Two months before he died of cancer, renowned literary critic Anatole Broyard called his grown son and daughter to his side, intending to reveal a secret he had kept all their lives and most of his own: he was black. But even as he lay dying, the truth was too difficult for him to share, and it...  more

Two months before he died of cancer, renowned literary critic Anatole Broyard called his grown son and daughter to his side, intending to reveal a secret he had kept all their lives and most of his own: he was black. But even as he lay dying, the truth was too difficult for him to share, and it was his wife who told Bliss that her WASPy, privileged Connecticut childhood had come at a price. Ever since his own parents, New Orleans Creoles, had moved to Brooklyn and began to "pass" in order to get work, Anatole had learned to conceal his racial identity. As he grew older and entered the ranks of the New York literary elite, he maintained the façade. Now his daughter Bliss tries to make sense of his choices and the impact of this revelation on her own life. She searches out the family she never knew in New York and New Orleans , and considers the profound consequences of racial identity. With unsparing candor and nuanced insight, Broyard chronicles her evolution from sheltered WASP to a woman of mixed race ancestry.

With wry wit and hard-earned wisdom, popular online personality and founder of TheChicSite.com founder Rachel Hollis helps readers break free from the lies keeping them from the joy-filled and exuberant life they are meant to have.Founder of the lifestyle website TheChicSite.com and CEO of her...  more

With wry wit and hard-earned wisdom, popular online personality and founder of TheChicSite.com founder Rachel Hollis helps readers break free from the lies keeping them from the joy-filled and exuberant life they are meant to have.Founder of the lifestyle website TheChicSite.com and CEO of her own media company, Chic Media, Rachel Hollis has created an online fan base of hundreds of thousands of fans by sharing tips for living a better life while fearlessly revealing the messiness of her own. Now comes her highly anticipated first book featuring her signature combination of honesty, humor, and direct, no-nonsense advice.Each chapter of Girl, Wash Your Face begins with a specific lie Hollis once believed that left her feeling overwhelmed, unworthy, or ready to give up. As a working mother, a former foster parent, and a woman who has dealt with insecurities about her body and relationships, she speaks with the insight and kindness of a BFF, helping women unpack the limiting mind-sets that destroy their self-confidence and keep them from moving forward.From her temporary obsession with marrying Matt Damon to a daydream involving hypnotic iguanas to her son?s request that she buy a necklace to ?be like the other moms,? Hollis holds nothing back. With unflinching faith and tenacity, Hollis spurs other women to live with passion and hustle and to awaken their slumbering goals.

Growing up, Shawn Thornton's life was anything but normal, but then, so was his mother. After waking from a coma following a car crash, Beverly Thornton's once sweet and gentle disposition had been replaced by violent mood swings, profanity laced tirades, and uncontrollable fits of rage....  more

Growing up, Shawn Thornton's life was anything but normal, but then, so was his mother. After waking from a coma following a car crash, Beverly Thornton's once sweet and gentle disposition had been replaced by violent mood swings, profanity laced tirades, and uncontrollable fits of rage. Inside the Thornton house, floors and countertops were piled high with dirty laundry and garbage, because Bev was unable to move well enough to clean. Dinners were a Russian roulette of half cooked meat, spoiled milk, and foods well past their expiration dates. A moment of frustration might prompt her to hurl a knife at Shawn, his brother, Troy, or their dad or to vehemently cuss them out, only to shower them with love and affection moments later as though nothing had happened, and God help the family cat! On several occasions, Bev even tried to jump out of the car on the highway while Shawn and his brother struggled to keep her inside. Yet this same woman was also a devoted Bible reader, Sunday school teacher, and friend to the elderly, poor, and marginalized wherever she went. How the same woman could be a saint one minute and a nightmare the next was a constant source of frustration for the family. Then one day, after decades of embarrassing outbursts, a surprise discovery finally helps the Thornton family come to grips with Bev's mysterious condition and brings Shawn to a startling realization that changes the course of his life forever. A heartwarming coming of age story, All But Normal is a powerful reminder that sometimes the broken people in our lives are the ones who need fixing the least.

A charming and moving novel about female friendship and the experiences that knit us together - even when we least expect it. Walker and Daughter is Georgia Walker's little yarn shop, tucked into a quiet storefront on Manhattan's Upper West Side. The Friday Night Knitting Club was...  more

A charming and moving novel about female friendship and the experiences that knit us together - even when we least expect it. Walker and Daughter is Georgia Walker's little yarn shop, tucked into a quiet storefront on Manhattan's Upper West Side. The Friday Night Knitting Club was started by some of Georgia's regulars, who gather once a week to work on their latest projects and to chat - and occasionally clash - over their stories of love, life, and everything in between. Georgia has her hands full, juggling the demands of running the store and raising her spunky teen daughter, Dakota, by herself. Thank goodness for Anita, her mentor and dear friend, and the rest of the members of the knitting club - who are just as varied as the skeins of yarn in the shop's bins. There's Peri, a pre-law student turned handbag designer; Darwin, a somewhat aloof feminist grad student; and Lucie, a petite, quiet woman who's harboring some secrets of her own. However, unexpected changes soon throw these women's lives into disarray, and the shop's comfortable world gets shaken up like a snow globe. James, Georgia's ex, decides that he wants to play a larger role in Dakota's life - and possibly Georgia's as well. Cat, a former friend from high school, returns to New York as a rich Park Avenue wife and uneasily renews her old bond with Georgia. Meanwhile, Anita must confront her growing (and reciprocated) feelings for Marty, the kind neighborhood deli owner. And when the unthinkable happens, they realize what they've created: not just a knitting club, but a sisterhood

In the wake of tragedy, a group of friends make a pact that will cause them to reunite a decade later and embark upon a life-changing adventure together. Four freshmen arrive at college from completely different worlds: Lainey, a California party girl with a flair for drama; Tyson, a brilliant...  more

In the wake of tragedy, a group of friends make a pact that will cause them to reunite a decade later and embark upon a life-changing adventure together. Four freshmen arrive at college from completely different worlds: Lainey, a California party girl with a flair for drama; Tyson, a brilliant scholar and law school hopeful from D.C.; Summer, a recruited athlete and perfectionist from the Midwest; and Hannah, a mild-mannered southerner who is content to quietly round out the circle of big personalities. Soon after moving into their shared dorm, they strike up a conversation in a study lounge, and the seeds of friendship are planted. As their college years fly by, their bond intensifies and the four become inseparable. But as graduation nears, their lives are forever changed after a desperate act leads to tragic consequences. Stunned and heartbroken, a pact is made to be there for each other in their time of need, no matter how separated they are by circumstances or distance. Ten years later, Hannah is anticipating what should be one of the happiest moments of her life when everything is suddenly turned upside down. Calling on her closest friends, it soon becomes clear that they are facing their own crossroads. True to their promise, they agree to take a time out from lives headed in wrong directions and embark on a journey of self-discovery, forgiveness, and acceptance. In this tender portrayal of grief, love, and hope, Emily Giffin asks: When things fall apart, who will be at our sides to help pick up the pieces?

Jill Fredston has traveled more than twenty thousand miles of the Arctic and sub-Arctic-backwards. With her ocean-going rowing shell and her husband, Doug Fesler, in a small boat of his own, she has disappeared every summer for years, exploring the rugged shorelines of Alaska, Canada, Greenland,...  more

Jill Fredston has traveled more than twenty thousand miles of the Arctic and sub-Arctic-backwards. With her ocean-going rowing shell and her husband, Doug Fesler, in a small boat of his own, she has disappeared every summer for years, exploring the rugged shorelines of Alaska, Canada, Greenland, Spitsbergen, and Norway. Carrying what they need to be self-sufficient, the two of them have battled mountainous seas and hurricane-force winds, dragged their boats across jumbles of ice, fended off grizzlies and polar bears, been serenaded by humpback whales and scrutinized by puffins, and reveled in moments of calm. As Fredston writes, these trips are "neither a vacation nor an escape, they are a way of life." Rowing to Latitude is a lyrical, vivid celebration of these northern journeys and the insights they inspired. It is a passionate testimonial to the extraordinary grace and fragility of wild places, the power of companionship, the harsh but liberating reality of risk, the lure of discovery, and the challenges and joys of living an unconventional life.

Respected conservative journalist and commentator Timothy P. Carney continues the conversation begun with Hillbilly Elegy and the classic Bowling Alone in this hard-hitting analysis that identifies the true factor behind the decline of the American dream: it is not purely the result of economics...  more

Respected conservative journalist and commentator Timothy P. Carney continues the conversation begun with Hillbilly Elegy and the classic Bowling Alone in this hard-hitting analysis that identifies the true factor behind the decline of the American dream: it is not purely the result of economics as the left claims, but the collapse of the institutions that made us successful, including marriage, church, and civic life. During the 2016 presidential campaign, Donald J. Trump proclaimed, "the American dream is dead," and this message resonated across the country. Why do so many people believe that the American dream is no longer within reach? Growing inequality, stubborn pockets of immobility, rising rates of deadly addiction, the increasing and troubling fact that where you start determines where you end up, heightening political strife -- these are the disturbing realities threatening ordinary American lives today.The standard accounts pointed to economic problems among the working class, but the root was a cultural collapse: While the educated and wealthy elites still enjoy strong communities, most blue-collar Americans lack strong communities and institutions that bind them to their neighbors. And outside of the elites, the central American institution has been religionThat is, it's not the factory closings that have torn us apart; it?s the church closings. The dissolution of our most cherished institutions -- nuclear families, places of worship, civic organizations -- has not only divided us, but eroded our sense of worth, belief in opportunity, and connection to one another. In Abandoned America, Carney visits all corners of America, from the dim country bars of Southwestern Pennsylvania., to the bustling Mormon wards of Salt Lake City, and explains the most important data and research to demonstrate how the social connection is the great divide in America. He shows that Trump's surprising victory was the most visible symptom of this deep-seated problem. In addition to his detailed exploration of how a range of societal changes have, in tandem, damaged us, Carney provides a framework that will lead us back out of a lonely, modern wilderness.

My husband is dead. I attended his funeral. I watched his casket be lowered six feet into the ground. (Actually, it may have been only five feet, but that still seems like more than enough.) And then we ate an array of finger sandwiches and deviled eggs and miniature beef...  more

My husband is dead. I attended his funeral. I watched his casket be lowered six feet into the ground. (Actually, it may have been only five feet, but that still seems like more than enough.) And then we ate an array of finger sandwiches and deviled eggs and miniature beef wellingtons that cost more than my first car. My point is, Grant is gone. And so are all his many, many deep, dark secrets which I never really ever bothered to ask him about. He is never coming back. So why do I still see his face everywhere I go?

Murders-at-White-House-Farm

Robert and Mary Rowe’s second child, Christopher, was born with severe neurological and visual impairments. For many years, the Rowes’ courageous response to adversity set an example for other parents of children with birth defects. Then the pressures on Bob Rowe—personal and...  more

Robert and Mary Rowe’s second child, Christopher, was born with severe neurological and visual impairments. For many years, the Rowes’ courageous response to adversity set an example for other parents of children with birth defects. Then the pressures on Bob Rowe—personal and professional—took their toll, and he fell into depression and, ultimately, delusion. And one day he took a baseball bat and killed his wife and three children. Julie Salamon deftly avoids sensationalism as she tells the Rowes’ tragic story with intelligence, sympathy, and insight. Like all great literary journalism, Facing the Wind asks us to join its issues and examine our own lives and problems in the new, bright light that good writing always sheds.

In 1966, Rebecca Wilson?s father, a Union Leader and civil rights activist, was assassinated on the street in San Francisco. Rebecca—known throughout as “Becky?—was three years old. A House with No Roof is Wilson?s gripping memoir of how the murder of her father propelled her family into a...  more

In 1966, Rebecca Wilson?s father, a Union Leader and civil rights activist, was assassinated on the street in San Francisco. Rebecca—known throughout as “Becky?—was three years old. A House with No Roof is Wilson?s gripping memoir of how the murder of her father propelled her family into a life-long search for solace and understanding. Following her father?s death, Becky?s mother, Barbara, desperate for closure and peace, uproots the family and moves to Bolinas, California. In this small, coastal town of hippies, artists, and “burnouts,? the family continues to unravel. To cope, Barbara turns to art and hangs a banner that loudly declares, “Wilsons are Bold.? But she still succumbs to her grief, neglecting her children in her wake. Becky?s brother turns to drugs while her beautiful sister chooses a life on the road and becomes pregnant. As Becky fumbles and hurtles toward adulthood herself, she comes to learn the full truth of her father?s death—a truth that threatens to steal her sanity and break her spirit. Told with humor and candor—and with love and family devotion at its heart—A House with No Roof is a brave account of one daughter?s struggle to survive.

Most Americans would be shocked to discover that slavery still exists in the United States. Yet most of us buy goods made by people who aren’t paid for their labor–people who are trapped financially, and often physically. In Nobodies, award-winning journalist John Bowe exposes the...  more

Most Americans would be shocked to discover that slavery still exists in the United States. Yet most of us buy goods made by people who aren’t paid for their labor–people who are trapped financially, and often physically. In Nobodies, award-winning journalist John Bowe exposes the outsourcing, corporate chicanery, immigration fraud, and sleights of hand that allow forced labor to continue in the United States while the rest of us notice nothing but the everyday low price at the checkout counter. Based on thorough and often dangerous research, exclusive interviews, and eyewitness accounts, Nobodies takes you inside three illegal workplaces where employees are virtually or literally enslaved. In the fields of Immokalee, Florida, underpaid (and often unpaid) illegal immigrants pick the produce all of us consume, connected by a chain of subcontractors and divisions to such companies as PepsiCo and Tropicana. At the top of the chain are stockholders and politicians; at the bottom is a father of six, one of whose children suffers from leukemia, who entered America only to become the unpaid employee of a labor contractor nicknamed “El Diablo” for his cruelty. In Tulsa, Oklahoma, the John Pickle Company reaped profits for years making pressure tanks used by oil refineries and power plants. Feeling squeezed by foreign competition and government regulations, JPC partnered with an Indian and Kuwaiti firm to import workers from India. Under the guise of a “training program,” fifty-three workers, including college-educated Uday Ludbe, came to the United States, only to have their documents confiscated and to find themselves confined to a factory building. Pickle laid off Americans and paid the Indians three dollars an hour. Saipan, a U.S. commonwealth in the Western Pacific where the author lived for three years, has long been exempted from American immigration controls, tariffs, and federal income tax–a status quo assiduously protected by lobbyist Jack Abramoff and Congressman Tom DeLay. There, garment magnates–selling to clothing giants like the Gap and Target–live in luxury while thousands of foreign factory workers, 90 percent of them female, work sixty-hour weeks for $3.05 an hour and spend weekends trying to trade sex for green cards. The garments they make are allowed to be labeled MADE IN AMERICA.Nobodies is a vivid and powerful work of investigative reporting, but it is also a lively examination of the eternal struggle for power between free people and unfree people. Against the American landscape of shopping mall, outlet stores, and Happy Meals, Bowe reveals how humankind’s darker urges remain alive and well, lingering in the background of every transaction and how understanding them may lead to overcoming them.

Throughout this intimate narrative, Grey richly evokes places and times that were defining for a generation—from her preteen days in 1970s Malibu and wild child nights in New York’s club scene, to her roles in quintessential movies of the 1980s, including The Cotton Club, Red...  more

Throughout this intimate narrative, Grey richly evokes places and times that were defining for a generation—from her preteen days in 1970s Malibu and wild child nights in New York’s club scene, to her roles in quintessential movies of the 1980s, including The Cotton Club, Red Dawn, and her breakout performance in Ferris Bueller’s Day Off. With self-deprecating humor and frankness, she looks back on her unbridled, romantic adventures in Hollywood. And with enormous bravery, she shares the devastating fallout from a plastic surgery procedure that caused the sudden and stunning loss of her professional identity and career. Grey inspires with her hard-won battle back, reclaiming her sense of self from a culture and business that can impose a narrow and unforgiving definition of female worth. She finds, at last, her own true north and starts a family of her own, just in the nick of time. Distinctive, moving, and powerful, told with generosity and pluck, Out of the Corner is a memoir about a never-ending personal evolution, a coming-of-age story for women of every age.

Frankie Cochran knew her boyfriend, David Gerard, was possessive, controlling, and prone to violent rages. When she tried to break up with him, Gerard threatened her with a hammer. One week later, he used it to club her in the head. Again. And again. Then he stabbed her in the throat - and left...  more

Frankie Cochran knew her boyfriend, David Gerard, was possessive, controlling, and prone to violent rages. When she tried to break up with him, Gerard threatened her with a hammer. One week later, he used it to club her in the head. Again. And again. Then he stabbed her in the throat - and left her for dead... Miraculously, Frankie survived - but cops began to suspect Gerard of other vicious crimes. One of his previous girlfriends had died in a house fire, along with her children and her mother. A local prostitute's brutalized body was found in a pool of blood. But it was the unsolved murder of another woman - repeatedly run over on a country road - that finally exposed Gerard as a rage-driven monster out of control... Justice finally caught up with Gerard. Hounded by the tireless efforts of detectives and incriminated by DNA evidence as well as up-to-date forensics that matched the tire marks at a crime scene to Gerard's car, one of the Pacific Northwest's most dangerous killers was finally locked behind bars.

Miriam Giles ran away to Colorado to bury her violent past -- but this seductive, charismatic widow had a dark side that could never stay buried. After finding the "sugar daddy" she was looking for in Alan Helmick, her new marriage seemed happy. Then, two years later, Alan met a...  more

Miriam Giles ran away to Colorado to bury her violent past -- but this seductive, charismatic widow had a dark side that could never stay buried. After finding the "sugar daddy" she was looking for in Alan Helmick, her new marriage seemed happy. Then, two years later, Alan met a gruesome fate. Returning home from errands, Miriam found him lying in a pool of blood. Miriam showed police a cryptic note warning her to "run, run, run." But Miriam was no distraught housewife. She was a master manipulator always able to stay one step ahead of her unwitting partner -- and the law -- until now.

A few minutes after 9 p.m. on Palm Sunday, April 5, 1936, a massive funnel cloud flashing a giant fireball and roaring like a runaway train careened into the thriving cotton-mill town of Tupelo, Mississippi, killing more than 200 people, not counting an unknown number of black citizens,...  more

A few minutes after 9 p.m. on Palm Sunday, April 5, 1936, a massive funnel cloud flashing a giant fireball and roaring like a runaway train careened into the thriving cotton-mill town of Tupelo, Mississippi, killing more than 200 people, not counting an unknown number of black citizens, one-third of Tupelo’s population, who were not included in the official casualty figures. When the tornado hits, Dovey, a local laundress, is flung by the terrifying winds into a nearby lake. Bruised and nearly drowned, she makes her way across Tupelo to find her small family -- her hardworking husband, Virgil, her clever sixteen-year-old granddaughter, Dreama, and Promise, Dreama’s beautiful light-skinned three-month-old son. Slowly navigating the broken streets of Tupelo, Dovey stops at the house of the despised McNabb family. Inside, she discovers that the tornado has spared no one, including Jo, the McNabbs’ dutiful teenage daughter, who has suffered a terrible head wound. When Jo later discovers a baby in the wreckage, she is certain that she’s found her baby brother, Tommy, and vows to protect him. During the harrowing hours and days of the chaos that follows, Jo and Dovey will struggle to navigate a landscape of disaster and to battle both the demons and the history that link and haunt them. Drawing on historical events, Minrose Gwin beautifully imagines natural and human destruction in the deep South of the 1930s through the experiences of two remarkable women whose lives are indelibly connected by forces beyond their control. A story of loss, hope, despair, grit, courage, and race, Promise reminds us of the transformative power and promise that come from confronting our most troubled relations with one another.

The latest novel from the sensational Jodi Picoult: Can murder ever be justice? Or mercy? Sage Singer has a past that makes her want to hide from the world. But when she strikes up an unlikely friendship with Josef Weber, a quiet old man and respected pillar of the community, she feels that...  more

The latest novel from the sensational Jodi Picoult: Can murder ever be justice? Or mercy? Sage Singer has a past that makes her want to hide from the world. But when she strikes up an unlikely friendship with Josef Weber, a quiet old man and respected pillar of the community, she feels that finally, she may have found someone she can open up to. Until Josef tells her the evil secret he's kept for sixty years...

In the summer after graduating from college, Suleika Jaouad was preparing, as they say in commencement speeches, to enter “the real world.” She had fallen in love and moved to Paris to pursue her dream of becoming a war correspondent. The real world she found, however, would take her...  more

In the summer after graduating from college, Suleika Jaouad was preparing, as they say in commencement speeches, to enter “the real world.” She had fallen in love and moved to Paris to pursue her dream of becoming a war correspondent. The real world she found, however, would take her into a very different kind of conflict zone. It started with an itch -- first on her feet, then up her legs, like a thousand invisible mosquito bites. Next came the exhaustion, and the six-hour naps that only deepened her fatigue. Then a trip to the doctor and, a few weeks shy of her twenty-third birthday, a diagnosis: leukemia, with a 35 percent chance of survival. Just like that, the life she had imagined for herself had gone up in flames. By the time Jaouad flew home to New York, she had lost her job, her apartment, and her independence. She would spend much of the next four years in a hospital bed, fighting for her life and chronicling the saga in a column for The New York Times. When Jaouad finally walked out of the cancer ward -- after countless rounds of chemo, a clinical trial, and a bone marrow transplant -- she was, according to the doctors, cured. But as she would soon learn, a cure is not where the work of healing ends; it’s where it begins. She had spent the past 1,500 days in desperate pursuit of one goal -- to survive. And now that she’d done so, she realized that she had no idea how to live. How would she reenter the world and live again? How could she reclaim what had been lost? Jaouad embarked -- with her new best friend, Oscar, a scruffy terrier mutt -- on a 100-day, 15,000-mile road trip across the country. She set out to meet some of the strangers who had written to her during her years in the hospital: a teenage girl in Florida also recovering from cancer; a teacher in California grieving the death of her son; a death-row inmate in Texas who’d spent his own years confined to a room. What she learned on this trip is that the divide between sick and well is porous, that the vast majority of us will travel back and forth between these realms throughout our lives. Between Two Kingdoms is a profound chronicle of survivorship and a fierce, tender, and inspiring exploration of what it means to begin again.

The Bluest Eye is the story of a black girl who prays -- with unforeseen consequences -- for her eyes to turn blue so she will be accepted.

Home is where the spark is. Born in rural Pennsylvania to an elegant, but emotionally-distant mother, and a free-spirited, adventurous father, Sue Muller grows up in a home where tears are forbidden. As an exchange student in Chile, she is shocked by her host mother’s range of anger,...  more

Home is where the spark is. Born in rural Pennsylvania to an elegant, but emotionally-distant mother, and a free-spirited, adventurous father, Sue Muller grows up in a home where tears are forbidden. As an exchange student in Chile, she is shocked by her host mother’s range of anger, laughter, and indignation. A world of feelings opens to her, and Sue enters college ready to be someone new. From falling in love with being in love, to building new friendships, Sue embarks on carefree escapades in Europe that eventually land her in hospital. Forced to reevaluate, she heads home to enter grad school and settle down. But her restless heart has other plans. Still searching for a place to call home—in every way—she travels solo to West Africa, immerses herself in counseling and teaching, and treks in the Himalayas. When she finds a love as wild as her wanderlust, Sue can heart and home finally be one? Heels to Hiking Boots is an extraordinary tapestry of self-growth, hard lessons, and inspiration for anyone yearning for a life of adventure and the courage to pursue what lights them up.

?An enchanting book?please read.? ?Dr. Jane Goodall, DBE; Founder of the Jane Goodall Institute & UN Messenger of PeaceIn this touching memoir about the relationship between father, daughter, and animals, Carole explores life after adopting thirteen pet Karakul lambs. Throughout her years with...  more

?An enchanting book?please read.? ?Dr. Jane Goodall, DBE; Founder of the Jane Goodall Institute & UN Messenger of PeaceIn this touching memoir about the relationship between father, daughter, and animals, Carole explores life after adopting thirteen pet Karakul lambs. Throughout her years with the lambs and her aging father, she comes to realize the distinct personality of each creature, and to understand more fully the almost spiritual bond between man and animals. This is a beautiful book in every way that will touch the hearts of readers everywhere.?In her new book, The Lambs, Carole George shares the fulfillment she has experienced over years tending a flock of sheep. I hope that this book will inspire readers to become more compassionate toward the living beings deprived of the many privileges we humans enjoy.? ?His Holiness The Dalai Lama ?The Lambs is beautifully written, and right on target as an example of the natural?pastoral?world where we may achieve the fullness of human experience. Our descendants may gravitate toward the equivalent of [Carole?s] Virginia farm.? ?Edward O. Wilson, University Research Professor Emeritus, Harvard University