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A seductive and lyrical debut following a young woman’s dangerous summer romance during an idyllic vacation on the Aegean coast “A gorgeous exploration.” ―Raven Leilani, author of Luster Ada adores spending every summer in a Turkish seaside town with her mother and grandmother at the family villa. The glittering waters, endless olive groves, and her spirited friends make it easy to leave her idle life in California behind. But no matter how much Ada feels she belongs to the country where her mother grew up, deep down, her connection to the culture feels as fleeting as the seasons. When Levent, a mysterious man from her mother’s past, shows up in their town, Ada can’t help but imagine a different future for her mother―one that promises a return to home, to love, to happiness. But while playing matchmaker, Ada has to come to terms with her own intensifying attraction to Levent. Does the future she’s fighting for belong to her mother―or to her alone? Lush and evocative, İnci Atrek’s Holiday Country is a rapturous meditation about what it means to experience being of two worlds, the limitations and freedom of a life in translation, and the intricacies of a love triangle that stretches across generations and continents. -
The author of What Lies in the Woods returns with a novel about three sisters, two murders, and too many secrets to count. Emma hasn’t told her husband much about her past. He knows her parents are dead and she hasn’t spoken to her sisters in years. Then they lose their apartment, her husband gets laid off, and Emma discovers she’s pregnant―right as the bank account slips into the red. That’s when Emma confesses that she has one more asset: her parents’ house, which she owns jointly with her estranged sisters. They can’t sell it, but they can live in it. But returning home means that Emma is forced to reveal her secrets to her husband: that the house is not a run-down farmhouse but a stately mansion, and that her parents died there. Were murdered. And that some people say Emma did it. Emma and her sisters have never spoken about what really happened that night. Now, her return to the house may lure her sisters back, but it will also crack open family and small-town secrets lots of people don’t want revealed. As Emma struggles to reconnect with her old family and hold together her new one, she begins to realize that the things they have left unspoken all these years have put them in danger again. -
A legendary band, an iconic lead singer, and their mysterious connection to a woman whose love helped create the music of a generation. Timing is everything in a powerful novel about fate, regret, and moving on by the author of A Day Like This. In the 1990s, Carter Wills was the lead singer of the English alt-rock band Mayluna, securing his place among music legends. His tortured-heart lyrics struck a chord. And so did his secret connection to a woman whose love changed all their lives. Who was she? Evie Waters’s two grown children discover an iconic photo in an old magazine of a “mystery girl” with Carter: their mother. It all started in a wistful time and place for Evie, her twenty-fifth summer. A young columnist forging her career. Backstage euphoria. A long-shot interview. And an almost cosmic connection with an enigmatic musician on the rise. What happened between them is a hidden story no one, not even Evie’s family, knows. Until now. Worlds apart, Carter and Evie finally reveal the story―joyful, regretful, and unforgettable. It was a time when the stars aligned for a love so profound the whole world felt it. It was as if it would last forever. -
Perfect for fans of Daisy Jones & The Six and Almost Famous, a gripping debut about the complicated legacy of a legendary rock band and the ghostwriter telling their story Three Rock & Roll icons. Two explosive tell-all memoirs. One ghostwriter caught in the middle. Anke Berben is ready to tell all. A legendary model and style icon, she reveled in headline-grabbing romances with not one but three members of the hugely influential rock band the Midnight Ramblers. The band members were as famous for their backstage drama as for their music, and Anke is the only one who fully understands the tangled relationships, betrayals, and suspicions that have added to the Ramblers’ enduring appeal and mystique. That is most evident in the mystery around Anke’s role in the death of Mal, the band’s founder and Anke’s husband, in 1969. When Mari Hawthorn accepts the job to work with Anke on her memoir, she is dead set on getting to the truth of Mal’s death. She has always been deft at navigating the fatal charms of celebrities, having grown up with a narcissistic, alcoholic father. As she ingratiates herself into the world of the band, she grows enchanted, against her better judgment, by these legendary rock stars. She knows she can’t get pulled in too deep, otherwise she’ll compromise her objectivity―and her integrity. Filled with all of the glamour and attitude of rock and roll, The Last Days of the Midnight Ramblers is a bighearted page-turner that will appeal to fans of Daisy Jones & The Six and Almost Famous. -
“Tubati Alexander is a writer to watch!” —Emily Giffin The author of Love Buzz follows her acclaimed first novel with a delightful Caribbean-set romp about an ambitious designer of apocalyptic video games with a strategy for (almost) everything who discovers what happens when her best-laid plans go off course . . . Sloane Cooper is up for her dream job as a designer for a top video game company. During the interview, though, she somehow promises the all-male panel that she’ll remain single and fully dedicated to the work. It’s actually fine—after her last boyfriend cheated on her, she vowed to focus on her career anyway. Enter Charlie, aka Hot Neighbor Guy, a near-stranger who shocks her with the offer of an all-inclusive trip to a Turks and Caicos resort. The catch? Charlie originally planned the trip with his ex, and asks Sloane to pose as his new girlfriend to make his old flame come running back. Against her better judgment, Sloane says yes; she can use the time away to develop a game design that will dazzle the Catapult team and get her a job offer. Despite sparks flying in paradise, the trip can’t lead to more. As their connection deepens, Sloane is reminded that she can’t fall for Charlie and get knocked off her professional path. Besides, he’s trying to win back his true love. Can Sloane figure out a way to move past heartbreak, land the job of her dreams, and avoid catching feelings? The zombie apocalypse would be easier to solve—at least she’s prepared for that. -
New York Times bestselling author Xochitl Gonzalez delivers a mesmerizing novel about a first-generation Ivy League student who uncovers the genius work of a female artist decades after her suspicious death Who gets to leave a legacy? 1985. Anita de Monte, a rising star in the art world, is found dead in New York City; her tragic death is the talk of the town. Until it isn’t. By 1998 Anita’s name has been all but forgotten―certainly by the time Raquel, a third-year art history student is preparing her final thesis. On College Hill, surrounded by progeny of film producers, C-Suite executives, and international art-dealers, most of whom float through life knowing that their futures are secured, Raquel feels herself an outsider. Students of color, like Raquel, are the minority there, and the pressure to work twice as hard for the same opportunities is no secret. But when Raquel becomes romantically involved with a well-connected older art student, she finds herself unexpectedly rising up the social ranks. As she attempts to straddle both worlds, she stumbles upon Anita’s story, raising questions about the dynamics of her own relationship, which eerily mirrors that of the forgotten artist. Moving back and forth through time and told from the perspectives of both women, Anita de Monte Laughs Last is a propulsive, witty examination of power, love, and art, daring to ask who gets to be remembered and who is left behind in the rarefied world of the elite. -
A glimpse of a quickly melting corpse at the foot of a volcano has amateur sleuth and food enthusiast Valerie Corbin shocked. But how can she investigate a murder, when there’s no evidence the victim ever existed? The first Orchid Isle cozy mystery, set in tropical Hilo, Hawai‘i, introduces a fun and feisty LGBTQ+ couple who swap surfing lessons for sleuthing sessions! Retired caterer Valerie Corbin and her wife Kristen have come to the Big Island of Hawai‘i to treat themselves to a well-earned tropical vacation. After the recent loss of her brother, Valerie is in sore need of a distraction from her troubles and is looking forward to enjoying the delicious food and vibrant culture the state has to offer. Early one morning, the couple and their friend – tattooed local boy, Isaac – set out to see an active lava flow, and Valerie is mesmerized by the shape-shifting mass of orange and red creeping over the field of black rock. Spying a boot in the distance, she strides off alone, pondering how it could have gotten there, only to realize to her horror that the boot is still attached to a leg – a leg which is slowly being engulfed by the hot lava. Valerie’s convinced a murder has been committed – but as she’s the only witness to the now-vanished corpse, who’s going to believe her? Determined to prove what she saw, and get justice for the unknown victim, Valerie launches her own investigation. But, thrown into a Hawaiian culture far from the luaus and tiki bars of glossy tourist magazines, she soon begins to fear she may be the next one to end up entombed in shiny black rock . . . The amiable characters, stunning backdrop and culinary delights make this the perfect cozy of fans who enjoy a tropical vacation with a twisty murder mystery and compelling Hawaiian culture – paired with an added bonus of recipes of local Hawaiian dishes! -
Days after graduating from college, Betsabé Ruiz begins her first job on Wall Street, where she plans to save enough money to eventually pursue her dreams of becoming a theatre actress. What she didn’t anticipate was that this job would allow her barely enough free time to sleep or hang out with friends, let alone take acting classes. She didn’t apprehend the magnitude of the wealth that would be swirling about her, either, or how the long hours and close quarters would infuse her professional relationships with intimacy. Still, she does her best to navigate this uncharted territory at work, where she makes an unlikely best friend and develops an unexpected attraction to her boss. Told in the retrospective as a letter to her unborn son, Daughter of a Promise is a coming-of-age tale in which a naïve Betsabé assumed leaving her past behind was the prerequisite for succeeding as an adult. The wisdom she ultimately passes on to her child, however, is steeped in the very traditions within which her grandmother raised her back in Miami. A modern retelling of the legend of Bathsheba and David, this novel is a reminder that the biological forces of desire and love are timeless and complicated. -
What if your social media addiction jeopardized the person you love? Inspired by the explosive events of our polarized political climate, Burner is an all-too plausible contemporary thriller that examines the social and personal consequences of the lost sense of identity, trust, and truth itself that characterizes our technology-obsessed culture. Shane Stoller has just been arrested for domestic terrorism, accused of being the mastermind behind the online profile Burner_911—the anonymous leader of a massive populist movement. Chloe Corbin has just been abducted by Burner_911’s followers in a lawless uprising on the streets of San Francisco, targeted as the socialite daughter of a tech billionaire. What nobody knows is that Shane and Chloe are secretly in love despite coming from opposite worlds. Plagued with regret but unable to communicate with his followers from prison, Shane tries desperately to find a way to save Chloe from the forces he has unleashed. From her own captivity, Chloe becomes more sympathetic to Burner_911’s cause—and transitions from victim to conspirator in an effort to free herself and exonerate Shane. Part tragic love story, part mind-bending psychological thriller, Burner dives headfirst into the modern zeitgeist of politically motivated disinformation, toxic internet subcultures, and our continuing need for belonging, purpose, and love in an age of distorted online personas. -
On her return to London, artist and seer Pamela Colman Smith discovers that her nemesis, Aleister Crowley, has returned—and his sights are set on her. Despite Aleister’s efforts to stop Pamela from further developing her tarot deck and accessing its magic, she carries on casting her High Priestess and Empress muses, Golden Dawn society leader Florence Farr and popular theatre star Ellen Terry. But when Ellen is poisoned and nearly killed, Pamela realizes that Aleister won’t stop coming for her—not until her muses are dead. When Aleister reveals his plot to assassinate Queen Victoria and all female rulers, war breaks out between the Aleister’s Carlists and the Golden Dawn. With so many lives on the line—that of the queen, and those of her friends—Pamela must access her inner magic to face the battle of her life. -
It is May 2014, and Dr. Klara Lieberman—forty-nine, single, professor of archaeology at a small liberal arts college in Maine, a contained person living a contained life—has just received a letter from her estranged mother, Bessie, that will dramatically change her life. Her father, she learns—the man who has been absent from her life for the last forty-three years, and about whom she has long been desperate for information—is dead. Has been for many years, in fact, which Bessie clearly knew. But now the Polish government is giving financial reparations for land it stole from its Jewish citizens during WWII, and Bessie wants the money. Klara has little interest in the money—but she does want answers about her father. She flies to Warsaw, determined to learn more. In Poland, Klara begins to piece together her father’s, and her own, story. She also connects with extended family, begins a romantic relationship, and discovers her calling: repairing the hundreds of forgotten, and mostly destroyed, pre-War Jewish cemeteries in Poland. Along the way, she becomes a more integrated, embodied, and interpersonally connected individual—one with the tools to make peace with her past and, for the first time in her life, build purposefully toward a bigger future. -
Once you’ve experienced the devastation of fracking, nothing but stopping it makes sense. After a year of well site visits and protests, four college student activists become determined to protect the people and the places they love.
In the river-crossed northwoods of Michigan, Kate, Brett, Sonya, and Mark, mentored by their former professor Rebecca, keep watch as North American Energy (NorA) connects a corridor of frack well sites deep in the state forests. When NorA expands in unexpected directions and their awful, bigger plan becomes clear, the action begins. As grassroots activists gather and prepare to stop NorA’s dangerous superfrac, stresses other than the fracturing of the bedrock appear. Sonya is arrested, Rebecca reveals her hidden past, and the one person who knows both women’s stories arrives in camp. Love and solidarity want to win, even if most showdowns with Big Oil don’t end well for those who take a stand. Suspenseful, poignant, and galvanizing, Land Marks is a tribute to the waterways that connect us, the land that sustains us, and the moments that inspire us to rise up together to say, “No more!” -
Having grown up on stories of her mother's wild youth in California, Elena Berg relocates from New England to the Bay Area in 2011 for a placement as an English teacher with Teach for America. Once there, she is eager to inspire a love of poetry and literature in her diverse but underprivileged students. Her own grandfather—a Holocaust survivor—was a storyteller and teacher who touched the lives of his students for years to come. Elena’s mother followed in his footsteps, leaving behind the hippie lifestyle of her twenties to become a university professor. But Elena quickly finds herself feeling disconnected from teaching, unable to inspire her students, and before long, she grows disillusioned with her career. She transitions to a role in an education technology startup—though she questions her decision, her motivations, and her values. Coming of age between the Occupy and #MeToo movements and against the backdrop of the 2016 election and California's ever-worsening fire season, Elena reckons with California as she imagined it and California as it really is. As she does so, she must also ultimately reconcile the person she envisioned herself to be with the person she actually is. -
The Dropout meets Inventing Anna in this cinematic and page-turning summer read! A ripped-from-the-headlines story set in the glossy offices of Silicon Valley startups and NYC new media, Anna Bright Is Hiding Something explores our fascination with female founders breaking barriers—and sometimes behaving badly in the process. Anna Bright is committing fraud. But nobody knows it yet. Not the board of her multibillion-dollar company, not her investors, not the public breathlessly anticipating the launch of BrightSpot, and not the media—including Jamie Roman, a hardworking journalist for BusinessBerry. But when Jamie does learn about Anna’s misconduct, she embarks on a bicoastal journey to expose the crimes and make a name for herself as a journalist. It’s not long before Anna learns what the reporter is up to, however—and she’ll do anything to stop Jamie. Especially now that BrightLife’s IPO is days away. -
Bella Fontaine is on her own. Fresh out of college and with the winnings from her first international photography competition, she decides to leave Los Angeles to forge a new life in New York City. But will she be able to overcome the trauma of her childhood and her break from home to make it as a successful artist and professional photographer in a new city? Or will her secrets catch up with her ,and keep her from developing the relationships she needs to make her dreams come true? We meet young Bella just after her tenth birthday, and her grandmothers, Olivette and Miriam, each with a beautiful, mature garden as different from each other as the two gardeners who tend them. As Bella’s homelife begins to unravel, she relies on her grandmother’s gardens as her refuge for stability and belonging. But when Miriam moves in with Olivette in search of healing, the grandmothers bond in a way that makes Bella feel excluded. What happens next sends Bella out into the world before she is ready. The Grandest Garden is a poignant coming-of-age story about the ties that bind us to our people and how to survive when they break. -
During a weekend retreat, a powerful family plays a dangerous game of dark secrets and cold-blooded ambition in a novel by Kaira Rouda, USA Todaybestselling author of Beneath the Surface. Under the direction of the Kingsleys’ new president, Paige, the family has gathered for a weekend retreat at a luxurious Laguna Beach resort. Still clinging to the hope of succession are the sons of Richard Kingsley, the family patriarch and CEO: John, the oldest, who’s clawed his way back from a dark tragedy, and Paige’s estranged husband, Ted, the golden boy. When Richard’s ex and his wayward daughter join the fray, Paige finds herself with two fast allies. They know a secret that could shatter the family legacy. Call it leverage, call it revenge, the Kingsley women believe they have the upper hand. But as the power games begin, greater threats than the howling Santa Ana winds are coming. Because this weekend, amid so much greed and betrayal, no Kingsley is safe. It’s family. Watch your back. -
When a popular mystery novelist dies suspiciously, his writing partner must untangle the author’s connection to a serial killer in award-winning John Copenhaver’s new novel set in 1950s McCarthy-era Washington, DC. In May 1954, Lionel Kane witnesses his apartment engulfed in flames with his lover and writing partner, Roger Raymond, inside. Police declare it a suicide due to gas ignition, but Lionel refuses to believe Roger was suicidal. A month earlier, Judy Nightingale and Philippa Watson—the tenacious and troubled heroines from The Savage Kind—attend a lecture by Roger and, being eager fans, befriend him. He has just been fired from his day job at the State Department, another victim of the Lavender Scare, an anti-gay crusade led by figures like Senator Joseph McCarthy and J. Edgar Hoover, claiming homosexuals are security risks. Little do Judy and Philippa know, but their obsessive manhunt of the past several years has fueled the flames of his dismissal. They have been tracking their old enemy Adrian Bogdan, a spy and vicious serial killer protected by powerful forces in the government. He’s on the rampage again, and the police are ignoring his crimes. Frustrated, they send their research to the media and their favorite mystery writer anonymously, hoping to inspire someone, somehow, to publish on the crimes—anything to draw Bogdan out. But has their persistence brought deadly forces to the writing team behind their most beloved books? In the wake of Roger’s death, Lionel searches for clues, but Judy and Philippa threaten his quest, concealing dark secrets of their own. As the crimes of the past and present converge, danger mounts, and the characters race to uncover the truth, even if it means bending their moral boundaries to stop a killer. -
“Behind You Is the Sea fearlessly confronts stereotypes about Palestinian culture, weaving a remarkable portrait of life’s intricate moments, from joyous weddings to heart-wrenching funerals, from shattered hearts to hidden truths—I wept and grew alongside this family. This is a story that challenges perceptions, offering a heartfelt glimpse into the interior lives of those who call this community home. A must read novel with unforgettable characters and an unwavering, fresh voice—I couldn’t put it down until the very last page! Darraj delivers an instant, necessary, and authentic classic to the cannon of Arab-American literature.”—Etaf Rum, author of Evil Eye and A Woman Is No Man An exciting debut novel that gives voice to the diverse residents of a Palestinian American community in Baltimore—from young activists in conflict with their traditional parents to the poor who clean for the rich—lives which intersect across divides of class, generation, and religion. Funny and touching, Behind You Is the Sea brings us into the homes and lives of three main families—the Baladis, the Salamehs, and the Ammars—Palestinian immigrants who’ve all found a different welcome in America. Their various fates and struggles cause their community dynamic to sizzle and sometimes explode: The wealthy Ammar family employs young Maysoon Baladi, whose own family struggles financially, to clean up after their spoiled teenagers. Meanwhile, Marcus Salameh confronts his father in an effort to protect his younger sister for “dishonoring” their name. Only a trip to Palestine, where Marcus experiences an unexpected and dramatic transformation, can bridge this seemingly unbridgeable divide between the two generations. Behind You Is the Sea faces stereotypes about Palestinian culture head-on and, shifting perspectives to weave a complex social fabric replete with weddings, funerals, broken hearts, and devastating secrets. -
In this bold hybrid collection of poetry, flash fiction, and Afrofuturism sci-fi, the award-winning interdisciplinary writer and author of Side Notes from the Archivist explores what happens when god is a Black woman in a town. What happens when there are multiple universes in the middle of nowhere? And what if in each universe there reigned other Black woman gods? One million versions of god, and one million saints to watch over us? And what if this Black woman god were placed here on earth? These are just a few of the questions Anastacia-Reneé asks in this daring and mind-bending hybrid collection. Hers is a universe of striking variety—monsters, nontraditional saints, witches, zombies, the couple in the apartment next door, the wise elders from down the block, and gods watching over us all—as well as community and connectedness. With a prose storyline and characters that connect through family, time, and place, Anastacia-Reneé paints world(s) rich with wonder and the paranormal as she peers into the lives of everyday people and spectacular creatures inhabiting not just our neighborhoods, but other dimensions. Here in the (Middle) of Nowhere is about interstellar ancestry, community and spirituality. It is about the things we invoke, conjure, and rely on to maintain joy as we keep it moving through difficult eras. Anastacia-Reneé’s power imbues her spellbinding storytelling with lovingly rendered characters brought to life in lyrical poetry. She builds worlds within worlds and dares us to fully see and love ourselves in all our complexity. -
In this enchanting love story from the New York Times bestselling author of Seven Days in June, a free-spirited florist and an enigmatic musician are irreversibly linked through the history, art, and magic of Harlem. Leap years are a strange, enchanted time. And for some, even a single February can be life-changing. Ricki Wilde has many talents, but being a Wilde isn’t one of them. As the impulsive, artistic daughter of a powerful Atlanta dynasty, she’s the opposite of her famous socialite sisters. Where they’re long-stemmed roses, she’s a dandelion: an adorable bloom that’s actually a weed, born to float wherever the wind blows. In her bones, Ricki knows that somewhere, a different, more exciting life awaits her. When regal nonagenarian, Ms. Della, invites her to rent the bottom floor of her Harlem brownstone, Ricki jumps at the chance for a fresh beginning. She leaves behind her family, wealth, and chaotic romantic decisions to realize her dream of opening a flower shop. And just beneath the surface of her new neighborhood, the music, stories and dazzling drama of the Harlem Renaissance still simmers. One evening in February as the heady, curiously off-season scent of night-blooming jasmine fills the air, Ricki encounters a handsome, deeply mysterious stranger who knocks her world off balance in the most unexpected way. Set against the backdrop of modern Harlem and Renaissance glamour, A Love Song for Ricki Wilde is a swoon-worthy love story of two passionate artists drawn to the magic, romance, and opportunity of New York, and whose lives are uniquely and irreversibly linked. -
A dazzling magical realism western in the vein of Cormac McCarthy meets Gabriel García Márquez, The Bullet Swallower follows a Mexican bandido as he sets off for Texas to save his family, only to encounter a mysterious figure who has come, finally, to collect a cosmic debt generations in the making. In 1895, Antonio Sonoro is the latest in a long line of ruthless men. He’s good with his gun and is drawn to trouble but he’s also out of money and out of options. A drought has ravaged the town of Dorado, Mexico, where he lives with his wife and children, and so when he hears about a train laden with gold and other treasures, he sets off for Houston to rob it—with his younger brother Hugo in tow. But when the heist goes awry and Hugo is killed by the Texas Rangers, Antonio finds himself launched into a quest for revenge that endangers not only his life and his family, but his eternal soul. In 1964, Jaime Sonoro is Mexico’s most renowned actor and singer. But his comfortable life is disrupted when he discovers a book that purports to tell the entire history of his family beginning with Cain and Abel. In its ancient pages, Jaime learns about the multitude of horrific crimes committed by his ancestors. And when the same mysterious figure from Antonio’s timeline shows up in Mexico City, Jaime realizes that he may be the one who has to pay for his ancestors’ crimes, unless he can discover the true story of his grandfather Antonio, the legendary bandido El Tragabalas, The Bullet Swallower. A family saga that’s epic in scope and magical in its blood, and based loosely on the author’s own great-grandfather, The Bullet Swallower tackles border politics, intergenerational trauma, and the legacies of racism and colonialism in a lush setting and stunning prose that asks who pays for the sins of our ancestors, and whether it is possible to be better than our forebears. -
The anti-rom-com debut collection that took Nigeria by storm, featuring twelve “bewitching and revelatory” (The New York Times) and “ridiculously entertaining” (Booklist starred review) stories about the perils and pitfalls of dating men in Lagos, from a rising star of Nollywood “Sharply observational, funny and profound, this book is dynamic sociological satire that is as universal as it is specific.” —Bolu Babalola, author of Reese’s Book Club pick and national bestseller Honey and Spice *INCLUDES A NEVER-BEFORE-SEEN SNEAK PEEK OF DAMILARE KUKU’S FORTHCOMING NOVEL* One night, you will calmly put a knife to your husband’s private part and promise to cut it off. It will scare him so much that the next day, he will call his family members for a meeting in the house. He will not call your family members, but you will not care. You won’t need them. In this remarkable short story collection, Damilare Kuku takes us deep into the heart of modern Lagos, Nigeria’s largest city, and the lives of a collection of audacious women who cope with romantic difficulties by brilliantly turning the tables on the men who wrong them. One hardworking married woman calmly threatens sharp-edged revenge on her lazy, hypocritical husband. Another skillfully protects her own business interests by shielding her pastor-husband from allegations of cheating that may or may not be true. A group of wealthy wives deceived by their husbands join forces in a WhatsApp support group called the Virtuous Wives Guild. And a discerning dater fed up with Nigerian men makes a vow to date only oyibos before discovering that white men can act just as badly. A bestseller in Damilare Kuku’s native Nigeria, Nearly All the Men in Lagos Are Mad is a raunchy, satisfying, and outrageous read steeped in the chaos and allure of sub-Saharan Africa’s largest city. It’s also a love letter to Nigerian women: the women in these stories may be confronted at every turn with liars, scammers, and cheaters in their quests for love, but they always figure out how to come out victorious. -
“If you’re looking to dive into historical fiction this summer, look no further than” (Town & Country) the acclaimed author of Summer Darlings and On Gin Lane and her latest page-turning novel about two estranged friends whose unexpected reconnection in the Hamptons forces them to finally confront the terrible event that drove them apart. When wealthy, impulsive summer girl Margot meets hardworking and steady local girl Thea in the summer of 1967, the unlikely pair become fast friends, working alongside one another in a record store and spending every spare moment together. But after an unspeakable incident on one devastating August night, they don’t see one another for ten years…until Margot suddenly reappears in Thea’s life, begging for help and harboring more than one dangerous secret. Thea can’t bring herself to refuse her beloved friend—but she also knows she can’t fully trust her either. Unfulfilled as a housewife, Thea enjoys the dazzling sense of adventure Margot brings to her life, but will the truth of what happened to them that fateful summer ruin everything? Testing the boundaries of how far she’ll go for a friend, Thea is forced to reckon with her uncertain future while trying to decide if some friends are meant to remain in the past. Set in the dual timelines of 1967 and 1977, All the Summers In Between is at once a mesmerizing portrait of a complex friendship, a delicious glimpse into a bygone Hamptons, and a powerful coming-of-age for two young women during a transformative era. -
A writer’s search for her missing friend becomes a real-life thriller in a twisting novel of suspense by the New York Times bestselling author of These Toxic Things. Bailey Meadows has just moved into the remote Topanga Canyon home of thriller author Jack Beckham. As his writer-in-residence, she’s supposed to help him once again reach the bestseller list. But she’s not there to write a thriller―she’s there to find Sam Morris, a community leader dedicated to finding missing people, who has disappeared in the canyon surrounding Beckham’s property. The missing woman was last seen in the drought-stricken forest known for wildfires and mountain lions. Each new day, Bailey learns just how dangerous these canyons are―for the other women who have also gone missing here…and for her. Could these missing women be linked to strange events that occurred decades ago at the Beckham estate? As fire season in the canyons approaches, Bailey must race to unravel the truth from fiction before she becomes the next woman lost in the forest. -
Set in the fictional California town of San Encanto–a place where suburban angst coexists with the astonishing–a lonely wife finds her oppressive husband has become a dirigible who follows her from the sky, a neglected boy spends his summer unwinding a parasitic Guinea worm from his little sister’s belly, and an aspiring life coach attends a self-actualization seminar that goes wildly off the rails. In THINGS I WANT BACK FROM YOU, Elizabeth Stix’s hilarious and poignant debut of 20 linked stories, hopelessly flawed characters flail against their own insecurities, seeking one true moment of connection, and if they’re lucky, winning that rarest of gifts–a second chance. “Funny and poignant, this collection will resonate with any reader who has felt trapped by something inexplicable, what Stix calls ‘the fishbowl of our circumstance.’ She takes on love, alienation, betrayal, and recriminations with wit and wisdom, and a generosity of spirit. Her tight cast of characters is frequently smothered by longing, doubt, and sometimes each other in a California landscape that shimmers with possibilities just out of reach. Elizabeth Stix is a true bard of modern life.”–Elizabeth Gonzalez James, author of The Bullet Swallower and Mona at Sea “Elizabeth Stix’s THINGS I WANT BACK FROM YOU is charming and inventive. By turns hilarious and heartbreaking, the interlinked collection of stories–set in and around the Bay Area suburb of San Encanto–features achingly alive characters who yearn for connection. An enchanting debut.”–Vanessa Hua, author of Forbidden City “With sharpness and ease, Elizabeth Stix shows us how the short story, above all literary forms, can deliver an explosion of meaning and feeling. Neighbors, co-workers, families and friends mess up and carry on in stories of poignancy and humor that disturb and delight. An affirmation of the absurdity of life and the steadying power of love.”–Kathryn Ma, author of The Chinese Groove -
In this captivating novel of suspense, a wilderness guide must team up with the man who ruined her life years ago when the friend who introduced them goes missing. Emlyn doesn’t let herself think about the past. How she and her best friend, Janessa, barely speak anymore. How Tyler, the love of her life, left her half dead on the side of the road three years ago. Her new life is simple and safe. She lives alone in her Airstream trailer and works as a fishing and hunting guide in scenic Idaho. Her closest friends are the community’s makeshift reverend and a handsome Forest Service ranger who took her in at her lowest. But when Tyler shows up with the news that Janessa is missing, Emlyn is propelled back into the world she worked so hard to forget. Janessa has become a social media star, documenting her #vanlife adventures with her rugged boyfriend. She hasn’t posted lately, though, and when Emlyn realizes the most recent photo doesn’t match up with its caption, she reluctantly teams up with Tyler to find her old friend. As the two trace Janessa’s path through miles of wild country, Emlyn can’t deny the chemistry still crackling between them. But the deeper they press into the wilderness, the more she begins to suspect that a darker truth lies in the woods―and that Janessa isn’t the only one in danger. Poignant, suspenseful, and unforgettable, Kimi Cunningham Grant’s THE NATURE OF DISAPPEARING explores what it takes to start over―and the cost of letting the past pull you back in. -
In this Ravishing World is a sweeping, impassioned short story collection, ringing out with joy, despair, and hope for the natural world. Nine connected stories unfold, bringing together an unforgettable cast of dreamers, escapists, activists, and artists, creating a kaleidoscopic view of the climate crisis. An older woman who has spent her entire life fighting for the planet sinks into despair. A young boy is determined to bring the natural world to his bleak urban reality. A scientist working to solve the plastic problem grapples with whether to have a child. A ballet dancer endeavors to inhabit the consciousness of a rat. In this Ravishing World is a full-throated chorus— with Nature joining in— marveling at the exquisite beauty of our world, and pleading, raging, and ultimately urging all of its inhabitants toward activism and resistance. -
There are two sides to every love story—and every breakup. Get ready for an emotional roller coaster of family, marriage, and divorce that will have you both laughing and crying, from the bestselling author of Before We Were Strangers. After twenty-two years together, Danielle and Alex are getting a divorce. Once fiercely in love, they can barely stand the sound of each other’s voice. Instead of shuttling the kids between two broken homes, Alex and Dani decide to share a nesting apartment while swapping days with their two teenage boys at the family home. In the apartment, Dani and Alex, on their own, begin to reflect on the last two decades—why they fell in love and why the marriage fell, spectacularly, apart. With the newfound space and time, they are given a chance to rediscover their autonomous selves again. They both get back in the dating pool. Dani finds major success at work as a showrunner on her own TV project, while Alex faces the challenges of a new relationship. Still, they find that they just can’t stay away from each other, and somehow, the distance allows them to remember (for the first time in years) what each used to love about the other. When a family crisis draws them back into each other’s orbit, Dani and Alex are once again put to the test, which leads to a dramatic conclusion that will have readers weeping. -
Punk rock meets Orwell’s 1984 in this story of a group of theater kids who take on a political regime, perfect for readers who love books by A.S. King and Marie Lu. In an alternate 1991, the authoritarian US government keeps tabs on everybody and everything. It censors which books can be read, what music can be listened to, and which plays can be performed. When her best friend is killed by the authorities and her theater teacher disappears without a trace, Gigi decides to organize her fellow Champaign High School thespians to put on a production of Henry VI. But at what cost? -
From #1 New York Times bestselling author Lisa Gardner comes a harrowing new thriller: Frankie Elkin is an expert at finding the missing persons that the rest of the world has forgotten, but even she couldn’t have anticipated this latest request—to locate the long-lost sister of a female serial killer facing execution in three weeks’ time. Frankie Elkin is an expert at finding the missing persons that the rest of the world has forgotten, but even she couldn’t have anticipated this latest request—to locate the long-lost sister of a female serial killer facing execution in three weeks’ time. She has called herself “death,” but people called her the devil. The case was sensational. Kaylee Pierson had confessed from the very beginning, waived all appeals. Despite the media’s chronicling of her tragic circumstances—the childhood spent with a violent father—no one could find sympathy for “the Beautiful Butcher” who had led eighteen men home from bars before viciously slitting their throats. Now, with only twenty-one days left to live, Pierson has finally received a lead on the whereabouts of the sister who was kidnapped over a decade ago, and she needs Frankie’s help to find her. The Beautiful Butcher’s offer: When was the last time your search ended with finding the living? Unable to resist the chance for a rescue, Frankie takes on Pierson’s request. Twelve years ago, five-year-old Leilani went missing in Hawaii. The main suspect? Pierson’s tech mogul ex-boyfriend, Sanders MacManus. Now, on a remote island in the middle of the Pacific—the site of MacManus’s latest vanity project—fresh evidence has appeared. In order to learn the truth and possibly save a young woman’s life, Frankie must go undercover at the isolated base camp. Her challenge: A dozen strangers. Countless dangerous secrets. Zero means of calling for help. And then the storm rolls in… -
On Capitol Hill, they work you to death. Cameron Leann is new to Washington, D.C. An Iowa farm boy without a penny to his name, Cam has joined a group of affluent junior staffers working for a powerful cohort of U.S. Senators known as The Gang of Six. Liz Frost, the group’s charismatic leader, teases and strings Cam along as he grows increasingly infatuated with her. Heir to a political dynasty, Randy Lancaster pushes Cam to his limits with his penchant for booze, drugs, and meaningless flings. Charlie James, Liz’s linebacker boyfriend, keeps Cam at a distance, eyeing the newcomer with suspicion. All of them have one thing in common. They hate their bosses. As the Gang of Six takes up the rushed nomination of the first Black chief justice to the Supreme Court, Cam and his friends are plotting against them. But in the game of politics, one’s motivations are never as they seem—especially true for Cam, the enigmatic figure at the center of it all. When a bombshell revelation threatens to sink the President’s Supreme Court pick, the Gang of Six fractures, pitting senator against senator in a confirmation battle for the ages. Alliances shift with the wind. Everyone is lying to everyone. And on Election Night, one senator will end up dead. -
A young academic moves from India to the United States, where she navigates first love, a green card marriage, single motherhood, and more in this “delightful novel, written with immediacy, warmth, and wry humor” (Ha Jin, National Book Award-winning author of Waiting). Vega Gopalan is adrift. Still reeling from the death of her sister years earlier, she leaves South India to attend graduate school at Columbia University. In New York, Vega straddles many different worlds, eventually moving in and out of a series of relationships that take her through the striving world of academia, the intellectual isolation of the immigrant suburbs, and, ultimately, the loneliness of single motherhood. But it is the birth of Vega’s daughter that forces the novel’s central question: What does it mean to make a home? Written with dry humor and searing insight, Habitations is an intimate story of identity, immigration, expectation and desire, and of love lost and found. But it is also a universal story of womanhood, and the ways in which women are forced to navigate multiple loyalties: to family, to community, and to themselves. A profound meditation on the many meanings of home and on the ways love and kinship can be found, even in the most unfamiliar of places, Habitations introduces Sheila Sundar as an electrifying new voice in literary fiction. -
“A story of love, healing, and second chances ” (Emily Henry) following a down on his luck country musician who, in the throes of grief after a shocking loss, moves back home and rekindles a relationship with his high school sweetheart, from award-winning author Jeff Zentner.
Colton Gentry is riding high. His first hit in nearly a decade has caught fire, he’s opening for country megastar Brant Lucas, and he’s married to one of the hottest acts in the country. But he’s hurting. Only a few weeks earlier, his best friend, Duane, was murdered onstage by a mass shooter at a country music festival. One night, with his trauma festering and Jim Beam flowing through his veins, Colton stands before a sold-out arena crowd of country music fans and offers his unfiltered opinion on guns. It goes over poorly. Immediately, his career and marriage implode. Left with few choices or funds, he retreats to his rural Kentucky hometown. He’s resigned himself to has-been-dom, until a chance encounter at his town’s new farm-to-table restaurant gives him a second shot at life: a job working in the kitchen with Luann, his first love, who has undergone her own reinvention. Told through perspectives alternating between his senior year of high school, his time coming up with Duane as hungry musicians in Nashville, and the present, COLTON GENTRY’S THIRD ACT is a story of coming home, undoing past heartbreaks, and navigating grief, and is a reminder that there are next acts in life, no matter how unlikely they may seem. -
“I urge you, read Alana S. Portero’s Bad Habit to fully grasp the degree of adversity, pain, and danger endured by those growing up trans.” –Pedro Almodóvar Combining the raw realism and vulnerability of Shuggie Bain and Detransition, Baby with the poignant sensibility of Pedro Almodóvar, a staggering coming-of-age novel deeply rooted in the struggles of a trans woman growing up in Madrid. Anchored by the voice of its sweet and defiant narrator, Bad Habit casts a trans woman’s trying youth as a heartfelt odyssey. Raised in an animated yet impoverished blue-collar neighborhood, Alana S. Portero’s protagonist struggles to find her place. As the city around her changes–the heroin epidemic that ravages Madrid through the ’80s and ’90s, rallying calls of worker solidarity and the pulsing beat of the city’s night scene– she becomes increasingly detached from the world and, most crucially, herself. Yet through her eyes, the streets and people of Madrid are illuminated by a poetry absent from everyday life. And by this guiding light she begins to plot her own course, from Margarita, the local trans woman whose unspoken kinship both captivates and frightens her, to Jay, her first love and source of an inevitable heartbreak, to the irrepressible diva Caramel. As she forges ahead, she sets her compass to a personal north star: endeavoring to find herself. But with each step forward, she is confronted by a violence she doesn’t yet know how to counter; in this exciting, often terrifying, world each choice is truly a matter of life and death. With her first novel, Alana S. Portero strikingly underscores the ties between gender and class, the search for identity, and the power of sisterhood and community. Gentle but blistering, Bad Habit is a mesmerizing story of self-realization that speaks to the outsider in all of us. Translated from the Spanish by Mara Faye Lethem -
The acclaimed author of The Secret Women and Things Past Telling returns with an engrossing historical novel about a little known aspect of World War II—the 6888th Central Postal Directory Battalion, the only Black WACs to serve overseas during the conflict. In the wake of the attack on Pearl Harbor in December 1941, Dorothy Thom, Spelman graduate, librarian and Francophile, joins the Women’s Army Corps wanting to do her part for the war effort. Longing for adventure, she has one question for the recruiter: “Do you think I’ll get to go abroad?” As Dorothy and her sister WACs discover, life in the Army is an adventure filled with unexpected deprivations and culture shock. Women from all levels of society, secretaries, teachers, and sharecroppers, work together to navigate a military segregated by race and gender. At boot camp, the “colored girls” are separated for processing. At Ft. Riley, the women’s barracks are rustic and heated by coal-burning pot-bellied stoves while German POWs spend their incarceration in buildings with central heat and hot water. In early 1945, Dorothy and eight hundred African American WACs cross the turbulent North Atlantic to their post in England. Their orders are to process the mail sent to GIs from their loved ones back home, an estimated 17 million pieces. The women arrive to find mail stockpiled for over two years in warehouses and airplane hangars, many pieces in poor condition, the names illegible. In England and France, the WACs traverse a landscape of unimagined possibilities. With their outlooks changed forever, they return to the United States as the catalysts for change in America and build lives that transcend anything their ancestors ever dreamed of. No Better Time illuminates a love of country and duty that has been overlooked until now. -
You’ve Got Mail meets Abbott Elementary in this sweet, sexy romantic comedy for fans of Lynn Painter and Lyssa Kay Adams. School counselor Lucy Galindo has a secret. To her coworkers, friends, and even family, she’s shy, sweet, and constantly struggling to hold off disaster (read: manage her anxiety and depression). But online? She’s bold, confident, and always knows what to say—it’s how she’s become the wildly popular @TheMissGuidedCounselor. It’s also why she keeps her identity anonymous. Her followers would never trust the real Lucy with their problems. History teacher Aldrich Fletcher thought a new job would give him some relief from his drama-filled family. Instead, he’s dodging his ex-girlfriend and pining over his new co-worker—who only ever seems to see him at his worst. Thankfully, he can count on his online confidant for advice . . . until he discovers @TheMissGuidedCounselor is Lucy. Now Fletcher has a secret too. And while Lucy can’t deny there’s something between them, she’s not sure she can trust him. Can they both find the courage to share the truth and step out from behind their screens?
