Contemporary Family Life Women Fiction

Some kids inherit a family business; Jo Ward inherited a badge. Once voted Most Likely to End Up in Jail, the town wild child has become sheriff - hell-bent on uncovering the truth about her father’s mysterious death. Life is quiet in rustic River Bend, but Jo longs for something beyond her small hometown and the painful memories it holds. All that keeps her sane is the support of her best friends, Melanie and Zoe.

As far as former NFL star Jake Masters is concerned, dreams are risky propositions. Years ago he came achingly close to achieving his ambition of playing in the Super Bowl - before a spinal injury ended his career. Confined to a wheelchair, unwilling to take a chance on another risky surgery that could restore his mobility, Jake now stays cocooned behind the imposing gates of his lavish home.

Daisy had gone to the Wyoming wilderness in search of inspiration for her art. She found rancher James Tucker, a man with the wilderness inside him. Their life together was close to paradise - until their three-year-old son Jake disappeared and was never found. Her marriage in tatters, Daisy returned home to Connecticut, taking with her from Wyoming two things: her daughter, Jake's twin, and her livelihood, the jewelry she etches with symbols of Indian legend.

A delicious, sharp novel about a woman who jets off to France after her perfect marriage collapses, putting the broken pieces of herself back together while rediscovering her own joie de vivre - a lust for life, art, and steamy sex.

After a devastating fire pitted their families against each other, high school sweethearts Phoebe Ritter and Aidan Payne were torn apart. Twenty years later, Aidan is called back to Blessings, nervous about confronting his painful past. And that's before he knows about the 19-year-old secret Phoebe has been harboring all this time. As Aidan tries to make up for lost time with the family he didn't know he had, Phoebe and Aidan rediscover long-suppressed feelings. But the past won't lie buried, and old enemies threaten to destroy the peace they've fought so hard to find.

Everyone is talking about Jennie Sue Baker and the mess she made of her life in New York. The former high school queen bee - and wealthy darling of Bloom, Texas - has returned home after all these years, riding on a common bus and bearing two bounced alimony checks. In a town that thrives on gossip, Jennie’s fall from grace has shamed her mother, set the town buzzing, and caused old, jealous enemies to whisper in delight. They say she’s taken a job as a housekeeper, gotten a garage apartment, and might be crushing on Rick Lawson, a simple farmer with modest dreams.

A rainy-day ritual - a tea party between three little girls - becomes the framework of not only their friendship, but their lives. Blonde, curly-haired Zoe Alexander is openhearted, kind, and free-spirited, but struggles with body image. Emily Waters is shy, diminutive, and would prefer to live vicariously through books. And Shannon Morell - tall, athletic, strong - has a deep sense of loyalty, but will always fear abandonment. As years pass, they forge careers, have their hearts broken, marry, and have children, but the one constant that remains is each other and their tea parties.

With Nealy, horses come first. So when her two grown children's irresponsible acts nearly cost her Shufly, she throws them both off Blue Diamond Farm, choosing to work alone rather than give them another chance to risk her dream of training the promising foal into a Triple Crown winner. But while the estrangement from her children doesn't seem to affect her work, inside she's shattered.

Following the sudden death of his wife, Nathan Bell spent nearly two years burying himself in work and neglecting his biggest responsibility: his daughter. Overcome with guilt, he wants to connect with little Marley, but he doesn't know how to do it alone. And then Jenna Savage throws him a lifeline. A single mom of twins, Jenna is more than capable of taking care of Nathan's adorable two-year-old and wants to help Nathan however she can. As the days go by and her attraction to Nathan grows, she can't help wondering what might happen if they became a family for real.

When Lillo Gray pulls up to Kennebunkport’s most exclusive hotel wearing a borrowed dress and driving a borrowed VW van, she knows she’s made a big mistake. She’s not even sure why Jessica Parker invited her to her posh wedding. They haven’t seen each other since they were unhappy 14-year-old girls at fat camp. And now they’re from two completely different worlds.

As a child, Skylar Mackenzie’s imagination always got her in trouble. Now it’s making her a fortune. She owns Imagine That, a toy and bookstore and creativity center in a small Rhode Island beach town where children, and adults, can use their imagination free from judgment. Skye is about to embark on her biggest venture yet, a weekend retreat of family exploration. But it begins to unravel when she finds her estranged half sister, Amy, on the doorstep. And Amy’s not alone. She’s brought Skye’s first love, Connor Reid - the boy who broke her heart.

Her life is missing the love… When Katelyn “Katie” Morrison attends her brother’s wedding, the glamorous hotel heiress wonders if she’ll ever find “the one”... especially when she sees her sexy-as-sin ex, Dean Prescott. While attending his best friend’s wedding, Dean can’t stop staring at Katie’s sinful curves. He swore he’d never repeat the mistake of falling for her. Learning that Katie has a newborn, Dean knows there’s more going on than Katie admits.

After three marriages and a lot of living, resilient Billie Slate knows exactly what trouble love can bring. Now she’s reinvented herself as the Heartbreak Bunny, an on-call performance artist who can heal anyone who’s been burned by that four-letter word, LOVE, by hopping about and whisking away sad mementos from their past relationships. Call it magic. Call it peculiar. But her bunny costume is as perfect as her breakup mantra: SNAP OUT OF IT.

In the small town of Celeste, Texas, Mitzi Taylor has never quite fit inside the lines. Nearly six feet tall, flame-haired, and with a plus-size spirit to match every curve, she’s found her niche: a custom wedding-dress boutique catering to big brides-to-be with big dreams. Taking the plunge alongside her two best friends, she’s proud they’ve turned The Perfect Dress into a perfect success. Just when Mitzi has it all pulled together, Graham Harrison walks back into her life, looking for bridesmaid dresses for his twin daughters.

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.

After hitting her head, Lucy Sparks awakens in the hospital to a shocking revelation: the man she’s known and loved for years - the man she recently married - is not actually her husband. In fact, they haven’t even spoken since their breakup four years earlier. The happily-ever-after she remembers in vivid detail - right down to the dress she wore to their wedding - is only one example of what her doctors call a false memory: recollections Lucy’s mind made up to fill in the blanks from the coma.

Michelle Turner thought she lost everything at 17. Her father, a Hollywood legend, had finally summoned her to his Montana ranch. But when he learned of her affair with Sam McPhee, a hired hand, he had Sam fired and destroyed his family. Michelle, pregnant and alone, fled to Seattle. Now a successful advertising exec, Michelle is safe-safe from love, safe from hurt. But her son is lost to her, a troubled teen on the verge of self-destruction, a boy who blames her for the absence of his father and grandfather.

Grace sees her boyfriend, Henry, everywhere. In the supermarket, on the street, at the graveyard. Only Henry is dead. He died two months earlier, leaving a huge hole in Grace's life and in her heart. But then, Henry turns up to fix the boiler one evening, and Grace can't decide if she's hallucinating or has suddenly developed psychic powers. Grace isn't going mad - the man in front of her is not Henry at all, but someone else who looks uncannily like him.

Ira Levinson is in trouble. At 91 years old, in poor health, and alone in the world, he finds himself stranded on an isolated embankment after a car crash. Suffering multiple injuries, he struggles to retain consciousness until a blurry image materializes and comes into focus beside him: His beloved wife, Ruth, who passed away nine years ago. Urging him to hang on, she forces him to remain alert by recounting the stories of their lifetime together - how they met, the precious paintings they collected together, the dark days of WWII and its effect on them and their families.

Sophie Chesterton is London's "It Girl". She knows all the right people, goes to all the right parties, and wears all the right clothes...and her rich parents pay for everything. But deep down she suspects that her best "friends" - and her posh lifestyle - are nothing but shallow fakes. Then one evening Sophie's life takes a shocking, drastic turn, and her father decides it's high time for the party girl to make her own way in the world.