In John le Carré’s latest novel, a young fugitive, half Chechen, half Russian, shows up in the German port city of Hamburg in the aftermath of 9/11.

The Inquisition, the Salem trials, the Red Scare: a survey of witch hunts over the past two millenniums.

Julia Glass’s new novel focuses on the complicated emotions — love, hate, envy, grief — that form between female siblings.

Edmund White's capsule biography of Rimbaud, poetry's enfant terrible.

A novel about an admiral, his unfaithful wife and her activist friend.

Barton Gellman’s biography paints Dick Cheney as the master manipulator of the Bush administration.

Fifty states, 50 essays, from the likes of Jhumpa Lahiri, Anthony Doerr and Heidi Julavits.

In Per Petterson’s novel, a woman remembers the bold, reckless, politically committed boy who taught her how to live.

Why has Goldman Sachs survived as its peers crumble around it? In this corporate history, Charles D. Ellis credits its culture.

A Pakistani author portrays a complex political situation in a novel that contains both savagery and tenderness.

The latest book by James Bamford, an expert on the National Security Agency, reconstructs the agency’s recent history.

Jean-Marie Gustave Le Clézio was praised by the Swedish Academy as an “author of new departures, poetic adventure and sensual ecstasy.”

In the end the fate of the life’s work of Marshall Frady came down to 15 minutes in a windowless room in Midtown.

Christian Liaigre, the French interior designer, is profiled in a grimly majestic coffee table book called “Liaigre.”

John Adams’s absorbing new book at times reads like a quest narrative that travels through the whole landscape of 20th-century music.

Tina Brown’s new Web site, The Daily Beast, is aiming to be a smaller, less chaotic version of the World Wide Web itself.

Mr. Wright wrote three autobiographical novels about black street life in New York City that seemed to herald the rise of an important literary talent, then vanished into alcoholism and despair.

Publishers, authors and even libraries are embracing video games to promote books to young readers.

The Nobel Prize has eluded America’s writers. Insularity is one unflattering explanation.

John le Carré’s new novel examines spying in the post-9/11 era.

The bookstore groups guidebooks and phrasebooks with literary fiction and memoirs -- books that, at first glance, might not be what the average traveler would think to pack in her suitcase.

Jonathan Tropper, author of “The Book of Joe,” understands if you feel disappointed upon meeting him. His quiet suburban life is nothing like that of his characters.

From Apsethos the Libyan to Perry Mason, the talking parrot has made its literary mark.

Campaign biographies for kids are a sunny, upbeat lot, unlike the grown-up versions.

This parody of Raymond Chandler or Dashiell Hammett is a young adult version of a rain-soaked noir.

Two new picture books, one trick and one treat, cut children's primal fears down to size.

More children’s books reviewed.

This Week: Matt Weiland and Sean Wilsey lead a tour of all 50 states; Motoko Rich with news on the book world; Bruce Handy on campaign biographies for kids; and Dwight Garner with best-seller news.

Last chapter: While trawling the Internet, Tess discovered a photograph of the missing woman Carole Epstein, nee Massinger, taken a few years back, while toasting the bride and groom at a wedding.