1. Serena, Written by: Cheryl
(Staff Picks/Fiction)

By Ron Rash (Ecco, $14.99) Rash's exquisitely-written novel evokes the ferocious razing of the great Appalachian forests at the end of the Great Depression, where men are impaled on falling tree branc

2. Eat Ate, Written by: Cheryl
(Staff Picks/Cooking)

By Guy Mirabella(Chronicle $35.00) If there ever were a case for the irreplaceability of the book as a compendium of knowledge and a living work of art, it's Guy Mirabella's Eat Ate. Pointed out to

3. One Fifth Avenue, Written by: Cheryl
(Staff Picks/Fiction)

Candace Bushnell (Voice, $15.99) Tired of those 800 page tomes in translation? Cross-eyed after reading Nabakov's original manuscript of his long-lost Laura? Or simply exhausted after schlepping aro

4. Lit, Written by: Cheryl
(Staff Picks/Nonfiction)

By Mary Karr (Harper, $25.99) Karr is one of our great memoirists. Her groundbreaking The Liars Club recounted her hardscrabble childhood on the Texas prairie where she tried to survive her alcoholi

5. Revenge of the Mooncake Vixen, Written by: Cheryl
(Staff Picks/Fiction)

By Marilyn Chin (W.W. Norton, $13.95) Marilyn Chin turns Chinese fables on their head with her updated, saucy, vitriolic rendering of the adventures of two twin Asian-American sisters--Mei-Ling and

6. La Maison Du Chocolat, Written by: Cheryl
(Staff Picks/Cooking)

By Gilles Marchal (Stewart, Tabori, Chang, $40.00) There is chocolate, and then there is CHOCOLATE. The famous Parisian chocolate shop, La Maison du Chocolate, produces the most divine dark CHOCOLATE

7. A Happy Marriage, Written by: Cheryl
(Staff Picks/Fiction)

by Rafael Yglesias (Scribner, $26.00) While the structural fabric of this amazing work of fiction is imagined, its characters are easily recognizable as their real life counterparts, to the point wh

8. Barefoot Contessa: Back to Basics, Written by: Cheryl
(Staff Picks/Cooking)

by Ina Garten (Clarkson Potter, $35) When I first started working at McNally Jackson, a customer came running into the store, his car illegally parked on the street, asking for The Barefoot Contessa

9. I Loved, I Lost, I Made Spaghetti, Written by: Cheryl
(Staff Picks/Cooking)

by Giulia Melucci (Grand Central Publishing, $23.99) This is the book that you read after you've trodden through Solzhenitzen's Gulag, lost half the value of your 401K and watched your beloved partn

10. Diary of a Wombat, Written by: Cheryl
(Staff Picks/Childrens)

by Jackie French (Sandpiper, $6.99) My husband, the Kiwi, taught me that kangaroos are dangerous because they can only hop in a straight line. So if you meet them on the road in the outback, they ca

11. I Want a Cat, Written by: Cheryl
(Staff Picks/Childrens)

by Tony Ross (Anderson Press, $8.95) If you ever were a child or knew a child who desperately wanted a live pet, this stunningly color-pencil-illustrated tale of existential longing and tenacious pu

12. The Forever War, Written by: Cheryl
(Staff Picks/Nonfiction)

by Dexter Filkins (Random House, $25.00) Dexter Filkins' sensitive and hair-raising reporting of the fighting on the front lines of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan will stop time and take your brea

13. Hunger Games, Written by: Cheryl and Katie
(Staff Picks/Childrens)

... be able to put down. Its excellent female protagonist, Katniss Everdeen, is a heroine for the ages. -- Cheryl Imagine a reality game where participation and even viewing are compulsory, and co...

14. Revolutionary Road, Written by: Cheryl
(Staff Picks/Fiction)

by Richard Yates (Random House, $14.95) This shattering, prophetic forty-year old novel surgically dissects the illusion of America's post-war suburban idyll. More Days of Wine and Roses t

15. The Commoner, Written by: Cheryl
(Staff Picks/Fiction)

by John Burnham Schwartz (Vintage Paperback, $14.95) A gorgeous novel that reads like a beautiful bamboo brushstroke. Burnhan Schwartz courageously evokes the pathos and beauty of Haruko who in 1

16. Wandering Star, Written by: Cheryl
(Staff Picks/Fiction)

by JMG Le Clezio (Curbstone Press, $15.00) When Le Clezio was pronounced this year's winner of the Nobel Prize in Literature, Wandering Star was the only one of his novels immediately available in E

17. The Bible, Written by: Cheryl
(Staff Picks/Nonfiction)

by Karen Armstrong (Grove/Atlantic, $13.00) This brilliant religious historian abbreviates the narrative history of the most influential narrative in history. Fascinating, illuminating and eye-ope

18. How to Heal a Broken Wing, Written by: Cheryl
(Staff Picks/Childrens)

by Bob Graham (Candlewick Press, $16.99) "High above the city, no one heard the soft thud of feathers against glass," and no one sees the injured pigeon lying on the sidewalk but little Wi

19. Marrying Mozart, Written by: Cheryl
(Staff Picks/Fiction)

by Stephanie Cowell (Penguin, $14.00)   A beguiling and charming romance which imagines the four captivating Weber sisters who inspired the love of a genius.  Rich in historical nua

20. The Perfect Scoop, Written by: Cheryl
(Staff Picks/Cooking)

by David Lebovitz (Ten Speed Press, $24.95) Who wants to bake in the middle of August? Beat the heat by making your own scrumptious ice creams, granitas and sorbet. This delightful cookbook will