A "gripping, beautiful, emotionally raw" collection of stories about the things that go wrong between men and women from a PEN Award winner.Arriving in the midst of the #MeToo era, these stories examine the fallout from failed relationships between men and women—partnerships that have crumbled under the weight of betrayal, misplaced hopes, illness, and particularly masculinity at its most toxic and misguided.A man in his mid-thirties receives a call from a ...

Hit the jackpot with stories from Michael Connelly, Laura Lippman, Walter Mosley, Alexander McCall Smith, and more superstars of mystery.In "One Dollar Jackpot," Michael Connelly's curmudgeonly Harry Bosch finds himself going toe-to-toe with a professional poker player. Jeffery Deaver offers up "Bump," a tale of a has-been actor trying to make it big by hustling cards. "Hardly Knew Her" by Laura Lippmann showcases a young woman learning about bluffing the hard way, ...

Short fiction about love in the face of mortal threats, in a prize-winning collection by the author of You Came Back.In this extraordinary collection of short fiction, characters wrestle with the moments in life that test us most deeply, in ways both dramatic and subtle. In "We're in Trouble," a woman is asked to end her dying husband's suffering. In "Abandon," a troubled young man must risk jail to do right by the only woman he has ever loved. And "In the...

A disturbing journey into the beauty that rests inside the very heart of darkness.From the Bram Stoker Award-winning Crystal Lake Publishing and the editing duo who brought you the critically acclaimed small-town Lovecraftian horror anthology Shadows Over Main Street, comes Gutted: Beautiful Horror Stories.Awe meets ache.Terror becomes transcendence.Regret gives way to rebirth.Fifteen short stories and one poem span nearly every twisted corner of the h...

Thirty-something midwesterner Mark Fife believes he has successfully moved past the accidental death of his young son Brendan, as well as his subsequent divorce from his college sweetheart Chloe. He's successful, he's in love again, and he believes he's mastered his own memories.But then he is contacted by a strange woman who tells him not only that she owns his old house, but that she believes it to be haunted by Brendan's ghost. Will Mark--who does not believe in ghosts--come to ...

Thirty-something midwesterner Mark Fife believes he has successfully moved past the accidental death of his young son Brendan, as well as his subsequent divorce from his college sweetheart Chloe. He's successful, he's in love again, and he believes he's mastered his own memories.But then he is contacted by a strange woman who tells him not only that she owns his old house, but that she believes it to be haunted by Brendan's ghost. Will Mark--who does not believe in ghosts--come to ...

Sing Them Home is a moving portrait of three siblings who have lived in the shadow of unresolved grief since their mother's disappearance when they were children. Everyone in Emlyn Springs, Nebraska, knows the story of Hope Jones, the physician's wife whose big dreams for their tiny town were lost along with her when she was swallowed up by the tornado of 1978. For Hope's three young children, the stability of life with their preoccupied father, and with Viney, their mother's spit...

Outside the back window Alice can see the outlines of the garden, some of the furrows visible under the snow, stretching away in long thin rows. She can’t imagine doing the garden without her dad. It’s his thing; she’s always thought of herself as his assistant at best. She can’t imagine doing anything without her dad and she starts to feel like she can’t breathe. And then she looks at him. Just looks at him as he watches the fire with muffin crumbs on his lap.“I’ll write to you...

After years of watching her best friends, Ben and Claire, try for a baby, Romily has offered to give them the one thing that they want most.Romily expects it will be easy to be a surrogate. She's already a single mother, and she has no desire for any more children. But Romily isn't prepared for the overwhelming feelings that have taken hold of her and which threaten to ruin her friendship with Ben and Claire - and even destroy their marriage.Now there are three friends, two m...

Award-winning broadcast journalist Naseem Rakha delivers a moving tale sure to elicit a deep emotional response from listeners. Irene and Nate embark on a new life in Oregon with their two children, Bliss and Shep. But shortly after their move the family is devastated when Shep is gunned down by an intruder in their home. Irene struggles through the aftermath, awaiting the murderer's execution-but as time passes, she draws closer to a desperate and surprising act.

""[Haigh is] an expertnatural storyteller with an acute sense of her characters' humanity."" —NewYork Times""We have the intriguing possibility that the nextgreat American author is already in print."" —Fort Worth Star-TelegramWhen Sheila McGann setsout to redeem her disgraced brother, a once-beloved Catholic priest in suburbanBoston, her quest will force her to confront cataclysmic truths about herfractured Irish-American family, her beliefs, and, ultimat...

For fans of Helen Fielding’s Bridget Jones’s Diary and Allison Pearson’s I Don’t Know How She Does It comes an irresistible novel of a woman losing herself . . . and finding herself again . . . in the middle of her life.Maybe it was those extra five pounds I’d gained. Maybe it was because I was about to turn the same age my mother was when I lost her. Maybe it was because after almost twenty years of marriage my husband and I seemed to be running ...