Maureen Corrigan

Novelist A.M. Homes writes about her real life — including her reunion with her biological parents, 31 years after they gave her up for adoption — in a memoir called The Mistress's Daughter.

Celebrated Japanese crime writer Natsuo Kirino made her American debut in 2005, when the novel Out was translated into English, and became a finalist for an Edgar award.

Out told the weird story of an abused wife who strangles her husband and then seeks the aid of her coworkers in a boxed lunch factory in covering up the murder. The novel was a sensation not simply because it lured American readers out of the tourist precincts of Japan, but because of its distinctive worldview and tone.

Another Kirino novel, Grotesque, has just been translated into English.

Maureen Corrigan reviews "Seabiscuit: An American Legend."

The Other Side of You is a new novel by Salley Vickers.

Ben Yagoda is the author of When You Catch an Adjective, Kill It. It's a guide to writing that capitalizes on the lively advice of writers from Mark Twain (author of the title quote) to Stephen King.

The new novel by Vikram Chandra is about the mob in India.

A review of Thomas Hardy: The Time-torn Man, the new biography of the 19th century poet and novelist by Claire Tomalin. Tomalin has distinguished herself in the field of literary biography by her celebrated biographies of such figures as Mary Wollstonecraft and Samuel Pepys.

Our book critic continues her list of the year's best in books. This time, she tells us about her favorites in mysteries and nonfiction.

Maureen Corrigan runs down her list of the year's best fiction, including a series of books set in post-Sept. 11 New York City, Richard Ford's last installment in the Frank Bascombe trilogy and fiction by two Alices.

Short story master Alice Munro would be justified in resting on her laurels at this point in her career — she's won Canada's Governor General's Literary Award three times, and the National Book Critics Circle Award. But in her new collection of stories, called The View from Castle Rock, Munro veers off into a fresh direction — exploring family history through fact and fiction.