Genre Literature

"There's no way not to suffer. But you try all kinds of ways to keep from drowning in it." The men and women in these eight short fictions grasp this truth on an elemental level, and their stories, as told by James Baldwin, detail the ingenious and often desperate ways in which they try to keep their heads above water.

When it was first published in 1979, this novel introduced inspirational fiction to people hungry for well-told stories based on Christian values. Since then, over a million copies have been sold, and it has been made into a popular Hallmark movie. Janette Oke has won the Christy Award, the Gold Medallion, and scores of other awards.

Our relationship was such a cliche. Friends to lovers. High school sweethearts. Then...driven by insecurities, I broke Grady Ryan's heart. I was weak, afraid to love, and even more afraid to be loved. There are secrets I've kept buried, but I can't forget what we once shared. I've been given a second chance, and this time I'm prepared to fight for him.

I'll be the first to admit that I live at extremes. After going 10 years locked in what felt like a dysfunctional marriage, I'm now decidedly boy-free. In nearly three years I've had no boyfriends, no flings, no dates, and no sex. For the sake of my dream career, the sacrifice has been easy. At least it was. Until he came along. Lukas Hendricks. He's rude, gorgeous, arrogant - a stone-carved wall of muscle and distraction. He's everything I know to avoid but there's no avoiding your next-door neighbor.

Celtic mythology, Arthurian romance, and an intriguing interpretation of British history - these are just some of the themes embraced by the anonymous authors of the eleven tales that make up the Welsh medieval masterpiece known as The Mabinogion. They tell of Gwydion the shape-shifter, who can create a woman out of flowers; of Math the magician whose feet must lie in the lap of a virgin; of hanging a pregnant mouse and hunting a magical boar.

In the Dutch settlement of Tarry Town, New York, in a secluded glen called Sleepy Hollow, Ichabod Crane arrives to educate the children of the region. This lanky schoolmaster fancies the idea of marrying the Katrina Van Tassel, but there is a problem with his plan. Abraham “Brom Bones” Van Brunt has already set his heart on marrying her. This rivalry climaxes one autumn night with the appearance of the legendary Headless Horseman, allegedly the ghost of a Hessian trooper....

Unpacking her belongings in her new hometown of Portland, Oregon, herbalist and reformed alchemist Zoe Faust can't help but notice she's picked up a stowaway. Dorian Robert-Houdin is a living, breathing three-and-half-foot gargoyle - not to mention a master of French cuisine - and he needs Zoe's expertise to decipher a centuries-old text. Zoe, who's trying to put her old life behind her, isn't so sure she wants to reopen her alchemical past... until the dead man on her porch leaves her no choice.

Marion and Shiva Stone are twin brothers born of a secret union between a beautiful Indian nun and a brash British surgeon. Orphaned by their mother’s death and their father’s disappearance, bound together by a preternatural connection and a shared fascination with medicine, the twins come of age as Ethiopia hovers on the brink of revolution.

Travel writer Macon Leary hates travel, adventure, surprises, and anything outside of his routine. Immobilized by grief, Macon is becoming increasingly prickly and alone, anchored by his solitude and an unwillingness to compromise his creature comforts. Then he meets Muriel, an eccentric dog trainer too optimistic to let Macon disappear into himself. Despite Macon’s best efforts to remain insulated, Muriel upends his solitary, systemized life, catapulting him into the center of a messy, beautiful love story he never imagined.

Meghann Dontess is a woman haunted by heartbreak. Twenty-five years ago she was forced to make a terrible choice, one that cost her everything, including the love of her sister, Claire. Now, Meghann is a hotshot divorce attorney who doesn’t believe in intimacy - until she meets the one man who can change her mind.

A modern classic, Einstein's Dreams is a fictional collage of stories dreamed by Albert Einstein in 1905, when he worked in a patent office in Switzerland. As the defiant but sensitive young genius is creating his theory of relativity, a new conception of time, he imagines many possible worlds. In one, time is circular, and people are fated to repeat their triumphs and failures over and over. In another, there is a place where time stands still, visited by lovers and parents clinging to their children.

Wallace Stegner's uniquely American classic centers on Lyman Ward, a noted historian who relates a fictionalized biography of his pioneer grandparents at a time when he has become estranged from his own family. Through a combination of research, memory, and exaggeration, Ward voices ideas concerning the relationship between history and the present, art and life, parents and children, and husbands and wives.

The car crash was the last thing I remembered...then I woke up here. Where "here" was felt like an impossible nightmare. I died, but this wasn't what I'd expected to find when they said I'd meet my maker. The afterlife is just like a video game, except I didn't start in a noob world like everybody else. I started out on one of the most challenging dungeon worlds meant only for ancient souls who've been dead much longer than I have.... Welcome to Epoc.

Jonathan Safran Foer's best-selling debut novel, Everything Is Illuminated, wowed critics on its way to winning several literary prizes, including Book of the Year honors from the Los Angeles Times. It has been published in 24 countries and will soon be a major motion picture. Foer's talent continues to shine in this sometimes hilarious and always heartfelt follow-up.

People say Beartown is finished. A tiny community nestled deep in the forest, it is slowly losing ground to the ever encroaching trees. But down by the lake stands an old ice rink, built generations ago by the working men who founded this town. And in that ice rink is the reason people in Beartown believe tomorrow will be better than today. Their junior ice hockey team is about to compete in the national semifinals, and they actually have a shot at winning.

Even before the doomed mission to Hadley’s Hope on LV-426, Jenette Vasquez had to fight to survive. Born to an immigrant family with a long military tradition, she looked up to the stars, but life pulled her back down to Earth—first into a street gang, then prison. The Colonial Marines proved to be Vasquez’s way out—a way that forced her to give up her twin children. Raised by Jenette’s sister, those children, Leticia and Ramon, had to discover their own ways to survive.

Radio-talk-show host Eve Reilly is used to backlash from her pot-stirring on-air commentary and interviews. But now it seems a disgruntled listener is resorting to more than angry words to express their displeasure. When a suspicious package arrives on her doorstep, Eve turns to law enforcement for help. Police Detective Brent Lange can't find any evidence to link the string of unsettling incidents that follows, but he's convinced they're connected. As the harassment grows more menacing, it becomes clear someone wants Eves voice silenced - permanently.

Sophie Saunders has the perfect life. Happily married to handsome Matt and expecting her first baby, she is the envy of her childhood friend, Lou. Lou's family has splintered. Her husband is dead and her son has left home. She would give anything to turn back the clock. But there's a secret buried deep in their past that the two friends can never forget. And when Sophie's world starts spiraling out of control, it's her new friend Roz to whom she turns. Trouble is, secrets have a habit of unraveling. And when they do, you can kiss your perfect life goodbye

Ten years ago, Izzy Stone's mother fatally shot her father while he slept. Devastated by her mother's apparent insanity, Izzy, now 17, refuses to visit her in prison. But her new foster parents, employees at the local museum, have enlisted Izzy's help in cataloguing items at a long-shuttered state asylum. There, amid piles of abandoned belongings, Izzy discovers a stack of unopened letters, a decades-old journal, and a window into her own past.

In the fall of 1918, 13-year-old German immigrant Pia Lange longs to be far from Philadelphia's overcrowded streets and slums, and from the anti-German sentiment that compelled her father to enlist in the US Army, hoping to prove his loyalty. But an even more urgent threat has arrived. Spanish influenza is spreading through the city. Soon, dead and dying are everywhere. With no food at home, Pia must venture out in search of supplies, leaving her infant twin brothers alone....