The bridge ladies A memoir

LEAVING LUCY PEAR, by Anna Solomon. (Penguin, $16.) Beatrice -18 years old, unmarried, Radcliffe-bound - leaves her newborn daughter in her uncle's pear grove, hoping that the thieves who often steal fruit will take the child, too. Years later, in a Massachusetts in the throes of Prohibition, Beatrice is restless, stalled and grieving, when the woman who adopted the baby begins working for Beatrice's uncle, and the families' fates are entwined yet again. AMERICAN ULYSSES: A Life of Ulysses S. Grant, by Ronald C. White. (Random House, $20.) This thorough biography celebrates the virtues and contradictions of the president and general, with a focus on his success during the Civil War. In White's telling, Grant emerges as a skilled, courageous leader with a deep faith, commitment to justice and hidden wit - a corrective to images advanced by Jim Crow-era historians and other critics. THE HIGH PLACES: Stories, by Fiona McFarlane. (Picador, $16.) The high places McFarlane invokes in this collection range from the literal (paratroopers during World War II) to the divine (a pastor questioning his faith). "The narrative impulse behind these vivid tales is understandable," our reviewer, Christopher Benfey, wrote. "McFarlane's instinct as a storyteller is to let some puzzles remain unsolved." THE BRIDGE LADIES: A Memoir, by Betsy Lerner. (Harper Perennial, $15.99.) To repair a fraught relationship with her mother, Lerner begins attending her longstanding Monday bridge club - a fixture of her social life even when the author was a child. As our reviewer, Becky Aikman, put it, the memoir "makes a case for spending time together under the rules of neutrality imposed by a game, an approach to living that refrains from over-sharing and outward complaint to concentrate on the task at hand." PALACE OF TREASON, by Jason Matthews. (Scribner, $16.99.) Dominika Egorova, the synesthetic double agent introduced in Matthews's first thriller, "Red Sparrow," has returned to Russia from the West and ascended to the top ranks of the Russian Intelligence Service - making her one of the best-placed C.I.A. moles. As she fends off Iranian assassination attempts and advances from President Vladimir V. Putin, she hides secrets of her own. HOW TO BE A PERSON IN THE WORLD: Ask Polly's Guide Through the Paradoxes of Modern Life, by Heather Havri lesky. (Anchor, $15.) The advice columnist for New York magazine grapples with such substantive issues as creative quandaries and emotional blocks. The collection, which includes both previously published and new columns, dispenses thoughtful, tough-love advice.