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Emily Dickinson is as famous for being a recluse as she is for her poetry. In this stunning novel, we see her struggling to reconcile spirit and flesh, preferring letters and reflecting that the only way to have books and life is to live through one's own writing. Dominique Fortier brings Dickinson vividly to life, as if reanimating a flower that had been pressed in a book, through her reflections on language and what it feels like to be home.

This novel following a Korean adoptee, her white mother, and her best friend through two decades is “an intense and compelling read... terrific” (Kirkus Reviews). What is considered a family, and who gets to define it? In 1964, as racial tension simmers in America, Catherine and Jonathan adopt a baby girl from Korea. This unconventional choice brings disapproval from Catherine's family—which creates an even closer bond between her and her daughter. Narrated in alternating chapters by Catherine, her adopted daughter Min, and Min's best friend Laura, Scissors, Paper, Stone spans twenty years of love, loss, and the complex reality of female relationships. As Min grows up, we watch as she comes out as a lesbian and learns to embrace her heritage, and after she and Laura take a summer road trip together, the shifts in their friendship force all three women to examine the assumptions they've been living by and to make choices about the roles they want to play in each other's lives. “Davis writes with rare insight and compassion about the evolving American family and the struggle to belong... a wise and affecting novel.” ―Hilma Wolitzer, author of An Available Man

div>'The emotions unleashed in this tale... are painfully universal. Yet you know exactly where in the universe you are. This is the hallmark of great short stories, from Chekhov's portraits of discontented Russians to Joyce's struggling Dubliners.'—Radhika Jones, TimeNaja Marie Aidt's long-awaited first novel is a breathtaking page-turner and complex portrait of a man whose life slowly devolves into one of violence and jealousy.Rock, Paper, Scissors opens shortly after the death of Thomas and Jenny's criminal father. While trying to fix a toaster that he left behind, Thomas discovers a secret, setting into motion a series of events leading to the dissolution of his life, and plunging him into a dark, shadowy underworld of violence and betrayal.A gripping story written with a poet's sensibility and attention to language, Rock, Paper, Scissors showcases all of Aidt's gifts and will greatly expand the readership for one of Denmark's most decorated and beloved writers.Naja Marie Aidt was born in Greenland and raised in Copenhagen. She is the author of seven collections of poetry and five short story collections, including Baboon (Two Lines Press), which received the Nordic Council's Literature Prize and the Danish Critics Prize for Literature. Rock, Paper, Scissors is her first novel.K. E. Semmel is a writer and translator whose work has appeared in Ontario Review, the Washington Post, and elsewhere. His translations include books by Karin Fossum, Erik Valeur, Jussi Adler-Olsen, and Simon Fruelund.

Along with his siblings, Raphael Hardin left his childhood home in rural Kentucky. Grappling with an AIDS diagnosis, he returns to care for his dying father. Told from the perspectives of Raphael, his family, and their lifelong neighbor, Fenton Johnson's landmark novel reveals the blood struggles and binding loves of a broken family made whole.

REESE'S BOOK CLUB PICK INSTANT #1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLEROVER 2 MILLION COPIES SOLD WORLDWIDE THE PAPER PALACE IS: “Filled with secrets, love, lies and a summer beach house. What more could you ask?”—Parade “A deeply emotional love story…the unraveling of secrets, lies and a very complex love triangle.” —Reese Witherspoon (Reese's Book Club July'21 Pick)'Nail-biting.'—Town & Country “A magnificent page-turner.” —Cynthia D'Aprix Sweeney, New York Times bestselling author“[An] irresistible placement of a complicated family in a bewitching place.” —The New York Times A story of summer, secrets, love, and lies: in the course of a singular day on Cape Cod, one woman must make a life-changing decision that has been brewing for decades.“This house, this place, knows all my secrets.” It is a perfect August morning, and Elle, a fifty-year-old happily married mother of three, awakens at “The Paper Palace”—the family summer place which she has visited every summer of her life. But this morning is different: last night Elle and her oldest friend Jonas crept out the back door into the darkness and had sex with each other for the first time, all while their spouses chatted away inside. Now, over the next twenty-four hours, Elle will have to decide between the life she has made with her genuinely beloved husband, Peter, and the life she always imagined she would have had with her childhood love, Jonas, if a tragic event hadn't forever changed the course of their lives. As Heller colors in the experiences that have led Elle to this day, we arrive at her ultimate decision with all its complexity. Tender yet devastating, The Paper Palace considers the tensions between desire and dignity, the legacies of abuse, and the crimes and misdemeanors of families.

From the best-selling author of The Secret in Their Eyes, an adventure about friendship, soccer, and good humor When Alejandro “Mono” dies of cancer, his brother and two closest friends, a tight-knit group since childhood, are left to figure out how to take care of his young daughter, Guadalupe. They want to give her all the love they felt for Mono and secure her future, but there isn't a single peso left in the bank. Mono invested all of his money in a promising soccer player whose talents haven't panned out, and the three hundred thousand dollars Mono spent on his transfer is soon to be lost for good. How do you sell a forward who can't score a goal? How do you negotiate in a world whose rules you don't know? How do you maintain relationships when repeated failures create fissures in lifelong loyalties? Fernando, Mauricio, and Ruso pool the few resources in their arsenal to come up with strategies—from harebrained to inspired—in their desperate attempt to recoup Mono's investment for Guadalupe. Following the lives of four distinct characters, who, despite their great differences, still manage to find solace and pride in one another, Papers in the Wind is a tribute to friendship and proof that love and humor can triumph over sadness.

Peregrine Island is the recipient of the following 10 literary awards: 2017 Winner of the New York City Big Book Award for Mystery 2017 Best Book Awards Finalist in General Fiction for Fiction, for Literary, and for Mystery & Suspense 2017 Winner of the National Indie Excellence Award for Regional Fiction: Northeast 2017 Distinguished Favorite in Literary Fiction by Independent Press Awards 2017 International Book Awards Finalist for Literary Fiction 2017 National Indie Excellence Award Finalist for Fiction 2017 Bronze Award for US Northeast Fiction from the Independent Publisher (IPPY) Book Awards 2018 Reader Views Literary Award Finalist and Honorable Mention for Adult - Fiction 2018 A Reader's Favorite literary fiction award winner 2018 Semifinalist, Somerset Award for Literary Fiction, Chanticleer International Book Awards ~~~~~ Literary Mystery Highlights an Heirloom Painting on Long Island Sound and the Relationships between Three Generations of Women Part “who-done-it” and part family drama, this award-winning novel reveals that neither people nor paintings are always what they appear to be. Contradictory relationships within troubled families are nothing new, but the award-winning psychological novel written by well-known journalist Diane B. Saxton elevates these relationships and the mysterious heirloom painting that both exposes and unites them to an art form. Peregrine Island interweaves the stories of three generations of women, one valuable painting, the artist who created it, and those who would do anything to possess it – including kill. Lush with sensory details, this psychologically complex mystery novel is set on a private island in the middle of Long Island Sound. It begins when the family's lives are turned upside-down one summer by so-called art experts, who appear on the doorstep of their isolated home to appraise a favorite heirloom painting. When incriminating papers along with two other paintings are discovered behind the painting in question, the appraisal turns into a full-fledged investigation and detectives are called into the case—but not by the family whose members grow increasingly antagonistic toward one another. During the course of the inquiry and as the summer progresses, the family members discover new secrets about one another and new facts about their past. Above all, they learn that neither people nor paintings can be taken at face value. The Peregrine family's lives are turned upside down one summer when so-called'art experts'appear on the doorstep of their Connecticut island home to appraise a favorite heirloom painting. When incriminating papers, as well as other paintings, are discovered behind the art work in question, the appraisal turns into a full-fledged investigation. Antagonism mounts between grandmother, mother, and child, who begin to suspect one another, as well as the shady newcomers in their midst, of foul play. As the summer progresses and the Peregrines discover facts about their past in the course of the investigation, they learn that people―including them―are not always who they appear to be.

A tender and poignant debut of the redemptive power of unexpected friendship.In an old-fashioned fishing community on Morecambe Bay, change is imperceptibly slow. Treacherous tides sweep the quicksands, claiming everything in their path.As a boy, Arthur had followed in his father's and grandfather's footprints, learning to read the currents and shifting sands. Now retired and widowed, though, he feels invisible, redundant. His daughter wants him in a retirement home. No one listens to his rants about the newcomers striking out nightly onto the bay for cockles, seemingly oblivious to the danger.When Arthur's path crosses Suling's, both are running out of options. Barely yet an adult, Suling's hopes for a better life have given way to fear: she's without papers or money, speaks no English, and chased by ruthless debt collectors. Her only next step is to trust the old man.Combining warmth and suspense and recalling a true incident, The Bay tells a tender story about loneliness, confronting prejudice, and the comfort of friendship, however unlikely—as well as exposing one of the most pressing social ills of our age. The Bay is an engrossing novel recalling the Morecambe Bay cockling disaster of 2004.

Dear Edie, I wanted you to know so many things. I wanted to tell you them in person, as you grew up by my side. But it wasn't to be…When Jess gives birth to Edie, it's the happiest day of her life. She knows, from the moment her little girl's hand grasps her finger, that her daughter owns her heart, completely and utterly. And even though Edie's father has left them, and single motherhood isn't easy, her beautiful, innocent child brings her untold joy.But then Jess receives a diagnosis that changes everything. Edie's life – that is just beginning – is interrupted by worried looks, heavy conversations. And Jess must face the possibility of leaving her daughter to grow up without her.Propelled by a ticking clock, Jess knows what she has to do. She begins to put pen to paper, to tell her daughter everything she might need to know.How to love, how to lose, how to forgive, and, most importantly, how to live when you never know how long you have…Readers love Laura Pearson:‘Gorgeous… Tender and beautiful… As hopeful as it is heart-breaking… I loved it.'Amy Beashel, author‘Wow. Seriously. Just beautiful. So many wonderful elements… Such a unique angle… So many memorable characters… Beautiful and utterly affecting.'Louise Beech, author‘Be still my beating heart. I've smiled and I've cried and everything in between. Most importantly I've learned… I'd give it 10 stars if I could.'Nicki's Book Blog‘This beautifully written story of friendship, love, loss and second chances captured my heart… Leaves you feeling warm, hopeful, and satisfied.'Lisa Timoney, author‘Such a treat!… Just beautiful… If you're looking for a charming, warm and moving read, this is the book you need. A beautifully written story about love and longing, and a poignant reminder that it's never too late to follow your heart.'Holly Miller, author‘I adored it. Laura has written a heartbreakingly beautiful story about love in all its different forms. (And she made me cry again, of course). Bravo.'Nikki Smith, author‘Well, I finished this in the same 24 hours as I started it. Oh… what a beautiful story and an amazing cast of characters. Poignant and inspiring!'Jennie Godfrey, author‘Such a poignant story. Brought a lump to my throat in many places.'Karen Angelico, author‘What a beautiful book about truth, love, relationships and how it's never too late to follow your heart… Moving, funny and emotionally clever. Highly recommend!'Alison Stockham, author

SHORTLISTED FOR THE NSW PREMIER'S LITERARY AWARDSLONGLISTED FOR THE INDIE BOOK AWARD FOR FICTION 2024‘A stand out amongst contemporary Australian literary fiction for its stylistic and structural ambition, God Forgets About the Poor is the novel Polites has been climbing to. It is moving, poetic, powerful - at once a folktale and a modern day lament. Christos Tsiolkas meets Gabriel Garcia Marquez.'- Maxine Beneba Clarke, bestselling and award winning author of Foreign Soil and The Hate Race ‘In God Forgets About the Poor, Polites has produced a masterpiece.'- ArtsHub ‘a triumphant reclamation, written in prose clean as polished stones'- The Saturday Paper ‘God Forgets About the Poor feels like a culmination; it's the author's most striking work yet.'- The Guardian ‘an important literary achievement'- The Conversation ‘God Forgets About the Poor is a reminder that everyone has a story worth telling and hearing, but not everyone gets the chance to share it. This is one told well.'- Books + PublishingI will tell you why you should draft my story. Because migrant stories are broken. Some parts in a village where we washed our clothing with soot. Some parts in big cities working in factories. How we starved for food in Greece and starved for Greece in Australia.You don't know the first thing about me. A son can never see his mother as a woman. You will only see me in relation to you. I have had a thousand lives before you were even a thought. Hospitalised as a child for an entire year. Living as an adult without family in Athens when the colonels took control.Start when I was born. Describe the village and how beautiful it was. On the side of a mountain but in the middle of a forest. If we walked to a certain point on the edge, we could look over the valley and see rain clouds coming. Sometimes we would see a cat on a roof, we read that as a warning of a storm. When we looked down, we saw the dirt, which was just as rich as the sky. My island, your island, our island.Sometimes I think God forgot about us because we were poor.A stunning new novel from the author of Down the Hume and The Pillars, God Forgets About the Poor is a love story to a migrant mother, whose story is as important as any ever told. PRAISE FOR GOD FORGETS ABOUT THE POOR: ‘Polites brings to light his mother's story, a migrant woman who has lived a number of lives, surely a common story in the Greek community, and while the title suggests god may forget about the poor, Polites wants to make sure the world does not.'- Neos Kosmos ‘It is an exquisite mode for the diaspora story, a genre that is increasingly losing its meaningfulness in a time of its commodification. In God Forgets About the Poor, the old country is dead, yet it continues to live vividly in migrants'memories even as they evolve amongst future generations.'- ABC Arts - The Bookshelf ‘Peter Polites is also sensitive to the ways in which migrant stories can be reduced, stereotyped and consumed in mainstream publishing, and is at pains to give voice to the complexity and richness of his subject's experience.'- The Sydney Morning Herald ‘a nuanced portrait in which a mother—in her full and challenging complexity—is truly honoured.'- Meanjin

A NEW YORK TIMES EDITORS'CHOICE The longest river in Europe, the Volga, divides the continent in two. On one side, mighty mountains, large Russian cities with white stone churches, translucent blue lakes of icy water, a cold wind blowing from the North Sea, and, in the early years of the twentieth century, the winds of momentous change blowing even harder, bringing with them revolution and ideologies that will shape the next two centuries of human history. On the other side, a world that belongs to the past, that is shored up by the vast Western Steppe, where small villages dot vast farmlands and life is perfumed by a hot, fragrant breeze that has its source in the Turkmen desert and the salty Caspian Sea. Two worlds that could not be further apart. Two worlds that will be brought together when Jakob Bach is hired by Udo Grimm to give lessons to Grimm's daughter, Klara. The love that grows between Jakob and Klara has unimaginable consequences. Expelled from Gnadenthal when their affair is discovered, they settle in a secluded hamlet hidden deep in the woods to live their lives in peace. But following a tragic episode, Jacob, psychically scarred, is forced to raise his daughter Anche alone. The fairy tales he invents and puts to paper in an effort to forge a bond with his daughter become widely known and slowly life in the German colonies along Volga begins to resemble the stories created by Bach. In the 18th century, the Russian empress Catherine the Great invited Europeans to immigrate and become Russian citizens and farm Russian lands while maintaining their language and culture. The settlers came mainly from Germany, and following the Russian Revolution, the Volga German Soviet Republic was founded, lasting until 1941, when it was abolished after the Germans invaded the region. In September 1941 all Volga Germans were deported. Over half a million were sent into exile in Siberia and Kazakhstan. Jacob Bach's life reflects and foreshadows that of his native colony, Gnadenthal, in this sweeping epic set in the dying years of the 19th century through to the mid-twentieth century of personal tragedy and resilience. In telling a stirring family story, Yakhina also recounts the story of a people, a republic, a nation, a tale that begins in quietude, flows and grows mighty, crosses space and time, like the Volga River itself.

“Hypnotic.” – New York Times“Cinematic.” – USA Today'I gripped the covers of this book as though it might be blown from my hands...powerful.'- Ron Charles, The Washington Post'A full-throttle page turner.'– Miranda Cowley Heller, #1 New York Times bestselling author of The Paper PalaceAn adrenaline-fueled story of lives upended and transformed by an unprecedented catastrophe To all appearances, the Larsen-Hall family has everything: healthy children, a stable marriage, a lucrative career for Brantley, and the means for Daphne to pursue her art full-time. Their deluxe new Miami life has just clicked into place when Luna—the world's first category 6 hurricane—upends everything they have taken for granted. When the storm makes landfall, it triggers a descent of another sort. Their home destroyed, two of its members missing, and finances abruptly cut off, the family finds everything they assumed about their lives now up for grabs. Swept into a mass rush of evacuees from across the American South, they are transported hundreds of miles to a FEMA megashelter where their new community includes an insurance-agent-turned-drug dealer, a group of vulnerable children, and a dedicated relief worker trying to keep the peace. Will “normal” ever return? A suspenseful read plotted on a vast national tapestry, The Displacements thrillingly explores what happens when privilege is lost and resilience is tested in a swiftly changing world.

The bestselling author of The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel delivers a “provocative, enthralling, bang up-to-the-minute” thriller (Daily Mail). It all starts with a prize. The Price family wins a holiday trip to Florida and gets their photo in the paper. They're all there, the picture-perfect family in front of their gorgeous home. But it's awkward, adolescent, seventeen-year-old Hannah who catches someone's eye. And only days later, she's gone. Val and Morris Price try not to panic when Hannah doesn't return from Camden Market on Sunday night. After all, she is a teenager. But when Hannah still hasn't shown up on Monday, they start to think the worst—then the ransom note comes with a demand for £500,000 and no police. After days of tallying assets and scrambling for money, Val makes the drop. Hannah comes home. Only what should be the end of a nightmare is just the beginning... The Prices'have lost their business and their home. Their sudden change in fortune takes its toll, and family bonds slowly begin to disintegrate. Meanwhile, the desperate couple who kidnapped Hannah embark on a life of luxury that only fuels their twisted love. But what goes up must come down... with a crash. “A neat plot... [with] dark flashes of hubris and nemesis.” —The Guardian “Moggach's subject is the rickety edifice we call the family, which she comes at armed with both a wrecking ball and an insatiable curiosity to note the particular way it collapses.” —The Independent “Deborah Moggach is a delight to read—her characters are wonderfully alive, and their stories grip us unequivocally.... The novel is enjoyable from first to last.” —The Daily Telegraph “It is characterisation at which Moggach excels. Her gift is to perceive and describe our confusions about life... and to write with feeling about the continual quest for love and happiness that is part of the human condition.” —The Sunday Times

“[A] social comedy with some brilliant people observations about ageing and a devilish plot twist” from the author of The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel (The Times, London). After their elderly father's fall, Phoebe and her brother, Robert, couldn't be happier with his new caregiver, Mandy. She came to them with great recommendations and has given the brilliant, yet lonely, widower a new lease on life—though he is gossiping about the locals'love affairs instead of debating science and politics. But Phoebe and Robert soon become suspicious of Mandy—her rummaging about in their father's papers, her strange inheritance from a former client, her habit of speaking her mind no matter the consequences. Then Robert discovers that their father has changed his will. Suddenly Mandy seems more devil than angel... For the first time in years, Phoebe and Robert are bonding over something—even if it is their mutual distrust of Mandy. And what happens next will make the siblings question everything they thought they knew about their parents—and themselves. “Moggach addresses an all too common nightmare with ruthless honesty and sublime wit—The Carer is one of the funniest novels I have read for ages.” —The Times (London) “Unputdownable, fun and tender with characters that jump off the page. Perfection.” —Marian Keyes, international-bestselling author of Again, Rachel “Joyous... a sustained satire on smug middle-class mores.” —Daily Mail “The most endearing of humorists, Deborah Moggach casts a penetrating eye on our foibles and fantasies. Neither ageing, nor death—as The Carer so beautifully demonstrates—can resist her comic scrutiny.” —Lisa Appignanesi, award-winning author of Mad, Bad, and Sad

“Willy Vlautin is not known for happy endings, but there's something here that defies the downward pull. In the end, Lynette is pure life force: fierce and canny and blazing through a city that no longer has space for her, and it's all Portland's loss.”—Portland Monthly MagazineAward-winning author Willy Vlautin explores the impact of trickle-down greed and opportunism of gentrification on ordinary lives in this scorching novel that captures the plight of a young woman pushed to the edge as she fights to secure a stable future for herself and her family.Barely thirty, Lynette is exhausted. Saddled with bad credit and juggling multiple jobs, some illegally, she's been diligently working to buy the house she lives in with her mother and developmentally disabled brother Kenny. Portland's housing prices have nearly quadrupled in fifteen years, and the owner is giving them a good deal. Lynette knows it's their last best chance to own their own home—and obtain the security they've never had. While she has enough for the down payment, she needs her mother to cover the rest of the asking price. But a week before they're set to sign the loan papers, her mother gets cold feet and reneges on her promise, pushing Lynette to her limits to find the money they need.Set over two days and two nights, The Night Always Comes follows Lynette's frantic search—an odyssey of hope and anguish that will bring her face to face with greedy rich men and ambitious hustlers, those benefiting and those left behind by a city in the throes of a transformative boom. As her desperation builds and her pleas for help go unanswered, Lynette makes a dangerous choice that sets her on a precarious, frenzied spiral. In trying to save her family's future, she is plunged into the darkness of her past, and forced to confront the reality of her life.A heart wrenching portrait of a woman hungry for security and a home in a rapidly changing city, The Night Always Comes raises the difficult questions we are often too afraid to ask ourselves: What is the price of gentrification, and how far are we really prepared to go to achieve the American Dream? Is the American dream even attainable for those living at the edges? Or for too many of us, is it only a hollow promise?

Shortlisted for the International Prize for Arabic Fiction 2016. In the wake of resettlement from the desert to the hills overlooking Jerusalem, aging Bedouin patriarch Mannan wants his son Muhammad al-Asghar (the Youngest) to take on leadership and hold the clan together. But the youngest of eighteen sons is unable to follow in his father's footsteps. Like others in the al-Abd al-Lat clan, he is torn between old customs and new choices. Muhammad al-Asghar is married—with affection and loyalty—to open-minded Sanaa, a childless divorcee. He works as a clerk in a sharia court, recording marriage contracts and divorce papers. But he wants to become a writer and gets drawn into stories: of his mate, of unhappy co-wives in the sharia court, of his storytelling mother Wadha (his father's sixth wife), of his brothers and relatives. Listening to them, he becomes aware of the impossibility of equality for women in a clan culture caught in the grip of a suffocating foreign occupation, following the Palestinian exodus of 1948. And while he fails to bring the clan together, as his father had hoped, he manages to honor Mannan's legacy request and record the life of the clan. A family album imbued with disaster, warmth and humor, Praise for the Women of the Family captures vivid snapshots of shifting intimate bonds, taken in the shadow of the patriarch by a youngest son, in search of his ­people's story. The Al-Abd al-Lat clan has left the desert and is preparing to leave its Bedouin customs behind. Some of the women of the clan are drawn to the allure of modern life, while others scorn it and fear the loss of their traditional lifestyle and values. When Rasmia accompanies her husband to a party, Najma wears a dress and Sana gets a tan on her white legs, they set malicious tongues wagging. Meanwhile, Wadha, the sixth wife of Mannan, the chief of the clan, still believes that the washing machine and television are inhabited by evil spirits. Set in the tumultuous time after the nakba (the Palestinian exodus from what is now Israel), Praise for the Women in the Family portrays the rapid advance of modernity and the growing conflict in 1950s Palestine. It also reveals the impossibility of political equality in a society that treats its women unjustly and denies them the right to dignity and equality with men.

A NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLERLONGLISTED FOR THE BOOKER PRIZESHORTLISTED FOR THE DUBLIN LITERARY AWARDSHORTLISTED FOR THE PRIX FEMINA AND THE PRIX MEDICISSHORTLISTED FOR THE GOLDSBORO BOOKS GLASS BELL AWARDWINNER OF THE PRIX DU MEILLEUR LIVRES ETRANGERWINNER OF THE 2020 NATIONAL JEWISH BOOK AWARDS CHOSEN AS A BOOK OF 2020 BY THE SUNDAY TIMES, OBSERVER, GUARDIAN, i PAPER, FINANCIAL TIMES, NEW STATESMAN, SCOTSMAN, IRISH TIMES, BBC.COM, WATERSTONES.COM'A wondrous book. It left me hopeful; this is its gift'Elizabeth Strout'An empathy engine... It is, itself, an agent of change'New York Times Book Review'A quite extraordinary novel'Kamila Shamsie______________________How do we continue living once we have lost our reason to live?Rami and Bassam live in the city of Jerusalem – but exist worlds apart, divided by an age-old conflict. And yet they have one thing in common. Both are fathers; both are fathers of daughters – and both daughters are now lost.When Rami and Bassam meet, and tell one another the story of their grief, the most unexpected thing of all happens: they become best of friends. And their stories become one story, a story with the power to heal – and the power to change the world.______________________'The book goes anywhere and everywhere. It is a delirious and thrilling improvisation, a jazz solo spun out of that meeting … A spectacular structure of stories about everything'Bryan Appleyard, Sunday Times

Originally published as a 20-episode serial between March 1852 and September 1853, “Bleak House” is a novel by English author Charles Dickens. The story centres around Esther Summerson, the novel's heroine and omniscient narrator, and a long-running legal case in the Court of Chancery which arises as a result of conflicting wills. Though brimming with arguably exaggerated satire, “Bleak House” helped further a judicial reform movement which led to legal reform in the 1870s. A classic example of Dickens's much-celebrated literature not to be missed by fans and collectors of his timeless work. Charles John Huffam Dickens (1812–1870) was an English writer and social critic famous for having created some of the world's most well-known fictional characters. His works became unprecedentedly popular during his life, and today he is commonly regarded as the greatest Victorian-era novelist. Although perhaps better known for such works as “Oliver Twist” or “A Christmas Carol”, Dickens first gained success with the 1836 serial publication of “The Pickwick Papers”, which turned him almost overnight into an international literary celebrity thanks to his humour, satire, and astute observations concerning society and character. This classic work is being republished now in a new edition complete with an introductory chapter from “Appreciations and Criticisms of the Works of Charles Dickens” by G. K. Chesterton.

Shortlisted for the 2021 Crime Writers of Canada Award for Best Crime Novel From the Giller-nominated author of Y comes How a Woman Becomes a Lake, a taut, suspenseful novel about the dark corners of a small town, and the secrets that lurk within...It's New Year's Day and the residents of a small fishing town are ready to start their lives anew. Leo takes his two young sons out to the lake to write resolutions on paper boats. That same frigid morning, Vera sets out for a walk with her dog along the lake, leaving her husband in bed with a hangover.But she never returns. She places a call to the police saying she's found a boy in the woods, but the call is cut short by a muffled cry. Did one of Leo's sons see Vera? What are they hiding about that day? And why are they so scared of their own father?Told from shifting perspectives, How a Woman Becomes a Lake is a compelling, lyrical novel about family, new beginnings, and costly mistakes, and asks, what do you do when the people who are meant to love you the most, fail?

The first novel in ten years from the author of the beloved New York Times bestseller The Particular Sadness Of Lemon Cake, a luminous, poignant tale of a mother, a daughter, mental illness, and the fluctuating barrier between the mind and the worldOn the night her single mother is taken to a mental hospital after a psychotic episode, eight year-old Francie is staying with her babysitter, waiting to take the train to Los Angeles to go live with her aunt and uncle. There is a lovely lamp next to the couch on which she's sleeping, the shade adorned with butterflies. When she wakes, Francie spies a dead butterfly, exactly matching the ones on the lamp, floating in a glass of water. She drinks it before the babysitter can see.Twenty years later, Francie is compelled to make sense of that moment, and two other incidents -- her discovery of a desiccated beetle from a school paper, and a bouquet of dried roses from some curtains. Her recall is exact -- she is sure these things happened. But despite her certainty, she wrestles with the hold these memories maintain over her, and what they say about her own place in the world. As Francie conjures her past and reduces her engagement with the world to a bare minimum, she begins to question her relationship to reality. The scenes set in Francie's past glow with the intensity of childhood perception, how physical objects can take on an otherworldly power. The question for Francie is, What do these events signify? And does this power survive childhood?Told in the lush, lilting prose that led the San Francisco Chronicle to say Aimee Bender is'a writer who makes you grateful for the very existence of language,'The Butterfly Lampshade is a heartfelt and heartbreaking examination of the sometimes overwhelming power of the material world, and a broken love between mother and child.

The highly acclaimed author of Landslide delivers “[an] intricate, delicate-as-rice-paper novel'(O, The Oprah Magazine) about an ex-pat in China who embarks on a journey that takes her into the darkest corners of addiction, marriage, and motherhood. When Elsey's husband, Lukas, hands her a brochure for a weeklong mountain retreat, she knows he is really giving her an ultimatum: Go, or we're done. Once a successful painter, Elsey set down roots in China after falling in love with Lukas. Now, with two young daughters and unable to find a balance between her identities as artist, mother, and wife, Elsey fills her days worrying, drinking, and descending into boredom and unhappiness. So she agrees to go. There, she meets a group of men and women who will forever alter the way she understands herself and her marriage. Written in a voice at once wry, sensual, blunt, and hypnotic, Elsey Come Home is a modern odyssey and a quietly dynamic portrait of contemporary womanhood.

Part of the Gibbs Smith Women's Voices series: A collection of literary voices written by, and for, extraordinary women—to encourage, challenge, and inspire.Louisa May Alcott (1832–1888) published more than thirty books in her lifetime, but it was her “girls'story” (written at the request of her publisher), Little Women, that has captured the imagination of millions of readers.This coming-of-age story spotlights beloved tomboy Jo March (arguably America's first juvenile heroine and a reflection of a young Alcott herself) and Jo's three sisters—Meg, Beth, and Amy—in a heartwarming family drama. Originally published in two parts, in 1868 and 1869, Little Women has never been out of print.Continue your journey in the Women's Voices series with Jane Eyre, by Charlotte Bronte (ISBN: 978-1-4236-5099-7), The Feminist Papers, by Mary Wollstonecraft (ISBN: 978-1-4236-5097-3), Hope Is the Thing with Feathers, the complete poems of Emily Dickinson (ISBN: 978-1-4236-5098-0), and The Yellow Wallpaper and Other Writings, by Charlotte Perkins Gilman (ISBN: 978-1-4236-5213-7).

The global fiction sensation—published in thirty-two countries. “A warm and tender story about life, memories, and the power of love and friendship.” —Katarina Bivald, New York Times–bestselling authorMeet Doris, a ninety-six-year-old woman living alone in her Stockholm apartment. She has few visitors, but her weekly Skype calls with Jenny—her American grandniece, and her only relative—give her great joy and remind her of her own youth.When Doris was a girl, she was given an address book by her father, and ever since she has carefully documented everyone she met and loved throughout the years. Looking through the little book now, Doris sees the many crossed-out names of people long gone and is struck by the urge to put pen to paper. In writing down the stories of her colorful past—working as a maid in Sweden, modelling in Paris during the'30s, fleeing to Manhattan at the dawn of the Second World War—can she help Jenny, haunted by a difficult childhood, unlock the secrets of their family and finally look to the future? And whatever became of Allan, the love of Doris's life?A charming novel that prompts reflection on the stories we all should carry to the next generation, and the surprises in life that can await even the oldest among us, The Red Address Book introduces Sofia Lundberg as a wise—and irresistible—storyteller.“Written with love, told with joy. Very easy to enjoy.” —Fredrik Backman, #1 New York Times–bestselling author of A Man Called Ove

“Be careful trying to place blame, or it might come back to you,” Ceng Guangxian's father warns him after the first time his good intentions end in ruin. Yet time and again as Guangxian comes of age, bad luck and his own desires for a bigger, better future wreak havoc upon his family, fortune, and social reputation, leaving him scrambling to find the causes of the mishaps that define his life. Dong Xi's Record of Regret, here in its first English translation, introduces readers to a masterpiece of contemporary Chinese literature, and to the unparalleled tragicomic style of one of China's most celebrated writers. Set in the wake of China's Cultural Revolution, the novel follows Guangxian from his days as a middle school student to adulthood as a lonely, middle-aged man. Guangxian's path of misery—which he meticulously documents—is driven by absurdity: his discovery of two dogs mating leads to his father's infidelity with a neighbor; Guangxian's attempts to court a woman with the gift of a new dress result in his imprisonment for rape; he selects a spouse through a catastrophic game of chance, drawing from a set of names scrawled on crumpled pieces of paper. Guangxian's guilty conscience and youthful understanding of morality compound these disasters. Translated by Dylan Levi King to preserve the tone and engaging style of Dong Xi's original text, Record of Regret provides English readers a look into a darkly humorous landscape of dubious loyalties and lessons, seen through the eyes of a man trying to find his place in an upside-down world.

'Michelle Bailat-Jones has written a stark, haunting novel that explores the binds of family, of marriage, and of mothering and being mothered. In the wake of Ella's father's death, what appears to be an ending is in fact the beginning of unraveling a life's worth of mysteries, as well as what it means to forgive others and forgive oneself. This is a gorgeous, sea-drenched book of exceptional lyricism that drew me in from the very first page.”—Anne Valente, author of Our Hearts Will Burn Us Down'Unfurled is a poignant novel about the chaos of life, and the mind and heart. Bailat-Jones writes with clarity, control, beauty, and a crystalline understanding of people—our fragility and strength, flaws and virtues, wounds and recovery. A wonderful accomplishment.'—Ethel Rohan, author of The Weight of Him For more than twenty years, Ella has learned to live without her mother, Maggie, who disappeared into a fog of mental illness when Ella turned ten. Despite this trauma, Ella has forged ahead, becoming a veterinarian, getting married, and most of all, developing a deep, trusting bond with her father, John, a ferry captain in Seattle. Ella's contented life is shattered when her father is hit by a car and killed. Going through his papers, she learns that her father maintained a secret relationship with her mother. The unsettling questions raised by her father's death and her mother's unexpected reappearance sends Ella on a journey to discover the truth about the woman who abandoned her and the man who raised her, a journey that threatens her marriage, her unborn child, and ultimately, her sanity.

Three touching contemporary British novels of love, loss, and humor from the international bestselling “virtuoso” (The Times, London). Jumping the Queue: This masterpiece of wit, humor, and psychological suspense tells the story of a middle-aged widow who has had it with life. She puts her papers in order, gives away her pet goose, packs a picnic lunch, and heads to the beach to drown herself—only to meet a criminal on the run who has the same idea. Together they set out on adventure in this novel about the hidden costs of love and death. The Camomile Lawn: In this international bestseller, several cousins reunite after forty years to lay one of their own to rest. Together they recall their last carefree summer—and one hot August night in 1939 before the war began. They also reflect on the chaos that followed... and how it changed their lives forever. Harnessing Peacocks: Single mother Hebe juggles numerous lovers while working as a manor house chef to pay for her son's schooling. When her two worlds collide, a secret from the past leads to a final showdown with a man who's in search for his lost love in this captivating and sensual novel.

Una meravellosa faula que explica la història d'una parella fascinada pels balls, els còctels, el bon menjar i els llibres, a través dels ulls encisats d'un nen. La novel·la en què es basa la nova pel·lícula de Régis Roinsard, protagonitzada per Romain Duris i Virginie Efira. Davant la mirada absorta del seu fill, una parella embriagada d'amor balla al so de Mr. Bojangles, de Nina Simone. L'escena, màgica, vertiginosa, només és un record més dels molts que broten de la memòria del protagonista de la història, que rememora una infància marcada per l'excentricitat d'uns pares amb un estil de vida aliè a qualsevol convenció social. El pare, la vitalitat feta persona, no concep una vida assossegada i monòtona -fins al punt de'rebatejar'la seva dona amb un nom diferent cada dia-, i la mare, capaç d'interpretar tot tipus de papers amb la convicció de l'il·lusionista més avesat, fa que la rutina familiar sigui una festa perpètua, un espai on només caben el plaer, la fantasia i l'amistat. Tanmateix, a poc a poc, comença a entreveure's que aquest univers ple de poesia, de quimeres, de moments meravellosos, s'assenta sobre un precari sentit de la realitat, i que, quan les cançons i els somnis arribin a la fi, el despertar pot ser molt dolorós. La crítica ha dit... «Recordeu el nom d'Olivier Bourdeaut. Amb la seva prosa musical, fa somriure les llàgrimes i plorar l'alegria.» Jérôme Garcin, Le Nouvel Observateur «Una escriptura aparentment simple, però en realitat rica en detalls, plena a vessar de fórmules atrevides, d'autèntiques troballes estilístiques. I el lector també participa de la festa.» Bernard Pivot, Le Journal du Dimanche «Feia molt de temps que no llegia una cosa tan deliciosa i amb tant d'encant.» Pierre Assouline, La République des Livres «Olivier Bourdeaut ens presenta una família que, sota l'extravagància, amaga tota una tragèdia. Un magnífic relat d'amor i desesperació.» Valérie Trierweiler, Paris Match «La fantasia és aquí la reina absoluta. L'autor ens submergeix en un desordre alegre i carregat d'enginy que delectarà el lector.» Elle

Winner of the Edge Hill Short Story PrizeA New York Times Notable Book of the YearAn NPR Best Book of the YearThe award-winning author of The Past once again'crystallizes the atmosphere of ordinary life in prose somehow miraculous and natural'(Washington Post), in a collection of stories that elevate the mundane into the exceptional.The author of six critically acclaimed novels, Tessa Hadley has proven herself to be the champion of revealing the hidden depths in the deceptively simple. In these short stories it's the ordinary things that turn out to be most extraordinary: the history of a length of fabric or a forgotten jacket. Two sisters quarrel over an inheritance and a new baby; a child awake in the night explores the familiar rooms of her home, made strange by the darkness; a housekeeper caring for a helpless old man uncovers secrets from his past. The first steps into a turning point and a new life are made so easily and carelessly: each of these stories illuminate crucial moments of transition, often imperceptible to the protagonists.A girl accepts a lift in a car with some older boys; a young woman reads the diaries she discovers while housesitting. Small acts have large consequences, some that can reverberate across decades; private fantasies can affect other people, for better and worse. The real things that happen to people, the accidents that befall them, are every bit as mysterious as their longings and their dreams.Bad Dreams and Other Stories demonstrates yet again that Tessa Hadley'puts on paper a consciousness so visceral, so fully realized, it heightens and expands your own. She is a true master'(Lily King, author of Euphoria).

By turns hilarious and bittersweet, Andy Mozina's winning debut novel introduces a charming new hero for our times: a dysfunctional, divorced family man whose passion for life comes straight from the harp. Matthew Grzbc is a talented musician who plays the concert harp. He is a divorced dad who lives in Chicago, has a sexy girlfriend, and has a major, potentially life-changing audition with an orchestra on the horizon. At least that's how he appears on paper. But take a closer look and a very different man starts to emerge: an obsessive, self-sabotaging Midwesterner, fumbling through his relationship with his curiously neurotic six-year-old daughter and headed for destruction in his romantic life by grasping at any remotely affectionate warm body, including that of his ex-wife. Instead of playing to sold-out concert halls, he spends his days plucking out “Send in the Clowns” at hotel brunches, and his weekends serenading the captive audience at the local hospice. When his father dies unexpectedly (while listening to a meditation tape), Matt's life begins to come untethered. In quick succession his ex-wife gets engaged, his girlfriend begins to pull away, and his daughter starts acting out. With his audition rapidly approaching, Matt is paralyzed by panic—why can't he hold it together and follow his dream? And what does that even mean, if you're not sure what it is you really want? Funny, poignant, and thoroughly engaging, Contrary Motion is a journey deep inside a male mind as it searches—desperately—for a way to balance life, love, and a harp. Praise for Contrary Motion “Mozina's finely detailed, painfully funny novel is a rollicking performance that will keep readers on the edge of their seats.”—Booklist (starred review) “Mozina has created a likeable, believable main character, the sort of guy alongside whom you could easily spend hours dissecting life over a couple of beers. It's the first novel for Mozina,... and it's sure to leave readers asking for more. Mozina's storytelling is easy and humorous, taking the stuff of everyday life and presenting it in a way that both entertains and draws out emotion.”—BookPage “Standing between world-class harpist Matt Grzbc and his dream, a permanent position in a top orchestra, is just about everybody in his life. This brilliant debut novel zigzags across Chicago's neighborhoods, exploring the obsession a striving artist must have for his craft, as he also makes a living and nourishes those near him, especially his eccentric and precocious six-year-old daughter. Contrary Motion is a wonderful story—beautifully written, hilarious, tortured, and filled with heavenly music.”—Bonnie Jo Campbell, author of National Book Award finalist American Salvage “Charming... The painfully self-aware Matt has a great sense of humor, but his comic insights don't help him much as he faces a confounding array of personal problems.... The pleasures of [Mozina's] writing never flag.”—Kirkus Reviews “No portrait of an artist brings alive vulnerability, hilarity, desperation, hipness, absurdity, and painful steadfastness as splendidly as Andy Mozina's Contrary Motion. A dazzling, unforgettable novel.”—Mark Wisniewski, author of Watch Me Go

A boy returns home from seminary to a family on the verge of collapse For almost seven years, Mrs. Fury has done nothing but think of Peter. Of her five children, he is the youngest, her darling boy whose future she planned out long ago. It was for Peter that she took one child out of college and married another off—for Peter that she sent a third to work at sea. She has sacrificed everything so that Peter could return to Ireland to study for the priesthood. He is to be the family's salvation—but after seven years in seminary, Peter has failed. Mrs. Fury receives two telegrams: One telling her that Peter is coming home, the other bearing the news that her eldest son, Anthony, has fallen from his ship's mast and is in a hospital in New York. With two slips of paper, Mrs. Fury's hopes for the future are dashed. But this Irishwoman is strong as iron, and she will do whatever it takes to keep her family together—if only for Peter's sake. The Furys is the first book of James Hanley's acclaimed Furys Saga.

From the New York Times bestselling author of The Unlikely Pilgrimage of Harold Fry comes an exquisite love story about Queenie Hennessy, the remarkable friend who inspired Harold's cross-country journey.“This lovely book is full of joy. Much more than the story of a woman's enduring love for an ordinary, flawed man, it's an ode to messy, imperfect, glorious, unsung humanity.”—The Washington PostA runaway international bestseller, The Unlikely Pilgrimage of Harold Fry followed its unassuming hero on an incredible journey as he traveled the length of England on foot—a journey spurred by a simple letter from his old friend Queenie Hennessy, writing from a hospice to say goodbye. Harold believed that as long as he kept walking, Queenie would live. What he didn't know was that his decision to walk had caused her both alarm and fear. How could she wait? What would she say? Forced to confront the past, Queenie realizes she must write again. In this poignant parallel story to Harold's saga, acclaimed author Rachel Joyce brings Queenie Hennessy's voice into sharp focus. Setting pen to paper, Queenie makes a journey of her own, a journey that is even bigger than Harold's; one word after another, she promises to confess long-buried truths—about her modest childhood, her studies at Oxford, the heartbreak that brought her to Kingsbridge and to loving Harold, her friendship with his son, the solace she has found in a garden by the sea. And, finally, the devastating secret she has kept from Harold for all these years. A wise, tender, layered novel that gathers tremendous emotional force, The Love Song of Miss Queenie Hennessy underscores the resilience of the human spirit, beautifully illuminating the small yet pivotal moments that can change a person's life.

In just a few heartbreaking days, Lexy Shaw's world has fallen apart. After her mother is killed in a tragic hit-and-run, her mother's childhood guardian, Ursula, also dies suddenly, leaving everything to Lexy. But as Lexy reads through Ursula's hidden papers, what she discovers raises doubts about her own identity and if she really is now all alone in the world.Desperate to find out if she has any surviving family, Lexy travels to Africa hoping she can unravel the mystery she's now tormented by, only to find that she's stumbled into a past full of lies and deceit and that her life is in grave danger.Winner of the Sunday Mail Fiction Competition 2015'Part detective thriller, part emotional journey, Ursula's Secret is a highly enjoyable and intelligent adventure that will appeal to fans of Kate Atkinson and Maggie O'Farrell. A very promising debut.'SOPHIE COOKE, author of The Glass House'Lovely straightforward and absorbing story telling of complex lives and a secret that spans decades and continents.'ISLA DEWAR, author of Dancing in a Distant Place'The complex story accelerates to a dramatic denouement that leaves Lexy enlightened and chastened, and on the verge of a new phase in her life, and leaves the reader wholly satisfied with Wilson's adept, sympathetic and colourful storytelling.'MORAG JOSS, award-winning author of the Sara Selkirk novels'Ursula's Secret is packed full of tension, questions, problems, secrecy and intrigue right until the concluding chapter.'EMMA CROWLEY, Shaz's Book Blog'This book is filled with twist after twist, secret after secret which will keep you guessing right to the end.'PORTOBELLO BOOK BLOG'I was completely captured from the beginning of Ursula's Secret, enveloped in the mystery and memories of Ursula and the beauty of her home. With it's ‘smiling'staircase and Lexy's obvious wonder I was lost to the tale and it's descriptive content… I loved this read.'•••• TRACY SHEPHARD, Postcard Reviews Blog

On April 10, 1994, PBS stations nationwide will air the first episode of a lavish six-part Masterpiece Theatre production of Eliot's brilliant work, Middlemarch, hosted by Russell Baker and produced by Louis Marks. The Modern Library is pleased to offer this official companion edition, complete with tie-in art and printed on acid-free paper. Unabridged.

Four distinct voices weave together the tale of a dysfunctional Montreal family obsessed with climbing the Kabbalah's Tree of Life. This literary debut by Jewish Daily Forward editor Sigal Samuel is reminiscent of Nicole Krauss's The History of Love and Myla Goldberg's Bee Season. The Meyer family lives in Mile End, home to a mashup of hipsters and Hasidic Jews, where down the street crazy Mr. Katz is building a tree out of plucked leaves, toilet paper rolls, and dental floss. When David, a skeptical professor of religion, is diagnosed with an unusual heart murmur, he becomes convinced that his heart is whispering divine secrets. But when David's frenzied attempts to ascend the Tree of Life lead to tragedy, his daughter Samara, who abruptly abandoned religion years earlier, believes it is up to her to finish what she started. As Samara's brother documents her increasingly strange behaviour, it falls to next-door neighbour and Holocaust survivor Chaim Glassman to shatter the silence that divides the members of the Meyer family. But can he break through to them in time? Long-held family secrets square off against faith and secularity in this remarkable debut novel, written with extraordinary heart and intelligence.

A midsummer morning, Brooklyn, 1955. Oscar Carnovsky, a respectable (yet hardly distinguished) middle-aged man, leaves for work in the usual fashion: takes his share of the morning paper, kisses his wife goodbye, and waves back as he turns the corner of Linden Boulevard. He has done it precisely this way five thousand times. This particular morning, however, he waves from the corner and is not seen again, nor is he heard from, for years. Decades later (at Oscar's funeral) his daybooks come to light—a record of the missing years and of his life as The Invisible Mensch. This unremarkable man will soon become an unforgettable character as you accompany him on his flight through the 1950s in a highly original second novel from Larry Duberstein, whose earlier work, The Marriage Hearse, was hailed by the critics.

In the tiny town of Titan Falls, New Hampshire, the paper mill dictates a quiet, steady rhythm of life. But one day a tragic bus accident sets two families on a course toward destruction, irrevocably altering the lives of everyone in their wake. June McAllister is the wife of the local mill owner and undisputed first lady in town. But the Snow family, a group of itinerant ne'er-do-wells who live on a decrepit and cursed property, have brought her--and the town--nothing but grief. June will do anything to cover up a dark secret she discovers after the crash, one that threatens to upend her picture-perfect life, even if it means driving the Snow family out of town. But she has never gone up against a force as fierce as the young Mercy Snow. Mercy is determined to protect her rebellious brother, whom the town blames for the accident, despite his innocence. And she has a secret of her own. When an old skeleton is discovered not far from the crash, it beckons Mercy to solve a mystery buried deep within the town's past.

From the prize-winning Chilean novelist Antonio Skármeta, author of Il Postino, comes this soulful novella about a son and his estranged fatherJacques is a schoolteacher in a small Chilean village, and a French translator for the local paper. He owes his passion for the French language to his Parisian father, Pierre, who, one year before, abruptly returned to France without a word of explanation. Jacques and his mother's sense of abandonment is made more acute by their isolation in this small community where few read or think. While Jacques finds distraction in a crush on his student's older sister, his preoccupation with his father's disappearance continues to haunt him. But there is often more to a story than the torment it causes. This one is about forgiveness and second chances.

That's when I noticed the couple we later named Bony and Mr. Creep sitting two rows in front of us. He had his arm around her, not like a father would do, or like I imagined a father would do—slinging his arm over the back of her chair. No, his arm was around her shoulders like she was his date. Bony kept wriggling but he would just grip her harder. Finally she gave up and sat still.He leaned over and licked her cheek.When stepsisters Nick and Luna suspect that a girl they meet at a Florida alligator farm is being held captive, they enlist an older boy with a set of wheels to help rescue her. Their parents are too busy renovating a bed and breakfast to realize the girls are in real danger.Elizabeth Stuckey-French is the author of The Revenge of the Radioactive Lady—a Ladies'Home Journal Book Club selection—Mermaids on the Moon, and The First Paper Girl in Red Oak, Iowa. She teaches at Florida State University.Patricia Henley is the author of four short story collections—including Other Heartbreaks—and two novels, In the River Sweet and Hummingbird House, which was a finalist for the National Book Award. She lives in Cincinnati, Ohio.

In the stunning tradition of Lisa See, Maeve Binchy, and Alice Hoffman, The Tin Horse is a rich multigenerational story about the intense, often fraught bond sisters share and the dreams and sorrows that lay at the heart of the immigrant experience. It has been more than sixty years since Elaine Greenstein's twin sister, Barbara, ran away, cutting off contact with her family forever. Elaine has made peace with that loss. But while sifting through old papers as she prepares to move to Rancho Mañana—or the “Ranch of No Tomorrow” as she refers to the retirement community—she is stunned to find a possible hint to Barbara's whereabouts all these years later. And it pushes her to confront the fierce love and bitter rivalry of their youth during the 1920s and'30s, in the Los Angeles Jewish neighborhood of Boyle Heights. Though raised together in Boyle Heights, where kosher delis and storefront signs in Yiddish lined the streets, Elaine and Barbara staked out very different personal territories. Elaine was thoughtful and studious, encouraged to dream of going to college, while Barbara was a bold rule-breaker whose hopes fastened on nearby Hollywood. In the fall of 1939, when the girls were eighteen, Barbara's recklessness took an alarming turn. Leaving only a cryptic note, she disappeared. In an unforgettable voice layered with humor and insight, Elaine delves into the past. She recalls growing up with her spirited family: her luftmensch of a grandfather, a former tinsmith with tales from the Old Country; her papa, who preaches the American Dream even as it eludes him; her mercurial mother, whose secret grief colors her moods—and of course audacious Barbara and their younger sisters, Audrey and Harriet. As Elaine looks back on the momentous events of history and on the personal dramas of the Greenstein clan, she must finally face the truth of her own childhood, and that of the twin sister she once knew. In The Tin Horse, Janice Steinberg exquisitely unfolds a rich multigenerational story about the intense, often fraught bonds between sisters, mothers, and daughters and the profound and surprising ways we are shaped by those we love. At its core, it is a book not only about the stories we tell but, more important, those we believe, especially the ones about our very selves.Praise for The Tin Horse“Steinberg, the author of five mysteries, has transcended genre to weave a rich story that will appeal to readers who appreciate multigenerational immigrant family sagas as well as those who simply enjoy psychological suspense.”—BookPage

From the award-winning author of Banana Heart Summer—“[a] wonderful debut…[that] resembles Sandra Cisneros's The House on Mango Street and is destined to be a hit among book club members”•—comes a wondrous tale of hope, secrets, and family devotion.It's six days until Christmas, and on the bustling streets of Manila a mute ten-year-old boy sells his version of the stars: exquisite lanterns handmade with colorful paper. But everything changes for young Noland when he witnesses an American tourist injured in a drive-by shooting of a journalist and imagines he's seen an angel falling from the sky. When Noland whisks her to the safety of the hut he shares with his mother, the magical and the real collide: shimmering lanterns and poverty, Christmas carols and loss, dreams of friendship and the global war on terror. While the story of the missing tourist grips the media, Noland and his mother care for their wounded guest, and a dark memory returns. But light sneaks in—and their lives are transformed by the power of love. •Library Journal ( starred review, “Editor's Pick”)

In this midcareer collection of twenty-three short stories, John Updike tackles such problems as separation, divorce, and remarriage, parents and children, guns and prostitution, leprosy, swooning, suffocation, and guilt. His self-seeking heroes tend to be forty; his heroines are asleep, seductive, longing, or reproachful. None of these characters is innocent, and all are looking vainly for the road back to an imagined Paradise. Pain and comedy closely coexist in this mainly domestic world of the 1970s, where life is indistinguishable from a television commercial (but what is it advertising?) and every morning's paper brings news of lost Atlantises.

Germany's master of wit and irony now for the first time in English. Hinrich takes his existence at face value. His wife, on the other hand, has always been more interested in the after-life. Or so it seemed. When she dies of a stroke, Hinrich goes through her papers, only to discover a totally different perspective on their marriage. Thus commences a dazzling intellectual game of shifting realities. Why Peirene chose to publish this book:'This novella deals with the weighty subjects of marriage and death in an impressively light manner. Shifting realities evolve with a beautiful sense of irony and wit. It is a tone that allows us to reflect - without judgment - on misunderstandings, contradictory perceptions and the transience of life.'Meike Ziervogel'Inventive and deeply affecting, this remarkable fiction lingers in the mind long after the last page has been turned.'CJ Schuler, Independent'A heartbreaking tale of loss.'Nicholas Lezard, Guardian'This is a tale of a marriage gone awry and the potential loneliness of cohabitation... but Matthias Politycki leavens his grim tale with playful teasing of his reader's expectations.'Rebecca K. Morrison, Times Literary Supplement'A teasing, testing story that makes you want to revisit and seek out those fascinating fragments you might just have missed.'Pam Norfolk, Lancashire Evening Post'Elegantly realised.'Lucy Popescu, Independent on Sunday'A page-turning pleasure... this novella has a supreme lightness of touch.. It never feels weighed down by its own significance.'Rosie Goldsmith, BBC LONGLISTED FOR THE INDEPENDENT FOREIGN FICTION PRIZE 2012 INDEPENDENT BOOKS OF THE YEAR 2011 GUARDIAN PAPERBACKS OF THE YEAR 2011

“Dark, nothing but darkness, thick and deep, and it wasn't home, she could sense that, it was somewhere else. Susan Ann was trying to think, trying to remember the last thing she remembered — what day was this?” (p. 2)It is September 11, 2001, and eighty-five-year-old Susan Ann Roberts is coming to the end of her life. In and out of consciousness, she is bedridden in a Toronto hospital, confused as to what has brought her to this place. Her daughter, Lorraine, and beloved granddaughter, Meg, are by her side but they seem unable (or unwilling) to take her home. Susan Ann isn't exactly sure where home is anymore. Lorraine had insisted her mother move to Toronto, worried about her living alone in the big house back east. Ever since, Susan Ann has been trapped—stuck in an unfamiliar city in a too-small apartment where things are so cramped that the dresser drawers in her bedroom open only partway.Susan Ann resolves that she will return home to the Maritimes one last time. Her journey begins at the bottom of the laneway of the New Brunswick farm where she spent her summers, and takes her to the town where she grew up, and then across the ponds and rivers of the Tantramar Marshes, all the way to Nova Scotia and Ragged Islands, where she had made her home with her devoted husband and children.As she travels on foot along old roads and visits the lost houses of her memory, Susan Ann is kept company by a dog from her distant past. Her unlikely guide propels Susan Ann forward, leading her ever closer to the place where she hopes to reunite with her husband. Along the way, they meet various people from Susan Ann's life: a neighbour who died in a fire with her four siblings; the man who was her brother in all the most important ways; and a young woman who may hold the key to one of the great mysteries of Susan Ann's life: why did her mother give her away to relatives to raise, despite the fact that she kept children who were born both before and after her?Meanwhile, Susan Ann's son, Carl, is at his mother's Toronto apartment sorting through her belongings. He comes across an envelope labelled TO BE SAVED. In it, he discovers assorted papers, letters, and pictures that reveal his mother's life as a woman and a wife, not just a mother. Old wounds are opened, unanswerable questions are asked, and mysteries are both solved and created.In Ragged Islands, Don Hannah has given us a moving, witty, and tender portrait of a remarkably modern old woman at the end of a life bound by tradition and family secrets, blessed with great love, and rocked by events in the outside world. Coloured with intimate portraits of a family that seems almost familiar, Susan Ann's journey suggests an answer to the question of what happens to the soul when the body begins to die. The final pages lead us to question what parts of a life remain behind for others to discover, how a family remembers those who have died, and where life's final journey will take us.

'Eddie's Bastard'is William Amos Mann IV, known as Billy -- the son of a heroic pilot killed in Vietnam and an unknown woman. The last in a line of proud, individualistic Irish-American men, Billy is discovered in a basket at the door of the dilapidated mansion where his bitter, hard-drinking grandfather, Thomas Mann, has exiled himself. Astonished and moved by the arrival of his unexpected progeny, Thomas sets out to raise the boy himself -- on a diet of love, fried baloney, and the fascinating lore of their shared heritage. Listening to his sets out to capture the stories on paper. He is a Mann, Grandpa reminds him daily, and thus destined for greatness. Through the tales of his ancestors, his own experiences, and the unforgettable characters who enhance and enliven his adolescence, Billy learns of bravery and cowardice, of life and death, of the heart's capacity for love and for unremitting hatred, eventually grasping the meaning of family and history and their power to shape destiny. Steeped in imagery and threaded with lyricism, Eddie's Bastard is a novel of discovery, of a young man's emergence into the world, and the endless possibilities it offers.

An emergency homecoming forces three sisters to deal with issues they'd rather ignore in this touching novel by the author of All About Evie. Ever since the Bommarito sisters were little girls, their mother, River, has written them a letter on pink paper when she has something especially important to impart. This time, the message is urgent—River requires open-heart surgery, and Isabelle and her sisters are needed at home to run the family bakery and care for their brother and ailing grandmother. Isabelle has worked hard to leave Trillium River, Oregon, behind as she travels the globe taking award-winning photographs. Still, she and her sisters, Cecilia, an outspoken kindergarten teacher, and Janie, a bestselling author, share a deep, loving bond. And all of them adore their brother, Henry, whose disabilities haven't stopped him from helping at the bakery and bringing good cheer to everyone in town. But going home again forces open the secrets and hurts the Bommaritos would rather keep tightly closed—Isabelle's fleeting relationships, Janie's obsessive compulsive disorder, and Cecilia's plans to get even with her cheating ex-husband. Now, working together, Isabelle and her sisters begin to find answers to questions they never knew existed, unexpected ways to salve their childhood wounds, and the courage to grasp surprising new chances at happiness. As irresistible as one of the Bommaritos'giant cupcakes, Henry's Sisters is a novel about family and forgiveness, mothers and daughters—and gaining the wisdom to look ahead while still holding onto everything that matters most.“This finely pitched family melodrama is balanced with enough gallows humor and idiosyncratic characters to make it positively irresistible.” —Publishers Weekly

In this heartrending and inspiring novel set against the gorgeous, vast landscape of South Africa under apartheid, award-winning playwright Pamela Gien tells the story of two families–one black, one white–separated by racism, connected by love. Even at the age of six, lively, inquisitive Elizabeth Grace senses she's a child of privilege, “a lucky fish.” Soothing her worries by raiding the sugar box, she scampers up into the sheltering arms of the lilac-blooming syringa tree growing behind the family's suburban Johannesburg home.Lizzie's closest ally and greatest love is her Xhosa nanny, Salamina. Deeper and more elemental than any traditional friendship, their fierce devotion to each other is charged and complicated by Lizzie's mother, who suffers from creeping melancholy, by the stresses of her father's medical practice, which is segregated by law, and by the violence, injustice, and intoxicating beauty of their country. In the social and racial upheavals of the 1960s, Lizzie's eyes open to the terror and inhumanity that paralyze all the nation's cultures–Xhosa, Zulu, Jew, English, Boer. Pass laws requiring blacks to carry permission papers for white areas and stringent curfews have briefly created an orderly state–but an anxious one. Yet Lizzie's home harbors its own set of rules, with hushed midnight gatherings, clandestine transactions, and the girl's special task of protecting Salamina's newborn child–a secret that, because of the new rules, must never be mentioned outside the walls of the house.As the months pass, the contagious spirit of change sends those once underground into the streets to challenge the ruling authority. And when this unrest reaches a social and personal climax, the unthinkable will happen and forever change Lizzie's view of the world. When The Syringa Tree opened off-Broadway in 2001, theater critics and audiences alike embraced the play, and it won many awards. Pamela Gien has superbly deepened the story in this new novel, giving a personal voice to the horrors and hopes of her homeland. Written with lyricism, passion, and life-affirming redemption, this compelling story shows the healing of the heart of a young woman and the soul of a sundered nation.

Meet the Laments—the affably dysfunctional globetrotting family at the center of George Hagen's exuberant debut novel.Howard is an engineer who dreams of irrigating the Sahara and lives by the motto “Laments move!” His wife Julia is a fiery spirit who must balance her husband's oddly peripatetic nature with unexpected aspirations of her own. And Will is the “waif with a paper-thin heart” who is given to Howard and Julia in return for their own child who has been lost in a bizarre maternity ward mishap. As Will makes his way from infancy to manhood in a family that careens from continent to continent, one wonders where the Laments will ever belong.In Bahrain, Howard takes a job with an oil company and young Will makes his first friend. But in short order he is wrenched off to another land, his mother's complicated friendship with the American siren Trixie Howitzer causing the family to bolt. In Northern Rhodesia, during its last days as a white colony, the twin enfants terribles Marcus and Julius are born, and Will falls for the gardener's daughter, a girl so vain that she admires her image in the lid of a biscuit tin. But soon the family's life is upturned again, thie time by their neighbor Major Buck Quinn, with his suburban tirades against black self-rule. Envisioning a more civilized life on “the sceptered isle,” the Laments board an ocean liner bound for England. Alas, poor Will is greeted by the tribal ferocity of his schoolmates and a society fixated on the Blitz. No sooner has he succumbed to British pop culture in the guise of mop-top Sally Byrd and her stacks of 45s, than the Laments uproot themselves once again, and it's off to New Jersey, where life deals crisis and opportunity in equal measure.Undeniably eccentric, the Laments are also universal. Every family moves on in life. Children grow up, things are left behind; there is always something to lament. Through the Lament's restlessness, responses to adversity, and especially their unwieldy love for one another, George Hagen gives us a portrait of every family that is funny, tragic, and improbably true.

Winner of the Lambda Literary Award'This first novel is so eloquent because it is hellbent on collaring the reader and telling him or her the whole passionate story.'--Edmund White, author of Our Young Man'This is a rich and unflinching book.'--The New York Times Book Review'Extraordinary…an exhilarating experience…that Soehnlein has produced as his first novel a work of such maturity and excellence is little short of astounding.'--Fenton Johnson, author of Scissors, Paper, RockThe time is the late 1970s--an age of gas shortages, head shops, and Saturday Night Fever. The place, suburban New Jersey. At a time when the teenagers around him are coming of age, Robin MacKenzie is coming undone. While'normal boys'are into cars, sports, and bullying their classmates, Robin enjoys day trips to New York City with his elegant mother, spinning fantastic tales for her amusement in an intimate ritual he has come to love. He dutifully plays the role of the good son for his meat-and-potatoes father, even as his own mind is a jumble of sexual confusion and painful self-doubt. But everything changes in one, horrifying instant when a tragic accident wakes his family from their middle-American dream and plunges them into a spiral of slow destruction. As his family falls apart day by day, Robin finds himself pulling away from the unquestioned, unexamined life that has been carefully laid out for him. Small acts of rebellion lead to larger questions of what it means to stand on his own. Falling into a fevered triangle with two other outcasts, Todd Spicer and Scott Schatz, Robin embarks on an explosive odyssey of sexual self-discovery that will take him beyond the spring-green lawns of suburbia, beyond the fraying fabric barely holding together his quickly unraveling family, and into a complex future, beyond the world of normal boys.'Karl Soehnlein's stunning first novel reads like a cross between the film American Beauty and Edmund White's A Boy's Own Story.'--The Advocate'The World of Normal Boys is a work of authenticity, as relevant to those who lived a similar coming-of-age experience many years ago as it will be to those who are living that experience now.'--Bay Area Reporter'An amusingly detailed and largely accurate picture of life in the Jersey'burbs.'--Publishers Weekly'Full of tension and suspense, Soehnlein's well-paced debut novel is a fresh look at one boy's sexual awakening in the 1970s and his journey to find a place where he can fit it.'--Booklist

The Ransomes had been burgled.'Robbed,'Mrs. Ransome said.'Burgled,'Mr. Ransome corrected. Premises were burgled; persons were robbed. Mr. Ransome was a solicitor by profession and thought words mattered. Though'burgled'was the wrong word too. Burglars select; they pick; they remove one item and ignore others. There is a limit to what burglars can take: they seldom take easy chairs, for example, and even more seldom settees. These burglars did. They took everything.This swift-moving comic fable will surprise you with its concealed depths. When the sedate Ransomes return from the opera to find their Notting Hill flat stripped absolutely bare—down to the toilet paper off the roll (a hard-to-find shade of forget-me-not blue)—they face a dilemma: Who are they without the things they've spent a lifetime accumulating? Suddenly the world is full of unlimited and frightening possibility. But just as they begin adjusting to this giddy freedom, a newfound interest in sex, and a lack of comfy chairs, a surreal reversal of events causes them to question their assumptions yet again. The Ransomes'bafflement is the reader's delight. Alan Bennett's gentle but scathing wit, unerring ear for dialogue, and sense of the absurd make The Clothes They Stood Up In a memorable exploration of where in life true riches lie.

A poignant, uplifting, heartbreaking love story from the beloved bestselling, Pulitzer Prize–winning author:'To read a novel by Anne Tyler is to fall in love'(PEOPLE).Thirty-eight-year-old Jeremy Pauling has never left home. He lives on the top floor of a Baltimore row house where he creates collages of little people snipped from wrapping paper. His elderly mother putters in the rooms below, until her death. And it is then that Jeremy is forced to take in Mary Tell and her child as boarders. Mary is unaware of how much courage it takes Jeremy to look her in the eye. For Jeremy, like one of his paper creations, is fragile and easily torn—especially when he's falling in love....