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While still at university, J.R.R. Tolkien became fascinated by Finnish mythology, abandoning his Classics degree to adapt the epic Story of Kullervo — work that led to the creation of Middle Earth.

Helen Oyeyemi's new story collection has all the sly humor, gorgeous writing and magical characterization as her novels. Critic Michael Schaub calls it a dreamy, spellbinding masterpiece.

The Complete Wimmen's Comix collects two decades of the groundbreaking all-women series. Critic Etelka Lehoczky calls it a "frenetic, anarchic, occasionally kamikaze production."

Julia Ward Howe wrote the Civil War psalm The Battle Hymn of the Republic. She was adrift in a lonely war of her own, against a husband who controlled every aspect of her life, including what she ate.

The Indecisive Chicken combines the recipes and life stories of eight women from communities across India who now make their home in Dharavi, a teeming slum featured in Slumdog Millionaire.

Writer Helen Oyeyemi's new collection features nine stories all linked through the idea of keys that open rooms, doors, even hearts. She says she felt haunted by keys while working on the book.

When James McBride, a National Book Award winner for his fiction, decided to write an entire book about James Brown, he wanted to push beyond the hype and racism he says haunts Brown's legacy.

Gloria Norris' wrenching, darkly funny memoir of her abusive father has strong parallels to accounts of life in the Soviet Union. How do you respond to tyranny? What would it cost you to rebel?

"A part of me was beneath the surface and I had to discover it if I wanted to write with any clarity about myself," says Phillips. His novel The Lost Child brings Wuthering Heights into modern times.

Anthropologist Barbara J. King reviews a new book that suggests domesticating the wolf gave early modern humans an extra edge in hunting that pushed Neanderthals to extinction.