“The son did as he was told. All his bloody life, he has done as he has been told. Time to change that, he thinks, grabbing a pen. He doesn’t write that this will be the last time his father stays here. He doesn’t write that he wants to break the father clause. Instead, he writes: Welcome, Dad. Hope you had a good flight.” A grandfather who lives abroad returns home to visit his adult children. The son is a failure. The daughter is having a baby with the wrong man. Only the grandfather is perfect—at least, according to himself. But over the course of ten intense days, relationships unfold and painful memories resurface. The grandfather is confronted by his past. The daughter is faced with an impossible choice. The son tries to write himself free. Something has to give. Per a longstanding family agreement, the grandfather has maintained his Swedish residency by coming to stay with his son every six months. Can this clause be renegotiated, or will it chain the family to its past forever? Through a series of quickly changing perspectives, in The Family Clause Jonas Hassen Khemiri evokes an intimate portrait of a chaotic and perfectly normal family, deeply wounded by the death of a child and the disappearance of a father.

"Everything I Don't Remember is a gripping tale about love and memory. But it is also a story about a writer who, by filling out the contours of Samuel's story, is actually trying to grasp a truth about himself. In the end, what remains of all our fleeting memories? And what is hidden behind everything we don't remember?"--

THE GRANDSON OF MAFIA CRIME BOSS VITO GENOVESE MAKES A REMARKABLE DEBUT IN THIS SUSPENSEFUL THRILLER. A NOVEL ONLY HE COULD WRITE. It's March of 1963 in a quiet New Jersey shore community. Joseph Napolo is a young boy who cherishes his Pop Pop Carmine's Sunday visits to his parent's home. Joseph has come to understand that there is something special about his grandfather - the stories he tells, his friends that visit after dinner, how they kiss his ring and call him Don Carmine. This Sunday, however, Joseph is the sole witness to sinister and dramatic events. Young Joseph and his grandfather pledge to keep a dark secret. Over time, Joseph learns his grandfather had been the boss of a New York crime family - one that the media continues to illuminate as the most powerful Mafia organization in the country. Joseph has shunned his grandfather's ways but he will forever share the Family name. He understands that fame is fickle and fleeting. Infamy is not. Now Spring 2001, Joseph is a husband, father, and with his best friend, Michael Cogan, co-owner of a successful trucking company. However, trouble with the Teamsters Union, Cogan's gambling debts, and a hijacking that is more than it appears to be, create a scenario where the past and the present reconvene. During this one week in May, these ostensibly unconnected events toss together several nefarious entities. Teamster officials, a high-tech defense contractor, the Napolo Crime Family, and an ex-US intelligence operative collude and collide, taking Joseph on a wild ride, racing toward a Friday deadline. Reluctantly, Joseph must penetrate his grandfather's world to protect his own family and to save his friend, only to find himself a key player in a conspiracy that redefines patriotism and his grandfather's role in history. More www.philgenovese.com

A history of Santa and his elves.

While history is often incomplete, Mrs. Claus is not at the margin as most may have guessed. The true story is that many years ago before Santa was known, it was Jammie Claus who began the Christmas tradition of unconditional giving. Each Christmas Eve, she climbs into her magical gingerbread sleigh and spreads peace, love, and joy as she delivers Christmas pajamas to all. You will know the pajamas are from her when you find your Jammie Claus Bag filled and tied with a bow! Enjoy this box set with your own Jammie Claus bag and book to bring the tradition to your family.

Complete with eight pages of full-color stills, this novelization of the upcoming holiday release starring Home Improvement's Tim Allen is filled with all the humor and adventure sure to make it a hit with American family audiences. Just what is the Santa Clause?--"Once you're Santa, you're Santa for life!"

At the start of this dazzlingly inventive novel from Jonas Hassen Khemiri, Abbas, a world-famous photographer and estranged father to a young novelist—also named Jonas Hassen Khemiri—is standing on a luxurious rooftop terrace in New York City. He is surrounded by rock stars, intellectuals, and political luminaries gathered to toast his fiftieth birthday. And yet how did Abbas, a dirt-poor Tunisian orphan and Swedish émigré, come to enjoy such success? Jonas is fresh off the publication of his first novel when answers to this question come in the form of an unexpected e-mail from Kadir, a lifelong friend of Abbas and an effervescent storyteller with delightfully anarchic linguistic idiosyncrasies. The portrait Kadir paints of Abbas—from a voluntarily mute boy who suffers constant night terrors, to a soulful young charmer, to a Swedish immigrant and political exile—proves to be vastly different from Jonas’s view of his father. As the two jagged versions reconcile in Kadir and Jonas’s impassioned correspondence, we’re given a portrayal of a man that is at once tender and feverishly imagined. With an arresting blend of humor and wit, Montecore marks the stateside arrival of an already acclaimed international novelist. Winner of the PO Enquist Literary Prize for accomplished European novelists under forty, Jonas Hassen Khemiri has created a world that is as heartbreaking as it is exhilarating. From the Hardcover edition.

No, but I do.

An unexpected inheritance. A pesky clause in the will. And 25 days to avoid falling in love.... Cassie Hayward hates Christmas. Especially this year. No job. Flat broke. And an ex most definitely on the naughty list. The unexpected inheritance of a charming Victorian cottage in the small town of Poppy Creek may be the Christmas miracle Cassie needs. Except for one itty-bitty problem: a clause in the will. To inherit the house, Cassie must complete a series of festive tasks every day in December leading up to Christmas. All overseen by the handsome, Christmas-loving lawyer Luke Davis. Luke is as strong and steady as the bespoke furniture he crafts as a hobby. He has to be. Stepping into his late father's shoes as the town lawyer comes with a sleigh full of responsibilities. Which means the captivating stranger collecting her inheritance is a distraction he can't afford. As the unlikely pair complete the daily tasks, fighting their attraction becomes more futile than putting jolly ole St. Nick on a diet. But when someone from Cassie's past reappears with the offer of a lifetime, Cassie will have to choose between love and the life she thought she wanted. ________________________________________________________________ Visit the quaint, charming town of Poppy Creek where strangers become family and hope and love always prevail. Each book in the feel-good, small-town romance series is a clean and wholesome read that's much more fun when read in order. Also includes: A delicious recipe. A copy of the Christmas Calendar so you can follow along with Cassie. Book club questions and more.

An entertaining, often surprising look at the life of the world’s most influential fictional character. He is the embodiment of charity and generosity, a creation of mythology, a tool of clever capitalists. The very idea of him is enduring and powerful. Santa Claus was born in early-nineteenth-century America, but his family tree goes back seven hundred years to Saint Nicholas, patron saint of children. Intervening generations were shaggy and strange — whip-wielding menaces to naughty boys and girls. Yet as the raucous, outdoor, alcohol-fuelled holiday gave way to a more domestic, sentimental model, a new kind of gift-bringer was called for — a loveable elf, still judgmental but far less threatening. In this engaging social and cultural history, Gerry Bowler examines the place of Santa Claus in history, literature, advertising, and art. He traces his metamorphosis from a beardless youth into a red-suited peddler. He reveals the lesser-known aspects of the gift-bringer’s life — Santa’s involvement with social and political causes of all stripes (he enlisted on the Union side in the American Civil War), his starring role in the movies and as adman for gun-makers and insurance companies. And he demolishes the myths surrounding Santa Claus and Coca-Cola. Santa Claus: A Biography will stand as the classic work on the long-lived and multifarious Mr. Claus.