When Lizzie Dowling, Queen Victoria’s Irish-born parlor maid, is found drowned near the Quarr Abbey ruins on the Isle of Wight, Julia, who happens to be vacationing there with her grandfather, examines the body over the objections of the local constabulary that the death was obviously accidental and a woman has no business messing with […]
In the mid-2010s, the author had a coveted position at a New York media company, family and friends on both coasts, and a romantic relationship. Under the shiny surface, however, life was not so bright: “I developed at an early age an exhausting habit of pathologically comparing myself to others and never measuring up in […]
Aurora begins to hope that the eccentric doomsday preppers’ mansion could be her forever home, but when the endless rains come, she begins to have doubts. Niko and Jada have BOBs, or “Bug-Out-Backpacks,” stashed in different rooms, and they train Aurora in disaster survival techniques, all while repeatedly moving to higher floors in their home […]
“Four acres, steel fence, two warehouses, three forklifts, one-thousand cars, and a junkyard dog”; for the temperamental, uneducated Harry Saunders, his new wrecking yard in the desert was an empire to command. His 9-year-old daughter, Robyn, wrenched from suburban life in Laguna Beach, California, warmed up to it more slowly. She began working the junkyard […]
Little Gnouf and Mirabelle—two “Gnoufs,” who look like pale-skinned children with snouts and animallike ears—are thrilled to be visiting the ocean for the first time. The pals are marveling at their surroundings when Mirabelle hears with her “magical ears” a far-off cry for help: It’s a baby whale trapped in a fishing net on the […]
In keeping with Romani traditions, young Marisol must enter an arranged marriage, though she’d rather stay with Mammie, Gran Rose, and her sister, Flora. Sneering “You’ll do what I want,” her future husband Levoy is abusive, just like Marisol’s father, so when both men are killed in a brawl at her wedding, Marisol isn’t heartbroken. […]
Laura is lucky—she’s recently received a Young Artists Grant to write her novel, right on the edge of turning 30. No one she remembers from high school writing classes or graduate humanities classes is making a living by writing. Despite her grant, Laura takes on odd jobs like teaching high school writing workshops. For 85 […]
Going with the idea that any household-name celebrity deserves a biography, this one gets the job done. Olivia Newton-John was born in Cambridge, England, in 1948; in 1954, her father accepted a job at the University of Melbourne, taking the family with him. After Newton-John’s mother gave her an acoustic guitar, the teenager started performing […]
In this sequel to Miller’s Out of Patients (2022), Dr. Norah Waters, approaching her 65th birthday, is planning to officially announce her impending retirement, which is scheduled to commence at the close of the year. The stress of caring for and worrying about patients has become exhausting. For the past five years, she’s been in […]
Sylvia—along with her faithful girlfriend, Charlie—arrives at the lake house of her university friend Karen. The secluded weeklong vacation is intended to be a much-needed reunion of their old friend group, which also includes reserved Esben, wild Quince, and caring Gry, who’s also brought her husband, Adam. After the first day among the “quiet and […]