Women Friendship Fiction

Finley McGowan is determined that the niece she’s raising will always feel loved and wanted. Unlike how she felt after her mom left to pursue a dream of stardom, and when the grandfather who was left to raise them abandoned her and her sister, Sloane, when they needed him most. Finley reacted to her chaotic childhood by walking the straight and narrow—nose down, work hard, follow the rules.

Sometimes you’re so busy writing other people’s stories that you can lose the plot of your own. This wasn’t how Kelsey Worthington’s day was supposed to go. She wasn’t supposed to be picking up Starbucks for her smarmy boss. She wasn’t supposed to get hit by a car that jumped the curb. And she certainly wasn’t supposed to wake up in a hospital room next to Georgina Tate—the legendary matriarch of New York City businesswomen.

When Ann Stilwell arrives in New York City, she expects to spend her summer working as a curatorial associate at the Metropolitan Museum of Art. Instead, she finds herself assigned to The Cloisters, a gothic museum and garden renowned for its medieval art collection and its group of enigmatic researchers studying the history of divination. Desperate to escape her painful past, Ann is happy to indulge the researchers’ more outlandish theories about the history of fortune telling.

When it’s announced that 1958 will be the last year debutantes are to be presented at court, thousands of eager mothers and hopeful daughters flood the palace with letters seeking the year’s most coveted invitation: a chance for their daughters to curtsy to the young Queen Elizabeth and officially come out into society. In an effort to appease her traditional mother, aspiring university student Lily Nichols agrees to become a debutante and do the Season, a glittering and grueling string of countless balls and cocktail parties. In doing so, she befriends two very different women.

A story about second chances, damaging secrets, and discovering the strength you have inside. Welcome to Magnolia. Clementine is attempting to adjust to her new normal. With Archer moved out and her father gone, she’s never been this alone or lost. On the spur of the moment, she decides to put in a bid on the vacant space next to the hardware store with the idea of opening a dance studio. If everyone is living their dream, why can’t she? Things turn complicated when the one person she’s bidding against is no other than Jake Palmer.

When a group of friends in Mason, Missouri, decide to start a monthly supper club, they get more than they bargained for. The plan for congenial evenings - talking, laughing, and sharing recipes, homemade food, and wine - abruptly changes course one night when one of the women reveals something startlingly intimate. The supper club then becomes Confession Club, and the women gather weekly to share not only dinners but embarrassing misdeeds, deep insecurities, and long-held regrets.

Megan Chernoff is a talented but unemployed copywriter in an identity crisis after the birth of her second child. Seeking a fresh start, she and her family move to New York City, where she meets Daphne Cole—a gorgeous, stylish, well-known momfluencer. To Meg's surprise and delight, Daphne shows an inordinate amount of interest in Meg, showering her with compliments, attention, gifts, and all the perks that come with having a massive digital platform. Before she knows it, Meg finds herself immersed in Daphne's world.

When Claire Barclay receives news that her beloved stepfather has had a stroke, she's more than a little shaken. Leo is her last real relative, and his own children rarely check up on the old man. Claire and her husband, Art, leave New York and fly back to Scotland to care for him during the summer. Their visit makes clear that Leo is no longer capable of living on his own, but he is determined to stay in his beloved old house. Art comes up with the idea of turning the place into a conference center, thinking they could purchase the place from Leo and build him a cottage on the property.

Summer 1999: Twentysomething Sawyer is striving to make it in New York. Between her assistant job in publishing, her secret dreams of becoming a writer, and her upcoming wedding to her college boyfriend, her is plate full. Only one problem: She is facing an incredibly lonely summer as her fiancé has been spending longer and longer hours at work . . . with an all-too-close female colleague, Kendra. When Kendra's boyfriend, Nick, invites Sawyer to meet up and compare notes about their suspicions, the meeting goes awry.

When Elizabeth's husband dies, leaving her with crippling debt, the only person she can turn to is her friend, Jo. Soon Jo has called in her daughter, Lucy, to help save Elizabeth from bankruptcy. Leaving her old life behind, Lucy is determined to make the most of her fresh start. As life slowly begins to return to normal, these three women, thrown together by circumstance, become fast friends. But then Jo's world is turned upside down when she receives some shocking news. In search of solace, Jo and Elizabeth find themselves enjoying midnight dips in the freezing Irish Sea.

Homicide cop Eve Dallas and her billionaire husband, Roarke, are building a brand-new school and youth shelter. They know that the hard life can lead kids toward dangerous crossroads - and they hope to nudge a few more of them onto the right path. For expert help, they hire child psychologist Dr. Rochelle Pickering - whose own brother pulled himself out of a spiral of addiction and crime with Rochelle’s support. Lyle is living with Rochelle while he gets his life together. He’s thrilled to hear about his sister’s new job offer. But within hours, triumph is followed by tragedy.

It's Christmastime in Magnolia, and Maggie is determined to mend the fissure between Spencer and Penny. So she comes up with a plan: create a Christmas extravaganza for them to participate in. After all, who couldn’t fall in love during the Christmas holiday? Plus, focusing on someone else helps keep her from thinking about her own heartbreaks. All the women of the Red Stiletto book club join in to help. Some have found their happily ever afters. Some have hiccups of their own. Abigail joins in and discovers just what’s she’s missing at home.

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....

It's 1924, and Peter and Patricia have what looks to be a very modern marriage. Both drink. Both smoke. Both work, Patricia as a head copywriter at a major department store. When it comes to sex with other people, both believe in "the honesty policy." Until they don't. Or, at least, until Peter doesn't—and a shell-shocked, lovesick Patricia finds herself starting out all over again, but this time around as a different kind of single woman: the ex-wife.

When bookshop owner Sarah Smith is offered the opportunity for a job exchange with her Parisian friend, Sophie, saying yes is a no-brainer - after all, what kind of romantic would turn down six months in Paris? Sarah is sure she’s in for the experience of a lifetime - days spent surrounded by literature in a gorgeous bookshop, and the chance to watch the snow fall on the Eiffel Tower. Plus, now she can meet up with her journalist boyfriend, Ridge, when his job takes him around the globe. But her expectations cool faster than her café au lait soon after she lands.

Knit the Season is a loving, moving, laugh-out-loud celebration of special times with friends and family. The story begins a year after the end of Knit Two, with Dakota Walker's trip to spend the Christmas holidays with her Gran in Scotland, accompanied by her father, her grandparents, and her mother's best friend, Catherine. Together, they share a trove of happy memories about past Christmases.

Australia, 1906: Orphan Jane Piper is nine years old when philanthropist siblings Michael and Elizabeth Quinn take her into their home to further her schooling. The Quinns are no strangers to hardship. Having arrived in Australia as penniless immigrants, they now care for others as lost as they once were. Despite Jane’s mysterious past, her remarkable aptitude for mathematics takes her far over the next seven years, and her relationship with Elizabeth and Michael flourishes as she plays an increasingly prominent part in their business.

In India, Smita is an untouchable. Desperate to give her daughter an education, she takes the child and flees her small village with nothing but her resourcefulness, eventually heading to a temple where she will experience a rebirth. In Sicily, Giulia works in her father’s wig workshop, the last of its kind in Palermo. She washes, bleaches, and dyes the hair provided by the city’s hairdressers, which is now in short supply. But when her father is the victim of a serious accident, she discovers that the company’s financial situation is dire.

Maggie Adair’s first year as a teacher at Downey House was a surprising success. After making the leap from an inner-city school in Glasgow, she’s learned to appreciate the mellower pace of the girls’ boarding school by the sea. Now engaged to her longtime boyfriend, sweet and steady Stan, Maggie’s just got to stop thinking about David McDonald, her colleague at the boys’ school down the road. Well, hasn’t she? Can Maggie take a leaf out of the Well Behaved Teacher’s exercise book and stick to her plan for a small but elegant wedding and settled life of matrimony?

For Duffy Sinclair, life boils down to one simple thing: maintaining his residence at the idyllic Centennial Assisted Living. Without it, he’s destined for the roach-infested nursing home down the road. So, he keeps his shenanigans to the bare minimum with the help of his straight-laced best friend and roommate, Carl Upton. But when Carl’s granddaughter Josie climbs through their bedroom window with booze on her breath and a black eye, Duffy’s faced with trouble that’s sticking around and hard to hide.