Winner of the 2016 National Jewish Book Award for Fiction A poignant tale about the enduring friendship between two men under the shadow of the Second World War. Gustav Perle grows up in a small town in Switzerland, where the horrors of the Second World War seem only a distant echo. An only child, he lives alone with Emilie, the mother he adores but who treats him with bitter severity. He begins an intense friendship with a Jewish boy his age, talented and mercurial Anton Zweibel, a budding concert pianist. The novel follows Gustav’s family, tracing the roots of his mother’s anti-Semitism and its impact on her son and his beloved friend. Moving backward to the war years and the painful repercussions of an act of conscience, and forward through the lives and careers of the two men, one who becomes a hotel owner, the other a concert pianist, The Gustav Sonata explores the passionate love of childhood friendship as it is lost, transformed, and regained over a lifetime. It is a powerful and deeply moving addition to the beloved oeuvre of one of our greatest contemporary novelists.

Growing up sheltered from the echoes of World War II, Gustav forges an intense relationship with a mercurial Jewish boy, Anton, a talented pianist who introduces him to the harsh realities of racism, tolerance, and cruelty during a friendship spanning half a century.

An epic of life in New Zealand during the nineteenth century explores the relationship between two newlyweds as they encounter the harsh realities of their chosen home in the South Pacific.

This is the story of a young English lutenist named Peter Claire who, in 1629, arrives at the Danish Court to join King Christian IV's Royal Orchestra.

Certain that she is really a male trapped in a female body, Mary Ward pursues this elusive identity, much to the consternation of her mother, her brother, and a neighbor's son.

Court physician Robert Merivel has a middle age crisis and sets off for Versailles where he meets Madame de Flamanville, a Swiss botanist, and rescues a captive bear to take back to Bidnold Manor.

Kelly Cherry's tenth work of fiction delivers twelve compelling stories about women of the American South. These are women struggling to find their way through the everyday workings of life while also navigating the maze of self. From a young woman's nightmare piano lesson to an elderly woman's luminous last breath, Twelve Women in a Country Called America takes readers on a journey sometimes dark, sometimes funny, and always enlightening.