Shades of Jade (Strivers Row)


Gloria Mallette - 2000
    Louis. Wayne. Eric. Marissa had been warned: One of these days you're gonna mess with the wrong woman's husband. But she doesn't care. Aside from an occasional bout of guilt, she feels no shame, because after all, if their wives were doing what they were supposed to, then their husbands would not be seeking her company. Marissa dates married men - four of them concurrently because it's easier. She gets all of the trappings of a relationship - love, wining and dining, physical pleasure - without any of the pain - cooking, laundry, and the day-to-day maintenance of a relationship. But when it appears that one of the wives of the men she is dating is out to get her - wants her dead, in fact - Marissa begins to reexamine the choices she's made. Her selfishness gives way to vulnerability and fear, and she comes to the conclusion that she deserves a man all her own. But will she survive long enough to find Mr. Right?From the Trade Paperback edition.

Mrs. Hemingway


Naomi Wood - 2014
    Hemingway reveals the explosive love triangles that wrecked each of Hemingway's marriages.The Paris Wife was only the beginning of the story... Paula McLain's New York Times bestselling novel piqued readers' interest about Ernest Hemingway's romantic life. But Hadley was only one of four women married, in turn, to the legendary writer. Just as T.C. Boyle's bestseller The Women completed the picture begun by Nancy Horan's Loving Frank, Naomi Wood's Mrs. Hemingway tells the story of how it was to love, and be loved by, the most famous and dashing writer of his generation. Hadley, Pauline, Martha and Mary: each Mrs. Hemingway thought their love would last forever; each one was wrong. Told in four parts and based on real love letters and telegrams, Mrs. Hemingway reveals the explosive love triangles that wrecked each of Hemingway's marriages. Spanning 1920s bohemian Paris through 1960s Cold War America, populated with members of the fabled "Lost Generation," Mrs. Heminway is a riveting tale of passion, love, and heartbreak.

Miss Ophelia


Mary Burnett Smith - 1997
    Belly Anderson now in the autumn of her life, reminisces about the last summer of her childhood. A strong-willed and free-spirited eleven-year-old, she reluctantly leaves her home in rural Pharaoh and goes to Jamison to help her mean Aunt Rachel recover from surgery. Belly has two reasons for deciding to go to Jamison: She's left alone when her only friend becomes pregnant and is sent away, and she hopes that she'll be allowed to take piano lessons from her mother's childhood friend. While taking lessons from Miss Ophelia, she learns a terrible secret about her beloved teacher--a secret that forces Belly to grow up and learn what it really means to be an adult.

If I Can't Have You


Mary B. Morrison - 2012
    Morrison delivers a seductive, mesmerizing tale of "love" gone dangerously wrong.  .  .No matter how direct Loretta is, Granville doesn't get it. He was fine when it came to burning up the sheets, but that's where their connection ends--or so she thinks. When he begins stalking her, Loretta's gorgeous girlfriend, Madison, claims she can tame any man...so Loretta dares Madison to prove she can tame Granville. But sexing Granville while she's engaged to the most eligible bachelor in Houston may cost Madison more than Loretta's bet is worth.  .  .Praise for Mary B. Morrison's I'd Rather Be With You "Drenched in jealousy, cheating.  .  .will leave readers gasping in shock."  --Library Journal "The sequel to If I Can't Have You has just as much drama, fighting and lying as its predecessor." --RT Book Reviews

The Wholeness of a Broken Heart


Katie Singer - 1999
    Growing up in Cleveland in the 1960s and 1970s, Hannah Felber basks in her mother's devotion to her, and for Celia, her daughter is her redemption from an unhappy childhood. But when Hannah goes off to college to begin a life of her own, her mother inexplicably shuts her out, refusing to answer her letters or phone calls." "With her mother's abrupt abandonment, Hannah loses not only her closest confidante, but also her sense of identity - she searches through old photographs and listens to family legends for clues to who she is and where she comes from. Drawn deeper and deeper into her family's past, she begins to see that the fate of her grandparents and those left in the old country has a direct bearing on her own life.In chapters narrated by Hannah's maternal ancestors, we hear the voices and stories of those beyond, we hear the voices and stories of those beyond the grave.

The Photograph


Penelope Lively - 2003
    The photograph is in an envelope marked "DON'T OPEN - DESTROY." But Kath's husband does not heed the warning, embarking on a journey of discovery that reveals a tight web of secrets: within marriages, between sisters, and at the heart of an affair. Kath, with her mesmerizing looks and casual ways, moves like a ghost through the memories of everyone who knew her - and a portrait emerges of a woman whose life cannot be understood without plumbing the emotional depths of the people she touched.Propelled by the author's signature mastery of narrative and psychology, The Photograph is Lively at her very best, the dazzling climax to all she has written before.

Groove


Geneva Holliday - 2005
    This funny, sexy book has something for everyone!

Millionaire Wives Club


Tu-Shonda L. Whitaker - 2009
    Whitaker’s steamiest novel yet, we meet the four deliciously dramatic, designer-clad divas from prime time’s new hit reality show, The Millionaire Wives Club.Evan: Married to a pro-football star who isn’t in love with her anymore, Evan is digging her freshly manicured nails in ever deeper as she fights to keep the husband who loves someone else.Milan: Half Dominican, half black, and beautifully exotic-looking, Milan is watching her has-been husband’s fortune fade fast–while her romantic attachment to Evan’s husband is heating up.Jaise: Divorced from a former boxing star who’s now married to a white woman, Jaise is trying to raise her sixteen-year-old son on her own. Will her huge alimony checks keep her from falling in love?Chaunci: Editor of the hottest black women’s magazine, Chaunci is now engaged to the high-powered man who helped finance her magazine when she was just a struggling single mom. But when a onetime passionate flame reignites, Chaunci may not be able to resist its charms.When these starlets’ private lives run as wild as their emotions, their relationships with one another inevitably turn into high-profile catfights. Through it all, the cameras never stop rolling on TV’s guiltiest pleasure, where power–and diamonds–are always a girl’s best friend.

The Dive from Clausen's Pier


Ann Packer - 2002
    She's had the same best friend, the same good relationship with her mother, the same boyfriend, for as long as anyone can remember. But when her fiance, Mike is paralyzed by a tragic accident, Carrie has to question everything she thought she knew about herself and about the meaning of home. Ann Packer has written a morally complex, deeply satisfying novel about the desire to live fully and the conflict between who we want to be to others and who we must be for ourselves. A magnificent debut from a remarkable new talent.

Don't Want No Sugar


J.D. Mason - 2004
    It was what drove her to kill herself and leave her only daughter, Roberta, in the care of the local mid-wife. So it was no wonder that Roberta became obsessed with Charles Harris the very first time she laid eyes on him. And she was willing to do whatever it took to make sure she was the only woman in his life. So when he is forced to marry her because of her unexpected pregnancy, Roberta feels that she has everything she ever wanted.Women have always come easy to Charles, so he's wondering how he got saddled with a wife he doesn't love, two beautiful children and a longing for something grander. Then he meets the stunning Sara Tate and discovers a love almost as consuming as the one Roberta feels for him. This deadly love triangle will result in deception and murder, leaving a legacy for generations to come.

Something's Wrong with Your Scale!: A Romantic Comedy


Van Whitfield - 1999
    Nice Guy who's found companionship and comfort with Marsha.  The only problem is that he's become too comfortable.  Weighing seventy-five pounds more than when the courtship first began, the newly food-obsessed Sonny just can't stay away from Marsha's marvelous dishes, even in the middle of their breakup conversation.Determined to slim down and get his girlfriend back, Sonny joins the FutraSystem weight-loss center and meets potential love interest Kayla, as well as a host of other colorful characters. In a heartwarming tale that is alternately hilarious, wise, and ultimately self-affirming, Whitfield has created a thoroughly delicious and engaging novel sure to be enjoyed by those who have waged the battle of the bulge, or know someone who has.

Ties That Bind


Brenda Jackson - 2002
    Randolph knew the moment he saw Jenna Haywood that he had to make her his. But the path to love is not an easy one. His wealthy Grandmother Julia disapproves of the match and unbeknowst to him, his brother's seemingly docile fiancee has a few plans of her own that she would like to set in motion. Betrayal and devastation lurks in unexpected places and tests the bond they believed was unbreakable. As they struggle with love and passion, secrets and lies the question is: Is love enough to help them see each other through the storms that await them ahead?

The Mothers


Brit Bennett - 2016
    It begins with a secret."All good secrets have a taste before you tell them, and if we'd taken a moment to swish this one around our mouths, we might have noticed the sourness of an unripe secret, plucked too soon, stolen and passed around before its season."It is the last season of high school life for Nadia Turner, a rebellious, grief-stricken, seventeen-year-old beauty. Mourning her own mother's recent suicide, she takes up with the local pastor's son. Luke Sheppard is twenty-one, a former football star whose injury has reduced him to waiting tables at a diner. They are young; it's not serious. But the pregnancy that results from this teen romance—and the subsequent cover-up—will have an impact that goes far beyond their youth. As Nadia hides her secret from everyone, including Aubrey, her God-fearing best friend, the years move quickly. Soon, Nadia, Luke, and Aubrey are full-fledged adults and still living in debt to the choices they made that one seaside summer, caught in a love triangle they must carefully maneuver, and dogged by the constant, nagging question: What if they had chosen differently? The possibilities of the road not taken are a relentless haunt.In entrancing, lyrical prose, The Mothers asks whether a "what if" can be more powerful than an experience itself. If, as time passes, we must always live in servitude to the decisions of our younger selves, to the communities that have parented us, and to the decisions we make that shape our lives forever.

The Aftermath


Rhidian Brook - 2013
    Thousands remain displaced in what is now the British Occupied Zone. Charged with overseeing the rebuilding of this devastated city and the de-Nazification of its defeated people, Colonel Lewis Morgan is requisitioned a fine house on the banks of the Elbe, where he will be joined by his grieving wife, Rachael, and only remaining son, Edmund. But rather than force its owners, a German widower and his traumatized daughter, to leave their home, Lewis insists that the two families live together. In this charged and claustrophobic atmosphere all must confront their true selves as enmity and grief give way to passion and betrayal. The Aftermath is a stunning novel about our fiercest loyalties, our deepest desires and the transformative power of forgiveness.

The Lost Art of Keeping Secrets


Eva Rice - 2005
    Penelope with her mother and brother struggles to maintain their vast and crumbling ancestral home while postwar London spins toward the next decade's cultural revolution. Penelope wants nothing more than to fall in love and when her new best friend Charlotte a free spirit in the young society set drags Penelope into London with all of its grand parties she sets in motion great change for them all. Charlotte's mysterious and attractive brother Harry uses Penelope to make his American ex-girlfriend jealous with unforeseen consequences and a dashing wealthy American movie producer arrives with what might be the key to Penelope's and her family's future happiness. Vibrant witty and filled with vivid historical detail The Lost Art of Keeping Secrets is an utterly unique debut novel about a time and place just slipping into history.