Contemporary Family Life Women Fiction

With her mother dying and her marriage falling apart, Euly Winger returns to her birth place in order to uncover a dark secret about her parent's divorce. Something that has haunted their family since Euly was a young adult. But when Euly meets up with an old acquaintance, her time back home turns nightmarish when he angrily reveals everything he knows about her parents.

Matthew was my biggest regret. For years he was my best friend, but I never told him how I really felt. That I loved him. When all the words should have been said, I said nothing at all. For fifteen years I kept him in my dreams, letting my life coast along and pass me by. Until he came back. But Matthew wasn't the man I remembered. Cold and aloof, his hatred of me burned little holes into my heart. We had just fifteen days to reconnect. Probably too short a time to bridge the gap to the past. Could we get back to who we used to be, when we were young?

After coming together following their father's stroke, the Wingate women have found second-chance romance, faced trials and tribulations, and built wonderful lives on Amelia Island. Their father is fully recovered and healthy, their businesses are flourishing, and the whole family is bursting with love and laughter.

When Frank Woods at number 79 Primrose Square comes home to a surprise birthday party thrown by his wife and adoring children, it is his guests who get the real surprise. Finding himself alone, he befriends the cantankerous Miss Hardcastle, who hasn't left her home for decades, and Emily Dunne - fresh out of rehab and desperate to make amends. As gossip spreads through Primrose Square, every relationship is tested, and nothing in this close-knit community will ever be the same again....

The fascinating, and largely autobiographical, sequel to J. G. Ballard’s prize-winning Empire of the Sun, that follows Jim to post-war England. The Kindness of Women continues the story of the boy whose life in Japanese-occupied Shaghai was described so memorably in Empire of the Sun, it sets those traumatic events within the context of a lifetime as we follow the narrator, Jim, to England and suburban Shepperton after the war.

Abby Rhodes is just starting to get her life on track. After her fiance's unexpected death, she returned with her young son to the small village where she grew up and threw herself into helping her ailing grandmother run the town's beach cafe. Then one evening, her mother, Laura, shows up in Hartley-by-the-Sea and announces her plan to stay. After twenty years away, she now wants to focus on the future-and has no intention, it seems, of revisiting the painful past.

Weeks away from the birth of her first child, Georgie should be enjoying the peace of her new life in the country, but boredom has settled in and nerves are running high. A viral news story about the rescue of a missing child warms her heart until she sees the photo: the woman who found the child is her own mother, Nancy, who disappeared twenty years ago. How could Nancy have abandoned her own children? Georgie needs to know before becoming a mother herself, even if it means calling on her estranged brother Dan for support.

Aurora York had it all together: loving parents, a steady relationship, and a promising career. But after she loses both parents unexpectedly, she can’t seem to stay on track any longer. Lonely and lost after a public meltdown that threatens her professional credibility, she’s shocked when DNA test results show a blood relative in Sicily. When her cousin reaches out online and begs her to come to Italy to meet everyone in person, Aurora makes the leap. Aurora arrives in Sicily for a month, and there she meets a colorful, dynamic family steeped in tradition.

Evie's book club friends are the people in the world she relies on most. When one of the newer members finds herself confronted with her past, the rest of the club will do what they can to help, endangering the existence of the bookshop without realizing it. When Charmaine's past comes calling, she reverts to her old way of living—running and hiding. She's not used to having friends. But on Coral Island, everyone is a friend. And this time, Charmaine will find that being part of a close-knit community is the one thing that will save her.

As she cleans up the cottage her mother left behind, Clara Hannigan discovers a locked hope chest. Inside is a book that might have the answers to her questions...if she can connect the dots between her mom and a prominent local. Complicating matters is one of Clara's students: a mean girl who has a bone to pick with the Hannigans.

Sloane’s world crumbles after receiving the news that her military husband is missing in action. She can barely climb out of bed, much less summon the strength to be the parent her children deserve. Her mother, Ansley, provides a much-needed respite as she puts her personal life on hold to help Sloane and her grandchildren wade through their new grief-stricken lives. But between caring for her own aging mother, her daughters, and her grandchildren, Ansley's private worry is that secrets from her past will come to light.

When they were growing up, Dana, Harper, and Tawny thought of themselves as “sometimes sisters". They connected only during the summer month they’d all spend at their grandmother’s rustic lakeside resort in north Texas. But secrets started building, and ten years have passed since they’ve all been together - in fact, they’ve rarely spoken, and it broke their grandmother’s heart.

Nathalie's plan: to announce her pregnancy now that she's finally made it past 12 weeks! But just as she's about to deliver (so to speak) the big news to her family, her scene-stealing sister barfs all over the Thanksgiving centerpiece. Yup, Lyndi's pregnant too, swiping the spotlight once more.... Lyndi's plan: finally get her life together! She's got a new apartment, new promotion, new boyfriend. What she didn't count on - a new baby! She can barely afford her rent, much less a state-of-the-art stroller....

When their paths first cross, Ben Livingston is a fledgling screenwriter on the brink of success; Tatum Connelly is a struggling actress tending bar in a New York City dive. They fall in love, they marry, they become parents, and they think only of the future. But as the years go by, Tatum's stardom rises while Ben's fades. In a marriage that bears the fallout of ambition and fame, Ben and Tatum are at a crossroads. Now all they can do is think back....

Cynical divorce attorney Lori Cumberland lives by one motto: Love is grand, but divorce is a hundred grand. With one failed marriage under her own personal belt, Lori had fallen hard and early - and it isn’t something she plans on repeating. She’s content focusing on the temporary marriages of her rich and famous clients. When she joins some of her recent divorcées on a celebratory cruise, her only vow is fun, sun, and new friends. But Lori finds herself tempted by a jury of one.

For ten years Emily Dobbs and Marcie Carter have been the closest of friends. They've raised their kids together, shared joy and heartache, exchanged neighborhood gossip over tea. But when Marcie's son, now a college freshman sports star, is arrested for date rape, the bond between the families could be shattered forever. As the Carters try to deal with the unthinkable, Emily discovers her daughter has been hiding a terrible secret...a secret that threatens the futures of both families.

Erica Ryan is flying home from London after a disastrous business trip. Free spirit Abby Hayes is flying into New York City to visit her mother before jetting off again. Both end up in Gander, Canada, when their flight is diverted because of 9/11. For ninety-six hours they share a rollercoaster of emotions and find themselves drawn to one another. Will their nascent connection survive everyday life when they return home?

Laid off, cheated on, mugged: what else can go wrong in Maeve Stephens’ life? So when she learns her birth mother has left her a house, a vintage VW Beetle, and a marauding cat in the small town of Timber Creek, Washington, she packs up to discover the truth about her past. She arrives to the sight of a cheerful bulldog abandoned on her front porch, a reclusive but tempting author living next door, and a set of ready-made friends at the St. Francis Society for Wayward Pets, where women knit colorful sweaters for the dogs and cats in their care.

A woman with a legendary green thumb, a man living in an emotional desert, and a small boy unable to connect with others. Can the three of them, with a little help from the charmed town of Dove Pond (and a pesky ghost), turn a nightmare into a fairytale and forge their own happily ever after?

Four people in a small Vermont village are about to have their lives inexorably intertwined by the uncertainties of love . . . and the apparent absolutes of gender. All four characters—Allison, Dana, Carly, and Will—narrate this compelling story, spinning a tale that will keep you turning the pages with the eagerness we usually reserve for thrillers, while nodding in wonder at such a deeply moving and profoundly honest portrayal of longing, love, and desire.