The Wideness of the Sea


Katie Curtis - 2017
    When she returns home to mid-coast Maine for his funeral, she faces all that she left behind when she left seven years earlier. The pain of her own mother’s death, the fractured relationships with her father, and her first love. The life she had built for herself in New York - the art world, her boyfriend, her roommate who is also her best friend - allowed her to forget the grief and hurt she had left behind in Maine. But when her uncle leaves her a surprising inheritance, if forces her to face them, and the parts of her self she’s buried. As she searches for answers about herself, and where she belongs, she discovers how people and places shape us, and how understanding, forgiveness and grace have the power to transform us and the people we love.

OLD HOUSE


Sharon Mierke - 2018
    Who has not wondered about old houses as they passed by? Who was the builder? Did he take pride in his work? Were the inhabitants always happy or were there hard times? How many people passed through the doors? Old House is a story about one house. It is located in a fictitious valley in the state of Montana U.S.A. Through the course of one hundred years, these are the people who lived, laughed, loved, and cried as they called this old house their home. Each chapter in the book is a story in itself. It begins with the man who built the house in the late 1860s, and it continues with the people who found lodging and refuge in it - from a young man with a bounty on his head, an old man in search of gold, to a woman seeking protection.

The Sacrifice of Lester Yates


Robin Yocum - 2021
    Or, is he? Yates is two months from his date with the executioner when Ohio Attorney General Hutch Van Buren is presented with evidence that could exonerate him. But Yates is a political pawn, and forces exist that don’t want him exonerated, regardless of the evidence. To do so could derail presidential aspirations and change the national political landscape. Yates’ execution will clear a wide political path for many influential people, including Van Buren, who must battle both the clock and a political machine of which he is a part.   Robin Yocum has been compared with E. Annie Proulx for his authenticity of place, and Elmore Leonard for his well-laid plots and perfect pacing. Arcade is thrilled to publish The Sacrifice of Lester Yates, which is Yocum at his best: suspenseful, political, and smart.

The Immortalists


Chloe Benjamin - 2018
    The Gold children—four adolescents on the cusp of self-awareness—sneak out to hear their fortunes.The prophecies inform their next five decades. Golden-boy Simon escapes to the West Coast, searching for love in '80s San Francisco; dreamy Klara becomes a Las Vegas magician, obsessed with blurring reality and fantasy; eldest son Daniel seeks security as an army doctor post-9/11; and bookish Varya throws herself into longevity research, where she tests the boundary between science and immortality.A sweeping novel of remarkable ambition and depth, The Immortalists probes the line between destiny and choice, reality and illusion, this world and the next. It is a deeply moving testament to the power of story, the nature of belief, and the unrelenting pull of familial bonds.

11 Stories


Chris Cander - 2013
    Instead of becoming a musician, he becomes the superintendent of the Chicago apartment building where he has lived since birth. Very soon, his life is no longer his own; he fades into the background, plumbing and fixing and toiling for the tenants populating the eleven stories above him. Although they hardly notice him as anything but a working part of the building, he develops a sometimes uncomfortable intimacy with the details of their complicated lives. Every night, in the privacy of his basement quarters, alone with his secret longings, he plays his trumpet. That is until the evening he climbs to the roof to play in public for the first time in fifty years — and the course of his life is irrevocably changed. For some, losses may turn, unexpectedly, to gain. For Roscoe, the relationships he forms with the tenants — two, in particular — justify the amputation of his finger and the forfeiture of his dreams. This is a story about sacrifice and service, longing and love — and the abiding hopefulness of the human heart that connects us all.

The Dream Daughter


Diane Chamberlain - 2018
    When Caroline Sears receives the news that her unborn baby girl has a heart defect, she is devastated. It is 1970 and there seems to be little that can be done. But her brother-in-law, a physicist, tells her that perhaps there is. Hunter appeared in their lives just a few years before—and his appearance was as mysterious as his past. With no family, no friends, and a background shrouded in secrets, Hunter embraced the Sears family and never looked back. Now, Hunter is telling her that something can be done about her baby's heart. Something that will shatter every preconceived notion that Caroline has. Something that will require a kind of strength and courage that Caroline never knew existed. Something that will mean a mind-bending leap of faith on Caroline's part.And all for the love of her unborn child.A rich, genre-spanning, breathtaking novel about one mother's quest to save her child, unite her family, and believe in the unbelievable. Diane Chamberlain pushes the boundaries of faith and science to deliver a novel that you will never forget.

The Essence of Shade


Deborah Jean Miller - 2019
    Despite his overbearing nature, Shade delights in her new role as wife and mother. When her husband suddenly dies years later, she uncovers secrets from his past—secrets so profound they derail the lives of both her and her daughter. After tragedy strikes, thirty-six-year-old Shade gains custody of her young grandson, Tyler, and moves to a small Michigan beach town where she becomes the owner of a successful bakery and café. Shade meets and falls in love with Tyler’s baseball coach, but their love for one another is doomed. Shade’s internal struggle to honor her vow to God, while denying her own desires, throws her on a path of painful redemption.

Bound by Forever


M.V. Kasi - 2018
    Until then, Abhimanyu had never made an attempt to see or meet the Senani heiress.A few encounters with the sassy and feisty Devasena Senani, he is filled with a burning desire to claim her. But Devasena, as a way of getting back at him for ignoring her all these years, kept most of her face hidden while she tormented him in many ways.Abhimanyu, however is not deterred. He is utterly consumed by her captivating eyes, bewitching smiles and alluring presence. He vowed that when he returned home, Devasena would be standing next to him as his claimed bride, binding them forever...

Valencia and Valentine


Suzy Krause - 2019
    To confront those fears, Valencia’s therapist suggests that she fly somewhere—anywhere—before her upcoming birthday. And as Valencia begins a telephone romance with a man from New York, she suddenly has a destination in mind. There’s only one problem—he might not actually exist.Mrs. Valentine is an eccentric old woman desperate for company, be it from neighbors, telemarketers, or even the funeral director (when you’re her age, you go to a lot of funerals). So she’s thrilled when the new cleaning girl provides a listening ear for her life’s story—a tale of storybook love and incredible adventures around the world with her husband before his mysterious and sudden disappearance.The stories of Valencia and Mrs. Valentine may at first appear to have nothing in common…but then again, nothing in life is as straightforward as it seems.

Amos: To Ride A Dead Horse


Stanley Gordon West - 2000
    A sports legend resides in a nursing home who encounters and unexpected life journey.West’s AMOS is an imposing landscape of human drama and emotion – hear-rendering, timeless, hilarious, stunning, joyful, - an incredible story, a book that rips readers early and late, a novel they don’t want to end… a page turner with heart, a joy to read, a treasure to cherish.Ever so often, indifference and neglect mutate into unmitigated evil and then humanity goes on trial.  Rarely, someone stands in the breach and shouts “No” with only courage and dignity as weapons.  Amos was a man who thought he’s experienced all that life had to offer, when with a capricious turn of fate, he fell through the cracks of society’s institutions, in to the merciless cogwheels of human apathy and carelessness.  His struggle not only to survive, but, to overcome is a compelling testimony to the inner strength and irrepressible spirit of man.  Against devastating odds and arrogant brutality, Amos finds a triumph he never expected.

The Flood Girls


Richard Fifield - 2016
    A town where nearly all of the volunteer firemen are named Jim, where The Dirty Shame—the only bar in town—refuses to serve mixed drinks (too much work), where the locals hate the newcomers (then again, they hate the locals, too), and where the town softball team has never even come close to having a winning season. Until now.Rachel Flood has snuck back into town after leaving behind a trail of chaos nine years prior. She’s here to make amends, but nobody wants to hear it, especially her mother, Laverna. But with the help of a local boy named Jake and a little soul-searching, she just might make things right.In the spirit of Empire Falls and A League of Their Own, with the caustic wit of Where’d You Go, Bernadette thrown in for good measure, Richard Fifield’s hilarious and heartwarming debut will have you laughing through tears.

In the Midnight Room


Laura McBride - 2017
    For the next 60 years, June will dare to live boldly. She will upend conventions, risk her heart and her life, rear a child, lose a child, love more than one man, and stand up for more than one woman.June’s story will intertwine with those of three unlikely strangers: a one-time mail order bride from the Philippines, a high school music teacher, and a young mother from Mexico working as a hotel maid. Knit together around June’s explosive secret, they forge a future that none of them foresee.This jubilant, compassionate novel explores the unexpected ways that life connects us, changes us, and even perfects us. A powerful story of lust and of hope, of redemption and of compassion, In the Midnight Room is a smart, sagacious novel about womanhood, family bonds, and how we live in America now.

The Best Kind of People


Zoe Whittall - 2016
    His wife, Joan, vaults between denial and rage as the community she loved turns on her. Their daughter, Sadie, a popular over-achieving high school senior, becomes a social pariah. Their son, Andrew, assists in his father’s defense, while wrestling with his own unhappy memories of his teen years. A local author tries to exploit their story, while an unlikely men’s rights activist attempts to get Sadie onside their cause. With George locked up, how do the members of his family pick up the pieces and keep living their lives? How do they defend someone they love while wrestling with the possibility of his guilt?With exquisite emotional precision, award-winning author Zoe Whittall explores issues of loyalty, truth, and the meaning of happiness through the lens of an all-American family on the brink of collapse.

Dog Days


Mavis Cheek - 1990
    (Nancy Pearl)After eleven years of marriage to an egocentric opera singer, Pat Murray packs up her daughter and leaves, regaining control of her life and approaching single parenthood bravely until she meets Roland and his pregnant wife.

The Demas Revelation: A Novel


Shane Johnson - 2007
    Anna Meridian—an archaeologist and woman of faith—uncovers the find of a lifetime: ancient documents dating to the time of the apostles, confessions that the early Christians are perpetrating a falsehood. She decides she must keep the documents' existence a secret, but word eventually leaks out. Many turn from their faith as another earth shattering discovery sheds more light on the validity of the manuscripts. The archaeologist searches for meaning in it all—why did these manuscripts come to light and what is her part in God's plan?