On a scorching August day in 1963, seven-year-old Annie Banks meets the girl who will become her best friend. Skinny, outspoken Starr Dukes and her wandering preacher father may not be accepted by polite society in Jackson, Mississippi, but Annie and Starr are too busy sharing secrets and playing elaborate games of Queen for a Day to care. Then, as suddenly as she appeared in Annie's life, Starr disappears.Annie grows up to follow the path ordained for pretty, well-to-do Jackson wo...

**From the “wholly original” author of The Right Thing comes this heartfelt story of a young woman’s yearning for a better life in the heart of Louisiana (**Bret Lott, New York Times–bestselling author)Eighteen-year-old Lireinne Hooten has always been on the lowest rung of the ladder. Abandoned by her mother, Lireinne lives with her stepfather in an old trailer and spends her days working at the world’s largest alligator farm.Shy and overw...

Late one August evening, Amy Conner was awoken from her sleep and given the most devastating news she had ever received. Her husband, Curt, had died (at the painfully young age of thirty-two) in an accident while hunting. She and her two young children, ages four and two at the time, were sent reeling into grief. With the unending support from her friends and family, Amy was eventually able to find herself in a place of healing and hope. She has written this book for her children to remind...

On a scorching August day in 1963, seven-year-old Annie Banks meets the girl who will become her best friend. Skinny, outspoken Starr Dukes and her wandering preacher father may not be accepted by polite society in Jackson, Mississippi, but Annie and Starr are too busy sharing secrets and playing elaborate games of Queen for a Day to care. Then, as suddenly as she appeared in Annie's life, Starr disappears. Annie grows up to follow the path ordained for pretty, well-to-do Jackson women--ma...

Set in the heart of Louisiana, Amy Conner's spellbinding new novel tells of a young woman yearning for a better existence-and of the secret longings that will change the lives of all those around her. Eighteen-year-old Lireinne Hooten has always been on the lowest rung of the ladder. Abandoned by her mother, Lireinne lives with her stepfather in an old trailer on Million Dollar Road. Every day she walks the long mile, through a canopy of live oaks, to her job at the world's largest alligat...

Grenadine Scotch Wild has only vague memories of the parents she last saw when she was six years old. But she's never forgotten their final, panicked words to her, urging Grenadine to run. The mystery of their disappearance is just one more frayed strand in a life that has lately begun to unravel completely. One year into her rocky marriage to Covey, a well known investor, he is arrested for fraud and embezzlement. And Grenadine, now a successful collage artist and painter, is facing jail ...

The inspiration for the Hallmark Hall of Fame film Christmas Everlasting, “a feel-good goldmine” from the New York Times bestselling author (USA Today).Years of long workdays and little sleep as a political campaigner are about to pay off now that Lucy Toomey’s boss is entering the White House. But when her estranged older sister, Alice, unexpectedly dies, Lucy is drawn back to Nilson’s Bay, her small, close-knit Wisconsin hometown.

Against a backdrop of peach orchards and languid summer afternoons, Dori Sanders spins a wise, sweet tale of crossing racial barriers in the South Carolina countryside. It was unthinkable that Gaten Hill, a successful black man, would marry Sara Kate, an uppercrust white woman. It was unbelievable that hours after his wedding, he would be killed in a devastating accident. Left to grieve together, Gaten's 10-year-old daughter, Clover, and her white stepmother forge a warm friendship which g...

New York Times bestselling author Charles Martin's breathtaking novel of love and redemption.Charlie Finn had to grow up fast, living alone by age sixteen. Highly intelligent, he earned a life-changing scholarship to Harvard, where he learned how to survive and thrive on the outskirts of privileged society. That skill served him well in the cutthroat business world, as it does in more lucrative but dangerous ventures he now operates off the coast of Miami....

Lauren Francis-Sharma's 'Til the Well Runs Dry opens in a seaside village in the north of Trinidad where young Marcia Garcia, a gifted and smart-mouthed 16-year-old seamstress, lives alone, raising two small boys and guarding a family secret. When she meets Farouk Karam, an ambitious young policeman, the risks and rewards in Marcia's life amplify forever.On an island rich with laughter, Calypso, Carnival, cricket, beaches and salty air, sweet fruits and spicy stews, the no...

It’s 1956, and working-mother Ava Lark and her son, Lewis, have rented a house in a less-than-welcoming Boston suburb. There, Lewis finds he is only able to befriend the other fatherless kids on the block, Jimmy and Rose. But when Jimmy goes missing, neighborhood paranoia ramps to new heights, further ostracizing Ava and Lewis.Lewis never recovers from the loss of his childhood friend. In his twenties, he is a failure in love, living without direction, estranged from his mother. Wh...

This novel by the author of Our New Normal “will evoke both tears and laughter while leaving readers contemplating the unbreakable bonds of friendship” (Booklist).Since the age of twelve, McKenzie Arnold has spent every summer at Albany Beach, Delaware, with her best friends Aurora, Janine, and Lilly. The seaside house teems with thirty years of memories—some wonderful, others painful—and secrets never divulged beyond its walls. This summer may be...