Genre Literature

In 1869, Gloriana Womack's family is much smaller since smallpox killed her mother and two of her siblings. She lives in a modest cottage in Duluth, Minnesota, with her father and young brother, and she has dedicated her life to holding her tiny, fractured family together - especially as her father is frequently gone on long fishing trips. Their livelihood may come from the waters of Lake Superior, but storms on the lake can be dangerous, even to those who know it well. Luke Carson has come to Duluth to help shepherd the arrival of the railroad to the city's port.

If anyone knows the road to purgatory, it's Red Ryan. As a stagecoach guard, he's faced holdups, ambushes, and all-out attacks from every kill-crazy outlaw, Indian, and prairie rat. But even he's a bit reluctant to take on his next job: riding shotgun with his driver Buttons Muldoon on a stage bound from Fort Concho, Texas, to Fort Bliss.

RITA Award winner Irene Hannon has also won the Holt Medallion for her romantic suspense. In this pulse-pounding thriller, the White House orders elite FBI operator Evan Cooper to secure Monica Callahan from a terrorist threat. But since Monica refuses all calls from her senior diplomat father, she sees no need for his round-the- clock protection—until a chilling “message” leaves no doubt.

A wrong turn in a rainstorm leads Englisher Amelia Devries to Michael Hostetler - and the young Amishman's charming Old Order community of Hickory Hollow. Despite their very different backgrounds, Amelia and Michael both feel hemmed in by the expectations of others and struggle with how to find room for their own hopes. And what first seems to be a chance encounter might just change their lives forever.

Nathaniel Bainbridge is used to hiding, whether it's concealing his struggles with reading or his forbidden desire for men. Under the thumb of his controlling father, the governor of Primrose Isle, he's sailing to the fledging colony, where he'll surrender to a respectable marriage for his family's financial gain. Then pirates strike and he's kidnapped for ransom by the Sea Hawk, a legendary villain of the New World. Bitter and jaded, Hawk harbors futile dreams of leaving the sea for a quiet life, but men like him don't deserve peace. He has a score to settle with Nathaniel's father.

Emma London never thought she had anything in common with her grandmother Genevieve London. The regal old woman came from wealthy and bluest-blood New England stock, but that didn't protect her from life's cruelest blows. Genevieve rose from the ashes of grief and built a fashion empire that was respected the world over, even when it meant neglecting her other son. When Emma's own mother died, her father abandoned her on his mother's doorstep. Genevieve took Emma in and reluctantly raised her - until Emma got pregnant her senior year of high school.

On the eve of her daughter Alia's wedding, Salma reads the girl's future in a cup of coffee dregs. She sees an unsettled life for Alia and her children; she also sees travel, and luck. While she chooses to keep her predictions to herself that day, they will all soon come to pass when the family is uprooted in the wake of the Six-Day War of 1967.

New York Times best-selling author of Fight Club, which was adapted into a major motion picture, Chuck Palahniuk offers a haunting tale. Winner of the Northwest Booksellers Association Award, Palahniuk is one of the rare literary geniuses who has been able to bridge the gap between a cult following and commercial success.

Set in the 1868 Colorado Rockies, Rekindled tells the poignant story of a man and wife whose life and love are forever changed.

He came west to the Rockies as a young runaway and grew into a legend among the already legendary frontier mountain men. They called him Preacher - a name that would become a monument to all who sought adventure in the savage wilderness of America's untamed west. The only man with the skills to lead a wagon train on the last leg of the rugged Oregon trail, Preacher knows they're headed into trouble. It's hard enough for a hundred greenhorns to survive the wilds of the northwest; being pursued by thieving renegade outlaws and Indians with a thirst for gold makes it damn near impossible.

Tom and Charlie are living out what's left of their lives on their own terms in a remote forest, two pot growers their only connection to the outside world. But then two women arrive - a photographer on the trail of survivors of a decades-ago forest fire and an elderly escapee from a psychiatric institution - and everything changes. And the Birds Rained Down, the recipient of several prizes, is a haunting meditation on aging and self-determination.

After too many dates, thirtysomething Mimi Perkins is still single, unmoored, and longing for love. So when Ren Yardley—a handsome, divorced fellow drama teacher and single father—falls in love with her and proposes, she’s sure this is at last the good news her psychic predicted. Soon after proposing, Ren receives the devastating news that his ex-wife has been in a debilitating car accident, prompting him to temporarily move back into his former home to care for her and his daughters.

Never pretty enough to please her gorgeous mother, Allie will do anything to gain her approval - even marry a man she doesn't love. Lt. Walter Novak - fearless in the cockpit but hopeless with women - takes his last furlough at home in California before being shipped overseas. Walt and Allie meet at a wedding and their love of music draws them together, prompting them to begin a correspondence that will change their lives. As letters fly between Walt's muddy bomber base in England and Allie's mansion in an orange grove, their friendship binds them together.

In London’s Pimlico neighborhood lies a tenement described in architectural guides as “a building of no interest whatsoever.” But the residents of Corduroy Mansions—including a literary agent, a wine merchant, a thoroughly unpleasant member of Parliament, and a vegetarian dog—are a rather fascinating lot.

After falling head over heels in love with Reagan Elliot, the perfect woman for him, Sinners' rhythm guitarist, Trey Mills, vows to give up his bisexual ways forever. When an obsessed fan threatens Reagan, she hires her friend, Ethan, to protect her while on tour. Falling for his girlfriend's bodyguard, a guy, was never on Trey's agenda. Will he have to choose between them, or can he have the best of both worlds?

Sadie may be married now, but she's as spirited as ever, and her life is no less tame. In fact, soon after she and Mark are settled into the farmhouse Mark is renovating, she's visited by three FBI agents who question her about the two children who mysteriously appeared one day at the ranch. Before the agents leave, they warn Sadie that her beloved horse, Paris, is highly valuable, and that she and Mark may be in grave danger because of Paris.

With starvation stalking in 1915 Alaska, Leah welcomes her brother Jacob's dogsled full of supplies. But not until she unwraps the scarf-covered sled driver does she realize she's been embracing Jacob's friend Jayce, the man who broke her heart a decade ago. Although she insists that Jacob get rid of Jayce immediately, a sudden snow storm and a disabling injury delay his departure.

In the summer of 1882, Dakota Rawlings, Texas Ranger, is still recuperating from an ambush that nearly killed him. Not yet fit for duty, the bored ranger eagerly accepts the opportunity to escort his boss’ beautiful daughter, Darvi, to the train station in Aurora. The trip won’t be difficult, and he’ll get to share his newly found faith with her. But Darvi is kidnapped from the train and held hostage, and Dakota must singlehandedly solve the mystery of her disappearance and stage a daring rescue.

"The dead can't hurt you. Only the living can." Effie Jones, a former slave who escaped to the Union side as a child, knows the truth of her words. Taken in by an army surgeon and his wife during the War, she learned to read and write, to tolerate the sight of blood and broken bodies - and to forget what is too painful to bear. Now a young freedwoman, she has returned south to New Orleans and earns her living as an embalmer, her steady hand and skillful incisions compensating for her white employer's shortcomings.

In this superb novel - an Oprah Book Club selection - a woman re-creates her life after divorce by opening up her house to strangers and her heart to the simple miracle of possibility.