In the fall of 1968, Melissa Coleman’s parents pack their VW truck and set out to forge a new existence on a rugged coastal homestead. Inspired by Helen and Scott Nearing, authors of the homesteading bible Living the Good Life, Eliot and Sue build their own home by hand, live off the crops they grow, and establish a happy family with Melissa and her two sisters. They also attract national media and become icons of the back-to-the-land farming movement, but the pursuit of a purer, simpler life comes at a price. In the wake of a tragic accident,
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Priscilla Gilman, a teacher of romantic poetry who embraced Wordsworth’s vision of childhood’s spontaneous wonder, eagerly anticipated the birth of her first child, certain that he would come “trailing clouds of glory.” But as Benjamin grew, his remarkable precocity was associated with a developmental disorder that would dramatically alter the course of Priscilla’s dreams.
In The Anti-Romantic Child, a memoir full of lyricism and light, Gilman explores our hopes and expectations for our children, our families, and ourselves—and the ways in which experience may lead us to re-imagine them. Using literature as a touchstone, Gilman reveals her journey through crisis to joy,
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After his mother’s death, Richard, a newly remarried hospital consultant, decides to build bridges with his estranged sister, Angela, inviting her and her family for a week in a rented house on the Welsh border. Four adults and four children, a single family and all of them strangers. Seven days of shared meals, log fires, card games and wet walks. But in the quiet and stillness of the valley, ghosts begin to rise up. The parents Richard thought he had; the parents Angela thought she had. Past and present lovers. Friends, enemies, victims, saviors. And from high on the dark hill,
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When the last thing you want is the one thing you need, you’ve got to have a little faith…
Growing up, Ellen Carlisle was a Christian: she went to Jesus camp, downed stale Nilla wafers at Sunday school, and never, ever played with Ouija boards. Now, years later, when infertility prevents her from giving her ambitious attorney husband a family, she finds herself on the brink of divorce, unemployed, and living with her right-wing, Born-Again-Christian parents in her suburban New Jersey hometown. There the schools are private, the past is public, and blessings come in lump sums.
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Logan Pyle, a lapsed grad student and stay-at-home dad, is just barely holding it together: His father has died, his wife Julie is distant, and his four-year-old son has gone back to drinking from a baby bottle. One Sunday morning at a children’s birthday party, he finds Julie kissing another man, and something snaps. Logan packs a bag, buckles his son into his car seat, and heads north with a 1920s Louisville Slugger in the back of his truck, a maxed-out American Express card in his wallet, and revenge in his heart. After some bad decisions and worse luck, he lands at his father’s old A-frame cabin,
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Golden sand, pounding surf, a sense of endless possibility–and four unforgettable stories of love, friendship, and second chances. . .
The Brass Ring by Lisa Jackson
It’s a beautiful June day, perfect for a wedding–until Shawna learns that her fiancé, Parker, has been involved in a car crash. Though his injuries heal, his memories of her are gone. Yet Shawna won’t stop reaching to reclaim the love they once shared. . .
June’s Lace by Cathy Lamb
June MacKenzie is done–with her high-pressure legal career, her difficult soon-to-be-ex,
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