Contemporary Family Life Women Fiction

Molly has arrived home from Vassar to reveal that she has an important announcement to make. Her mother, Suzanne, is convinced that Molly’s news is history repeating herself and that she’s about to become a 36-year-old grandmother. Suzanne’s mother, Ava, develops a case of impending great-grandmother fever - that is, when she’s not spying on the new next-door neighbor, Buddy McKinley, who turns out to be a blast from her past.

Raised on her father's South Carolina plantation, Callie Parker wanted for nothing, and now she is about to marry wealthy local scion Wyn Archer. But her wedding wouldn't be complete without the three people she grew up with under the sheltering branches of the angel oaks at Parker Manor.

Being broke, unemployed, and stranded back in the tiny town of Pick, Texas, was not part of Jancy Wilson’s plan. Yet here she is, watching her car literally go up in smoke - along with her last-ditch hope of staying with her cousin in Louisiana. When Jancy spies a Help Wanted sign hanging in the window of the quaint Strawberry Hearts Diner, the memories of the two years she spent there as a teenager - and the lure of the diner’s beloved strawberry tarts - are enough to draw her in and plant her feet...but only temporarily.

Single mom Kiera Malone struggled for years to raise her three children in a small town on the coast of Ireland. Just when she's let down her guard and allowed herself to love again, her fiancé suffers a fatal heart attack. Overwhelmed by her loss, she's persuaded to visit her father, Dillon O'Malley, and her daughter, Moira O'Brien, in Chesapeake Shores. With the promise of family ties and a job at her son-in-law's Irish pub, she takes what seems like the biggest risk of her life. As it turns out, crossing the ocean is nothing compared to moving right next door to Bryan Laramie.

In London, the snow is falling and Christmas is just around the corner - but Allegra Fisher barely has time to notice. She's pitching for the biggest deal of her career and can't afford to fail. And when she meets attractive stranger Sam Kemp on the plane to the meeting, she can't afford to lose her focus either. She learned to shut off her emotions long ago and only her sister and best friend Isobel knows why. But when Allegra finds herself up against Sam for the bid, their passion quickly turns sour.

As the snowstorm of the century rages toward Newfoundland, twenty-one-year-old Xavier is beaten and stabbed in a vicious attack. His mother, Jules, must fight her way through the shuttered streets of St John’s to reach the hospital where Xavier lies unconscious. When a video of the attack surfaces, Jules struggles to make sense of what she sees in the footage—and of what she can’t quite make out. While Xavier’s story unfolds, so, too, do the stories that brought him there.

Josh Coleman left SunStar, the thoroughbred horse farm he'd built from nothing, unfinished when he took to his deathbed. But his family's unfinished business cannot be ignored now that his long-lost daughter has come back to settle an old score. No longer resembling the teenage waif who slipped away in the middle of the night with her illegitimate child 30 years ago, Nealy is rich, sophisticated, and renowned in the racing world-a woman to be reckoned with - and her shocking return changes everything.

Not all broken things are ruined. Then: Ellison Brooks - PTA President, real estate agent extraordinaire, and head bitch in charge with endless friends and parties to attend. Now: Ellison Brooks - divorced, single mother of two, financially reliant on her awful ex-husband, and utterly lacking self-confidence. One month after her divorce is final, Ellison’s ex-husband marries the woman he left her for, sending Ellison spiraling into despair. Her friends have abandoned her, her job is in the tank, and she’s lonely for human connection. But then Ellison meets Luke....

Elsie Lavender and Homer Hickam (the father of the author) were high school classmates in the West Virginia coalfields, graduating just as the Great Depression began. When Homer asked for her hand, Elsie instead headed to Orlando, where she sparked with a dancing actor named Buddy Ebsen (yes, that Buddy Ebsen). But when Buddy headed for New York, Elsie's dreams of a life with him were crushed, and eventually she found herself back in the coalfields, married to Homer.

From her silver Mercedes to her designer kitchen, Molly's life is gleaming and beautiful - at least on the surface. Married to Tanner, a top cosmetic dentist, she has a wonderful daughter finishing high school and twin stepsons from Tanner's first marriage. No one in her exclusive neighborhood in Goldenhills, Massachusetts, knows what living with the demanding Tanner is really like. They know even less about the life she left behind in Florida almost two decades ago.

Kitchens of the Great Midwest is about a young woman with a once-in-a-generation palate who becomes the iconic chef behind the country's most coveted dinner reservation. When Lars Thorvald's wife, Cynthia, falls in love with wine - and a dashing sommelier - he's left to raise their baby, Eva, on his own. He's determined to pass on his love of food to his daughter - starting with puréed pork shoulder. As Eva grows, she finds her solace and salvation in the flavors of her native Minnesota.

Life was good for Liz and Jack Sutherland. In eighteen years of marriage, they had built a family, a successful law practice, and a warm, happy home near San Francisco, in a house on Hope Street. Then, in an instant, it all fell apart. It began like any other Christmas morning, with joy and children's laughter. But for Jack Sutherland, a five-minute errand ends in tragedy. And suddenly, Liz is alone, facing painful questions in the wake of an unbearable loss.

The PS, I Love You Club. These are the six words written on a card handed to Holly Kennedy. They’re words that are engraved on her heart - because PS, I Love You is how her husband, Gerry, signed his last letters to her, letters that mark a year she will never forget. Now, the mysterious club wants something from her. And if Holly can find the courage meet them, she’ll learn what it really means to live life to the full. Because every love story has one last thing to say....

The obituaries for Gerald Candless were respectful. He had been, after all, an admired and popular writer, and his sudden death at his home in Devon was a loss to literature as well as to his family and friends. The trouble was, as his daughter Sarah soon discovered, that it seemed that her father had taken on a different identity that he wasn't Gerald Candless at all. But if he wasn't Gerald Candless, who was he?

Keith bears scars - both physical and emotional - from his childhood, but he's worked hard to overcome the past. After walking away from his mother and her controlling ways five years ago, he's built a new life in LA. He's also accumulated a fortune of his own. But as soon as he learns of his mother's death, he returns to Fairham. He feels he owes it to his grandfather to put the family empire together again, and he's determined to find his mother's killer.

Ever since Ruby was tiny, she has been unique. Her smiles are magically rare, and she likes things done in a very particular way - her blocks are always color-coded, and her toy animals stand in regimented lines. She’s also the daughter of Sara’s dreams - even on days when being a mother to a three-year-old is exhausting. Not everyone understands Ruby like Sara does though. Not Sara’s husband Mike, and certainly not her disapproving mother-in-law, Barbara. So when circumstances force their family to move in with Barbara, Sara knows it’s going to make motherhood even harder.

Mary Alice Monroe, New York Times best-selling author of the Lowcountry Summer series, returns to her beloved Beach House series with the highly anticipated follow-up to Beach House Memories and The Beach House!

Dr. Trisha Raje is San Francisco’s most acclaimed neurosurgeon. But that’s not enough for the Rajes, her influential immigrant family who’s achieved power by making its own nonnegotiable rules: Never trust an outsider, never do anything to jeopardize your brother’s political aspirations, and never, ever, defy your family. Trisha is guilty of breaking all three rules. But now, she has a chance to redeem herself. So long as she doesn’t repeat old mistakes.

In the five years since Julia last visited her aunt and uncle’s home in Malibu, her life has been turned upside down by her daughter’s death. She expects to find nothing more than peace and solitude as she house-sits with only her dog, Bonnie, for company. But she finds herself drawn to the handsome man who oversees the lemon orchard. Roberto expertly tends the trees, using the money to support his extended Mexican family. What connection could these two people share? The answer comes as Roberto reveals the heartbreaking story of his own loss – a pain Julia knows all too well, but for one striking difference: Roberto’s daughter was lost but never found. And despite the odds he cannot bear to give up hope.

Waitress and single mom Jessica “Jessie” Mann is practical to a fault. Even if she had time to date, which she doesn’t, she’d be determined to provide her son with a more secure upbringing than the one she had - and that would mean a husband with big bucks. When Jack Morrison - a sexy-as-sin, seemingly broke customer with a cowboy hat and a seductive grin - tries to flirt with her, she shoots him down.