In a California of the ’60s and ’70s, characters examine the contents of deceased relatives’ freezers, tape-record high-school locker-room chatter, or collect a community’s gossip while cleaning the teeth of its inhabitants. Mr. Darcy is the captain of the football team, Mansfield Park materializes in a suburb of L.A., bake sales replace balls, and station wagons, not horse-drawn carriages, are the preferred mode of transit. The stories of traversing class, race, and gender leap into our modern world with wit and humor.

    . . a subtly subversive talent. . . . [Only Alice Munro and Colm Toibin] are so adept at portraying whole lives in a few thousand words. With Married Love, Hadley joins their company as one of the most clear-sighted chroniclers of contemporary emotional journeys." -Edmund Gordon, The GuardianA girl haunts the edges of her parents' party; a film director drops dead, leaving his film unfinished and releasing his wife to a new life; an eighteen-year-old insists on marrying her music professor, then finds herself shut out from his secrets; three friends who were intimate as teenagers meet up again after the death of the women who brought them together. Ranging widely across generations and classes, and evoking a world that expands beyond the pages, these are the stories of Tessa Hadley's astonishing new collection.On full display are the qualities for which Tessa Hadley has long been praised: her unflinching examination of family relationships; her humor, warmth and psychological acuity; her powerful, precise and emotionally dense prose. In this collection there are domestic dramas, generational sagas, wrenching love affairs and epiphanies-captured and distilled to remarkable effect. Married Love is a collection to treasure, a masterful new work from one of today's most accomplished storytellers.

    A professor of cardiovascular physiology lingers on the cusp of consciousness as he waits for his new heart to be delivered, still beating, from another body—and is carried on a tidal wave of memories to an attic room half a century ago. Visiting Sylvia Plath’s grave in Yorkshire, the author imagines a conversation with the poet, a fellow North American who settled in grey England. She reflects on the treasured photograph of Princess Diana she took as a teenager, one of a multitude taken during a life cut short. And at Charleston, Angelica Garnett, child of the Bloomsbury Group, is overpowered by echoes of the past—all the beloved ghosts that spring to life before her eyes. MacLeod’s characters hover on the border of life and death, where memory is most vivid and the present most elusive.

    '⦠The scallops arranged in the spider lambis were succulently decadent. A bottle of rare wine had been reduced to its essence and sprinkled over the raw bodies, and rough salt, and finely-chopped redware. The flush of the shell echoed visually the wine and the seaweed, and although there were but five scallops, they were truly sweet meat. The slices of mild green pepper were almost transparent, and they tangled artfully with shreds of young daikon, and pressure-steamed fragments of ti. Hot and crisp and oily-melting, a challenging blend. And the tea, as always, was Black Dragon tea, a hint of smoky coolness in the steam, and a consummation in the mouth. People died just to get it to these islands she had learned. She could think of many worse reasons to dieâ¦.'

     Sixteen years ago, Scarlet’s family sent her away in disgrace. She’s been back once – with disastrous consequences. Now, her little sister is getting married and Scarlet's headed home once more. Will this be the reunion she's always longed for? Or will the lies of her childhood entangle her once more in their beautiful embrace? She has a nightmarish fear of flying and she’s escorting her sister’s wedding dress through three different time zones. He’s the tall, dark and handsome stranger that gets in her way… What happens when Scarlet has to go home to be bridesmaid to her least favorite little sister, (who loves to remind everyone she’s a former beauty Queen EVERY OTHER MINUTE?) Can she survive three weeks of tropical heat and mosquitos, droves of busybody relatives all wanting to tell her WHY she’s still single as she endures the wedding from hell? Six hundred guests, three wedding dresses, twenty-four cake tiers, fifteen bridesmaids, a mother on a mission to makeover her daughter who ‘lacks ambition,’ and ONE deliciously divine man who alternately renders her speechless then drives her to outrage - all add up to a recipe for disaster. Or does it? More than 'just a romance', this poignant story about the tangled connections between mothers, daughters and sisters - speaks with compelling insight and humor, of inherited trauma, desire and deception, and the power and stubbornness of love. Scarlet Lies is the first in a three book series. The second book, 'Scarlet Secrets' will release April 30th, followed by the thrilling conclusion to the saga, 'Scarlet Redemption', May 30th.

    I was sixteen when Ryder left me with a forbidden promise. Now I’m twenty, and he’s back, but he has a secret. I walked out as the boy Piper had loved for far too long. Now I’m back as a man who’s broken, angry, and flawed. Yet, each time she looks at me, it’s as if I’m perfect.Can we have a second chance at love?Or will our next dance be our last?*This is a standalone new adult romance with mature situations.*

    Too late Leah realizes the scheme is filled with lies and injustice. Beaten, bruised and without hope, Leah is prepared to die... but fate has other plans.Andrew...All he wanted was freedom. So willingly, Andrew Code trades slavery for exile to the new town. As his team uncovers the lies and deceit of the new town, Andrew remains determined to carve out a life worth living for himself.In an untamed forest filled with ex-convicts, starving residents, schemers, and murderers, will love and hope conquer all?

    From the multiple award- winning "The Faery Handbag," in which a teenager's grandmother carries an entire village (or is it a man-eating dog?) in her handbag, to the near-future of "The Surfer," whose narrator (a soccer-playing skeptic) waits with a planeload of refugees for the aliens to arrive, these ten stories are funny and full of unexpected insights and skewed perspectives on the world. Kelly Link's fans range from Michael Chabon to Peter Buck of R.E.M. to Holly Black of Spiderwick Chronicles fame. Now teens can have their world rocked too!Contents:The wrong grave --The wizards of Perfil --Magic for beginners --The faery handbag --The specialist's hat --Monster --The surfer --The constable of Abal --Pretty monsters --

    Her motto, "Live life to the fullest" is derailed when the young man, who's captured her attention, turns out to be the son of a drug tycoon- the same that provided the drugs that killed her brother. Whitney believes she simply need to heal from her first heartache, not knowing she is a part of a devious trade, one against human rights, and she has been… since the day age was born.Blue Waters is the first Novella in a Tainted Waters, and begins a story of deception, corruption, self-discovery, and love with all that it demands you sacrifice…"There was a beauty in dying that day…"

    But before long, she discovers how little she really knew about the man she married.Lies, betrayal and double-crossing shock to the core, and treachery that threatens to destroy more than a marriage…

    Sexy and tart, low-down and high-hearted poems such as Suture, Slash, Vamp, and Bride of Reanimator articulate the dark desires, fears, and traumas out of which pop culture is made. Author Daphne Gottlieb is the winner of the 2002 Firecracker Award and a 2002 Lambda Finalist.

    Her stories are revered by some of the best American writers of our day, but until now there has been no stand-alone collection of her short fiction.Wait Till You See Me Dance consists of several extraordinary longer stories as well as a selection of intoxicating very short stories. In the chilling “The First Full Thought of Her Life,” a shooter gets in position while a young girl climbs a sand dune. In “Voltaire Night,” students compete to tell a story about the worst thing that ever happened to them. In “Stay Where You Are,” two oblivious travelers in Central America are kidnapped by a gunman they assume to be an insurgent—but the gunman has his own problems.An Unferth story lures you in with a voice that seems amiable and lighthearted, but it swerves in sudden and surprising ways that reveal, in terrifying clarity, the rage, despair, and profound mournfulness that have taken up residence at the heart of the American dream. These stories often take place in an exaggerated or heightened reality, a quality that is reminiscent of the work of Donald Barthelme, Lorrie Moore, and George Saunders, but in Unferth’s unforgettable collection she carves out territory that is entirely her own.

    At first glance one might be disposed to dismiss Miss Towers as an imitation Jane Austen, but it would be a mistaken judgment, for her cool detachment and ironic eye are directed more often than not against the sensible breeze that blasts and withers, the forthright candour that kills the soul. Miss Towers flashes and shines now this way, now that, like a darting sunfish.' 'At her best her prose style is a shimmering marvel,' wrote the Independent on Sunday, 'and few writers can so deftly and economically delineate not only the outside but the inside of a character…There's always more going on than you can possibly fathom.' And the Guardian said: 'Her social range may not be wide, but her descriptions are exquisite and her tone poised between the wry and the romantic.' Five of the stories were read on BBC Radio 4.

    In this collection, she evokes what it means to be young, to be a woman, to have both feet firmly planted both in this world & the virtual. She asks fascinating questions like, 'Is anyone moved by the plainness of raw skin anymore?' She makes you trust she's the necessary answers with intelligence & confidence. In this book, she builds an identity for herself, tears it down & builds herself anew. It's breathtaking to behold."--Roxane Gay, author of An Untamed State & Bad Feminist“The poems & prose pieces in this smart & complex collection illuminate the shape of a new, 21st century webcam feminism—one that questions its own ambitions, knows the shape of pornstar mouths & doubts the sanctity of individuality when pitted against the existential. Gabby writes with radical uncertainty about illusions of control, the limits of identity & what it means to still want to kiss another human amidst the screenshots. This is a book that invents its own female gaze & then, like a bad bitch, breaks the lens.”--Melissa Broder, author of Meat Heart“Gabby Bess’s Alone with Other People orchestrates an impressive catalog of young human want with a uncompromising style. In the span between its 1st phrase The sex can be rough & its last sentence, Panic, the reader forward thru a virtual rolodex of self-inquisition shaped by boredom, horror, aspiration, fear for future, wonder, lust. There’s a lot of intense light coming off this book full of screens & suns & large black dots.”--Blake Butler, author of Sky Saw“Don’t take me for crazy when I say that the verse “Hahaha, am I alone here?” is the one that best sums up Gabby’s incredible debut book, because it’s true. Thru each & every page that makes up Alone with Other People, the author manages to head out into the world with a sane, witty & protesting laugh. A laugh about the strength of woman, of youth, of poetry. When Gabby says hahaha, it also starts to unravel before our very eyes a series of texts that first & foremost find beauty in the mundane, followed by the universality of intimacy, & lastly (& most importantly): the sensation that with this book, we will never, ever feel lonely again.”--Luna Miguel, author of Bluebird & Other Tattoos“Of-the-moment, brilliant & triumphantly sad, Illuminati Girl Gang leader Gabby Bess’s debut Alone with Other People is a post-feminist, hyper selfconscious teen swansong of the Internet age. The line between girl body & Macbook is collapsed in these vignettes that riff from blog posts, text messages & tumblr memes, & what emerges is a “modern tragic figure who would sacrifice herself for whatever.”--Kate Durbin, author of E! Entertainment“Alone with Other People deftly deals with relationships in a highly mediated age–one that twists our perceptions of self & others. Gabby shows us how we can be simultaneously complicit in this culture but still have the desire to fight against it.”--Ann Hirsch, performance artist

    It contains eleven previously published stories and five new ones. Included are the Sevenwaters novella, "’Twixt Firelight and Water", the epic Nordic story, "Otherling", and "In Coed Celyddon", a tale of the young man who would one day become King Arthur. The title story, especially written for the collection, concerns an old Scottish wise woman facing an impossible moral dilemma. Other new stories in the book include "By Bone-Light", a contemporary retelling of the Russian fairy tale "Vasilissa the Wise", and "The Angel of Death", a dark story about a puppy mill rescue.