The world is a recognizable place: there's a rich Nigerian boy who lounges around the family pool; a foster kid whose religious parents hide their true nature; an ambitious American politician; a tough London girl from a tricky family. But then a vital new force takes root and flourishes, causing their lives to converge with devastating effect. Teenage girls now have immense physical power--they can cause agonizing pain and even death. And, with this...

Looking back on her ninety years of life while waiting for the arrival of her children and grandchildren to the family summer home, Maude Chambliss recalls a life of wealth, friendship, love, and loss.

March Murray returns to her New England hometown with her teenage daughter, supposedly to attend the funeral of her old housekeeper, but in the back of her mind March knows she is headed for a reunion with Hollis, the boy she has loved since childhood.

Thirty-three-year-old Abby Stern is on track to marry Mark Medoff, her childhood summer sweetheart, a man she met at the weight-loss camp that her mother forced her to attend. Yet Abby can't escape the feeling that something isn't right or the memories of one thrilling night she spent with a man named Sebastian two years previously. When Abby gets a last-minute invitation to lead a cycling trip from NYC to Niagara Falls, she's happy to have a chance...

Georgia Chambers sifts through other people's pasts while trying to forget her own. Then her work as a fine china expert sends her to the place she swore she'd never revisit. To embrace her own life -- mistakes and all -- she'll have to find the courage to confront the ghosts of her past.

Jennifer Weiner has an amazing ability to find hope and humor, longing and love in the hidden corners of our common experiences. That talent shines like never before in this collection of short stories following the tender, and often hilarious, progress of love and relationships over the course of a lifetime. From a teenager coming to terms with her father's disappearance to a widow accepting two young women into her home, Weiner's eleven stories...

For Nina Askew, turning forty means freedom from the ex-husband whose career always came first and from their stuffy suburban home. Freedom to have her own apartment in the city, freedom to focus on what she wants for a change. --

Rose and Lily Winters are twins; they feel each other's emotions, taste what the other is tasting. They've struggled with their bodies and food since childhood, and high school finds them turning to food - or not - to battle the waves of insecurity and the yearning for popularity. But their connection can be as destructive as it is supportive when Rose stops eating and Lily starts consuming everything Rose won't or can't. Within a few years, Rose...

Forced to leave England and struggling with illness in the wake of a family tragedy, Quaker Honor Bright is forced to rely on strangers in the harsh landscape of 1850 Ohio and is compelled to join the Underground Railroad network to help runaway slaves escape to freedom.

As the owner of Twisted, one of Seattle's best salons, Erica knows that the sharpest cuts come from the people we love. She's terrified that she's losing her teen daughter, Summer, to her "other" family, especially to her stepmom, Allison. All it takes to blow up Allison's happy life is one collect call. From prison. Her beloved husband, Peter, has been arrested, leaving Allison pregnant, broke, scared and alone with a toddler. But when her stepdaughter...