Shortly after she entered the ninth month of what had been an easy pregnancy, her husband, Jeff, followed a sudden and inexplicable urge to bring her flowers in the middle of a busy workday. Within hours of his visit, their lives would change forever.The rapid onset of a pregnancy-related disorder nearly claimed the lives of both Lauren and her baby. After more than a month in intensive care, and with years of recovery work ahead of her, Lauren was left with the question: What now? Amidst the wreckage of her near-fatal illness, an opportunity emerged—the chance to rebuild a different life, one that was more personally meaningful and fulfilling. With absolute clarity about their limited time on earth, Lauren and Jeff changed their priorities, their careers, their lifestyle, and even where they lived.As her physical strength grew, so too did Lauren’s understanding of just how many people — nurses, doctors, friends, family, and anonymous blood donors — had contributed to giving her a second chance in life. An overwhelming sense of gratitude emerged and found expression through her fundraising campaigns and national speaking tour. And along the way, Lauren became a shamelessly proud mother, who sought to live as joyfully as possible no matter the circumstances.At times heartbreaking, at times laugh-out-loud funny, Zuzu’s Petals is a story about human resilience, living authentically, and the power of turning gratitude into action.

    He and his three children are lost in their grief...until Sophie walks unexpectedly into their lives. Having left her native Czechoslovakia, Sophie has discovered the land which seemed so bright with promise is far from her dream. A highly educated woman, Sophie now finds herself keeping house for Alec and his family.How can Sophie find peace in her new job? Will God use her gentle spirit to help heal Alec's broken heart?25 years after its initial release comes this exquisite silver anniversary edition of Lori Wick's bestselling classic, Sophie's Heart (over 350,000 copies sold worldwide).Get swept up anew in Sophie and Alec's love story with this beautifully designed keepsake version of one of the most beloved Christian romance novels of all time.

    Not knowing which direction to go, she finds herself hiding out in the same Amish community in which she grew up. With her ten-year-old daughter Abby, in tow, she fears her secrets will catch up to her. When ABBY discovers her real father may be living just down the road from where they are staying, she sets off on an adventure to meet him. What she doesn't know are the many secrets that her mother never shared with her--the same secrets that will turn her life upside down. JACOB YODER is an Amish widower, trying to raise his ten-year-old son, when his past shows up on his doorstep unexpectedly, threatening to change his life forever. AMISH WINTER WONDERLAND Twenty-five-year-old LILLIAN STOLTZFUS is living in the shadow of her deceased brother. When her dad gives her the gift of land that would normally go to the eldest son, it includes a bakery he built as an offering to a suitor for her. No one wants marriage for Lillian more than she wants it for herself, but at twenty-five, she fears she will end up a spinster if Seth never returns her secret feelings for him. Thirty-year-old SETH MILLER is loaded down with the responsibility of caring for an overbearing father. His loyalty to his father's farm has caused him to put his own needs on hold his entire adult life. Being secretly in love with Lillian for many months, he finds it difficult to speak to her because he lacks the confidence having never dated before. Will the contents of an old spice box change everything for both of them? Or are they destined to admire each other from afar indefinitely? UNDER THE MULBERRY TREE Lizzie's lies from the past have finally caught up to her, and are wreaking havoc in Abby's life. When Abby and Jonah Beiler get branded by the youth in the community as "kissing cousins", will the truth be able to set them free, or will it be too late? Find out in this story of forbidden love... AMISH WINTER OF PROMISES Caleb has a secret he's kept to himself for too many years. When he crosses paths with Katie Graber, the new school teacher, he discovers she has a secret of her own. Hoping for an opportunity to get out of a prearranged marriage to a man she doesn't love, Katie enlists the help of Caleb. In exchange, she must agree to help him change his own life to overcome the shame his secret has brought him. The two of them make a promise to help one another, and to keep each other's secrets. But those secrets will change things in a way neither of them could have ever expected. CHASING FIREFLIES After tragedy struck Noah Beiler's life nearly two years ago, he turned his back on his faith and the community. No one except Rose knows he has remained in the dilapidated home that overlooked the pond that he'd grown to despise. When new tragedy strikes, he is forced out of hiding. Will chasing fireflies on a warm, summer night change his life forever? Find out in this tale of summer love... AMISH SUMMER OF COURAGE Lizzie's troubled past has finally come full circle. When Levi Schrock shows up to work as a hired hand on her father's farm, no one suspects he's an impostor A chance meeting with her daughter, Rachel, on his first day in town could change Levi's mind about his plans, as well as his heart. UNDER THE HARVEST MOON Lila King pays a visit to her uncle Jessup and her new Aunt Bess at the B&B, and ends up getting into the middle of more than she bargained for in this final look into the lives of the families you have come to know in the Jacob's Daughter series.

    After a rape and unwanted pregnancy leave her exiled from her family in Kano, thwarting her plans to go to university, she is sent to her aunt's in Lagos and pressured into a marriage with an older man. When their whirlwind romance descends into abuse and indignity, Ogadinma is forced to channel her independence and resourcefulness to escape a fate that appears all but inevitable. Ogadinma, the UK debut by Ukamaka Olisakwe, introduces a heroine for whom it is impossible not to root, and announces the author as a gifted chronicler of the patriarchal experience.‘An intimate and dazzling exploration of the life and times of a young Nigerian woman whose move to the capital city of Lagos leads to a series of encounters, which are by turns disorienting, revelatory and tragic.’ Christopher Merrill, author of Self-Portrait with Dogwood‘Written in vivid, engaging prose, this is the story of one woman’s journey to independence.’ Chinelo Okparanta, author of Under the Udala Trees and Happiness, Like Water: Stories

    Dusman Gonzaga lives in a squalid tenement building overrun with cockroaches and inhabited by strange characters. His is a world of poverty, fights, bar women and visits to a doctor who doesn't understand him.

    A sympathetic prostitute befriends Chun, but two years later, at the height of a plague quarantine, Chun is thrust into a bewildering new world. A young Methodist woman rescues her and places her in a Home for abused and trafficked girls. The Home is destroyed in the 1906 earthquake and fire, but Chun (aka "Maud") survives. In an attempt to raise funds to rebuild the Home, Maud and a group of seven other Chinese children embark on a six-month cross-country singing tour. Performing for President Theodore Roosevelt in the White House is the highlight of the journey, but when the matron of the Home suffers a breakdown, thirteen year-old Maud must find within herself the strength and resolve to lead the band of children home. The novel is based on events in the life of the author's wife's grandmother.

    At either end of the twentieth century, two women fall in love with men outside their familiar worlds. In 1901, Anna Winterbourne, recently widowed, leaves England for Egypt, an outpost of the Empire roiling with nationalist sentiment. Far from the comfort of the British colony, she finds herself enraptured by the real Egypt and in love with Sharif Pasha al-Baroudi. Nearly a hundred years later, Isabel Parkman, a divorced American journalist and descendant of Anna and Sharif has fallen in love with Omar al-Ghamrawi, a gifted and difficult Egyptian-American conductor with his own passionate politics. In an attempt to understand her conflicting emotions and to discover the truth behind her heritage, Isabel, too, travels to Egypt, and enlists Omar's sister's help in unravelling the story of Anna and Sharif's love.Joining the romance and intricate storytelling of A.S. Byatt's Possession and Michael Ondaatje's The English Patient, Ahdaf Soueif has once again created a mesmerizing tale of genuine eloquence and lasting importance.

    Her family are dead, but for her beloved brother Sofiane, who has become a harraga – one of those who risk their lives attempting to flee the country for a better life in Europe/elsewhere.Lamia's tranquil, ordered existence is turned upside-down when a sixteen-year-old stranger knocks on her door in the middle of the night. Only because she has been sent by Sofiane, Lamia takes the girl in. Pregnant, unmarried and dressed in garish finery like an X-Factor contestant, Chérifa is talkative, curiously innocent, and utterly unafraid. She enters the house like a whirlwind, and leaves a trail of destruction in her wake. Lamia must try to teach her, to protect her against a world where a woman who is not meek, subservient, married is an affront, where a girl who is pregnant can be killed to spare her family's honour.By turns funny and lyrical, luminous and sardonic, Harraga, by the controversial author of An Unfinished Business, is the engaging and ultimately tragic story of two very different women who become friends and allies in a patriarchal world. - See more at: http://www.bloomsbury.com/uk/harraga-...

    Told from multiple points of view and crisscrossing narratives, combining everything from superhero comics to Nigerian mythology to tie together a story about a city consuming itself. ‘There was no time to flee. No time to turn. No time to shriek. And there was no pain. It was like being thrown into the stars.’

    

    It includes character studies and summaries of the plot with discussions of the major themes, as well as a background to John Steinbeck.

    One is black, one white. Both are successful women with impressive careers. Both have recently been widowed. And both are sworn enemies, sharing hedge and hostility which they prune with a zeal that belies the fact that they are both over eighty.But one day an unforeseen event forces the women together. And gradually the bickering and sniping softens into lively debate, and from there into memories shared. But could these sparks of connection ever transform into friendship? Or is it too late to expect these two to change?

    In his second novel, Eghosa Imasuen presents the everyday life of a Nigerian university student against the backdrop of the pro-democracy riots of the 1980s and ‘90s, the lost hopes of June 12th, and the terror of the Abacha years.

    The young would clash on the bloody battlefields of Bull Run and Fredericksburg, while in intrigue-ridden Washington and Richmond strong-willed men and beautiful women would defend their principles with their lives...or satisfy illicit cravings with schemes that could destroy friends and enemies alike. This surging drama is the second part of the trilogy that includes NORTH AND SOUTH and HEAVEN AND HELL. "Craftsmanship nears artistry....A coherent and penetrating vision of the seamy underside of war." (Richmond Times-Dispatch)

    Jane is an American journalist who has traveled to Africa, hoping to give a voice to children like Esther and to find her center after a series of failed relationships. In unflinching prose, Minot interweaves their stories, giving us razor-sharp portraits of two extraordinary young women confronting displacement, heartbreak, and the struggle to wrest meaning from events that test them both in unimaginable ways.  With mesmerizing emotional intensity and stunning evocations of Africa's beauty and its horror, Minot gives us her most brilliant and ambitious novel yet.