Stunning, hypnotic, spare, The Seal Wife is the masterly new novel by Kathryn Harrison, “a writer of extraordinary gifts” (Tobias Wolff). Set in Alaska in 1915, it tells the story of a young scientist’s consuming love for a woman known as the Aleut, a woman who never speaks, who refuses to reveal so much as her name.
Born and educated in midwestern cities, Bigelow is sent north by the United States government to establish a weather...

Will has a good sex life–with the woman he married. So why then is he increasingly plagued by violent erotic fantasies that, were they to break out of his imagination and into the real world, have the power to destroy not only his family but his career? He’s about to lose his grip when he attends a college reunion and there discovers evidence of a past sexual betrayal, one serious enough that it threatens to overpower the present, even...

Stretching across Asia and into eastern Europe and northern Africa, the Silk Road opened the world to new ideas, products, and cultures. Because the Mongols controlled so much of the territory across this network of pathways, trade between east and west flourished, spreading silk, spices, technology, and languages. In addition, the Mongols were known for their different religious traditions, including Buddhism, Islam, and Zoroastrianism, which were...

In this richly textured historical novel, best-selling author Kathryn Harrison spins a mesmerizing tale of forbidden passion and terrifying superstition in 17th-century Spain. As the Spanish Inquisition conducts its ruthless reign of terror, the lives of two women-one, the free spirited daughter of a poor silk farmer; the other, the French princess doomed to marry the deformed King of Spain-unravel like the cocoons of silkworms. A nationally-acclaimed...