast of unforgettable characters in the late 1600s on the high seas. It is a time of breathtaking genius and discovery for men and women whose exploits define an age known as Baroque.
  Suggested Reading: Historical Fiction Stars
  Updated 4.5.04