Preston Grind, she's just about out of options. She recently graduated from high school and is pregnant with her art teacher's baby. Her mother is dead and her father is a drunk. The art teacher is too much of a head-case to help raise the child. Izzy knows she can be a good mother but without any money or prospects, she's left searching.So when Dr. Grind offers her a space in The Infinite Family Project, she accepts. Housed in a spacious compound in Tennessee, she joins nine other couples, all with children the same age as her newborn son, to raise their children as one extended family. Grind's theory is that the more parental love a child receives, the better off they are.This attempt at a utopian ideal-funded by an eccentric billionaire-starts off promising: Izzy enjoys the kids, reading to them and teaching them to cook. She even forms a bond with her son more meaningful than she ever expected. But soon the gentle equilibrium among the families is upset and it all starts to disintegrate: unspoken resentments between the couples begin to fester; the project's funding becomes tenuous; and Izzy's feelings for Dr. Grind, who is looking to expunge his own painful childhood, make her question her participation in this strange experiment in the first place.Written with the same compassionate voice, disarming sense of humor, and quirky charm that made The Family Fang such a success, Perfect Little World is a poignant look at how the best families are the ones we make for ourselves.

    Secure in the love of her beautiful mother, she is unaware that her father, Jack, is caught up in a web of secrets. When a very local murder intersects with global forces, Jack must decide where his loyalties lie, and Madeleine will be forced to learn a lesson about the ambiguity of human morality -- one she will only begin to understand when she carries her quest for the truth, and the killer, into adulthood twenty years later.

    Although she's had her ups and downs, life is good now: she lives with her twin brother, Onyx, and another friend in an artsy community in Cincinnati and is pursuing a master's degree in psychology. An avid reader, Ophelia likes everything to be orderly, including her job at a nearby bookstore. But when a good-looking stranger ends up in her apartment-invited to crash on their couch by her brother-her life begins to change forever.Brax Smith arrives to Cincinnati with nothing other than his van, having left Florida to start a new life, escaping the memories of losing his mother to cancer and dealing with his drunk father. A recovering alcoholic himself, Brax meets two guys at a group session in an eclectic area of Cincinnati when he gets to town. He feels grateful to have a place to stay but also comes face-to-face with the sister of one of his new friends, who is less than excited to have an additional roommate. Can he win her over, despite the fact that she has no interest in being his friend?In this novel, the lives of two struggling people collide and take them on a roller-coaster journey of good times and bad, ultimately leading to true love, devotion, and tragedy.

    For generations, the Sawtelles have raised and trained a fictional breed of dog whose thoughtful companionship is epitomized by Almondine, Edgar's lifelong friend and ally. But with the unexpected return of Claude, Edgar's paternal uncle, turmoil consumes the Sawtelles' once peaceful home. When Edgar's father dies suddenly, Claude insinuates himself into the life of the farm—and into Edgar's mother's affections. Grief-stricken and bewildered, Edgar tries to prove Claude played a role in his father's death, but his plan backfires—spectacularly. Forced to flee into the vast wilderness lying beyond the farm, Edgar comes of age in the wild, fighting for his survival and that of the three yearling dogs who follow him. But his need to face his father's murderer and his devotion to the Sawtelle dogs turn Edgar ever homeward. David Wroblewski is a master storyteller, and his breathtaking scenes—the elemental north woods, the sweep of seasons, an iconic American barn, a fateful vision rendered in the falling rain—create a riveting family saga, a brilliant exploration of the limits of language, and a compulsively readable modern classic.

     A Million Little Pieces was the first Oprah Book Club pick by a living author in over two years. It instantly became a #1 New York Times bestseller, a #1 USA Today bestseller, and a #1 Publishers Weekly bestseller, with over 1.7 million copies in print. My Friend Leonard picks up right where Pieces leaves off. A New York Times bestseller in its own right before the Oprah pick, My Friend Leonard is James Frey's story of his friendship with Leonard, the larger-than-life mobster who "adopted" James as he left rehab. Leonard, who offers James lucrative-if illegal, mysterious, and slightly dangerous-employment when he needs it. Leonard, of the secret deals, of the surprising passions that belie his violent career choice, of fantastic generosity and ferocious loyalty. Leonard, who has been holding on to some remarkable secrets, and who has invested in their friendship more than James could ever imagine. My Friend Leonard is, at its core, about the responsibility that comes with loving someone and going out on any number of limbs to care for them. And it is a book that proves that one of the most provocative literary voices of his generation is also one of the most emphatically human.

    Along with Andreas, the old man who runs the taverna, they become close to each other after witnessing a tragedy when a pleasure steamer catches fire in the harbour. NIGHTS OF RAIN AND STARS is the story of one summer when Fiona, Thomas, Elsa and David all have to face the particular life crisis which first made them leave their homes and end up in Greece. With the help of Vonni, a middle-aged Irish woman who lives in the village and is now a near-native, they each find a solution - although not necessarily the one they anticipated...

    But his mother sees a boy with a heart as open and wide as the ocean.Laurel Lockwood lost her son once through neglect. She's spent the rest of her life determined to make up for her mistakes, and she's succeeded in becoming a committed, protective parent—maybe even overprotective. Still, she loosens her grip just enough to let Andy attend a local church social—a decision that terrifies her when the church is consumed by fire. But Andy survives…and remarkably, saves other children from the flames. Laurel watches as Andy basks in the role of unlikely hero and the world finally sees her Andy, the sweet boy she knows as well as her own heart. But when the suspicion of arson is cast upon Andy, Laurel must ask herself how well she really knows her son…and how far she'll go to keep her promise to protect him forever.

    But only the secret holder is fooled in the long run, as Lenny discovered in a dark alley in the Wall Street neighborhood. Michael McKaybees is a private investigator working in New York’s five boroughs. He specializes in money crimes like insurance fraud, with the occasional cheating spouse (his partner’s favorite since she thinks all cheaters should be flogged in public). Now, however, he has been forced to expand his investigative work to include homicide. Implicated in his best friend Lenny’s death, Michael finds himself entangled in a web carefully woven by someone who wants to destroy him—and there’s no doubt he’s up to his neck in shit. Then there’s his father, Marlowe Black, who has decided now is the right time to show up after an absence of more than three decades. Hell, Michael didn’t even know he was still alive. Marlowe’s reputation as a combat-hardened PI is well-known among the City’s criminal element, making him a hated man. And he, too, is a suspect in Lenny’s murder. When McKaybees discovers the body of Lenny’s wife, Jill—Michael’s childhood sweetheart—hidden in his apartment, murder becomes seriously personal and the need for vengeance demanding.

    A mysterious wall appears where none previously existed and something other than mere curiosity prompts a close-up examination, accidentally setting off a violent explosion which ruptures the barrier and sends all three hurtling into an alien, highly-dangerous world where skies are purple and vermilion forests endemic; home to a dreadful flying predator - not unlike the dragon of mythology - besides other, equally fearsome carnivores.Two of their number return leaving one behind, prisoner of an enormously strong but beautiful woman possessed of extraordinary powers. The escapees vow to re-enter, sworn to rescue their companion regardless of danger, but are eventually to discover another, preordained and vitally important reason for their presence. How will they survive and will they somehow manage to fulfil their destiny and ultimately return home...?

    Coming from a family with a literal skeleton in their closet, she's developed this talent all her life, whether helping her willful mother to smooth over the reality of her family's ugly past, or elevating humble scraps of unwanted fabric into nationally acclaimed art quilts. Her sister Thalia, an impoverished "Actress" with a capital A, is her opposite, and prides herself in exposing the lurid truth lurking behind life's everyday niceties. And while Laurel's life was neatly on track, a passionate marriage, a treasured daughter, and a lovely home in lovely suburban Victorianna, everything she holds dear is thrown into question the night she is visited by an apparition in her bedroom. The ghost appears to be her 14-year-old neighbor Molly Dufresne, and when Laurel follows this ghost , she finds the real Molly floating lifeless in her swimming pool. While the community writes the tragedy off as a suicide, Laurel can't. Reluctantly enlisting Thalia's aid, Laurel sets out on a life-altering investigation that triggers startling revelations about her own guarded past, the truth about her marriage, and the girl who stopped swimming.Richer and more rewarding than any story from Joshilyn Jackson, THE GIRL WHO STOPPED SWIMMING is destined both to delight Jackson's loyal fans and capture a whole new audience.

    As for me, my parents named me Regret."Honolulu is the rich, unforgettable story of a young "picture bride" who journeys to Hawai'i in 1914 in search of a better life.Instead of the affluent young husband and chance at an education that she has been promised, she is quickly married off to a poor, embittered laborer who takes his frustrations out on his new wife. Renaming herself Jin, she makes her own way in this strange land, finding both opportunity and prejudice. With the help of three of her fellow picture brides, Jin prospers along with her adopted city, now growing from a small territorial capital into the great multicultural city it is today. But paradise has its dark side, whether it's the daily struggle for survival in Honolulu's tenements, or a crime that will become the most infamous in the islands history...With its passionate knowledge of people and places in Hawai'i far off the tourist track, Honolulu is most of all the spellbinding tale of four women in a new world, united by dreams, disappointment, sacrifices, and friendship.

    In the 1970s in Northern California a father and his teenage daughters, Anna and Claire, work their farm with the help of Coop, an enigmatic young man who makes his home with them. Theirs is a makeshift family, until it is shattered by an incident of violence that sets fire to the rest of their lives. Divisadero takes us from San Francisco to the raucous backrooms of Nevada's casinos and eventually to the landscape of southern France. As the narrative moves back and forth through time and place, we find each of the characters trying to find some foothold in a present shadowed by the past.

    A twenty-seven-year-old college dropout with stalled ambitions, he works at an animal shelter and lives with his bullheaded older brother, Littlefield, in their old family home on Meadow Island, Maine, a house that has fallen into disrepair since their father’s untimely death several years earlier.When a massive blizzard hits the state one Saturday afternoon, Bennie, Littlefield, and a crew of roughneck war-game enthusiasts decide to play paintball at the local granite quarry. Bennie accidentally falls into a gully, landing in the hospital, and wonders if his life can get any worse. But when one of the players disappears during the storm and Littlefield becomes the main suspect in the disappearance, Bennie realizes that the game might have had much higher stakes. Then Littlefield takes off without a word of explanation, forcing Bennie to seriously question his loyalty to his enigmatic brother. With the guidance of his intrepid girlfriend, Helen, and his twin sister, Gwen, Bennie goes looking for answers, embarking on a journey that brings him closer to a truth he may not want to discover. What he finds will change his family and his life forever.Written in prose as arresting and spare as the novel’s rural Maine setting, Lewis Robinson’s Water Dogs is a marvel of modern fiction, a book rich in empathy that follows one man’s path through the uncertainties of youth and loss toward self-discovery.

    But one treacherous winter night, in a house isolated by icy roads and failed telephone lines, Sibyl takes desperate measures to save a baby's life. She performs an emergency Caesarean section on its mother, who appears to have died in labor. But what if—as Sibyl's assistant later charges—the patient wasn't already dead, and it was Sibyl who inadvertently killed her?As recounted by Sibyl's precocious fourteen-year-old daughter, Connie, the ensuing trial bears the earmarks of a witch hunt except for the fact that all its participants are acting from the highest motives—and the defendant increasingly appears to be guilty. As Sibyl Danforth faces the antagonism of the law, the hostility of traditional doctors, and the accusations of her own conscience, Midwives engages, moves, and transfixes us as only the very best novels ever do.

    A teenage girl—her father long since disappeared, her mother unwilling to have her in the house—is pregnant, alone herself, with nowhere to go. And out in the country, two brothers, elderly bachelors, work the family homestead, the only world they've ever known.From these unsettled lives emerges a vision of life, and of the town and landscape that bind them together—their fates somehow overcoming the powerful circumstances of place and station, their confusion, curiosity, dignity and humor intact and resonant. As the milieu widens to embrace fully four generations, Kent Haruf displays an emotional and aesthetic authority to rival the past masters of a classic American tradition.Utterly true to the rhythms and patterns of life, Plainsong is a novel to care about, believe in, and learn from.