A sampling of favorite books recently returned to print.

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	Love in a Fallen City  •  Eileen Chang  •  Karen S. Kingsbury LITERATURE •  2006 •  PAPER  • 338 PAGES Eileen Chang wrote these four novellas and two stories in Japanese-occupied Shanghai in the 1940s. Canonized in China, Taiwan, and Hong Kong, Chang has been little known in the U.S. (where she spent the last half of her life, after fleeing the People's Republic), but this collection should go far to change that. Her work is a revelation, poised tellingly between Confucian tradition and Western modernity, like their author herself. (CHN387, $14.95)
	Paris Stories  •  Mavis Gallant  •  Michael Ondaatje LITERATURE •  2002 •  PAPER  • 350 PAGES A welcome collection of Gallant's magnificent work, much of it originally published in the New Yorker. Canadian by birth, Gallant has lived in Europe since just after World War II, and her characters are exiles on the peripheries of European society, at home precisely nowhere. This selection (chosen by Michael Ondaatje) includes stories set in postwar Germany and Franco's Spain, as well as many set on the French riviera and in the Left Bank neighborhoods that Gallant knows so well. Gallant surely ranks among the greatest short story writers of the 20th century, so if you've never read her, you're in for a tremendous treat. (FRN373, $14.95)
	Varieties of Exile  •  Mavis Gallant  •  Russell Banks LITERATURE •  2003 •  PAPER  • 400 PAGES Wonderful stories set primarily in Gallant's native Montreal (with side trips to Paris, Moscow, and the south of France). Gallant left Canada for France shortly after World War II, and the Montreal of her stories is the place she remembers from childhood: a city starkly divided between working-class French Catholics and genteel English Protestants. The book includes the autobiographical Linnet Muir story cycle. (CND267, $14.95)
	The Towers of Trebizond  •  Rose MacAulay  •  Jan Morris LITERATURE •  2003 •  PAPER  • 277 PAGES First published in 1956, this is the impossibly witty account of an eccentric party of Brits who set off for Turkey to establish a mission. Known for her sparkling humor, Macaulay has written a minor masterpiece that makes great fun of the church and eccentric Englishmen in exotic lands. It also includes much information on the region and its ancient history. (TKY15, $14.95)
	The Siege of Krishnapur  •  J.G. Farrell LITERATURE •  2004 •  PAPER  • 344 PAGES A harrowing, grimly humorous novel set during the Sepoy Rebellion, the bloody 1857 revolt of Indian military recruits against the Raj. It's one of a terrific trio of novels (The Empire Trilogy) by the late J.G. Farrell. Winner of the 1973 Booker Prize. (IDA240, $15.95)
	The Singapore Grip  •  JG Farrell LITERATURE •  2005 •  PAPER  • 572 PAGES A big, rich, all-encompassing novel, set in British-ruled Singapore in the years leading up to and including the Japanese invasion in 1941-42. Farrell, who wrote a trio of novels about the British Empire, was at his most ambitious in this book, which ranges all over the colony from the slums to the cricket clubs. It's an exhaustively researched, meticulously evoked portrait of the colonial city in peace and war. (The other two books in Farrell's Empire Trilogy are The Siege of Krishnapur (IDA240) and Troubles (IRE171), also set during violent revolts against British rule.). (SGP13, $17.95)
	Troubles  •  J.G. Farrell LITERATURE •  2002 •  PAPER  • 459 PAGES Terrifically evocative of the British Empire's decline in Ireland--and darkly hilarious, too--this is a plum of a read. You couldn't do better on an idle day than to pick this page-turner up. Farrell, who dissected the Empire in this and two other novels-- The Singapore Grip (Item SGP13) and The Siege of Krishnapur (IDA240) -- never misses a ruling-class absurdity or a violent undercurrent. (IRE171, $16.95)
	The Raven Crown, the Origins of Buddhist Monarchy in Bhutan  •  Michael Aris HISTORY •  2005 •  HARD COVER  • 160 PAGES The definitive account of the modern history of Bhutan as seen through the 20th-century Wangchuk dynasty, which has ruled the kingdom since 1907. Based on Bhutanese chronicles, this gorgeously produced, informative book features 106 rare historic photographs from archives in Bhutan and the United Kingdom. Originally published in 1994. The late Michael Aris lived in Bhutan from 1967 to 197 as a historian and tutor of the children of the royal family. (BHU02, $60.00)
	Libby: The Alaskan Diaries and Letters of Libby Beaman, 1879-1880  •  Libby Beaman  •  Betty John BIOGRAPHY/MEMOIR •  1998 •  PAPER  • 206 PAGES • FAVORITE The engrossing memoir of an American woman who accompanied her husband to Alaska's Pribilof Islands in 1879, just after American acquisition of the region. Libby was the first non-native woman to live on St. Paul, which lies just south of the Arctic Circle in the Bering Sea. As edited by Libby's granddaughter, the book is a plainly told and wonderfully evocative tale of a pioneering life in remote Alaska -- with much attention paid to the natural history of the Pribilof Islands. From her storm-bound arrival at St. Paul to her reception by the local population to her near-death of cold and malnutrition, it's a great story. (ARC07, $16.95)
	A Time of Gifts  •  Patrick Leigh Fermor TRAVEL NARRATIVE •  2005 •  PAPER  • 384 PAGES Fermor effortlessly interweaves anecdote, history and culture in this exuberant account of a walk as a young man in 1933 across Europe. This first volume chronicles his trip from the Hook of Holland, up the Rhine and down the Danube. The adventure continues in Between the Woods and Water, thankfully also reissued by NYRB. The books were written not by the young adventurer but the accomplished author 40 years later, adding perspective and a sweet nostalgia. (CEU30, $16.95)
	My Journey to Lhasa  •  Alexandra David-Neel TRAVEL NARRATIVE •  2005 •  PAPER  • 317 PAGES A reprint of the 1927 classic by the indomitable Buddhist scholar Alexandra David-Neel, with a new preface by the Dalai Lama. Tibet was still closed to the West in 1923, the year that David-Neel and her adopted Tibetan son set out on their wintry trek to Lhasa. Dressed as humble pilgrims and traveling under cover of night, the duo climbed mountains, fooled soldiers and ultimately reached the capital, where they joined the pilgrim throng. David-Neel was not altogether without the prejudices of her European contemporaries, but she was markedly better-educated; and as a result her travelogue is an informed, informative portrait of early twentieth-century Tibet. (TBT26, $14.95)
	Under the Glacier  •  Halldor Laxness  •  Magnus Magnusson LITERATURE •  2005 •  PAPER  • 256 PAGES Written at the height of his powers in 1968, Laxness brings the full range of his wit, humor, humanity and imagination to this wholly unclassifiable tale of a young emissary from the Bishop ("Embi") among the people of Snaeffels, a strange place indeed. This playful book, returned to print with an introduction by Susan Sontag, toys with Jules Verne's Journey to the Center of the Earth, Norse mythology and Christian conventions. Laxness won the Nobel Prize in 1955. (ICL24, $14.00)
	D'Aulaires' Book of Norse Myths  •  Edgar D'Aulaire  •  Ingri D'Aulaire  •  Michael Chabon LITERATURE •  2005 •  HARD COVER  • 160 PAGES • FAMILY A beautifully illustrated introduction to Norse legends, recently returned to print. The D'Aulaireses, who wrote and illustrated many classic children's books during their long career, vividly recreate the characters and Norse landscapes of Odin the All-father, Thor the Thunder-god, Loki, Ragnarokk, Bragi, and the Valkyries. Originally published in 1967 as Norse Gods and Giants. For ages 8 and up. (SCN35, $24.95)
	Dersu the Trapper  •  V.K. Arseniev  •  Malcolm Burr TRAVEL NARRATIVE •  1996 •  PAPER  • 358 PAGES • FAVORITE A mesmerizing account of adventure, exploration and friendship in the Russian Far East. Arseniev, a Russian captain who explored much of the region north of Vladivostok at the turn-of-the-century, forged a friendship with the taciturn Dersu, a nomadic Goldi hunter, to whom he owed much of his success. The bond between the men, almost wordless (and much romanticized), heightens Arseniev's obvious love for the wilderness. The book was the source for Kurosowa's magnificent 1976 film, Dersu Uzala. (SIB24, $16.00)
	Down The Garden Path  •  Beverley Nichols NATURAL HISTORY •  2005 •  HARD COVER  • 296 PAGES A facsimile edition of Nichols' beloved classic, originally published in 1932. On its surface an account of creating a garden at Huntingdonshire in the 1930s, it's an entertaining ode to the pleasures and perils of gardening. Nichols answers in splendid prose, rich in anecdote, the ageless question: Why Garden? Timber Press has also reissued The Merry Hall Trilogy and many of Nichols's other gardening books and lightly fictionalized novels (always as much about plants as people). He was a prolific writer and man-about-town (1898-1983). (GBR598, $24.95)

	Letters on Cezanne  •  Rainer Maria Rilke  •  Joel Agee   • ART & ARCHITECTURE • FAVORITE  •  This brilliant meditation on Paris, art, and life takes the form of a series of short letters by the great poet Rilke to his wife Clara. The book chronicles Rilke's daily pilgrimage to a Cezanne exhibition at a Paris gallery. (FRN300, $13.00)
	A Visit to Don Otavio, A Traveller's Tale from Mexico  •  Sybille Bedford  •  Bruce Chatwin   • TRAVEL NARRATIVE  •  A tale of a leisurely journey to Mexico after World War II, the first book by the marvelous Sybille Bedford. Chatwin called it "the most perfect travel book of the 20th century." (MEX126, $16.00)
	Between the Woods and the Water  •  Patrick Leigh Fermor   • TRAVEL NARRATIVE  •  This sequel to A Time of Gifts (CEU30), Fermor's classic account of walking across Europe in 1933, continues with his youthful adventures in Hungary and Romania. The book ends at the Iron Gates, which divide the Carpathian mountains from the Balkans. (CEU31, $15.95)
	Hindoo Holiday, An Indian Journal  •  J.R. Ackerly   • TRAVEL NARRATIVE  •  Ackerly traipses across India as the English tutor to a handsome and extravagantly homosexual maharajah in this comic, beautifully turned-out novel masquerading as a travelogue. (IDA115, $14.00)
	Mani, Travels in Southern Peloponnese  •  Patrick Leigh Fermor   • TRAVEL NARRATIVE  •  An inspired travelogue and history of the region, first published in 1958 by the incomparable Paddy Fermor, who has lived for many years in Greece. (GRE27, $15.95)
	Peking Story, The Last Days of Old China  •  David Kidd  •  John Lanchester   • BIOGRAPHY/MEMOIR  •  A wry tribute to lost way of life and time in Beijing. Kidd writes with humor and sweet nostalgia of the privileged and eccentric Lu family in the years around the 1948 Communist Revolution. (CHN264, $14.00)
	Roumeli, Travels in Northern Greece  •  Patrick Leigh Fermor  •  William Dalrymple   • TRAVEL NARRATIVE  •  An account of travels, history and place by the incomparable Fermor, who has lived in Greece for many decades, originally published in 1966. (GRE249, $14.95)
	The Egg and I  •  Betty MacDonald   • BIOGRAPHY/MEMOIR  •  MacDonald's uproarious account of raising chickens and children on a dilapidated 40-acre farm on the rainy, remote Olympic Peninsula. (PNW51, $13.95)
	The Innocent Anthropologist, Notes from a Mud Hut  •  Nigel Barley   • TRAVEL NARRATIVE  •  British anthropologist Barley's refreshingly candid, witty account of the perils of fieldwork among the Dowayo of northern Cameroon. (CAF14, $17.95)
	The Oysters of Locmariaquer  •  Eleanor Clark   • TRAVEL NARRATIVE  •  This splendid portrait captures with flair the hardy oystermen and traditional byways of the southern coast of Brittany. It's a charming, lyrical book, often quoted ("Obviously, if you don't love life, you can't enjoy an oyster"), and winner of the 1964 National Book Award. (FRN152, $13.95)
	The Way of the White Clouds  •  Lama Anagarika Govinda  •  Robert Thurman   • TRAVEL NARRATIVE  •  The 40th anniversary edition of the remarkable German-born monk and interpreter of Tibetan Buddhism's account of travels and discoveries in Tibet before the 1950 Chinese invasion. (TBT87, $19.95)
	Weird and Tragic Shores: The Story of Charles Francis Hall, Explorer  •  Chauncey Loomis  •  Andrea Barrett   • EXPLORATION  •  The tale of 19th-century Arctic explorer Charles Francis Hall, and the mysterious circumstances surrounding his untimely death somewhere in Greenland. (ARC63, $19.00)
	Constantinople  •  Edmondo De Amicis  •  Stephen Parkin  •  Umberto Eco   • LITERATURE • OUT OF PRINT  •  These atmospheric sketches, happily returned to print by Hesperus Press in a handsome paper edition, capture the flavor of Istanbul. (TKY102, $17.95)
	Enchanted April  •  Elizabeth Von Arnim  •  Cathleen Schine   • LITERATURE  •  In this delightful book, four Englishwomen are awakened by self-discovery and the power of their friendship on a stay in Italy in the 1920s. (ITL316, $14.95)
	Hadji Murat  •  Leo Tolstoy  •  Colm Toibin   • LITERATURE  •  Tolstoy short tale of the meeting of two polarized cultures -- the refined, Europeanized court of the Russian tsar and the fierce Muslim chieftains of the Chechnen hills. (RUS383, $13.95)
	Iceland's Bell  •  Halldor Laxness  •  Philip Roughton   • LITERATURE  •  The first translation into English of a novel in the spirit the medieval sagas by Iceland's Nobel Laureate. (ICL22, $15.95)
	Memed, My Hawk  •  Yasar Kemal   • LITERATURE  •  From Turkey's master storyteller comes this deceptively simple tale of a rebellious boy in the Taurus mountains of rural Turkey. (TKY57, $15.95)
	Rock Crystal  •  Adalbert Stifter  •  Marianne Moore   • LITERATURE • COMING IN SEPTEMBER  •  This 1945 tale of a brother and sister lost on Christmas Eve in the Austrian Alps is among the most moving and memorable of holiday tales. (ALP36, $12.95)
	Sleepless Nights  •  Elizabeth Hardwick   • LITERATURE  •  Harwick's luminous 1979 novel of longing, desolation, New York City and Billie Holiday, thankfully returned to print. Read it for the extraordinary language, the flavor of 1940s New York. (NYC21, $12.95)
	The Summer Book  •  Tove Jansson  •  Thomas Teal   • LITERATURE  •  Tove Jansson's slender novel is a season told in episodes in the lives a six-year-old girl, awakening to existence, and her grandmother, who is nearing the end of hers. (SCN56, $14.00)
	Winter Wheat  •  Mildred Walker   • LITERATURE  •  A classic novel of family life and love on a 1940s-era farm in Central Montana. (RKY75, $13.95)

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