fiction / general

"...Ruth and Nat are orphans, packed into a house full of abandoned children run by a religious fanatic. To entertain their siblings, they channel the dead. Decades later, Ruth's niece, Cora, finds herself accidentally pregnant. After years of absence, Aunt Ruth appears, mute and full of intention. She is on a mysterious mission, leading Cora on an odyssey across the entire state of New York on foot. Where is Ruth taking them? Where has she been? And who-- or what--has she hidden in the woods at the end of the road?"--Provided by publisher.

"The Turners have lived on Yarrow Street for over fifty years. Their house has seen thirteen children grown and gone--and some returned; it has seen the arrival of grandchildren, the fall of Detroit's East Side, and the loss of a father. The house still stands despite abandoned lots, an embattled city, and the inevitable shift outward to the suburbs. But now, as ailing matriarch Viola finds herself forced to leave her home and move in with her eldest son, the family discovers that the house is worth just a tenth of its mortgage. The Turner children are called home to decide its fate and to reckon with how each of their pasts haunts--and shapes--their family's future"--Provided by publisher.

"One game. Six students. Five survivors. It was only ever meant to be a game played by six best friends in their first year at Oxford University; a game of consequences, silly forfeits, and childish dares. But then the game changed: the stakes grew higher and the dares more personal and more humiliating, finally evolving into a vicious struggle with unpredictable and tragic results. Now, fourteen years later, the remaining players must meet again for the final round. Who knows better than your best friends what would break you? A gripping psychological thriller partly inspired by the author's own time at Oxford University, this is perfect for fans of The Secret History and The Bellwether Revivals. The author's background in puzzle writing and setting can clearly be seen in the plotting of this clever, tricky book that will keep readers guessing to the very end"--.

"A ... novel about a reclusive young woman saving up for weight loss surgery when she gets drawn into a shadowy feminist guerilla group called "Jennifer"--equal parts Bridget Jones's Diary and Fight Club"--Provided by publisher.

At the end of a long winter in well-to-do Ridgedale, New Jersey, the body of an infant is discovered in the woods near the town's prestigious university campus. No one knows who the baby is, or how the body ended up out there. But there is no shortage of opinions. When freelance journalist, and recent Ridgedale transplant, Molly Sanderson, is unexpectedly called upon to cover the story, it's a risk, given the severe depression that followed the loss of her own baby. But the bigger threat comes when Molly unearths some of Ridgedale's darkest secrets, including a string of unreported sexual assaults going back twenty years. Meanwhile, Sandy, a high school dropout, searches for her volatile and now missing mother, and PTA president Barbara struggles to help her young son, who's suddenly having disturbing outbursts. Told from the perspectives of Molly, Barbara, and Sandy, the story of the baby's death is revealed and the three women find they have far more in common than they realized.

Dave is fourteen years old, entering high school, and living with his family in a cabin on Oregon's Mount Hood. But he isn't the only one approaching adulthood and its freedoms that summer. Martin, a pine marten (a small animal of the deep woods, of the otter/mink family), is leaving his own mother and siblings and setting off on his own as well. As Martin and Dave's paths cross on forest trails and rocky mountaintops, they and we witness the full, unknowable breadth and vast sweep of life, and the awe inspiring interconnectedness of the world and its many inhabitants, human and otherwise.

"Trampoline, a debut novel by Robert Gipe, is set in the coalfields of Kentucky. Its narrator is Dawn Jewell, a teenager who recounts the turbulent time when her grandmother Cora led her into a fight to stop a mountaintop removal coal mine. Dawn's father, Delbert, is dead, killed in the mines, leaving her mother, Tricia, a grieving drunk. Trampoline follows Dawn as she decides whether to save a mountain or save herself; be ruled by love or ruled by anger; remain in the land of her birth or run for her life"--Provided by publisher.

"An uncanny child born to brilliant parents, befriended by a prince, mentored by a wise woman, pursued by a powerful man, Secret Riven has no idea what destiny will demand of her or the courage she must have to confront it"--Provided by publisher.

Alex Meier, a young Jewish writer, fled his native Berlin, Germany, before World War II, but when McCarthyism threatens his new life in America in 1948, Alex makes a desperate bargain with the CIA: he will go back to Berlin and act as their agent in the political hotspot as a way of earning his way back to his new home and family. But almost immediately, things start to go wrong, and Alex finds himself a wanted man. Even worse, he discovers that his real mission is to spy on the woman he left behind, the only woman he has ever really loved.

"Born in 1941, Eileen Tumulty is raised by her Irish immigrant parents in Woodside, Queens, in an apartment where the mood swings between heartbreak and hilarity, depending on whether guests are over and how much alcohol has been consumed. Eileen can't help but dream of a calmer life, in a better neighborhood. When Eileen meets Ed Leary, a scientist whose bearing is nothing like those of the men she grew up with, she thinks she's found the perfect partner to deliver her to the cosmopolitan world she longs to inhabit. They marry, and Eileen quickly discovers Ed doesn't aspire to the same, ever bigger, stakes in the American Dream. Eileen encourages her husband to want more: a better job, better friends, a better house, but as years pass it becomes clear that his growing reluctance is part of a deeper psychological shift. An inescapable darkness enters their lives, and Eileen and Ed and their son Connell try desperately to hold together a semblance of the reality they have known, and to preserve, against long odds, an idea they have cherished of the future. Through the Learys, novelist Matthew Thomas charts the story of the American Century, particularly the promise of domestic bliss and economic prosperity that captured hearts and minds after WWII. The result is a powerfully affecting work of art; one that reminds us that life is more than a tally of victories and defeats, that we live to love and be loved, and that we should tell each other so before the moment slips away. Epic in scope, heroic in character, masterful in prose, We Are Not Ourselves is a testament to our greatest desires and our greatest frailties."--.