Family life fiction / Stories about family

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Book Synopsis?Hafner?s taut and utterly delightful debut is a novel of multitudes. . . . What a wonder of storytelling.??Weike Wang, New York TimesNew York Times Editor?s Choice * Good Morning America Reading Pick * LitHub Most Anticipated Book * Christian Science Monitor Summer Reading PickA delicious summer read filled with humor and surprise for readers of Anne Tyler and Kevin Wilson.When introverted Ethan Fawcett marries fun-loving Barb, so comfortable in the world, he has every reason to believe he will be delivered from a lifetime of solitude. She fills his world with a sense of adventure, expanding his horizons beyond his comfortable routine. To ease Ethan?s fears of becoming a father, Barb suggests they foster two young brothers, Tommy and Sam, and Ethan immediately falls in love with the boys.When the pandemic hits, he becomes obsessed with providing a perfect life for them. But instead of bringing Barb and Ethan closer together, the boys become a wedge in their relationship, as Ethan is unable to share with Barb a secret that has been haunting him since childhood. Then Ethan takes Tommy and Sam on a biking trip in Italy, and it becomes clear just how unusual Ethan and his boys are.

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Book SynopsisTwo exquisite novellas on memory, perception, and shifting intimaciesIn “The Impostor,” a man travels with his wife through Italy and recalls a family legend about an uncle who was swallowed by Mt. Vesuvius. Preoccupied by this mysterious event, he grapples with the fallibility of memory and the enigma of time. In “Blue Butterflies of the Amazon,” a matriarch, rendered mute and paralyzed by a stroke, defenselessly observes the shifting dynamics between her only son, his wife, and her husband while they play out their complex intimacies before her.As the characters of The Impostor wander between worlds and states of mind, Edgard Telles Ribeiro elucidates their situations in surprisingly inventive ways that explore devastating questions of reality, consciousness, and loss.Trade ReviewPraise for The Impostor“Ribeiro’s deft and insinuating storytelling captures the uncanny feeling of slippage. . . . [His writing is] atmospheric and engrossing, and by the end Mr. Ribeiro has proven himself a master of the subtleties of subjectivity.” —Wall Street Journal“Explor[es] the mysteries and possibilities of life continually unfolding rather than irrevocably damaged.” —North of Oxford“Two elegant novellas, each an atmospherically charged investigation of consciousness, familial ties, legacy, and language. . . . These crystalline stories form a memorable diptych.” —Publishers Weekly“These inventive novellas are like literary puzzles for the reader to tease out.” —Kirkus Reviews“Telles Ribeiro’s title novella is a tour de force that takes place simultaneously in the distant past and in the present, in a seamlessly fractured continuum of time. The second novella is a complex and breathtaking work, rich in feeling, an audacious, dazzling performance. By turns delicate and humorous, wrenching and melancholic, it lays bare the souls of its characters in a manner that I can only call Chekhovian. It is the work of a master.” —Jaime Manrique, author of Cervantes Street and Like This Afternoon Forever“Comical and brooding, enchanting and disturbing, The Impostor triggers a unique free fall into the unnerving craters of the mind.” —Laura Restrepo, author of Delirium and The Divine BoysSelect Praise for Edgard Telles Ribeiro“Elegant, absorbingly knowing, chilling, dryly humorous and often moving.” —Francisco Goldman, author of Say Her Name and Monkey Boy“Cunning” —Maureen Corrigan, Washington Post“[Telles Ribeiro] unveils details with a poetic lushness, unhurried, dreamy, as if lingering on their weight, their significance.” —Philadelphia Inquirer“The art of Telles Ribeiro’s [work] is in his sumptuous lyrical narrative style.” —Tulsa World“Telles Ribeiro’s [work] is of global import, a caution against too readily forgetting and too quickly adapting.” —Words Without Borders

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Book SynopsisLonglisted for the 2024 Joyce Carol Oates Prize Winner, Independent Publisher Book Awards, Silver Medal - Literary Fiction Featured on PBS NewsHour Named by Good Morning America, New York Post, and Los Angeles Daily News as one of the Best Books of Spring 2023 A deeply moving debut novel from the award-winning author of Yes, Yes, Cherries (“Funny, brave, and amazing”—Lorrie Moore) that explores the relationship complexities between mothers and daughters, the desire to escape, and the longing to connect. Viva has always found ways to manage her mother’s impulsive, eccentric and addictive personality. She’s had to—for her entire life, it has always been Viva and Charlotte against the world. After accidentally discovering an innate ability for dance, Viva chases her new passion with the same fervor with which her mother chases the bottle. Over the years, Viva’s talent becomes a ticket to a life of her own, and as she moves further away from home to pursue her dream, Charlotte struggles to make peace with her own past as a failed artist and the effects of her addiction. When tragedy strikes, Viva begins a downward spiral and must decide whether she will repeat her mother’s mistakes or finally take control of her life. Told from interwoven perspectives with lyrical prose as deft as a choreographed dance.Trade ReviewSelected by Publisher’s Marketplace as a Buzz Book for Spring/Summer 2023 “In lyrical language that expresses both Viva’s and Charlotte’s perspectives, Otis portrays a mother and daughter caught in a tense pas de deux, perpetually pushing one another away before returning to each other. This author continues to impress.” —Publishers Weekly “Otis’s debut novel explores the intricacies of mother-daughter relationships with depth, humor, and sensitivity...A moving and relatable story; literary fiction fans will be pleased.” —Library Journal “A new spin on the theme of entwined mothers and daughters…(Otis) steers ably away from cliché in what could easily have been a conventionally tense relationship between mother and daughter, documenting the ways in which both are distorted by the “umbilical cord” that stretches between them for decades but allowing them to be individuals with their own quirks and longings as well.” —Kirkus Reviews “Mary Otis delivers a psychologically acute vision of a mother and daughter and their haunting waltz in which allegiance, dreams of escape, the desire for dignity and the urge for self-destruction play their part in a dance that spreads over three decades. A powerful debut.” —Janet Fitch, author of White Oleander and The Revolution of Marina M. “A profound, propulsive exploration of what it means to be a mother, a daughter, an artist, and an addict. A transfixing, singular evocation of the precarious, terrifying predicament that constitutes being a woman alone in the world. BURST made me think deeply about my own choices and compulsions and changed, forever, the way I see myself and the world.” —Joanna Rakoff, author of My Salinger Year and A Fortunate Age “Mary Otis is so gifted at giving us two full and complicated women in this captivating novel, allowing each her brokenness and her dignity. Plus, the gorgeous writing about dance! I was making a list in my head of readers I want to give it to." —Aimee Bender, author of The Particular Sadness of Lemon Cake and The Butterfly Lampshade “When it comes to stories of mothers and daughters, Mary Otis's Burst is up there with Mona Simpson's Anywhere But Here and Elizabeth Strout's Amy & Isabelle. Otis writes with complexity and heart. We are all richer and wiser after reading her work.” —Natalie Baszile, author of Queen Sugar and We Are Each Other’s Harvest “Beautifully written, propulsive, and utterly transcendent, this is a mother-daughter story for the ages.” —J. Ryan Stradal, author of Kitchens of the Great Midwest and The Lager Queen of Minnesota “Burst is a wallop of a novel—it is about risk and pleasure, the way a body or mind can feel like a boundless possibility and a small prison, the way a mother and daughter set loose in the world can make everything shine, even if the shiny things also have teeth.” —Ramona Ausubel, author of Sons and Daughters of Ease and Plenty and Awayland “The mysterious bond that occurs between troubled mothers and their daughters has been written about endlessly, but almost never with such perfectly-modulated electricity, such humor and deep wisdom, such enveloping–but utterly unsentimental–tenderness. Burst is a taut, economical novel that nonetheless contains multitudes. Its interrogations of what we owe ourselves and one another, how we love our parents and struggle to escape their shadows, and how we reconcile our dreams with our disappointments, is wonderful indeed.” —Matthew Specktor, author of Always Crashing in the Same Car and American Dream Machine "Mary Otis writes about the ineffable—the high of being a dancer, the terrible closeness of mothers and daughters—with clarity, soul, and grace. BURST is a radiant first novel, its characters impossible to forget in their individual vividness and their complicated love for one another." —Sarah Shun-lien Bynum, author of Likes and Madeline is Sleeping "I knew from the first few lines that I was in with this book for the duration. Well-observed and propulsive, Mary Otis makes the reader acutely aware of consequences—both short and long term—and plays them out masterfully.” —Keith Mosman, Powell’s Books "An arresting debut novel...with writing as deft as a choreographed dance." —The San Francisco Bay Times

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Book Synopsis“As lush and inviting as the gardens created by its heroine, this novel…will wrap you in captivating, high-stakes drama.”—People Magazine (Best Books Summer 2023) “A great portion of [Hedge’s] magic lies in how it turns a radical corner, gaining speed and burning urgency—then slowly becoming something else: deeper, denser, wiser. Readers will (and should) trust it to take us where we need to go—even if not where we expected.”―The Washington Post Featured in Oprah Daily’s Spring 2023 Reading List and Kirkus Reviews An emotionally charged, richly observed novel about a woman balancing the demands of motherhood and marriage with her own needs. Maud is a talented garden historian and devoted mom to daughters Ella and Louise. Motivated to reignite her career and escape her troubled marriage, she accepts a summer job restoring the garden of a lush, 19th-century estate in the Hudson Valley. Reveling in her work and temporary independence, Maud relishes her days in the sun. While waiting for her daughters to join her at the end of their school year, she strikes up a friendship with a coworker, archeologist Gabriel Crews. As the two share nightly dinners, their relationship grows more intimate, and Maud starts to imagine a future outside of her stifling marriage. Once Ella and Louise arrive, however, she is torn by her desire for Gabriel, her obligations to her daughters, and her growing concern for Ella’s dark moods. Is Ella acting out because she senses that Maud and Gabriel have fallen in love? What happens next is a seismic shock that profoundly changes Maud's life, as well as the lives of everyone she cares about. Deeply moving and impossible to put down, Hedge is an unforgettable portrait of a woman’s longing to be a good mother while still answering the call of her soul and mind.Trade Review“With language as lush as the setting, Delury pulls readers into a thicket of lust, responsibility, and betrayal that they won’t want to escape.” —Oprah Daily “As lush and inviting as the gardens created by its heroine, this novel…will wrap you in captivating, high-stakes drama.” —People Magazine (Best Books Summer 2023) “A great portion of [Hedge’s] magic lies in how it turns a radical corner, gaining speed and burning urgency—then slowly becoming something else: deeper, denser, wiser. Readers will (and should) trust it to take us where we need to go—even if not where we expected.” ―The Washington Post “The book is brimming with high-stakes tension…and readers will find themselves unable to put the book down until they find out what happens next." ―BookTrib "[A] sharply drawn portrait of anguish, loneliness, fear, and desire, it delivers an engaging new journey from ignorance to knowledge via a garden. A persuasive, quietly satisfying portrait of a woman's midlife crisis and the essential choices she makes." —The Kirkus Review “In this profound novel about love, loss, and choices, a summer's exciting work and exhilarating affair will reverberate through the lives of a deeply likeable protagonist and her family for years.” —Shelf Awareness "Filtered through the fierce love of a mother for her child, the book compassionately represents the messes people create and scramble to fix...Readers who enjoy themes of women’s lives and relationships will be fully invested in [Maud's] journey." —Library Journal “A beautiful exploration of the inherent tension between motherhood and desire. Transfixing and utterly rewarding.” —Fiona Davis, New York Times bestselling author of The Spectacular "Reading Hedge is like spending time with your best friend: the daring, smart, compassionate one whose wisdom opens your eyes even as her secrets stun you. Part love story, part thriller, this novel kept me entranced until the very last page.” —Jean Kwok, New York Times and international bestselling author of Searching for Sylvie Lee “The magnificent Delury explores the complexities of marriage, parenthood, and art in Hedge. Maud is an every woman, relatable and strong, who loves her work and her daughters but finds herself at a crossroads when a secret is revealed that will upend their lives. As Maud restores gardens to their historic beauty, she must do the same for the family she loves. Passion and persistence bring a garden to full bloom, and so it goes for Maud, an unforgettable character in a story of arresting beauty and truth.” ―Adriana Trigiani, New York Times bestselling author of The Good Left Undone “Jane Delury has done the impossible: written a seemingly quiet novel about a woman trapped in a bad marriage that builds and builds and builds until suddenly you realize you’re reading a page turner. I could not stop turning the pages. Hedge is a wonderful book.” —Marcy Dermansky, author of Hurricane Girl “Hedge immediately pulls the reader in with its engaging storytelling and its exploration of themes like marital and maternal love and betrayal. Every turn the story takes feels both surprising and earned. I loved this novel and will recommend it widely.” —Liz Moore, New York Times bestselling author of Long Bright River “It’s impossible to turn away from Jane Delury’s newest novel, Hedge. I fell deeply and intensely into this story of love, loss, marriage and parenthood. These are characters, this is a book, you will never forget.” —Jessica Anya Blau, author of Mary Jane “Hedge insightfully explores the complexities of marriage and motherhood, and the danger of family secrets that fester. Delury builds up her characters while breaking down their reserves, and the result is an honest, beautiful, and riveting read.” —Karen Winn, author of Our Little World “Hedge begins as a contemporary love story, but grows into a complex and suspenseful narrative about family. All the big themes—love, life, loss—bind together in this page-turner, with writing that is clear and riveting throughout. A gem of a book from start to finish.” —Catie Marron, author of Becoming a Gardener: What Reading and Digging Taught Me About Living “How do we protect those we love when there might be a terrible cost to ourselves? Which version of a story do we really believe about ourselves and others—and why? Delury’s immersive novel is about family and lovers, passion and responsibility, and it’s filled with such gorgeous writing, compassion and stunning surprises, that I couldn’t bear to tear myself from the page.” —Caroline Leavitt, New York Times bestselling author of With or Without You

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Book SynopsisA new kind of momcom role-playing adventure! Next stop on the party's journey is a casino town! Lured by the potential big winnings, Wise, Medhi, and Porta try their luck at a few games only to sustain devastating financial losses. It's up to Masato and his mother Mamako to rescue them from their debt by taking on a job at the casino...and for Mamako, that involves a bunny girl costume! For readers ages 16 and up

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Book SynopsisLittle Kun isn't too happy about the latest addition to his family. With the arrival of a new baby sister in the house, he worries his parents may not love him as much as they used to... But when a teenage girl shows up and tells Kun that she is his sister from the future, it may be that there's more to this new relationship than Kun ever could've dreamed! - Mamoru Hosoda is an internationally acclaimed animator, director, and author who has previously helmed such award-winning films as The Girl Who Leapt Through Time, Summer Wars, Wolf Children, and The Boy and the Beast.

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Book SynopsisNew York Times bestselling author Karen Hawkins crafts an unforgettable story about a sleepy Southern town, two fiercely independent women, and a truly magical friendship.Sarah Dove is no ordinary bookworm. To her, books have always been more than just objects: they live, they breathe, and sometimes they even speak. When Sarah grows up to become the librarian in her quaint Southern town of Dove Pond, her gift helps place every book in the hands of the perfect reader. Recently, however, the books have been whispering about something out of the ordinary: the arrival of a displaced city girl named Grace Wheeler. If the books are right, Grace could be the savior that Dove Pond desperately needs. The problem is, Grace wants little to do with the town or its quirky residents—Sarah chief among them. It takes a bit of urging, and the help of an especially wise book, but Grace ultimately embraces the challenge to rescue her charmed new community. In her quest, she discovers the tantalizing promise of new love, the deep strength that comes from having a true friend, and the power of finding just the right book. “A mesmerizing fusion of the mystical and the everyday” (Susan Andersen, New York Times bestselling author), The Book Charmer is a heartwarming story about the magic of books that feels more than a little magical itself. Prepare to fall under its spell.

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Book SynopsisFrom the acclaimed author of Sailing Lessons and Mystic Summer—a “charming gem of a novel” (Elin Hilderbrand, #1 New York Times bestselling author)—an evocative and moving tale about what it means to be a family, set over the course of one unforgettable Connecticut summer. Siblings Perry, Jake, and Phoebe Goodwin were raised on the shore of a beautiful Connecticut lake in a close-knit family. The eldest of the family, forty-two-year-old Perry has long craved order as surely as his charismatic younger brother, Jake, has avoided it. Phoebe, their baby sister, courts both. As adults, the Goodwin siblings could not be more different. Perry is as married to his career in New York as a risk analyst as Phoebe is to her college sweetheart, but both have returned to Connecticut to raise their young families. Charismatic Jake, however, has spent his years living away wanderlust and unable to settle. The three have not spent much time together…until this summer. On the afternoon of their grandmother’s ninety-seventh birthday party, the siblings reunite at the lake house where Jake stuns the family with a stranger on his arm and an announcement. Olivia Cossette, daughter of a French chef, does not share the traditional Goodwin New England upbringing or sense of family. What she does share is parenthood, as the single mother of a little girl who does not speak. While the Goodwin family struggle to welcome the newcomers over the course of the summer, a series of bad choices made by each family member finally unravels, leaving them all to question just what truly makes a family. Can one fateful moment on a July afternoon undo a lifetime of good intentions? Only one thing is for certain—this extraordinary summer has irrevocably changed the Goodwin family and all that remains is the uncertain future. With Hannah McKinnon’s signature “enticing and refreshing” (Nancy Thayer, New York Times bestselling author) prose, this is a warm-hearted novel that is perfect for fans of Mary Alice Monroe’s the Beach House series and the works of Elin Hilderbrand.Trade Review"Fans of J. Courtney Sullivan’s Maine (2011), Cristina Alger’s The Darlings (2012), and Jonathan Tropper’s This is Where I Leave You (2009) will relish the slow-simmering chaos and long-standing resentments of this reserved New England family. A warm-hearted yet clear-eyed look into what brings people together and what tears them apart, this makes a delightful case for shaking off childhood roles." * Booklist *"Warm-hearted and a perfect beach read." * 9-to-5 Toys *

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Book SynopsisWhen an Instagram-famous teenager mysteriously disappears, her mother grapples with the revelation of dark secrets in this twisty, atmospheric thriller—from the author of the “poignant, riveting” (Wendy Walker, author of Don’t Look for Me) Everything We Didn’t Say.Mother and daughter Charlie and Eva never sought social media fame, but when a stunning photo of Eva went viral, fame found them. Now, after more than two years documenting life on the road in their vintage Airstream trailer, the duo has temporarily settled on the North Shore of Lake Superior. Eva is happily finishing her senior year of high school and applying to college, but Charlie longs for the adventures they left behind. When Eva goes missing less than a week before her graduation, it’s Charlie who is immediately suspected of foul play—not just by their fans, but also by the police and the FBI. As a fight about one more road trip comes to light, and the truth about their relationship is questioned, Charlie realizes the rosy facade they portrayed online hid a complicated and potentially dangerous reality. Now, to clear her name and find out what has happened to her daughter, she’ll have to confront her own role in Eva’s disappearance—and whether she knows her daughter at all.Trade Review"You won’t be able to predict the journey Baart is taking you on when you start the novel, and she will keep you guessing where she is headed until the very end.” —Glamour“The Long Way Back is a beautifully written, atmospheric, page-turner, that brilliantly explores the complexities of the mother-daughter bone, finding it as fraught as it is profound.” —Kimberly McCreight, New York Times bestselling author of A Good Marriage and Friends Like These"For any parent, the most frightening nightmare is the disappearance of their child. In Nicole Baart’s extraordinary novel The Long Way Back, not only is a mother tortured by this terrible circumstance, but she also becomes a primary suspect. Baart writes with a poet’s eye for language and a storyteller’s gift for suspense. Readers already won over by Nicole Baart’s fine body of work will discover another sparkling gem, and new readers couldn’t find a better place to begin." —William Kent Krueger, New York Times bestselling author of This Tender Land“Riveting and timely, The Long Way Back is not just an unforgettable mother-daughter thriller, it’s a deeply felt love story about the natural world. In beautiful prose, Nicole Baart has penned a novel that will stick with me for a very long time.” —Jo Piazza, bestselling author of We Are Not Like Them“In Nicole Baart’s gripping new thriller The Long Way Back, a mother creates a perfect Instagram life for herself and her teenage daughter, traveling the country while chronicling their adventures for legions of fans. But despite doing everything right, never posting her daughter’s face and never identifying their location until they’ve moved on, things go horribly wrong. Timely and provocative, Baart’s marvelously relatable characters and gifted storytelling take the reader on a wild and unexpected ride. I loved this book!” —Karen Dionne, #1 internationally bestselling author of The Marsh King’s Daughter and The Wicked Sister"Nicole Baart is the queen of the family thriller! This tender, propulsive story reveals a heart-twisting understanding of human nature and the risks we take to get what we want. Timely and thought-provoking, this “turn the pages as fast as you can" cautionary tale about the danger of the spotlight and the steep price of privacy will surprise you and haunt you, even after the gasp-worthy conclusion. Baart crafts her mother-daughter suspense not only with soul and passion and stomach-churning tension—but also a deep and important wisdom. Book clubs rejoice--this is the novel for you!” —Hank Phillippi Ryan, USA Today bestselling author"In The Long Way Back, Baart achieves the nearly impossible feat—writing that is tense and propulsive as well as poetically rendered. A beautiful story about the fraught relationships between parents and their children, the tension between growing up and learning the difficult truths about the dangers of independence, The Long Way Back will have you turning pages late into the night and holding your breath until the final, emotional scenes. I absolutely loved it." —Danielle Girard, USA Today bestselling author

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Book SynopsisLonglisted for the 2020 Center for Fiction First Novel Prize A “rich, ambitious debut novel” (The New York Times Book Review) that reveals the ways in which a Jamaican family forms and fractures over generations, in the tradition of Homegoing by Yaa Gyasi. *An Entertainment Weekly, Millions, and LitHub Most Anticipated Book of 2020 Pick and Buzz Magazine’s Top New Book of the New Decade*Stanford Solomon’s shocking, thirty-year-old secret is about to change the lives of everyone around him. Stanford has done something no one could ever imagine. He is a man who faked his own death and stole the identity of his best friend. Stanford Solomon is actually Abel Paisley. And now, nearing the end of his life, Stanford is about to meet his firstborn daughter, Irene Paisley, a home health aide who has unwittingly shown up for her first day of work to tend to the father she thought was dead. These Ghosts Are Family revolves around the consequences of Abel’s decision and tells the story of the Paisley family from colonial Jamaica to present-day Harlem. There is Vera, whose widowhood forced her into the role of a single mother. There are two daughters and a granddaughter who have never known they are related. And there are others, like the houseboy who loved Vera, whose lives might have taken different courses if not for Abel Paisley’s actions. This “rich and layered story” (Kirkus Reviews) explores the ways each character wrestles with their ghosts and struggles to forge independent identities outside of the family and their trauma. The result is a “beguiling…vividly drawn, and compelling” (BookPage, starred review) portrait of a family and individuals caught in the sweep of history, slavery, migration, and the more personal dramas of infidelity, lost love, and regret.

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Book Synopsis#1 New York Times bestselling author Richard Paul Evans returns this holiday season with a tale of love, belonging, and family, following a trail of letters that leads to a Christmas revelation about the healing miracle of hope and forgiveness. After nearly two decades, Noel Post, an editor for a major New York publishing house, returns to her childhood home in Salt Lake City to see her estranged, dying father. What she believed would be a brief visit turns into something more as she inherits the bookstore her father fought to keep alive. Reeling from loneliness, a recent divorce, and unanticipated upheavals in her world, Noel begins receiving letters from an anonymous source, each one containing thoughts and lessons about her life and her future. She begins to reacquaint herself with the bookstore and the people she left behind, and in doing so, starts to unravel the reality of her painful childhood and the truth about her family. As the holidays draw near, she receives a Christmastime revelation that changes not only how she sees the past but also how she views her future.

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Book SynopsisFrom the bestselling author of Mrs. Poe and Twain’s End comes a “poignant, beautifully rendered story of two sisters who find the courage to reclaim their bond after years of misunderstandings and heartbreak” (Melanie Benjamin, New York Times bestselling author) during the Great Depression. 1934. Ruth has been single-handedly raising four young daughters and running her family’s Indiana farm for eight long years, ever since her husband, John, was infected by the infamous “sleeping sickness” devastating families across the country. If only she could trade places with her older sister, June: blonde and beautiful, married to a wealthy doctor, living in a mansion in St. Paul. And June has a coveted job, too, as one of “the Bettys,” the perky recipe developers who populate the famous Betty Crocker test kitchen. But these gilded trappings hide sorrows: she has borne no children. And the man she loves more than anything belongs to Ruth. When the two sisters reluctantly reunite after a long estrangement, June’s bitterness about her sister’s betrayal sets into motion a confrontation that’s been years in the making. And their mother, Dorothy, who’s brought the two of them together, has her own dark secrets, which might blow up the fragile peace she hopes to restore between her daughters. An emotional journey of redemption, inner strength, and the ties that bind families together, for better or worse, The Sisters of Summit Avenue is a moving and heartfelt tribute to mothers, daughters, and sisters everywhere.

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Book Synopsis“The perfect summer read” (USA TODAY) begins with a shocking tragedy that results in three generations of the Adler family grappling with heartbreak, romance, and the weight of family secrets over the course of one summer. *A New York Times Book Review Editors’ Choice * One of USA TODAY’s “Best Books of 2020” * One of Good Morning America’s “25 Novels You''ll Want to Read This Summer” * One of Parade’s “26 Best Books to Read This Summer”Atlantic City, 1934. Every summer, Esther and Joseph Adler rent their house out to vacationers escaping to “America’s Playground” and move into the small apartment above their bakery. Despite the cramped quarters, this is the apartment where they raised their two daughters, Fannie and Florence, and it always feels like home. Now, Florence has returned from college, determined to spend the summer training to swim the English Channel, and Fannie, pregnant again after recently losing a baby, is on bedrest for the duration of her pregnancy. After Joseph insists they take in a mysterious young woman whom he recently helped emigrate from Nazi Germany, the apartment is bursting at the seams. Esther only wants to keep her daughters close and safe but some matters are beyond her control: there’s Fannie’s risky pregnancy—not to mention her always-scheming husband, Isaac—and the fact that the handsome heir of a hotel notorious for its anti-Semitic policies, seems to be in love with Florence. When tragedy strikes, Esther makes the shocking decision to hide the truth—at least until Fannie’s baby is born—and pulls the family into an elaborate web of secret-keeping and lies, bringing long-buried tensions to the surface that reveal how quickly the act of protecting those we love can turn into betrayal. “Readers of Emma Straub and Curtis Sittenfeld will devour this richly drawn debut family saga” (Library Journal) that’s based on a true story and is a breathtaking portrayal of how the human spirit can endure—and even thrive—after tragedy.

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Book SynopsisNATIONAL BESTSELLER Named a Best Book of 2021 by Newsweek, the San Francisco Chronicle, The Washington Post, and the Los Angeles Times “A glorious book—an assured novel that’s gorgeously told.” —The New York Times Book Review “An incredibly moving epic about an unforgettable family.” —CBS Sunday Morning “[An] absorbing novel…I felt both grateful to have known these people and bereft at the prospect of leaving them behind.” —The Washington Post A stunning novel about love, work, and marriage that asks how far one family and one community will go to protect their future.Colleen and Rich Gundersen are raising their young son, Chub, on the rugged California coast. It’s 1977, and life in this Pacific Northwest logging town isn’t what it used to be. For generations, the community has lived and breathed timber; now that way of life is threatened. Colleen is an amateur midwife. Rich is a tree-topper. It’s a dangerous job that requires him to scale trees hundreds of feet tall—a job that both his father and grandfather died doing. Colleen and Rich want a better life for their son—and they take steps to assure their future. Rich secretly spends their savings on a swath of ancient redwoods. But when Colleen, grieving the loss of a recent pregnancy and desperate to have a second child, challenges the logging company’s use of the herbicides she believes are responsible for the many miscarriages in the community, Colleen and Rich find themselves on opposite sides of a budding conflict. As tensions in the town rise, they threaten the very thing the Gundersens are trying to protect: their family. Told in prose as clear as a spring-fed creek, Damnation Spring is an intimate, compassionate portrait of a family whose bonds are tested and a community clinging to a vanishing way of life. An extraordinary story of the transcendent, enduring power of love—between husband and wife, mother and child, and longtime neighbors. An essential novel for our times.

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Book Synopsis*A whip-smart, funny, and searing look at the wild world of startups. —Good Morning America Book Club Buzz Pick *Named a Best Book of the Year by NPR In this “wise and wickedly funny novel about love, creativity, and the limitations of the tech-verse” (Vogue) newlyweds Asha and Cyrus find themselves running one of the most popular social media platforms in the world.Meet Asha Ray. Brilliant coder and possessor of a Pi tattoo, Asha is poised to make a scientific breakthrough when she is reunited with her high school crush, Cyrus Jones. Before she knows it, Asha has abandoned her lab, exchanged vows with Cyrus, and gone to work at an exclusive tech incubator called Utopia to develop an app called WAI—“We are Infinite.” WAI creates a sensation, with millions of users logging on every day. Will Cyrus and Asha’s marriage survive the pressures of sudden fame, or will she become overshadowed by the man everyone is calling the new messiah? This “scathing—and hilarious—take on startup culture, marriage and workaholism” (Politico) explores whether or not technology—with all its limits and possibilities—can disrupt modern love.

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Book SynopsisBecause every wife deserves a happy ending. Three best friends decide they’re finally done with their ex-husbands taking their work as wives and moms for granted. They’re ready to monetize the mental load, stick it to their exes, and have a wild ride in the process in this novel that is “fresh, funny, empowering, and totally satisfying” (Judy Blume).Lauren, mother of twins, wakes up one morning to her Wife Alarm Bells sounding. She sleuths on her husband’s phone and stumbles on a dirty secret that explodes her marriage. Madeline has it all—a penthouse apartment, a perfect daughter, and no-strings-attached romps with handsome men. But when she learns she might lose her child to her ex in England, it stirs up a decades-old personal tragedy. Sophie, with too much FOMO and never enough money, obsesses over her ex-husband’s Family 2.0—all while keeping her true desires hidden, even from herself. It starts as a joke during a tipsy night out, as Lauren, Madeline, and Sophie rail against everything wives do for free. Let’s build an app that monetizes the mental load. And maybe revenge on our exes in the process. Soon, the Wife App is born, and before long, it’s the fastest growing start-up in New York City. But then life intervenes. Love intervenes. Ex-husbands intervene. And the consequences are bigger than anything Lauren, Madeline, or Sophie could have expected. Carolyn Mackler marks her debut into adult fiction with a rollercoaster ride of revenge and redemption that is at once a send-up of modern marriage and a celebration of female friendship and love in all forms.Trade Review“Who wouldn't want a wife? I'm not talking about sex here. Carolyn Mackler's delightful new novel is sexy but it's not about sex. Think of all the other services wives perform without getting paid and you'll get some of what this Wife App is all about. The Wife App is fresh, funny, empowering, and totally satisfying.”—Judy Blume “ The Wife App is one of the most entertaining novels I’ve read in a while. I couldn’t put this book down, and you won’t be able to, either.”—Meg Cabot, author of The Princess Diaries and Little Bridge Island series “THE WIFE APP is quick-paced and gripping, and Mackler's writing is addictive. She makes us really like these three women, and we want them to succeed and get their justice. And while the novel is an enjoyable read, it's also a thoughtful one.”—BookReporter “Mackler's razor-sharp adult fiction debut imagines one answer to a persistent question: What if women got paid for all the "mental load" tasks that wives usually do for free?... Smart, wincingly funny, and occasionally sexy, Mackler's novel is a 21st-century ode to female empowerment and women pursuing what they really want.”—Shelf Awareness “The Wife App is a book lover’s updated Sex and the City. You will not be able to stop reading as you hook into the lives of three women dealing head-on with love, sex, money, marriage, divorce, business, motherhood and friendship. Carolyn Mackler’s first adult novel is an absolute triumph!”—Jessica Anya Blau, author of Mary Jane “Carolyn Mackler’s The Wife App is a provocative, funny novel that poses serious questions: why does so much work in a marriage still fall to wives, and why aren’t these labors paid? Much to discuss!”—Gabrielle Zevin, New York Times bestselling author of Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow “Three divorced mothers in Manhattan join forces to create an app ‘to right marital inequalities’ in this breezy look at gender imbalance…. Although Mackler’s protagonists are around 40 and would have been barely 20 at the turn of the 21st century, they could easily populate an updated Sex and the City.”--Kirkus "The character development of each of the protagonists, the nod to breaking down gender norms, and a satisfying ending all point to potential for Mackler among the beach-read set."--Booklist

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