Bottoms up! There's no way to read Charles Blackstone's debut novel, Vintage Attraction, with its scrumptiously crafted details about the ins and outs of wine tasting, without craving a glass of fine vino and a hunk of aged cheese.

Peter Hapworth is an adjunct English professor in his late 30s who doesn't bother to read his students' papers and often assigns top marks to female students just for being pretty. Even with his parents still paying his credit card bills, he's an unapologetic cheapskate who never met a free buffet he didn't like and has, on occasion, passed out in his car.

But Hapworth's redemption comes in the form of a gorgeous, accomplished celebrity sommelier named Isabelle Conway. By some miracle, she falls hard for his pithy bon mots and they embark on an affair that's as uncertain as a bottle low-grade merlot. While it's intriguing to watch the ebb and flow of their relationship, the real star of the novel is the wine.

Blackstone brings out the flavor of something truly riveting as the tale pours through various wine tastings and winds through vineyards. (Blackstone is married to one of Chicago's master sommeliers, which lends credence to this fictional guided tour of all things wine.) Clearly, Vintage Attraction proves the maxim that "in wine there's truth," because it's spot-on with explanations of the many varietals in the fascinating world of wine. --Natalie Papailiou, author of blog MILF: Mother I'd Like to Friend

Discover: A debut novel filled with riveting information about wine.

Keenan Norris's debut novel, Brother and the Dancer, follows two African American teenagers in Southern California along the winding route through high school and into adulthood. Erycha Evans, from the poor, crime-riddled neighborhood of West Highland, dreams of dancing ballet, while Touissant Freeman, living on the other side of town, is preoccupied with belonging, trying to connect his middle-class privilege with his black heritage.

As Erycha and Touissant follow divergent trajectories, Norris develops an intricate, looking-glass narrative. Erycha works hard to earn enough to buy ballet shoes, only to be held back at every turn--by her boyfriend and her parents, by expectations and obligations. Meanwhile, Touissant keeps his grades up, hits the clubs with his older sisters and stars on his high school football team. The rare instances when their lives intersect potently show more of the disparity between their experiences than the similarities.

The alternating narrative structure and leaps in time can be jarring occasionally, but Norris nevertheless succeeds in thoughtfully portraying the powerful tension between privilege and poverty in the variety of black experience as Touissant's internal struggle to maintain the integrity of his identity synchronizes beautifully with Erycha's fight to dance the way she wants. --Dave Wheeler, bookseller, The Elliott Bay Book Co., Seattle, Wash.

Discover: Norris's debut novel about ambitious Californian teens struggling to forge their own identities won the 2012 James D. Houston Award.

"You must learn all the arts of enticement," a veteran courtesan advises Violet Minturn in The Valley of Amazement. Successful courtesans seduce not just with beauty but with words, as Amy Tan does in this beguiling, gorgeously written novel, her first in eight years. An adventure-filled story of family and friendship, fate and forgiveness, decisions and consequences, The Valley of Amazement spans four decades and takes readers from the inner chambers of a Shanghai courtesan house and the remote mountains of China to San Francisco and New York's Hudson Valley. At the novel's heart is a cast of female characters fiercely, bravely making their way in a world where they're often at the mercy of men.

The daughter of the only white woman to own a first-class courtesan house in early 20th-century Shanghai, Violet--who inherited her mother Lulu's brown hair and green eyes--has grown up believing her parents were both American and that her father is deceased. "When I was seven, I knew exactly who I was: a thoroughly American girl in race, manners, and speech," she declares in the novel's opening line. When a courtesan spitefully reveals the truth about her lineage, Violet is shocked and dismayed to learn she is half-Chinese, a revelation that leaves her suspended between two cultures. As she struggles with her dual identity, she begins to doubt her mother, questioning why Lulu would have hidden the truth if she weren't ashamed of her daughter's Chinese blood and wondering what else she is hiding.

Like Tan has done so compellingly in previous works, including her debut novel, The Joy Luck Club, she treads into the always intriguing territory of mother-daughter ties. Despite the misunderstandings and cultural divide that cloud Violet's relationship with Lulu, she discovers it's a bond that is inescapable even after their paths diverge.

Lulu has a say early in the story, shedding light on her unusual place in Shanghai society. She "broke taboo rather extravagantly" by opening a courtesan house, Hidden Jade Path, that caters to both Chinese and Western clientele, many of whom are wealthy players in foreign trade. In addition to providing pleasures of the flesh to patrons, she is sought after for the connections she brokers among businessmen. Readers don't hear directly from Lulu again for more than a decade, as the story follows Violet on a harrowing, heartrending journey. Through the cruel deception of one of Lulu's former lovers, Lulu is sent sailing for San Francisco solo while teenaged Violet is sold to a Shanghai courtesan house. Told by a trusted source that her daughter is dead, Lulu never returns to search for her.

Held against her will, Violet is forced into her mother's former trade and groomed to be a courtesan. Scared, angry and helpless, she finds an unexpected ally in Magic Gourd, an older woman who used to work at Hidden Jade Path and who becomes her mentor and close friend. Out of necessity Violet transforms from a petulant adolescent into a highly popular courtesan and savvy businesswoman.

When Violet later falls in love with Edward, the married American heir to an international shipping conglomerate, and becomes pregnant, she leaves the courtesan life for domesticity. Her bliss is short-lived, and the family she has found shatters, when she loses Edward to illness and her child to circumstance. Much like her mother years earlier, she makes an error in judgment that leads to her three-year-old daughter, Flora, being spirited away. Seeking to support herself, Violet returns to her previous profession. But age is a courtesan's dreaded enemy, and when a lover proposes, she agrees to marry him, grasping at what she sees as a last chance for respectability and a stable future. Instead she finds herself in an arduous situation during which she makes a vow to herself: if she makes it out alive, she will find Flora and get her back.

Both Violet and Lulu engender admiration for their gutsy determination, strength in challenging circumstances and ability to reinvent themselves, while other times they infuriate with reckless behavior and misguided choices. Tan takes her time reuniting the two women, who resume their relationship through correspondence after Violet--knowing what it's like to lose a daughter--softens her long-held resentment toward her mother for abandoning her, letting her know she is alive and asking for her help locating Flora.

Tan's fans will likely find The Valley of Amazement well worth the wait. A feast of a novel at 600 pages, it rarely loses its grip on the reader. Being immersed in the vividly told tale is a deeply felt experience--laughing at a little girl's antics, heart pounding as a mother flees with her child in her arms, flinching as a fist delivers a blow. Tan deftly draws the reader along as she explores the nature of identity, the joys and pitfalls of love, the ripple effects of the choices we make and the role of fate in our lives.

"I'm not saying fate happens without blame. But when fate turns out well, everyone should forget the bad road that got us here," a character advises in The Valley of Amazement. Years of complicated circumstances can't be undone, though, and Violet ultimately comes to a crossroads, faced with deciding whether her future lies in China or America--and with whom. Like her life, this story is bittersweet. --Shannon McKenna Schmidt

For readers who like their dark fantasy light on fright and big on laughs, The Creeps, the third of John Connolly's Samuel Johnson Tales (following The Infernals), should be just what the demon, er, doctor, ordered.

Samuel Johnson and his faithful dachshund, Boswell, may have saved the world--again--from the legions of the Great Malevolence, but the course of his life never did run smooth. Nurd, Samuel's bad-at-evil demon friend, and his minion Wormwood are lodging with Samuel and his mum, but Nurd seems morose lately. Samuel finally lands the gorgeous Lucy Highmore as his girlfriend, only to find that her beauty is definitely skin-deep. Oh, and then there's the brand-new evil threatening Samuel's village. Shadows gather, the veil between universes continues to thin and the Great Malevolence sends an emissary to reassemble the atoms of his most feared lieutenant, Ba'al, who most recently went by the name of Mrs. Abernathy. The storm breaks when a toy store opening unleashes a plague of pointy-toothed toy elves--and an old foe seeks to destroy Samuel for good.

Connolly is the Terry Pratchett of horror, right down to his mastery of the sardonic footnote. Vampire eyeballs (or are they eyeball vampires?), evil reindeer and one very polite monster make The Creeps a macabre giggle-fest to delight fans of horror and humor in equal measure. Connolly also manages the neat trick of wrapping up the series in a way that still leaves room for more stories of Samuel and his motley crew of demon-busting heroes. --Jaclyn Fulwood, youth services manager at Latah County Library District and blogger at Infinite Reads

Discover: The dark and hilarious world-saving adventures of Samuel Johnson, Nurd the demon and other unlikely heroes in the town of Biddlecombe.

Popular romance author Laura Lee Guhrke begins a new series with When the Marquess Met His Match, a fun and frothy romp through London featuring straight-laced matchmaker Belinda Featherstone and a charming rake who proves to be more than a match for her. When Nicholas, Marquess of Trubridge, comes knocking on Belinda's door, looking to alleviate his suddenly penniless state through marriage to a rich young American heiress, Belinda sees only his apparent resemblance to her own cold and selfish late husband, and sends him packing. With a bit of devious manipulation, Nicholas manages to engage her, but over the course of their business arrangement finds his plans decidedly inconvenienced by a ferocious attraction. Ultimately, Nicholas must overcome his own personal case of arrested development to prove to his matchmaker that there is no match so perfect for him as Belinda.

Guhrke is a seasoned hand at the romance game, and it shows in the seeming ease with which she constructs her stories. Plot and pacing are deftly handled, and her characterization in particular is delightfully vibrant. From their first meeting, Nicholas and Belinda sizzle with wit and vivacity, and it's great fun to watch them strike sparks off each other. When the Marquess Met His Match makes for a charming addition to Guhrke's highly entertaining body of work--and an exciting start to a new series. --Judie Evans, librarian

Discover: The lively start of a new romance series by RITA winner Laura Lee Guhrke.

In 2007, amateur baker Jeff Hertzberg and his Culinary Institute-trained partner Zoë François published Artisan Bread in Five Minutes a Day, introducing a technique that would launch a community of online fans who regularly visit their website, BreadIn5.com. For the updated edition of their cookbook, the duo has added new recipes, a q&a section and a chapter on gluten-free baking.

Daily bread baking should be stress-free, and a batch of pre-mixed (not kneaded!) refrigerated dough that keeps for two weeks goes a long way toward that goal. This dough (flour, yeast, salt, water) yields about four loaves of basic bread. The real fun, though, begins with François  and Hertzberg's new recipes, including crock-pot bread, pretzel buns and European peasant bread. Since ardent bakers can't live on bread alone, they pair their recipes with other foodstuffs, such as kabob accompanying naan, or gazpacho and Moroccan bread. With detailed directions, a review of ingredients by brand names, conversions from American to metric measurements, suggested tools, black-and-white how-to photos and color shots of mouthwatering finished products, even the inexperienced baker is guaranteed success.

While baking bread is an old-fashioned skill, the authors encourage their readers to join in the conversation on social media platforms, listing Facebook and Twitter accounts along with their website. You, too, can post a picture: "Hey, look at my baguette!" --Cheryl Krocker McKeon, bookseller, Book Passage, San Francisco

Discover: Anyone with a kitchen and an oven can enjoy fresh bread every day following these recipes.

Widely recognized as one of the 20th century's great English prose stylists, Patrick Leigh Fermor led a life most people only dream of. In 1934, the 18-year-old Leigh Fermor set out on foot from Britain to walk the breadth of a Europe teetering on the edge of catastrophe. On just a £5 allowance per major city, he dined, conversed and slept under the roofs of diplomats and farmers, aristocrats and parish priests, making friends and kindling an insatiable curiosity for the lives, lore and languages of the diverse groups and lost civilizations across the continent. After serving in the Irish Guards during World War II, he resumed his peripatetic lifestyle, travelling through and writing about the Caribbean and the Peloponnesus, steadily adding to his treasure trove of knowledge.

Artemis Cooper's Patrick Leigh Fermor: An Adventure deftly brings its subject to life, drawing on Leigh Fermor's own memoirs and travel narratives--including A Time of Gifts, the memoir that brought enduring literary fame upon its 1977 publication. Wide-ranging conversations and interviews with Leigh Fermor and his acquaintances, along with access to their letters and journals, flesh out the portrait of this remarkable citoyen du monde. Cooper has written a riveting biography sure to captivate any reader. --Benji Taylor, freelance writer, student, blogging at Destructive Anachronism

Discover: A wide-ranging biography of a master prose stylist, traveler and witness to the sweep of 20th-century European history.

Scott Adams may be best known as the creator of Dilbert, but he's also a fascinating entrepreneur. Full of humor, but also surprisingly useful advice, How to Fail at Almost Everything and Still Win Big succeeds on multiple levels. Adams finds ways to remain optimistic even in the most devastating failures, like losing the ability to speak, the failure of one business venture after another and his complete lack of artistic ability. "Most failures involve bad luck, ignorance, and sometimes ordinary stupidity," he writes. "One day in college I managed to combine all three into one experience. It was breathtaking."

This is also a markedly good, wide-ranging self-help book, with advice on how to see the world, approach risk and eat right and exercise. In line with the theme of personal growth, Adams writes with a purpose: to make readers feel good and raise their energy. The book succeeds here, too, resulting in an enjoyable, engaging read most readers will be loath to put down.

This is a fantastic book full of useful and uncommon recommendations for daily living and becoming happier, fitter and more marketable. If nothing else, if How to Fail at Almost Everything and Still Win Big may raise reader energy levels--and who can complain about that? --Rob LeFebvre, freelance writer and editor

Discover: A witty yet serious guide to living life the Scott Adams way, full of clever moments of surprisingly practical advice.

The Most of Nora Ephron is an enormous compilation of the late writer's wit, perception and, most of all, her honesty about everything--even being flat-chested. The collection is divided into nine sections, each reflective of a part of her personal and professional life, from "The Journalist" and "The Screenwriter" to "The Advocate" and "The Blogger."

If you didn't make it to Broadway to see Tom Hanks in Lucky Guy, the entire script is included in the "Playwright" section. "The Foodie" shows Ephron trying out recipes, reading Gourmet, discovering the folly of an egg-white omelette, taking part in the Pillsbury Bake-Off and having guests for dinner. (Keep it easy, serve four things, make it fun.)

Everything was grist for Ephron's mill, and it's all here in this tremendous volume--including the complete screenplays of Heartburn and When Harry Met Sally. Her essays and journalism are filled with fascinating details, from the time that Las Vegas tycoon Steve Wynn put his elbow through a Picasso to the observation that the gap between Condoleezza Rice's front teeth is not as bad in person as it is on television.

Ephron was raised, she tells us, by an indifferent mother and a father who looked at everything as potential material. At the dinner table, he would say: "That's a good line; write it down." She took his advice--and we are all richer for it. --Valerie Ryan, Cannon Beach Book Company, Ore.

Discover: A diverse selection, from essays to screenplays, of the wit, wisdom and unfailing sense of humor of Nora Ephron (1941-2012).

Ian Fleming was a sadomasochist. F. Scott Fitzgerald was worried about his measurement; Hemingway allayed his fears. Edith Wharton carried on, while married, a long-term affair with Morton Fullerton. Did Dickens have a thing for his sister-in-law?

Following their tribute to literary landmarks in Novel Destinations, in Writers Between the Covers Shannon McKenna Schmidt (a Shelf Awareness contributing writer) and Joni Rendon have compiled a very different compendium of information about authors--gossipy and surprising, filled with all kinds of salacious stories about the writers we know and love (or think we know, at any rate).

Among the intriguing stories is that of Agatha Christie, who married a dashing aviator when she was 21. A decade later, her husband blindsided her with the news he was leaving her for another woman. They argued, he left to keep an assignation with his lover and Agatha disappeared. All available means were deployed to find the missing author--who was enjoying herself at a spa in another part of England, using the name of her husband's mistress. When she finally surfaced 11 days later, doctors diagnosed amnesia, but she would never speak of the incident. She divorced her him and later married Sir Max Mallowan, with whom she spent 40 happy years.

Few of the stories end so tidily. Much of the drama recounted in these pages was fueled by alcohol, drugs, bad tempers, confused gender roles--all the things that drive people to wild behavior. Sexual adventurism is an equal opportunity pastime, and the authors have a deft hand at portraying both men and women at their moral nadir--and, oh, how much fun it is to read about. --Valerie Ryan, Cannon Beach Book Company, Ore.

Discover: Shannon McKenna Schmidt and Joni Rendon reveal the love lives of literary figures, sparing no detail--and no author.

John McMillan recounts an anecdote early on in Beatles vs. Stones, his entertaining history of the epic battle between what many consider the two greatest bands in popular music. In the summer of 1968, Mick Jagger brought an advance copy of Beggars Banquet to the grand opening of a hot new club in London. People were "leaping around," until Paul McCartney strolled in with an advance copy of the single "Hey Jude"/"Revolution." They played it all night long. "Mick looked peeved," McMillan writes. "The Beatles had upstaged him."

McMillan (Smoking Typewriters) lovingly tells the story of the rivalry between the songwriting teams of Lennon/McCartney and Jagger/Richards, between England's north (Liverpool's Beatles) and south (London's Rolling Stones). "The Beatles want to hold your hand," Tom Wolfe once quipped, "but the Stones want to burn down your town."

The Stones, McMillan tells us, marked their success against the Beatles; the latter transformed pop into art, and the Stones were always watching. Early on, they got along fine; less so later. The Beatles didn't feel threatened by the Stones, but there was competition. Rubber Soul came out, then Aftermath; Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band was followed by Let It Bleed--it was one record counterpunch after another.

In 1975, Mick Jagger said you'd never see him singing "Satisfaction" when he was old. He does, still. The Beatles, on the other hand, never grew old--as McMillan observes, "they didn't have the chance." --Tom Lavoie, former publisher

Discover: McMillan's breezy, insightful chronicle of a decade-defining battle of the bands--and, maybe, who won it--is a fascinating trip through pop music history.

Printz Honor winner A.S. King (Everybody Sees the Ants) here explores the cost of fame and the power of narrative in the life of Gerald Faust. A reality TV show about dysfunctional families made Gerald both famous and infamous. Cast as the young villain for his "acting out"--most of which was actually an attempt to defend himself from his psychotic older sister, Tasha--he lived up to expectations and then some.

Gerald has grown into a friendless 17-year-old, afraid of his emotions and still subject to Tasha's tyranny. He often escapes into a fantasy world where everything is perfect. His real life seems designed to keep him enraged--and stuck. His mother treats him as if he is deficient and unmanageable. His father is disaffected, made powerless by his wife's obsession with keeping Tasha happy. The bright spots in Gerald's life take place primarily at his concession-stand job at a nearby stadium. That also happens to be where his crush works--if he were allowed to have crushes, which he's not. The rules that Gerald lives by, the only things keeping him from life in prison (or so he believes), don't allow for much interaction. But his walls and his rules start to crumble.

King's ability to show all sides of the story is a marvel. Reality Boy is as much about parental depression and denial as it is about teen rage. It's also about first love, celebrity, therapy and finding your own narrative despite the story your family--and sometimes the world--tells about you. --Jenn Northington, events manager at WORD bookstore

Discover: A Printz Honor author tells a story of a young man struggling with anger as he seeks a new identity for himself.

Author and artist Steve Jenkins (My First Day) caught the animal appreciation bug at age six, and--luckily for readers--it's never left him.

In his introduction, Jenkins describes cutting out pictures from a Life magazine article about Darwin's 1835 voyage to the Galápagos Islands, and he continues to cut and glue paper in ways that captivate curious minds and esthetic eyes from preschoolers through adults. "So far, more than 1½ million species of animals have been named. Another 17,000 or so are added every year," he writes. "One of every four living things is a beetle," he adds, a few pages later. A pie chart depicts the mind-boggling visual that compares the number of insects (one million species) with mammals (a mere 5,490 species).

His innovative segues (he ushers in various animal families with headings such as "I'll do it myself" and "Fighting for love"), bar graphs (the numbers of eyes of each animal--a giant clam has thousands) and "an ecological pyramid" (with "producers" like algae at the bottom and "apex predators" such as tigers at the top), along with brief chunks of text chock full of facts will captivate even the most distractible youngsters. He breaks down big ideas into digestible chunks (his series of four bird beaks on the Galápagos illuminates Darwin's theory of evolution). But the greatest treasure is Jenkins's backmatter: 14 pages of additional animal facts with thumbnail illustrations and page references, a glossary, the importance of research and how he makes books. This luxuriously designed, sumptuously illustrated book is for every child. --Jennifer M. Brown, children's editor, Shelf Awareness

Discover: A nature lover's guide to creatures great and small, luxuriously designed and sumptuously illustrated.

This bilingual tale of sisterly generosity by master storyteller Joe Hayes (Ghost Fever) brims with humor and love, while Esau Andrade Valencia's Mexican folk art matches the siblings' affection and playfulness.

As children, Rosa and Blanca helped each other with the chores their mother assigned. Blanca accompanied Rosa to buy flour for tortillas; Rosa helped Blanca sweep the sidewalk in front of their house. Their proud mother proclaims, "I think I'm the luckiest mother in the whole wide world." Rosa marries and has three children; Blanca lives alone. But both sisters still live on the same street, on either side of their mother. Hayes describes how each helps the other harvest corn, tomatoes and "good hot chiles"--and secretly takes half her yield to the other. "Don't say a word, Mamá!" each of them makes her promise. (Rosa and Blanca of course share with Mamá, too.)

Hayes makes the most of the repeated phrases ("The night was dark. The sisters didn't see each other when they passed right in front of their mother's house"), and Valencia heightens the comedy when Rosa and Blanca see their bounty in the morning ("Did my tomatoes have babies during the night?" Rosa says), depicting tomato parents in dresses and jeans pushing baby carriages, and corn cobs in top hat and bridal veil. In a clever climax, Mamá breaks her silence--but without breaking her promise to her daughters. Author and artist celebrate family and abundance in a story that will be a favorite read-aloud at harvest time or anytime. --Jennifer M. Brown, children's editor, Shelf Awareness

Discover: A funny, affectionate tale of two sisters who let their mother in on their secret gift-giving mission.