Family First Life

Three generations. One summer that will change everything. Jenna has returned to the sunny shores of Lake Summers, tucked under the Adirondack Mountains in upstate New York, with her daughter Sophie to care for her aging mother, Sweet. Recently divorced, Jenna finds comfort in lazy afternoons along the water and long nights watching Sweet tell Sophie stories about her long-lost loves. When she meets Sweet’s new next-door neighbor, Troy, she recognizes him instantly as the boy with whom she shared her first kiss.

Beta sits beside her mother after she died. Beta is 13. Her mother stares off into space, wondering what to say. She goes to live at a foster home. When her mother first dies, Beta hears words of wisdom from her mother. After all the firsts, Beta no longer hears words of wisdom from her mother.

When 16-year-old Kyra Agnew wakes up behind a Dumpster at the Gas 'n' Sip, she has no memory of how she got there. With a terrible headache and a major case of déjà vu, she heads home only to discover that five years have passed…yet she hasn't aged a day. Everything else about Kyra's old life is different. Her parents are divorced, her boyfriend, Austin, is in college and dating her best friend, and her dad has changed from an uptight neat-freak to a drunken conspiracy theorist who blames her five-year disappearance on little green men.

Celebrate the greatest love story of all time—the one you share with your baby! Drawing clever parallels to the very best romance storylines, Baby’s First Love Story is a charming, vibrant, and endearingly tender celebration of the bond between baby and parent and caregiver. From the moment they arrive in this world and into your arms, they bring out our most loving, healthy selves.

Is it more dangerous to forget...or to remember? Phoebe's life has fallen apart and there's only one place left to go. Alone and adrift after a failed marriage proposal, she flees Sydney to her family's abandoned holiday cottage. On the slow-moving river Phoebe is confronted with the legacy of her older sister's suicide, a year before. Why did Karin leave a note written in flowers and walk into the water?

Family relationships can be complicated, even during the best of times. And under the worst, amid loss, as family dynamics change, those relationships also change. Old relationships can be comfortable to fall back into, or they can feel oppressive and claustrophobic. Childhood memories revisited from an adult perspective offer different, and often humorous, glimpses into the past, and can help form new relationships with a deeper understanding.

From the author of The Rope Walk, the story of a woman's life in its twilight, as she looks back on both a harrowing childhood and the unaccountable love and happiness that emerged from it. As the novel opens we see the Derry School in all its glorious New England fall colors and witness the loosening of the aging Peter's grasp - he will soon have to retire, and Ruth is wondering what they will do in their old age, separated from the school into which they have poured everything, including their savings.

Was it a remarkable stroke of fate, or destiny which brought John Jacobson and his son together? His son was brought up in a household of hate and mistrust. He left home at an early age to try and seek out some sort of happiness in New York City. During this time, his real father, a truck driver, was unaware of his son's existence. What forces were in play to give his son the idea of leaving New York and heading to Florida? This story is an example of human stamina, integrity, and love beyond our understanding.

This is a book written for new parents as a sort of tutorial for this stage in their lives. For anyone going through the stress of being a new parent, I want them to find this book and feel as safe as possible. The book covers mainly infancy all the way to the graduation of toddlerhood.

Crushed by guilt over the car accident that killed her father and sister, and torn apart by her mother’s resentment, Darcy Goodridge fled her family estate eight years ago and hasn’t looked back. Now an unexpected phone call threatens to upend what little serenity she’s found. Her nephew, Emerson, who was just a baby when his mother died, has gone missing. Darcy must return home and face her past in order to save him.

After 60 years of marriage and five daughters, Lynn "Lovey" White knows that all of us, from time to time, need to use our little white lies. Her granddaughter Annabelle, on the other hand, is as truthful as they come. She always does the right thing - that is until she dumps her hedge fund manager fiance and marries a musician she has known for three days. After all, her grandparents fell in love at first sight....

Amelia Albright dreams about going to Florida for spring break like everyone else in her class, but her father - a cranky and stubborn English professor - has decided Florida is too much adventure. Now, Amelia is stuck at home. The week ahead promises to be boring, until Amelia meets Casey at her neighborhood art studio. Amelia has never been friends with a boy before, and the experience is both fraught and thrilling. When Casey claims to see the spirit of Amelia’s mother (who died 10 years before), the pair embarks on an altogether different journey in their attempt to find her.

When the twins start a summer basketball league at their local park, they notice the once rundown court is getting freshened up with each passing day. First new nets, then the benches have been completely restored. But who's behind it? Zach and Zoe are on the case!

Otis, Willie, and Hibernia are three children with a lot in common: they've all lost a loved one, they each have secret dreams, and they won't stop fighting for what they want. And they're also a lot like their hero, famed boxer Joe Louis. Throughout this moving novel, their lives gradually converge to form friendship, family, and love. Their trials and triumphs echo those of Joe Louis, as he fights to become the first African-American heavyweight boxing champion.

My mother named me Gabriella, after my grandmother who, coincidentally, didn't want to meet me when I was born because my mother was unmarried, and therefore living in sin. My mom has told me the story many, many, many, times of how, when she confessed to my grandmother that she was pregnant with me, her mother beat her. BEAT HER! She was 25. That story is the basis of my sexual education and has reiterated why it's important to wait until you're married to give it up.

Victor Spoil realizes he's not cut out for life as a supervillain and instead decides to be...a librarian. Little does he know that librarians are a kick-butt secret society who will stop at nothing to control - and shush - the world!

Sal has been looking forward to first grade for a long time. But her excitement quickly turns to disappointment when she learns that her best friend, Griff, is in the other first-grade classroom and has the most popular teacher. Then Sal’s name is spelled wrong on her name tag, she trips in front of the cool fifth graders, and her self-portrait doesn’t turn out the way she wanted it to. In fact, everything about school is an absolute disaster. Poor Sal!

The 10th collaboration between Jamie Lee Curtis and Laura Cornell celebrates the everyday bravery of trying new things for the very first time. While our spunky heroine, Frankie, learns to ride a bike, tie her shoes, make new friends, love her first dog, borrow a book from the library, say when she's wrong, try yucky food, and work with her dad, she also learns that trying new things is how she grows - and that being brave enough to do so is what growing up is all about.

Friends First is a testament to the power of faith and to the resilience of the human spirit. As a teenager, Fiona is rescued from an alcoholic, abusive father by her boyfriend, Cliff. His family, who take Fiona in, convince her that she is in no way to blame for her father's drinking and his physical and verbal abuse. Feeling unsure and lacking confidence, Fiona clings to Cliff whom she sees as her savior until they eventually marry. Her marriage to Cliff would seem liked a "happily ever after" ending. But, once again, life events intervene.

A young girl's wish is granted when a new sister arrives. While the baby can't do much, over time the big and little siblings become inseparable, playing and dancing, imagining and laughing. By each other's sides, they are smarter, kinder, and braver than they ever thought they could be. And they are forever sisters first.