. . Other Girls.

    . .Twenty-three-year-old artist Andrea Morales escaped her Midwestern Catholic childhood—and the closet—to create a home and life for herself within the thriving but insular lesbian underground of Portland, Oregon. But one drunken night, reeling from a bad breakup and a friend’s betrayal, she recklessly crosses enemy lines and hooks up with a man. To her utter shock, Andrea soon discovers she’s pregnant—and despite the concerns of her astonished circle of gay friends, she decides to have the baby.A decade later, when her precocious daughter Lucia starts asking questions about the father she’s never known, Andrea is forced to reconcile the past she hoped to leave behind with the life she’s worked so hard to build.A thoroughly modern and original anti-romantic comedy, Stray City is an unabashedly entertaining literary debut about the families we’re born into and the families we choose, about finding yourself by breaking the rules, and making bad decisions for all the right reasons.

    Ten years ago Jackie fled Mountain Ridge, her need to escape the pain and abuse her single motivation. It wasn’t until after she left that she realized she’d left her heart behind. Burying her feelings for the only woman she’d ever loved, and the only loving family she’d ever known, Jackie struggles to forget her past and move on with her life. Now ten years later, she wonders if she’ll ever find someone that can love the person she’s become. A suggestion from her therapist sends Jackie back to her old hometown in search of those she’d left behind so long ago. Can she settle the past and hope to find her future?

    No one knew why Robin abandoned a brilliant university career to start a new life at an eccentric island monastery, but it was thought to have something to do with the surprise engagement of Candida, Robin's childhood playmate and Jake, their mutual friend.

     Dan Savage's mother wants him to get married. His boyfriend, Terry, says "no thanks" because he doesn't want to act like a straight person. Their six-year-old son DJ says his two dads aren't "allowed" to get married, but that he'd like to come to the reception and eat cake. Throw into the mix Dan's straight siblings, whose varied choices form a microcosm of how Americans are approaching marriage these days, and you get a rollicking family memoir that will have everyone-gay or straight, right or left, single or married-howling with laughter and rethinking their notions of marriage and all it entails. BACKCOVER: "Hilarious, heartfelt." -Seattle Post-Intelligencer "As funny as David Sedaris's essay collections, but bawdier and more thought-provoking." -Publisher's Weekly (starred review) "Most of all, a book about creating and appreciating family." -Seattle Times "I think America would be a better place if everyone on every side of the gay marriage debate would read this book." -Ira Glass, host of the public radio show This American Life "The strongest argument here, which [Savage] brilliantly plays down, is that family means everything to these people: married, not married, blended, gay, straight, whatever." -The Washington Post

    A somewhat cranky woman to begin with, she really doesn't much like people. But she does enjoy working at her pet accessory boutique The Fuzzy Belly Deli. Brooke Hewitt thought she was happy in her relationship with her stockbroker boyfriend, until the day she and her dog wander into the Fuzzy Belly Deli. There she meets Cayden - a woman that Brooke can't stop thinking about. Brooke has never questioned her sexuality, but there is something about Cayden that she just can't shake free. The encounter changes both Cayden and Brooke, disrupting both women's lives - in some ways for the worse and yet, some certainly for the better...

     Luke’s life couldn’t get any worse. His parents are gone, the family bar is failing, and he's had to drop out of college. On top of everything else, now he's engaged in a custody battle with his grandparents over his younger brother. Adam is a drop-dead gorgeous lawyer, representing a certain pair of grandparents in the custody battle. He isn’t pleased to be involved with such snobby clients, and he’s definitely miffed to be shipped out to the Midwest for this case. That all changes when he meets Luke. The man is handsome, charming, and he gets Adam’s sense of humor. Worse, he definitely deserves to win the case. They’re not supposed to talk to one another, much less date, but both Adam and Luke feel a connection they can’t ignore. Can they figure out a way to make it work? Or will the case – and the things they have to do to win it – tear them apart? If you love tense, sensual, heartwarming gay romance, dive in to Fighting for Love tonight. Delight in desperation and a guaranteed happy ending. Get this and five other books with steamy, sweet stories in the Fighting for Love Bundle!

    Arriving in Alabama, Shona convinces the kind Jeffrey Ellis, wealthy co-owner of Ellis and Bruce Machinery, to give her a job and heads to the site with hopes of becoming invisible while she saves up the money to continue her journey to safety. There, she strikes up a bond with Cuban, who is on a similar path to her, but is racially abused on a daily basis by the workforce and by Jeffrey Ellis’s brutal business partner, Larry Bruce. Shona also meets Elbie, the elderly tool room supervisor, who has been covertly keeping a diary of all the horrific acts that have been carried out over the last five years by Bruce and his associates.As Elbie helps Shona and Cuban settle into their jobs, they are introduced to Chloe Bruce, Larry’s daughter, resulting in their complex worlds becoming inextricably linked, with devastating consequences for all those involved.Will Elbie’s diary end up in the wrong hands? Will Cuban achieve his dream of making it to New York? Will Shona’s past finally catch up with her?A compelling and heart-breaking story of secrets too dangerous to confess to, at a time of cruel, unforgiving and relentless intolerance to difference.“A heart-wrenching and gripping read.”“A moving yet disturbing story…you won’t put this book down!”

    She’d rather wear sweats, build furniture, and get into trouble with her solid group of friends: Woods, Mash, Davey, Fifty, and Janie Lee.But when Janie Lee confesses to Billie that she’s in love with Woods, Billie’s filled with a nagging sadness as she realizes that she is also in love with Woods…and maybe with Janie Lee, too.Always considered “one of the guys,” Billie doesn’t want anyone slapping a label on her sexuality before she can understand it herself. So she keeps her conflicting feelings to herself, for fear of ruining the group dynamic. Except it’s not just about keeping the peace, it’s about understanding love on her terms—this thing that has always been defined as a boy and a girl falling in love and living happily ever after. For Billie—a box-defying dynamo—it’s not that simple.Readers will be drawn to Billie as she comes to terms with the gray areas of love, gender, and friendship, in this John Hughes-esque exploration of sexual fluidity.

    Grace is smart, beautiful, and most unfortunately, straight. Life would’ve been perfect if Grace had only loved her back, but when Grace gets married, Dex knows it’s time to move on. Then Dex meets Emma Lawson, and her life takes a whole new direction. Only trouble is, she never expected to have to choose between her best friend and her new love.Emma Lawson is successful and happy except when it comes to love. She’s been alone for a year and has no intention of giving love another chance, until falling for Dex changes everything. When Grace comes between them, Emma refuses to be second best. Can Emma show Dex what true love really looks like?

    Thus has it been since before the physical and spirit worlds divided. There are five martial Forms inspired by the elements and humans have learned them, using them to defend themselves, for thousands of years. Ever since the Empire of Iron began using the Metal Form for conquest, the secrets of each Form have been guarded more closely. Few people learn more than one Form as they did in the past. In Avrilatha – an ordinary village in the Western Plains – lives Ayah. Daughter of the village healer, Ayah’s only genuinely remarkable features are a stubborn streak and a desire to master all five Elemental Forms. When she is forced to leave her village, Ayah sets out on her quest to find teachers. Accompanied by a fox with a secret, Ayah’s journey will take her all over the continent and involve her in politics, intrigue, and war. The Empire of Iron is on the move, and the only thing in its way is one stubborn girl.

    In these memoirs, coming out is less important than coming of age and coming to the realization that young gay people experience the world in ways quite unlike straight boys. Whether it is a fascination with soap opera, an intense sensitivity to their own difference, or an obsession with a certain part of the male anatomy, gay kids — or kids who would eventually identify as gay — have an indefinable but unmistakable gay sensibility. Sometimes the result is funny, sometimes it is harrowing, and often it is deeply moving. Essays by lauded young writers like Alex Chee (Edinburgh), Aaron Hamburger (Faith for Beginners), Karl Soehnlein (The World of Normal Boys), Trebor Healy (Through It Came Bright Colors), Tom Dolby (The Trouble Boy), David Bahr, and Austin Bunn, are collected along with those by brilliant, newcomers such as Michael McAllister, Jason Tougaw, Viet Dinh, and the wildly popular blogger, Joe.My.God.

    Ben likes Noah back. No one must know. But somebody does ... Between his depression and anxiety disorder and his secret relationship with popular jock Ben Hynes, seventeen-year-old Noah Simmons has already more than enough to deal with. But there is always room for deterioration.When an anonymous blackmailer threatens to publish a salacious video of them unless they comply with his demands, Noah and Ben are hard-pressed to figure out the lesser of two evils. Ben has a reputation to lose. Noah has one hardly worth fighting for, but he doesn't want to lose Ben. Neither of them wants to be an inadvertent teenage porn star, so how far are they willing to go to protect their secret?Get your copy of Instafamous now for a fresh and relevant look at the intricacies of social media, teenagers, and mental health.

    And Jo reluctantly agrees.Although it is (mostly) much easier for Jo to fit in as a straight girl, things get complicated when she meets Mary Carlson, the oh-so-tempting sister of her new friend at school. But Jo couldn’t possibly think of breaking her promise to her dad. Even if she’s starting to fall for the girl. Even if there’s a chance Mary Carlson might be interested in her, too. Right?

    When they get trapped inside a cabin together for a week, what could possibly go wrong?  April Bauer packed her bags and fled from her abusive ex-husband overnight, only to land in a secluded farming town, Norcoast, without a clue. With the approaching winter weather, no farming skills to speak of, and hardly any money to her name, how the hell was she supposed to survive out here on her own?Not only that, but her new life felt lonelier than ever. She awoke alone, ate alone, slept alone, and didn’t see that changing anytime soon. How could it? Her heart needed as much mending as her drafty cabin, and that was saying something.  Danny Irving, professional cowgirl and heartbreaker extraordinaire, wanted more out of life. She was tired of manning her parents’ farm day in and day out with nothing to show for it. When was she going to find her happy ending? The woman of her dreams? All she had was a handful of men drooling over her, a broken plow, and a bedroom she shared with two of her siblings. At twenty-four, she expected more than this monotonous existence she’d been living. But when her father sends her over to a neighbor’s house before the oncoming storm, she never anticipated what would happen next.  Slow burn, HEA novel. Book 1 of 2.