They've been engaged for two years and still haven't set a date, a fact that has started to irk Grace no end. In fact, things just haven't been feeling right at all lately, and aren't they supposed to when you're with Mr. Right? Then Spencer goes and makes a fool of himself -- yet again -- on Grace's birthday, and she ends up walking to a taxi company to get a lift home. Alone. See the guy who dumped her thirteen years ago! Jimi Malik, a half-Indian, half-Irish writer and ladies man who lives in North West London, has surprised everyone -- himself included -- by deciding to settle down with Kylie, a twenty-one-year-old model from Canada. But when he bows out of his own stag night and goes to catch a cab home, he bumps into Grace Fairley and the past comes rushing back. Like the way they couldn't stand each other. And how their high school hair-pulling routine eventually turned into friendship, then something more. And how he never called again. She's still furious at him and he's still hot for her. But what's the harm in sharing a cab? After all, they're both getting married...Right?

    With school behind him and a summer job at a brick works, Tom had his whole life before him. Years later, alone in a rented flat in Edinburgh and lost in memories, Tom recalls the intellectual and sexual awakening of his youth. In looking back, Tom discovers that only by understanding where he comes from can he make sense of his life as it is now.

     There are two certainties in Lily Ward’s life: • A job she loves with an imminent promotion • A gorgeous boyfriend who’s about to make a commitment But a last minute holiday and office politics are about to cast doubt on those certainties and turn her world upside down. Can Lily weather the storm, uncover the secrets of success, survive the hand of fate and achieve happiness? The perfect read for beach, train or sofa. For lovers of quirky British romcom.

    Unless someone can get the cash to save it, the house that's served as a peaceful anchor for generations will go under the hammer. A free spirit like Mimi has the will, what she needs is a way. Moving back into Chez Ducky is a start. But when she meets the man next door, her life is going to change direction in ways she never imagined.

    To his shock, the child—wrapped in a sweater and wearing a tiny knitted hat—is still alive. To his wife’s shock, Nathan wants to adopt the boy…but the child’s grandmother steps in. Nathan makes her promise, however, that one day she’ll bring the boy to meet him so he can reveal that he was the one who rescued him. Fifteen years later, the widowered Nathan discovers the child abandoned once again—this time at his doorstep. Named Nat, the teenager has grown into a sullen delinquent whose grandmother can no longer tolerate him. Nathan agrees to care for Nat, and the two engage in a battle of wills that pans years. Still, the older man repeatedly assures the youngster that, unlike the rest of the world, he will never abandon him—not even when Nat suffers a trauma that changes both of their lives forever.From the bestselling author of Pay It Forward comes When I Found You, an exquisite, emotional tale of the unexpected bonds that nothing in life can break.

    Five Quarters of the Orange represents Harris's most complex and sophisticated work yet - a novel in which darkness and fierce joy come together to create an unforgettable story.When Framboise Simon returns to a small village on the banks of the Loire, the locals do not recognize her as the daughter of the infamous Mirabelle Dartigen - the woman they still hold responsible for a terrible tragedy that took place during the German occupation decades before. Although Framboise hopes for a new beginning she quickly discovers that past and present are inextricably intertwined. Nowhere is this truth more apparent than in the scrapbook of recipes she has inherited from her dead mother.With this book, Framboise re-creates her mother's dishes, which she serves in her small creperie. And yet as she studies the scrapbook - searching for clues to unlock the contradiction between her mother's sensuous love of food and often cruel demeanor - she begins to recognize a deeper meaning behind Mirabelle's cryptic scribbles. Within the journal's tattered pages lies the key to what actually transpired the summer Framboise was nine years old.Rich and dark. Five Quarters of the Orange is a novel of mothers and daughters of the past and the present, of resisting, and succumbing, and an extraordinary work by a masterful writer.

    By her agent, her publisher & now her fiance. So she's over the moon when she's given the opportunity to ghostwrite a novel for model, Lulubelle Ryan. Particularly as it means travelling around the world as part of Lulubelle's entourage."

    In spite of their differences, the Gold sisters have always been close.When their father dies, everything begins to fall apart. Level-headed May is left to fend for herself (and somehow learn to drive), while her two sisters struggle with their own demons. But the girls learn that while there are a lot of rules for the road, there are no rules when it comes to the heart. Together, they discover the key to moving on -- and it's the key to their father's Pontiac Firebird..

    and I asked God if he please couldn't take my brother Matthies instead of my rabbit. 'Amen.' Jas lives with her devout farming family in the rural Netherlands. One winter's day, her older brother joins an ice skating trip; resentful at being left alone, she makes a perverse plea to God; he never returns. As grief overwhelms the farm, Jas succumbs to a vortex of increasingly disturbing fantasies, watching her family disintegrate into a darkness that threatens to derail them all.A bestselling sensation in the Netherlands by a prize-winning young poet, Marieke Lucas Rijneveld's debut novel lays everything bare. It is a world of language unlike any other, which Michele Hutchison's striking translation captures in all its wild, violent beauty. Studded with unforgettable images - visceral, raw, surreal - The Discomfort of the Evening is a radical reading experience that will leave you changed forever.

    For the past few months, she's been on her own in the yellow house, managing somehow, knowing that her mother will probably never return. That's how she comes to live with Cora, the sister she hasn't seen in ten years, and Cora's husband Jamie, whose down-to-earth demeanor makes it hard for Ruby to believe he founded the most popular networking Web site around. A luxurious house, fancy private school, a new wardrobe, the promise of college and a future; it's a dream come true. So why is Ruby such a reluctant Cinderella, wary and defensive? And why is Nate, the genial boy next door with some secrets of his own, unable to accept the help that Ruby is just learning to give? Best-selling author Sarah Dessen explores the heart of a gutsy, complex girl dealing with unforeseen circumstances and learning to trust again.

    With a fabulous career in television, a posh apartment, and four fiercely loyal and wickedly funny friends, she knows she should be counting her lucky stars. But as her thirties tick by at an alarming pace, Amelia is getting anxious about the one thing missing in her otherwise successful life--a husband!If it's not too much to ask the universe, Amelia wants a husband not a boyfriend, not a lover, not even a mind-bending one-night fling but a wedding band and the Vera Wang gown of her dreams. When she sees an ad for a night course entitled How to Find a Husband over the Age of Thirty-five, she finally makes up her mind to have it all an old-fashioned ring on her finger by the end of the year. So after twenty years of going it on her own, Amelia swallows her pride, signs up for dating boot camp, and enlists the help of a professional.Enter Ira Vandergelder a native New Yorker with a black belt in tongue-fu, a woman who's snappier than a crocodile handbag and more acidic than a chili finger dipped in your eye who trains the hopelessly romantic Amelia to apply business marketing principles to the world of dating, to become goal-driven and to pursue her dream husband in exactly the same way she'd pursue her dream job. Even if this involves tracking down all the men she's ever loved and lost before.With the constant support and biting commentary of her tight foursome of friends, Amelia revisits her bumpy romantic past from the first love who dumped her during Live Aid to the most recent ex, officially dubbed he-who's-name-shall-forever-remain-unspoken. As Amelia recognizes that her future happiness can't wait for fate, she has to tackle lesson number one: If you can't learn from your past, how can you expect to move forward? Sharp, witty, and irresistibly funny, Remind Me Again Why I Need a Man cuts to the heart of every single man and woman out there. Claudia Carroll examines the rules of attraction in a sophisticated and refreshing way. This beautifully written novel will have your heart pounding until the final page.

    She was lonely and unsettled - her parents had been killed in a car accident, her boyfriend had decided to go back to his wife, and as a painter she led a solitary life in her North Yorkshire home town. But she felt immediately at home in the gracious stone house that had been bequeathed to her, and was made welcome by the local residents - in particular, by the members of the Mindon Amateur Dramatic Society (somewhat appropriately known as MADS) presided over by the formidable Ursula. Ursula liked to run things her way, and brooked no opposition when the ambitious decision was made (largely by herself) to put on A Midsummer Night's Dream as their next production. Petra , to her surprise and pleasure, was put in charge of the wardrobe. Rivalries, squabbles, love affairs and seething resentments threatened to scupper the production, and all Ursula's managerial skills were needed to prevent disaster. But Petra had more pressing things on her mind than the costumes for the cast. A mystery from her past began to haunt her - and the answer to that mystery might solve the puzzle of why she had been left such a beautiful house by a total stranger.

    Knowing the book will cause a sensation, they decide they must publish it. Now you can read what the hype is about.To find herself…she might lose everything.By all appearances, Kate Carmichael had the perfect life: two adorable daughters, a pre-war town house on the Upper East Side, and a husband who ran one of the most successful publishing companies in New York. But when Kate attends the wedding of two of her oldest friends and reconnects with successful classmates from graduate school, she suddenly sees her life in a different light: the career she didn’t pursue, the dreams she’s locked away, the empty veneer of her privilege.When the wedding weekend ends, instead of heading home to her husband and family, Kate gets on a plane and flies halfway around the world. She claims it’s just going to be for a week—two max—so she can clear her head, make headway with her writing, and shake free of the feeling that time is passing her by.But just like Kate’s life, the adventure doesn’t go quite as planned. When it’s time to return, she finds herself trapped between wanting to be a good mother and partner and needing to find herself again.This provocative and gripping novel asks: is a wife and mother allowed to have a midlife crisis? And, if she does, can she ever be forgiven? Marriage Vacation is for anyone who has ever fantasized about what it would be like to run away from it all.

    1 Ladies' Detective Agency novels, begins a wonderful new series starring the irrepressibly curious Isabel Dalhousie.Isabel is fond of problems, and sometimes she becomes interested in problems that are, quite frankly, none of her business. This may be the case when Isabel sees a young man plunge to his death from the upper circle of a concert hall in Edinburgh. Despite the advice of her housekeeper, Grace, who has been raised in the values of traditional Edinburgh, and her niece, Cat, who, if you ask Isabel, is dating the wrong man, Isabel is determined to find the truth—if indeed there is one—behind the man's death. The resulting moral labyrinth might have stymied even Kant. And then there is the unsatisfactory turn of events in Cat's love life that must be attended to.Filled with thorny characters and a Scottish atmosphere as thick as a highland mist, The Sunday Philosophy Club is irresistible, and Isabel Dalhousie is the most delightful literary sleuth since Precious Ramotswe.

    When she wakes up in the hospital, the doctors insist she’s someone else: Lauren Richardson, wife and mother of four.Lauren’s husband wants nothing more than for life to get back to normal—complete with a well-organized house and very properly behaved children. But Lauren’s kids haven’t been allowed to have much fun, and one of them has special needs. Can Jessica embrace this family of strangers and become the wife and mother they need? As she struggles to find her way in this new life—and the way back to her old life—she reconnects with Lauren’s estranged sister and discovers a secret that could rip the family apart.Now, torn between Lauren’s responsibilities to her family and Jessica’s chance at love, one woman is about to find out whether the road not taken leads to happiness—or to heartbreak.