Ayelet Waldman

"In 1945 on the outskirts of Salzburg, victorious American soldiers capture a train filled with unspeakable riches: piles of fine gold watches; mountains of fur coats; crates filled with wedding rings, silver picture frames, family heirlooms, and Shabbat candlesticks passed down through generations. Jack Wiseman, a tough, smart New York Jew, is the lieutenant charged with guarding this treasure--a responsibility that grows more complicated when he...

After John Tetherly and Becca Copaken die in a freak car accident an hour after their wedding, their families are left to bridge stark class and cultural divides, and eventually forge deep-rooted bonds thanks to the twin deities of love and music. Becca's family is well off, from New York, and summers in Red Hook, Maine, a small coastal town where John's blue-collar single mother, Jane, cleans houses for a living. They interact, awkwardly, over how...

"What moves memoirists to make their most personal stories public? In Why We Write About Ourselves, twenty of America's most successful memoirists answer this question -- and share the nuts and bolts of how they do it. Exploring such issues as the reliability of memory, the ethics of disclosure, and how to protect others' privacy without self-censoring, these bestselling memoirists reveal what keeps them going during the tough times and what they...