In?"The Stain"?Rikki Ducornet tells the story of a young girl named Charlotte, branded with a furry birthmark in the shape of a dancing hare, regarded as the mark of Satan. "Sadistic nuns, scatology, butchered animals, monkish rapists, and Satan" (Kirkus), as well as the village exorcist, inhabit this bawdy tale of perversion, power, possession, and the rape of innocence. Ducornet weaves an intricate design of fantasy and reality, at once surreal, hilarious, and terrifying.

NATIONAL BESTSELLER • WINNER OF THE PEN/FAULKNER AWARD • The Pulitzer Prize–winning author of American Pastoral delivers “a master novelist's haunting parable about our troubled modern moment" (The Wall Street Journal). It is 1998, the year in which America is whipped into a frenzy of prurience by the impeachment of a president, and in a small New England town, an aging classics professor, Coleman Silk, is forced to retire when his colleagues decree that he is a racist. The charge is a lie, but the real truth about Silk would have astonished even his most virulent accuser. Coleman Silk has a secret, one which has been kept for fifty years from his wife, his four children, his colleagues, and his friends, including the writer Nathan Zuckerman. It is Zuckerman who stumbles upon Silk's secret and sets out to reconstruct the unknown biography of this eminent, upright man, esteemed as an educator for nearly all his life, and to understand how this ingeniously contrived life came unraveled. And to understand also how Silk's astonishing private history is, in the words of The Wall Street Journal, "magnificently" interwoven with "the larger public history of modern America."

A princess must win back her kingdom, save a prince, and restore peace in this fantasy by the #1 New York Times–bestselling author of the Splintered series. After Lyra—a princess incapable of speech or sound—is cast out of her kingdom of daylight by her wicked aunt, a witch saves her life, steals her memories, and raises her in an enchanted forest…disguised as a boy known only as Stain. Meanwhile, in Lyra’s rival kingdom, the prince of thorns and night is dying, and the only way for him to break his curse is to wed the princess of daylight—for she is his true equal. As Lyra finds her way back to her identity, an imposter princess prepares to steal her betrothed prince and her crown. To win back her kingdom, save the prince, and make peace with the land of the night, Lyra must be loud enough to be heard without a voice, and strong enough to pass a series of tests—ultimately proving she’s everything a traditional princess is not. “A decadent fantasy anchored in childhood delights with vibrantly detailed writing and brilliantly theatrical subplots.” —Kirkus Reviews “[A] reimagining of “The Princess and the Pea” . . . An emotionally complex tale of fate, inner beauty, and found family that illustrates the strength of love born from friendship.” —Publishers Weekly

Born of bloodshed, a prolific stain, fed by the sins of earliest man…. The Simmons moved into 228 Briar Street. With two growing children needing a stable routine and a house to call home, Marc and Claire settled into the old red brick, unaware of the neighborhood’s dirty little secret. In the dark and unfamiliar depths of the basement it lurks. It desires to manipulate the family into destructive chaos as it has countless times past and as far back as there were settlers in this plot of land, feed upon both flesh and the ecstasy of its dark influence. And not just in this house. It is old, mischievous, and inherently evil. It is...THE STAIN.

The Dark Stain is a novel of tremendous force and vitality. It is a story of lust and hatred and passion . . . nakedly portrayed and in words the meaning of which can escape no one. The locale is Harlem, but what happens in its exciting pages has already been paralleled in many American cities and may happen in many more. It is the story of Sam Miller, a New York cop, who was unwillingly forced to kill a crazed negro. This killing sets off a series of events that threatens to explode into the riot. How an American Fascist group thies to exploit the situation gives the author an opportunity to tell a story that has all the elements of a thriller and all the threat of a warning. Suzy Buckles, beautiful and in love with Sam, is aware of the forces this killing will let loose. Hal Clair, negro leader, so light-hued that he passes for white, tries to act as the appeaser. Marian Burrow, his secretary, light-brown, desirable, a reefer smoker, hates the whites but is attractive to them and attracted by them. Bill Trent is a former gangster who has graduated into a salesman for Fascism. Ex-Governor Heney is a suave rabble rouser who has a particular appeal for people with fat bank accounts. Haydn Norris is a rich ma’s son, an international Fascist, without emotional hatreds; Big Boy Bose is vice lord of Harlem, whose distrust of the whites makes him a valuable ally. These are the leading characters, but there are many others, each of whom plays a role in this drama that is as timely as tomorrow’s headlines . . . The story of an America that can happen here.