Contemporary Family Life

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.

Bold, brash, Irish--Brodie Monaghan's been breaking hearts ever since he arrived in Maine to rebuild the family business. Still, there's one woman he just can't wow. Grace Maddox claims she's now part owner of Monaghan Shipbuilders, and she has her own dreams for the weathered dockside buildings. Tiny Blueberry Cove has a way of welcoming strangers with wide open arms, but is the sleepy coastal village ready for the fireworks these two spark? DIY is so much better with two. . .

One day, sitting in traffic, Stella Sweeney attempts a good deed. The resulting car crash changes her life. But in this event is born the seed of something which will take Stella thousands of miles from her old life, turning an ordinary woman into a superstar, wrenching her whole family apart. For the first time real, honest-to-goodness happiness is just within her reach. But is Stella Sweeney, Dublin housewife, ready to grasp it?

His Second-Chance Family by RaeAnne Thayne: Julia Blair is hoping for a fresh start. So when she sees an apartment-for-rent sign on Brambleberry House, she can’t help but feel that it’s a good omen. Having spent summers as a teen in a cottage near the rambling Victorian home, Julia easily pictures herself and her two children starting over in the one place that’s always felt welcoming to her. Katie’s Redemption by Patricia Davids: After two years away, Katie Lantz returns to her Amish community nine months pregnant - and unmarried.

Anna Sullivan has spent the last 30 years traveling solo around the world as a nature photographer, and she's loved every minute of it. But suddenly, the nights seem long and lonely, and she looks forward to her trips away from Bluebird, Maine, and her sisters, Cee-cee and Steph, less and less. When a cruel twist of fate brings her back home, Anna reevaluates everything in her life. Can she find happiness in the town she's spent a lifetime running away from?

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.

Vivi Shager is living her dream. Raised with drive and ambition by a resolutely single mother, Vivi has a thriving law career, a gorgeous apartment in London, and a full calendar that keeps her busy at work and at play. Then on the day of her 27th birthday, an undiagnosed heart condition sends Vivi’s prospects for the future into a tailspin. After escaping her roots nearly a decade ago, she’s forced to return to her childhood home to be cared for by her devoted and enigmatic mother.

The born rancher who stole her heart, her ex-husband, the tough, tender father of her child. Tori Tyler can't let Will Tyler go to prison for a crime that was a simple accident. But she can't deny that her feelings for the man run much deeper than loyalty, and her desire for his strong, sure embrace has never died. Protecting him is second nature until an unexpected terror threatens to shatter them both - and Tori needs Will's fierce love more than ever before.

Nisha Kulkarni justifies every reason to be the favourite child of Pune's premier school - be it her academic brilliance, her exceptional facility with music, or simply her unassuming charm. With his daughter showing promising signs of a stellar success story, Vaibhav Kulkarni has made peace with own unrequited dreams of the past. But when the girl mysteriously starts losing mojo and spirals into despair and seclusion, Vaibhav faces the toughest test of his life as single father - to reclaim his child's trust and happiness.

The last thing Cleopatra Knight expects on her business trip to Tokyo is to fall into bed with her arrogant, irresistibly hot boss, Dante Damaso. It's a mistake - a steamy, mind-blowingly satisfying mistake. But a few nights of passion with the superwealthy bad boy prove to have long-term effects when Cleo's world is unexpectedly turned upside down.

A multiple RITA nominee, Karen White crafts engrossing stories that have found a special place in the hearts of fans nationwide. After The Rain stars freelance photographer Suzanne Paris. On her own since the age of 14, Suzanne has no intention of settling down in tiny Walton, Georgia. But to her surprise, Walton residents have a way of making even reluctant guests feel right at home. And the new connections she builds come in handy when a dark figure from her past returns, determined to ruin her life.

In it she reminds him of her love and makes one final request. An impossible request — I want you to marry again. She tells him he shouldn’t spend the years he has left grieving her. And to that end she’s chosen three women she asks him to consider. First on Hannah’s list is her cousin, Winter Adams, a trained chef who owns a café on Seattle’s Blossom Street. The second is Leanne Lancaster, Hannah’s oncology nurse. But the third name is one he’s not familiar with - Macy Roth.

Yeong-Hye und ihr Ehemann sind ganz gewöhnliche Leute. Er geht beflissen seinem Bürojob nach und hegt keinerlei Ambitionen. Sie ist eine zwar leidenschaftslose, aber pflichtbewusste Hausfrau. Die angenehme Eintönigkeit ihrer Ehe wird jäh gefährdet, als Yeong-Hye beschließt, sich fortan ausschließlich vegetarisch zu ernähren und alle tierischen Produkte aus dem Haushalt entfernt. "Ich hatte einen Traum," so ihre einzige Erklärung.

This hip contemporary romance combines Jane Austen-inspiration and foodie fiction in a witty and engaging tale of two sisters who are forced to uproot to unfamiliar Austin, Texas, after high rent and broken relationships force them away from their San Francisco life. In this Sense and Sensibility adaptation, Jane Woodward and her sister Celia run a small tea salon in San Francisco but are forced to relocate to Austin, Texas.

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.

When confronted by raging fires or deadly accidents, volunteer fireman Taylor McAden feels compelled to take terrifying risks to save lives. But there is one leap of faith Taylor can't bring himself to make: He can't fall in love...

In the Irish town of Schancarrig, the young people carve their initials - and those of their loves - into the copper beech tree in front of the schoolhouse. But not even Father Gunn, the parish priest, who knows most of what goes on behind Shancarrig's closed doors, or Dr. Jims, the village doctor, who knows all the rest, realizes that not everything in the placid village is what it seems.

There are two sides to every story. The surface reality that’s presented to the world. And then, there’s the other side. The real one. The one that matters. Seventeen-year-old self-proclaimed asshole Toby Page is alone. No friends. No family. He trades maintenance work in exchange for room and board. Every day, he fights demons no one else can see. Every day, he wants to give up. But he can’t. Not yet. When Alice Eliot moves in downstairs, she offers Toby some light in his dark world.

A beautiful, very moving, melancholic and elegiac novel set in the late 1960s in Melton, a small town in the West Country. The story revolves around a disparate group of people who come together there to establish an arts festival...This is the story of their intertwining relationships and how they come to love, and not to love each other in different ways and why - a perfect book to curl up and read by the fireside on an autumn afternoon and as satisfying a read as Brief Encounter is a film.

Maëva s'envole pour Los Angeles où elle a décroché un job de nounou le temps d'un été. Mais ce n'est pas l'attrait du voyage ou un hypothétique amour pour les enfants qui la motive. Non, Maëva tente un coup de poker qui risque bien de la détruire... ou de la sauver. Abandonnée par son père à l'âge de 11 ans au lendemain des obsèques de sa mère, elle n'a jamais renoncé à retrouver sa trace. Et cette photo accompagnant l'annonce lui révèle la cruelle vérité : son père a reconstruit une famille loin d'elle, mais surtout sans elle.