-
Women are entering the national and international arena more than ever today, from political campaigns to corporate boards to entrepreneurship, and their success is showing. Statistics show that when women lead countries, those countries are less apt to go to war. There is also a positive correlation between the number of women on corporate boards and greater profits. Women entrepreneurs have also been shown to generate higher revenues and create more jobs than male entrepreneurs. In She Is Me, veteran journalist Lori Sokol, PhD, introduces readers to thirty-five women hailing from all walks of life who have successfully utilized qualities like compassion, empathy, introspection, and solidarity to create change and transform lives. Through interviews with women including Gloria Steinem, Billie Jean King, and Nobel Peace Prize recipient Leymah Gbowee, readers will come to understand how these traits, which have long been considered soft and weak in our patriarchal culture, are actually proving more effective in transforming lives, securing our planet, and saving the world. Author: Lori Sokol Publication Date: August 11, 2020 -
Praise for Book One of Savoring the Olde Ways: “Both a regional history and a cooking memoir, this is even more than the sum of its parts, and a celebration of living life every moment. Francophiles, history fans, and foodies will love this book.” —Booklist Join Carole Bumpus as she continues the culinary journey of Book One in Searching for Family and Traditions at the French Table, with her incomparable guide, Josiane, as they head north from Paris to Nord-Pas-de-Calais, Normandy, and Brittany, then drop into the Loire Valley before ending in the Auvergne. Sample family favorites and regional delights such as Flemish Potjevlesh, Algerian-influenced chicken tagine, moules (mussels) in cider and cream, salt-encrusted Lamb Grevin, Far Brêton, and Pâté de Pomme de Terre. Enjoy the music and antics of local festivals like La Bande de Pecheur (Gang of Fisherman), Feast of St. John, and the Blessing of the Fleet. Discover the wonder of troglodyte caves, wineries, and truffle farms in the Loire Valley. Then travel to Josiane’s family home, where you, too, can discover why food and family time are considered sacred in the Auvergne. And, all along the route, witness the impact WWI and WWII on the families profiled. Even seventy-five years later, the legacy of war remains—and yet, incredibly, the gift that each generation has handed down has been gratitude and a deep understanding of the importance of family. A compilation of personal stories, memorable moments, family secrets, and mouth-watering recipes, this French culinary travelogue is sure to find a prized place on the bookshelf of readers who love France—its food, its people, and its history. Author: Carole Bumpus Publication Date: August 18, 2020 -
“This is Raymond Chandler for feminists.” —Sharma Shields, author of The Cassandra Jane’s a very brave boy. And a very difficult girl. She’ll become a remarkable woman, an icon of her century, but that’s a long way off. Not my fault, she thinks, dropping a bloody crowbar in the irrigation ditch after Daddy. She steals Momma’s Ford and escapes to Depression-era San Francisco, where she fakes her way into work as a newspaper copy boy. Everything’s looking up. She’s climbing the ladder at the paper, winning validation, skill, and connections with the artists and thinkers of her day. But then Daddy reappears on the paper’s front page, his arm around a girl who’s just been beaten into a coma one block from Jane’s newspaper―hit in the head with a crowbar. Jane’s got to find Daddy before he finds her, and before everyone else finds her out. She’s got to protect her invented identity. This is what she thinks she wants. It’s definitely what her dead brother wants. Author: Shelley Blanton-Stroud Publication Date: June 23, 2020 -
At sixteen, Sharon leaves home to escape the limited life her parents have planned for her—it’s 1971 in Connecticut, and they think that, because she’s a girl, she should become a clerical office worker after high school and live at home until she marries and has a family. But Sharon wants to join the hippies and be part of the changing society, so she heads to California. Thrown into an adult world for which she is unprepared, she embarks on a precarious journey amid the 1970s counterculture. On her various adventures across the country and while living on a commune, with friends and lovers filtering in and out of her life, she realizes she must learn quickly in order to survive. In this colorful memoir, Sharon navigates difficult lessons as she searches for a place to belong. She reconciles her spirituality and her Catholic upbringing. Most important, she recognizes how the changes that reshaped her during the 1970s women’s movement have transformed society’s expectations for girls and women today. And through it all, she shares moments of triumph, joy, love, and awakening. Author: Sharon Dukett Publication Date: June 2, 2020 -
I’m So Glad You’re Here is a story of a family disrupted by the ramifications of a father’s mental illness. The memoir opens with a riveting account of Gay, age eighteen, witnessing her father being bound in a straitjacket and carried out on a stretcher to a state mental hospital. The trauma she experiences escalates when, after her father has electroshock treatments, her parents leave her in a college dorm room and make the move from Massachusetts to Florida without her. She feels abandoned: now both her parents have gone missing. While Gay moves on with her life, this trauma keeps resurfacing. And later, when she and her three much-older siblings show up for their father’s funeral, she witnesses her sundered family’s inability to gather together. Eventually, she is diagnosed with PTSD of abandonment and treated with EMDR therapy—and finally begins to heal. Poignant and powerful, I’m So Glad You’re Here is Gay’s exploration of the idea that while the wounds we carry from growing up in fractured families stay with us, they do not have to control us—a reflective journey that will inspire readers to think about their own relational lives. Author: Pamela Gay Publication Date: May 26, 2020 -
When Cindy moves to Thailand with her husband and teenage son, she finds herself strangely adrift in a foreign culture, unprepared for the challenges she encounters there. On an impulse she signs up for a conference where she unexpectedly meets a Thai Buddhist nun, Venerable Dhammananda Bhikkhuni, who leads her on a spiritual journey from which there is no turning back. Along the way she discovers the beauty of the Thai people and culture. This soulful and engaging memoir is the story of one woman’s journey of physical, emotional, and spiritual healing through her connection to a loving Buddhist teacher who fully accepts and nurtures her in a way her own mother never did. Finding Venerable Mother is a testimony to the power of faith, forgiveness, and love. Author: Cindy Rasicot Publication Date: May 12, 2020 -
The only thing reclusive bookworm Nora, high-powered attorney Christina, and supermom-in-training Leanne ever had in common was their best friend, Molly. When Molly dies, she leaves mysterious gifts and cryptic notes for each of her grieving best friends, along with one final request: that these three mismatched frenemies have brunch together every month for a year. Filled with heartwrenching scenes and witty prose, Brunch and Other Obligations explores the intricate dynamics of girlhood acquaintances who are forced to reconnect as women. This upbeat novel reminds readers that there’s hope for getting through the hard times in life—with a lot of patience, humor, and a standing brunch date. Author: Suzanne Nugent Publication Date: May 5, 2020 -
Jill Sherer Murray lived in a dead-end relationship into her forties before she finally let it go. She was like millions of women who struggle with whether to stay in a loveless marriage, a bad relationship, or give up on dating altogether, believing love isn’t in the cards. You may be struggling with a similar decision yourself. Perhaps you’re terrified of being single, and yet you don’t truly feel you’re living the life you want. With warmth and honesty, Murray shows you how letting go—of feeling stuck, afraid, and alone, and of believing what you’ve got is all you deserve—can free you from a life that isn’t serving you. She knows this is true, because she did it herself—and ultimately attracted the love and life she wanted. Through her story, other women’s stories, surprising facts and statistics, and helpful exercises, Big Wild Love will show you the way back to the self you’ve lost. It will put you on the path to change and teach you that, wherever you are, it’s never too late to start anew and find the Big Wild Love you deserve. Author: Jill Sherer Murray Publication Date: May 12, 2020 -
From the award-winning author of Eliza Waite comes a gripping tale of adventure and survival based on the true story of the ill-fated Donner Party on their 2,200-mile trek on the Oregon–California Trail from 1846 to ’47. Nineteen-year-old Ada Weeks confronts danger and calamity along the hazard-filled journey to California. After a fateful decision that delays the overlanders more than a month, she—along with eighty-one other members of the Donner Party—finds herself stranded at Truckee Lake on the eastern side of the Sierra Nevada Mountains, stuck there for the entirety of a despairing, blizzard-filled winter. Forced to eat shoe leather and blankets to survive, will Ada be able to battle the elements—and her own demons—as she envisions a new life in California? Researched with impeccable detail and filled with imagery as wide as the western prairie, Answer Creek blends history and hearsay in an unforgettable story of challenging the limits of human endurance and experiencing the triumphant power of love. Author: Ashley E. Sweeney Publication Date: May 19, 2020 -
April is a thoughtful yet sarcastic mother of two who tries her best to be a caring, connected mom in a middle-class culture where motherhood has become relentless. April rages at modern motherhood’s impossible pressures, her husband’s “Dad privilege,” and her kids’ incessant snack requests. She wants to enjoy motherhood, but her idealist vision and lived experience are in constant conflict with one another. Is she broken—or is motherhood? Desperate for an answer, she seeks out a therapist, and lands with an unexpected woman whose validation and wisdom gives April the clarity to reclaim herself and even start designing clothes—her pre-motherhood passion. But when the ever-elusive babysitter cancels last-minute, April finds herself back at square one. She seeks guidance, but her therapist is now dealing with her own crumbling marriage—and instead of counseling April, she convinces her to speed off to Las Vegas with her to help catch her husband cheating. With a little weed, alcohol, and topless pool hopping, plus a male stripper and some much-needed autonomy, the two find lost pieces of themselves that motherhood swallowed up.But neither one is prepared for how tested—and tempted—they will be, or for the life-altering choices their journey will force them to make. Who is guiding whom anymore? Author: Brandy Ferner Publication Date: May 5, 2020 -
In 1998, fiery Eleanor “Els” Gordon thought the new century would find her married to her childhood soul mate, rejuvenating her family’s Scottish Highlands estate, and finally earning a managing director title at her investment bank. Maybe she’d even have the courage to discover why her estranged mother ran home to Italy thirty years earlier. But when 2000 dawns, Els is mourning her fiancé and her father, and she’s unemployed, broke, and sharing an antique plantation house on the Caribbean island of Nevis with the ghost—or “jumbie”—of Jack Griggs, the former owner. Jack’s jumbie wangles Els’s help in making amends for wrongs committed during his Casanova life, and in exchange he appoints himself Cupid on behalf of a charter captain who’s as skittish about vulnerability as Els. Meanwhile, Els lures her mother to Nevis in hopes of unraveling the family secrets—but will the shocking truth set her free, or pull her fragile new happiness apart? A moving and lyrical novel that transports readers from lush tropics to rugged highlands and back again, The Moon Always Rising explores how the power of forgiveness can help even the most damaged person fix whatever is broken. Author: Alice C. Early Publication Date: April 21, 2020 -
Quest for Eternal Sunshine chronicles the triumphant, true story of Mendek Rubin, a brilliant inventor who overcame both the trauma of the Holocaust and decades of unrelenting depression to live a life of deep peace and boundless joy. Born into a Hassidic Jewish family in Poland in 1924, Mendek grew up surrounded by extreme anti-Semitism. Armed with an ingenious mind, he survived three horrific years in Nazi slave-labor concentration camps while virtually his entire family was murdered in Auschwitz. After arriving in America in 1946—despite having no money or professional skills—his inventions helped revolutionize both the jewelry and packaged-salad industries. Remarkably, Mendek also applied his ingenuity to his own psyche, developing innovative ways to heal his heart and end his emotional suffering. After Mendek died in 2012, his daughter, Myra Goodman, found an unfinished manuscript in which he’d revealed the intimate details of his healing journey. Quest for Eternal Sunshine—the extraordinary result of a posthumous father-daughter collaboration—tells Mendek’s whole story and is filled with eye-opening revelations, effective self-healing techniques, and profound wisdom that have the power to transform the way we live our lives. Authors: Mendek Rubin & Myra Goodman Publication Date: April 14, 2020 -
A chance meeting with a charismatic photographer will forever change Elizabeth’s life. Until she met Richard, Elizabeth's relationship with Georgia O’Keeffe and her little-known Hawaii paintings was purely academic. Now it’s personal. Richard tells Elizabeth that the only way she can truly understand O’Keeffe isn’t with her mind—it’s by getting into O’Keeffe’s skin and reenacting her famous nude photos. In the intimacy of Richard’s studio, Elizabeth experiences a new, intoxicating abandon and fullness. It never occurs to her that the photographs might be made public, especially without her consent. Desperate to avoid exposure—she’s a rising star in the academic world and the mother of young children—Elizabeth demands that Richard dismantle the exhibit. But he refuses. The pictures are his art. His property, not hers. As word of the photos spreads, Elizabeth unwittingly becomes a feminist heroine to her students, who misunderstand her motives in posing. To the university, however, her actions are a public scandal. To her husband, they’re a public humiliation. Yet Richard has reawakened an awareness that’s haunted Elizabeth since she was a child—the truth that cerebral knowledge will never be enough. Now she must face the question: How much is she willing to risk to be truly seen and known? Author: Barbara Linn Probst Publication Date: April 7, 2020 -
Jeremy Ivester is a transgender man. Thirty years ago, his parents welcomed him into the world as what they thought was their daughter. As a child, he preferred the toys and games our society views as masculine. He kept his hair short and wore boys’ clothing. They called him a tomboy. That’s what he called himself. By high school, when he showed no interest in flirting, his parents thought he might be lesbian. At twenty, he wondered if he was asexual. At twenty-three, he surgically removed his breasts. A year later, he began taking the hormones that would lower his voice and give him a beard—and he announced his new name and pronouns. Never a Girl, Always a Boy is Jeremy’s journey from childhood through coming out as transgender and eventually emerging as an advocate for the transgender community. This is not only Jeremy’s story but also that of his family, told from multiple perspectives—those of the siblings who struggled to understand the brother they once saw as a sister, and of the parents who ultimately joined him in the battle against discrimination. This is a story of acceptance in a world not quite ready to accept. Author: Jo Ivester Publication Date: April 21, 2020 -
All around us, older women flourish in industry, entertainment, and politics. Do they know something that we don’t, or are we all just trying to figure it out? For so many of us, our hearts and minds still feel that we are twenty-something young women who can take on the world. But in our bodies, the flexibility and strength that were once taken for granted are far from how we remember them. Every day we have to rise above the creaky joints and achy knees to earn the opportunity of moving through the world with a modicum of grace. Yet we do rise, because it’s a privilege to grow old, and every single day is a gift. Peter Pan’s mantra was “never grow up”; our collective mantra should be “never stop growing.” This collection of user-friendly stories, essays, and philosophies invites readers to celebrate whatever age they are with a sense of joy and purpose and with a spirit of gratitude. Author: Stephanie Raffelock Publication Date: April 28, 2020 -
Who is it we love and why do we love these people? Toward the end of her life, Judith asks these questions, trying to understand why she chose Elliot Pine to love. Why, for sixty years, did she persist in loving someone who never gave as much as he was given? In her quest for understanding, she writes her story to this exceptional man. Meeting as children in Chicago, they move to opposite coasts. Elliot embarks on a remarkable legal career in Washington and New York while Judith raises her children alone in California, after tragedy. Coming together again and again throughout their lives, their love is never equal, Elliot defining the terms of the relationship. Judith examines the role of Beauty in love, for Elliot's face and form were beautiful. She considers the role of Consolation, how they supported one another in devastating times. Insanity, Magic, Deceit, Sensory Fulfillment, and, finally, Being Seen―Judith looks at these many aspects of her love. Her feelings for this man cost her, impinged on every other relationship in her life: friends, her two husbands, even her three children. After sixty years, however, it all changes. Judith makes one more profound sacrifice, finally achieving a sort of long-awaited happiness in her love. Author: Elayne Klasson Publication Date: November 12, 2019 -
Rachel Levy Lesser can relive almost every significant life event through an accessory. A scarf, a pair of earrings, a bag, even a fleece pair of socks―each contains the elements that put together the story of a life. Life’s Accessories is a funny, sad, touching, relatable, shake-your-head-right-along-as-you-laugh-and-wipe-away-tears, coming-of-age memoir. In fourteen essays, Lesser tackles sensitive issues like anxiety, illness, and loss in a way that feels a bit like having a chat with a good friend. Out of the stories comes solid life―and fashion―advice. About far more than just a hair tie, a bracelet, or a belt, Life’s Accessories is a window into the many ways in which Lesser has come to understand life―in all of its beauty, its joys, its sorrows, its heartaches, its challenges, and its absurdity. Author: Rachel Levy Lesser Publication Date: November 5, 2019 -
Told alternately, by Colleen, an idealistic young white teacher; Frank, a black high school football player; and Evelyn, an experienced black teacher, Freedom Lessons is the story of how the lives of these three very different people intersect in a rural Louisiana town in 1969. Colleen enters into the culture of the rural Louisiana town with little knowledge of the customs and practices. She is compelled to take sides after the school is integrated―an overnight event for which the town’s residents are unprepared, and which leads to confusion and anxiety in the community―and her values are tested as she seeks to understand her black colleagues, particularly Evelyn. Why doesn’t she want to integrate the public schools? Frank, meanwhile, is determined to protect his mother and siblings after his father’s suspicious death―which means keeping a secret from everyone around him. Based on the author’s experience teaching in Louisiana in the late sixties, this heartfelt, unflinching novel about the unexpected effects of school integration during that time takes on the issues our nation currently faces regarding race, unity, and identity. Author: Eileen Harrison Sanchez Publication Date: November 12, 2019 -
In the United States, more than 15 million women are parenting children on their own, either by circumstance or by choice. Too often these moms who do it all have been misrepresented and maligned. Not anymore. In We Got This, seventy-five solo mom writers tell the truth about their lives—their hopes and fears, their resilience and setbacks, their embarrassments and triumphs. Some of these writers’ names will sound familiar, like Amy Poehler, Anne Lamott, and Elizabeth Alexander, while others are about to become unforgettable. Bound together by their strength, pride, and—most of all— their dedication to their children, they broadcast a universal and empowering message: You are not alone, solo moms—and your tenacity, courage, and fierce love are worthy of celebration. Author: Marika Lindholm et. al Publication Date: September 10, 2019 -
Meet Chris and Marty—a married couple working on their careers, raising their only child, and chasing big adventures. At midlife, they suddenly find themselves weighing the responsibility of parenthood against the possibility of one more grand adventure, before their aging bodies and the warming continent of Antarctica further degrade. They ultimately decide it’s time to pursue their biggest dream: Ski 570 miles from the edge of Antarctica to the South Pole. With no guide or resupply. From the lush Pacific Northwest to the barren landscape of Antarctica, Chris and Marty embark on one of the hardest challenges on the planet. After three years of intense planning and training, including meticulous preparations for the care of their twelve-year-old son, they are ready. Experience a boundless white wonderland like no other on earth. Encounter life-threatening dangers lurking in the bitter cold. Feel the intensity of 220-pound sleds, relentless wind, 40-below temperatures, and mind-numbing isolation. This is not an average couples getaway. Chris and Marty go where few others have dared on the way to making history—stretching their bodies, minds, and marriage to the limit in the process. Riveting and inspiring, The Expedition is about the power of family and community, the adventurous spirit that dwells within us all, and breaking through to feel fully alive. Author: Chris Fagan Publication Date: September 3, 2019 -
Joanna and Ev have been partners for ten years―in business and in love―when one of the only women in government in the Middle East invites their firm to design a children’s museum in Riyadh. Jo sees a chance to solidify her name in the design world, and help Saudi girls along the way, in the venture. Her husband, however, has no desire to work in a vigorously policed society; he prefers to remain in his workshop, fashioning gadgets for museum displays. Jo’s sister and young protégé share his doubts, but Ev accedes to Jo’s wishes. The process of bidding on the job soon throws their home office into chaos and challenges their long-held assumptions about the value of their work―and marriage. If they get the job, will their partnership survive the strain? Author: Sheila Grinell Publication Date: September 24, 2019 -
In Bowing to Elephants, a woman seeking love and authenticity comes to understand herself as a citizen of the world through decades of wandering the globe. During her travels she sees herself more clearly as she gazes into the feathery eyes of a 14,000-pound African elephant and looks for answers to old questions in Vietnam and the tragically ravaged landscape of Cambodia. Bowing to Elephants is a travel memoir with a twist―the story of an unloved rich girl from San Francisco who becomes a travel junkie, searching for herself in the world to avoid the tragic fate of her narcissistic, alcoholic mother. Haunted by images of childhood loneliness and the need to learn about her world, Dimond journeys to far-flung places―into the perfumed chaos of India, the nostalgic, damp streets of Paris, the gray, watery world of Venice in the winter, the reverent and silent mountains of Bhutan, and the gold temples of Burma. In the end, she accepts the death of the mother she never really had―and finds peace and her authentic self in the refuge of Buddhist practice. Author: Mag Dimond Publication Date: September 17, 2019 -
Many Hands Make Light Work is the rollicking true story of a family of nine children growing up in the college town of Ames, Iowa in the ’60s and ’70s. Inspiring, full of surprises, and laugh-out-loud funny, this utterly unique family champions diversity and inclusion long before such concepts become cultural flashpoints. Cheryl and her siblings are the offspring of an eccentric professor father and unflappable mother. Mindful of their ever-expanding family’s need for cash, her parents begin acquiring tumbledown houses in campus-town, to renovate and rent. Dad, who changes out of his suit and tie into a carpenter’s battered white overalls, like Clark Kent into Superman, is supremely confident his offspring can do anything, whether he’s there or not. Mom, an organizational genius disguised as a housewife, manages nine children so deftly that she finds the time―and heart―to take in student boarders, who stir their own offbeat personalities into this unconventional household. The kids, meanwhile, pour concrete, paint houses, and, at odd moments, break into song, because instead of complaining, they sing as they work, like a von Trapp family in painters caps. Free-wheeling and contagiously cheerful, Many Hands Make Light Work is a winsome memoir of a Heartland childhood unlike any other. Author: Cheryl Stritzel McCarthy Publication Date: August 6, 2019 -
Unflinchingly honest and darkly funny, this memoir will resonate with anyone facing the complicated reality of aging and illness in the United States. Elizabeth and her mother, Judy, have always had a complicated relationship. Now they face a confounding illness, as well as a labyrinthine healthcare system, at a complicated stage of life. Nothing is as it first seems in this riveting account of an unconventional mother-daughter journey—a journey that from the start poses questions about love, life, family, aging, healthcare, sex, and death. In Bound, Elizabeth Anne Wood addresses these questions as she chronicles the last eight months of her mother’s life—a period she comes to see, over the course of months, as a maternity leave in reverse: she is carrying her mother as she dies. Throughout their journey, Wood uses her notebook as a shield to keep unruly emotions at bay, often taking comfort in her role as advocate and forgetting to “be the daughter,” as one doctor reminds her to do. Meanwhile, her mother’s penchant for denial and childlike tendency toward magical thinking lead to moments of humor even as Wood battles the red tape of hospital bureaucracies, the frustration of planning in the midst of an unpredictable illness, and the unintentional inhumanity of a healthcare system that too often fails to see the person behind the medical chart. Author: Elizabeth Anne Wood Publication Date: August 13, 2019 -
Part culinary memoir and part travelogue, Carole Bumpus gathered this compilation of intimate interviews, conversations, stories, and traditional family recipes (cuisine pauvre) in the kitchens of French families as she traveled throughout the countryside. Travel with her through Champagne caves/wineries and historic cathedrals, local farmers’ markets, ancient potters’ guilds, and restaurant kitchens with wood-fire ovens. Learn how to make homemade Spinach-stuffed Tortellini with Bolognaise Sauce from the Champagne region, Crêpes and Watercress-stuffed Ravioli from the Lorraine, and Baekeofe and Kugelhopf from the Alsace. “Go blind” from the family stock of Eau de Vie liqueur and be treated to tales of foraging for snails for the infamous and now extinct Escargots Festival. And, on a somber note, listen to accounts of families forced from their communities during the German occupation of WWII in the Alsace and Lorraine, only to continue to struggle for survival after finally making their way home. This book is a compilation of stories about making ends meet; about people being grateful for all they had, even when they had almost nothing; about the sharing of family jokes and laughter; and about family trials and triumphs. This book is about people savoring the life they have been given. Author: Carole Bumpus Publication Date: July 23, 2019 -
In Riverton Falls, a small New England town, globe-trotting bartender Celeste Fortune stands in her kitchen puzzling over last night’s frightening dream—a woman at a window, lilacs blowing in the breeze, someone’s hands tight around her neck. Celeste is sure the dream belongs to someone else. Perhaps she has finally broken through to the collective dreams of Dreamland cult. Hoping her therapist and cult leader will help her untangle it, she heads off into the cold November morning to her final appointment with him—or so she hopes. Her estranged fiancé has delivered an ultimatum: Leave the cult of Dreamers, or end their relationship for good. Instead of help, however, Celeste discovers her therapist dying in a pool of blood, skull stove in by his own healing crystal. His computer, containing the intimate dreams and secrets of half the town, is gone. Suspicion immediately falls on Celeste, known to be a rebellious member of his cult. To clear her name, Celeste enlists the help of her old friend, Gloria, and the two women set out to find the real culprit. But in the middle of their hunt, the stolen dreams seemingly come to life, terrifying the town—and Celeste and Gloria become the killer’s next target. Author: Susan Z. Ritz Publication Date: July 16, 2019 -
It's 2014 and Amy Daughters is a forty-six-year old stay-at-home mom living in Dayton, Ohio. She returns to her hometown of Houston over the Thanksgiving holiday to discuss her parents’ estate—and finds herself hurled back in time. Suddenly, it’s 1978, and she is forced to spend thirty-six hours in her childhood home with her nuclear family, including her ten-year old self. Over the next day and a half she reconsiders every feeling she’s ever had, discusses current events with dead people, gets overserved at a party with her parent’s friends, and is treated to lunch at the Bonanza Sirloin Pit. Besides noticing that everyone is smoking cigarettes, she’s still jealous of her sister, and there is a serious lack of tampons in the house, Amy also begins to appreciate that memories are malleable, wholly dependent on who is doing the remembering. In viewing her parents as peers and her siblings as detached children, she redefines her difficult relationships with her family members and, ultimately, realizes that her life story matters and is profoundly significant—not so much to everyone else, perhaps, but certainly to her. Amy’s guide said her trip back in time wouldn’t change anything in the future, but by the time her thirty-six hours are up, she’s convinced that she’ll never be the same again. Publication Date: June 4, 2019 Author: Amy Weinland Daughters -
It's 1967, and Katherine Roebling is a Chicago-based stewardess caught between the hold of highflying travel and the call of her Native American ancestors just as the women’s movement is taking the US by storm. As she vacillates between an ever-present mystical ancestral feather and her alluring stewardess life of excitement and travel, she embarks on a journey from one adventure to the next—each episode bringing her closer to her predestined calling. A chance meeting with a college student from Athens, Greece at a Chicago Playboy Mansion Press Party and her visit to the Oracle of Delphi intertwine with Katherine's discovery of the treasure inside herself. Ultimately, she gains wings that allow her to glide over society’s barriers; she abandons the so-called glamorous life she’s been living, creates her own path, and embarks upon a new career at the Smithsonian in DC—one that will take her on a miraculous experience of personal growth and uncharted paths. Author: Judy Kundert Publication Date: June 18, 2019 -
When they were young, Susan and Edna, children of Holocaust refugee parents, were inseparable; Edna was Susan’s first love and constant companion. But as they grew up and Edna’s physical, and mental challenges altered the ways she could develop, a gulf formed between them. Susan’s life became even more complicated when, just short of her sixteenth birthday, she learned that she’d been born without a uterus and would never menstruate or give birth to children. As she coped with this trauma, Edna continued loving her unconditionally, as she always had. In her adult years Edna lived a life of dignity in a spiritual community, becoming a model for how Susan could live hers. In her forties, Susan realized her dream of motherhood when she adopted a daughter. Throughout, Edna remained a teacher and loving presence in her sister’s life. Encompassing Susan and Edna’s lifelong, complex, intertwining relationship, Edna’s Gift has a powerful message: life may be unpredictable, even traumatic—but if you remain open, strength and wisdom will come to you from surprising and unexpected sources. Publication Date: June 4, 2019 Author: Susan Rudnick -
In this richly depicted story, told in vignettes relative to markers of age and experience, Patricia Eagle reveals the heartbreak and destruction of her sexual abuse, from age four to thirteen, by her father. A victim of her father’s anger and her mother’s complacency with his abusive behavior, Eagle uses dissociation and numbing in response to the abuse, and as a way to block her own sense of self. How does a child confused by episodes of abuse come to know what is safe or unsafe, right or wrong, normal or abnormal? How does a young woman learn the difference between real love and a desire for sexual pleasure stimulated by abusive childhood sexual experiences? Careening through life, Eagle wonders how to trust others and, most importantly, herself. As a mature woman struggling to understand and live with her past, she remains earnest in her pursuit of clarity, compassion, and trust to build a stronger life. Being Mean is about blocking sexual abuse memories, having them surface, then learning how to acknowledge and live with incomprehensible experiences in the healthiest ways possible. Author: Patricia Eagle Publication Date: June 11, 2019 -
Some truths can do more harm than good. This is what Isa comes to believe at the tender age of nine when she first has a dream about kissing a girl—an act that would never be acceptable to her family. By her late twenties, Isa has left her hometown in South Texas, so her conservative family won't discover that she’s gay, and immersed herself in the workaholic routine of law school. One fateful night, she experiments with a man, and subsequently ended up with an unwanted pregnancy. Meanwhile, Isa’s only sister, Cristina, loses the infant she spent years trying to conceive. Moving forward with her own pregnancy and giving the baby to Cristina seems like the perfect solution—until Isa bonds with the newborn. Still, the sisters move forward with the family adoption. Now everyone in the family has a secret. Twelve years later, after much deceit and loss has passed between the sisters, Isa decides to reveal both her sexuality and her niece’s true parentage to their family, against Cristina’s wishes—but before all can be exposed, tragedy strikes. Timely and gripping, Profound and Perfect Things is a story of two first-generation Mexican-American sisters striving to build a meaningful existence outside their traditional parent’s approval and ways of life—and an exploration of the boundaries of our responsibilities to those we love. Author: Maribel Garcia Publication Date: May 14, 2019 -
In 1923, seventeen-year-old “Esther Grünspan arrives in Köln with a hardened heart as her sole luggage.” Thus she begins a twenty-two-year journey, woven against the backdrops of the European Holocaust and the Hindu Kali Yuga (the “Age of Darkness” when human civilization degenerates spiritually), in search of a place of sanctuary. Throughout her travails, using cunning and shrewdness, Esther relies on her masterful tailoring skills to help mask her heritage, navigate war-torn Europe, and emigrate to India. Esther’s traveling companion and the novel’s narrator is Ganesha, the elephant-headed Hindu God worshipped by millions for his abilities to destroy obstacles, bestow wishes, and avenge evils. Impressed by Esther’s fortitude and relentless determination, born of her deep—though unconscious—understanding of the meaning and purpose of love, Ganesha, with compassion, insight, and poetry, chooses to highlight her story because he recognizes it is all of everyone’s stories—for truth resides at the essence of its telling. Weaving Eastern beliefs and perspectives with Western realities and pragmatism, Guesthouse for Ganesha is a tale of love, loss, and spirit reclaimed. Author: Judith Teitelman Publication Date: May 7, 2019 -
Jess Lawson, a forty-five-year-old healthcare consultant, wife, and mother of two, has spent most of her adulthood fostering the illusion of having a perfect life. Her impending empty-nest syndrome as her youngest child prepares to start college is troubling enough, but when her doctor husband, Arthur, announces his intention to take a prestigious new job on the other side of the country—and relocate with-out Jess—her world quickly crumbles. Amid their acrimonious divorce, revelations about Arthur's infidelity come to light; and at work, instead of the revitalized ca-reer Jess is hoping for, she uncovers surprising financial corruption that threatens a scandal for her client—and the well-being of the many unsuspecting patients and physicians they serve. Ultimately, this superwoman is forced to acknowledge that her put-together veneer can't hold up under the weight of these new burdens. She also, however, refuses to wallow in victimhood. So what now? A smart, relatable story for every woman who’s gone bold to sort out her next chapter, A Better Next shows how—with a little soul searching and a supportive circle of friends and colleagues—it’s possible to redefine happiness and establish a liberating, new normal at any stage of life. Author: Maren Cooper Publication Date: May 28, 2019 -
The Parrot’s Perch opens in 2013, when Karen Keilt, age sixty, receives an invitation to testify at the Brazilian National Truth Commission at the UN in New York. The email sparks memories of her “previous life”—the one she has kept safely bottled up for more than thirty-seven years. Hopeful of helping to raise awareness about ongoing human rights violations in Brazil, she wants to testify, but she anguishes over reliving the horrific events of her youth. In the pages that follow, Keilt tells the story of her life in Brazil—from her exclusive, upper-class lifestyle and dreams of Olympic medals to her turmoil-filled youth. Full of hints of a dark oligarchy in Brazil, corruption, crime, and military interference, The Parrot’s Perch is a searing, sometimes shocking true tale of suffering, struggle—and survival. Karen Keilt lived through the darkest days of Brazil’s military dictatorship. In her courageous and compelling memoir, Keilt narrates an emotionally honest reckoning of her desire to find true happiness. Forbidden by her wealthy family to even mention her imprisonment, torture, and rape, Keilt is forced to make a change that will affect the rest of her life. Seen through her testimony to the Brazilian National Truth Commission at the UN, readers become witnesses to both her vulnerability and her quiet strength. Author: Karen Keilt Publication Date: April 16, 2019 -
Dena was a busy midwife trapped on the hamster wheel of working motherhood. Adam was an eccentric Buddhist yogi passing as a hard-working dad. Bella was fourteen and wanted to be normal. Sophia was up for anything that involved skipping school. Together, they shouldered backpacks, walked away from their California life of all-night births, carpool schedules, and Cal Skate, and criss-crossed India and Nepal for eight months—a journey that led them to His Holiness the Dalai Lama, the tree where the Buddha sat, and the arms of Amma the Divine Mother. From the banks of the Ganges to the Himalayan roof of the world, this enthralling memoir is an unforgettable odyssey, a moving meditation on modern family life, and a spiritual quest, written with humor and honesty—and filled with love and awe. Author: Dena Moes Publication Date: April 2, 2019 -
“Devilishly sharp… a masterful balance of psychological excavation and sumptuous description.” —Kirkus Reviews An only child, Deborah Burns grew up in prim 1950s America in the shadow of her beautiful, unconventional, rule-breaking mother, Dorothy—a red-haired beauty who looked like Rita Hayworth and skirted norms with a style and flare that made her the darling of men and women alike. Married to the son of a renowned Italian family with ties to the underworld, Dorothy fervently eschewed motherhood and domesticity, turning Deborah over to her spinster aunts to raise while she was the star of a vibrant social life. As a child, Deborah revered her charismatic mother, but Dorothy was a woman full of secrets with a troubled past—a mistress of illusion whose love seemed just out of her daughter’s grasp. In vivid, lyrical prose, Saturday’s Child tells the story of Deborah’s eccentric upbringing and her quest in midlife, long after her parents’ death, to uncover the truth about her mother and their complex relationship. No longer under the spell of her maternal goddess, but still caught in a wrenching cycle of love and longing, Deborah must finally confront the reality of her mother’s legacy—and finally claim her own. Author: Deborah Burns Publication Date: April 9, 2019 -
Samantha—the fashionable wife of a successful businessman and doting mother of one—struggles to negotiate the spheres of intimacy between her husband and her family of origin. Samantha loves her husband, Richard, and she loves her sister, Elizabeth. But the two of them can barely exist in the same room, which has caused the entire family years of emotional distress. Yet it’s not until Samantha’s sister is diagnosed at age forty-three with lung cancer that her family and her marriage are tipped into full-blown crisis. A story of love, loss, forgiveness, learning to live with grief, and healing, Appearances will resonate with anyone who has ever experienced tension in their familial relationships—even as it serves as a poignant reminder that no amount of privilege can protect us from family conflicts, marital difficulty, or mortality. Author: Sondra Helene Publication Date: April 9, 2019 -
"Maureen reminds us to pay attention and follow the signs and signals of the Universe that lead us to the life of our dreams. To remember, even in the midst of the depths of despair, that endings are always beginnings, that we are writing our own stories in collaboration with the Divine Creator that lives within us, to never give up when the chips are down, because the Goddess will burn down our limited expectations and deliver something bigger, badder, and bolder than we could ever dream of ourselves." —Cathy Richardson, lead singer Jefferson Starship This story begins with an ending: the day Maureen Muldoon realized the devastating fact that her husband was having an affair—and leaving her for Miss Universe. Miss freaking Universe! How does this even happen? An intimate examination of Muldoon’s unraveling in the face of this betrayal, A Spiritual Vixen’s Guide to An Unapologetic Life takes a fresh, funny and fearless look at loss, denial, anger, grace, and liberation. Muldoon reveals the strength that comes from facing one’s fears, the humor that arrives in the darkest hours, and the miracles that happen when you least expect them in this grand tapestry of tales from the dark side. Ultimately, with wit and wisdom, she walks herself out of hell in a pair of sexy stilettos and manages to do what the all the king’s horse and all the king’s men could not: she puts herself back together. And in doing so, she comes to find more beauty and strength in the fractured places than anyone would have ever imagined. Author: Maureen Muldoon Publication Date: November 20, 2018 -
Jaded New York City Public Defender Liana Cohen would give anything to have one client in whom she can believe. Dozens of hardened criminals and repeat offenders have chipped away at her faith in both herself and the system. Her boyfriend Jakob’s high-powered law firm colleagues see her do-gooder job as a joke, which only adds to the increasing strain in their relationship. Enter imprisoned felon Danny Shea, whose unforgivable crime would raise a moral conflict in an attorney at the height of her idealism―and that hasn't been Liana in quite a while. But Danny's astonishing blend of good looks, intelligence, and vulnerability intrigues Liana. Could he be the client she’s been longing for―the wrongly accused in need of a second chance? Is he innocent? As their attorney-client relationship transforms into something less than arm’s length, Liana is forced to confront fundamental questions of truth, faith, and love―and to decide who she wants to be. Author: Reyna Marder Gentin Publication Date: November 13, 2018 -
Can you come sit at the table? Tammy Letherer’s husband of twelve years spoke these words on a Tuesday night, just before Christmas, after he had put their three children in bed. He had a piece of paper and two fingers of scotch in front of him. As he read from the list in his hand, his next words would shatter her world and destroy every assumption she'd ever made about love, friendship, and faithfulness. In The Buddha at My Table, Letherer describes―in honest, sometimes painful detail―the dismantling of a marriage that encompasses the ordinary and the surreal, including the night she finds a silent, smiling Thai monk sitting at the same dining room table. It’s this unexpected visitation, this personification of peace, that sticks with her as she listens to her husband reveal hurtful, shocking things―that he never loved her, he doesn’t believe in monogamy, and he wants to “wrap things up” with her in four weeks―and allows her to find the blessing in her husband’s betrayal. Ultimately, it’s when she realizes that she is participating in her life, not at its mercy, that she discovers the path to freedom. Author: Tammy Letherer Publication Date: October 16, 2018 -
After seven years of faithfully following her Buddhist teacher, Renee Linnell realized she had been severely brainwashed. She had graduated magna cum laude with a double degree. She had traveled to nearly fifty countries alone before she turned thirty-five. She was a surf model and a professional tango dancer. She had started five different companies and was getting an MBA from NYU. How did someone like her end up in a cult?The Burn Zone is an exploration of how we give up our power— how what started out as a need to heal from the loss of her parents and to understand the big questions in life could leave a young woman fighting for her sanity and her sense of self. Part inspirational story, part cautionary tale, this is a memoir for spiritual seekers and those who feel lost in a world that makes them feel like they don’t belong.Author: Renee Linnell Publication Date: October 9, 2018 -
Valeria Vose: A Novel takes a reader deep inside the cultural and emotional life of a 1970’s southern woman. Privileged, approaching age forty, her “perfect” life is shattered. Determined to survive, she’s forced to confront all preconceived values and expectations in order to find a path toward creative, spiritual independence and her true identity. Author: Alice Bingham Gorman Publication Date: October 2, 2018 -
"Skip Sunday School and read this book instead! Join Bella LaVey on her unflinching journey through the underworld of sex, where the mingling of pleasure and pain reopen the childhood wound of love withheld and eventually lead to healing. Defined by compassion, humor, and violence, Fetish Girl proves that the spiritual path can be one of adventure, startling discovery, and large men in pink tutus. A moving and courageous book, full of outcasts and deviants--the kind of folks Jesus called friends.” —Donna M. Johnson, author of Holy Ghost Girl: A Memoir Fetish Girl is a kinky roller coaster ride through addiction, violence, motherhood, sex, and the creation of Evil Kitty, Bella LaVey’s larger-than-life dominatrix persona. It is a singular memoir that shows that a heavily tatted BDSM sex worker can be courageous enough to come to terms with her painful truths and raise a healthy, loving child, even as she remains boldly sexual and authentic. It’s the story of a woman attracted to extremes who is willing to go to great lengths to uncover and make peace with her true nature. Author: Bella LaVey Publication Date: November 13, 2018 -
Named as a Best Book of 2018 by Kirkus Reviews Being kind is something most of us do when it’s easy and when it suits us. Being kind when we don’t feel like it, or when all of our buttons are being pushed, is hard. But that’s also when it’s most needed; that’s when it can defuse anger and even violence, when it can restore civility in our personal and virtual interactions. Kindness has the power to profoundly change our relationships with other people and with ourselves. It can, in fact, change the world. In A Year of Living Kindly―using stories, observation, humor, and summaries of expert research―Donna Cameron shares her experience committing to 365 days of practicing kindness. She presents compelling research into the myriad benefits of kindness, including health, wealth, longevity, improved relationships, and personal and business success. She explores what a kind life entails, and what gets in the way of it. And she provides practical and experiential suggestions for how each of us can strengthen our kindness muscle so choosing a life of kindness becomes ever easier and more natural. An inspiring, practical guide that can help any reader make a commitment to kindness, A Year of Living Kindly shines a light on how we can create a better, safer, and more just world―and how you can be part of that transformation. Author: Donna Cameron Publication Date: September 25, 2018 -
A Readers' Favorite Book Award Finalist and Best Book Awards Finalist * Featured in Ms. Magazine, Brit + Co, Hypertext Magazine, BookTrib, Publishers Weekly, Writer's Digest and more! An enthralling historical novel about brave women set during the peak of the Vietnam War and told through the rare perspective of a young woman, who traces her path to self-discovery and a “Coming of Conscience.” If you loved Kristin Hannah's latest novel The Women, this one's for you. On September 14, 1969, Private First Class Judy Talton celebrates her nineteenth birthday by secretly joining the campus anti-Vietnam War movement. In doing so, she jeopardizes both the army scholarship that will secure her future and her relationship with her military family. But Judy’s doubts have escalated with the travesties of the war. Who is she if she stays in the army? What is she if she leaves? When the first date pulled in the Draft Lottery turns up as her birthday, she realizes that if she were a man, she’d have been Number One―off to Vietnam with an under-fire life expectancy of six seconds. The stakes become clear, propelling her toward a life-altering choice as fateful as that of any draftee. Judy’s story speaks to the poignant clash of young adulthood, early feminism, and war, offering an ageless inquiry into the domestic politics of protest when the world stops making sense. Author: Rita Dragonette Publication Date: September 18, 2018 -
Odessa, Odessa follows the families of two sons from a proud lineage of rabbis and cantors in a shtetl near Odessa (now Ukraine, in what was then part of western Russia). It begins as Henya, wife of Rabbi Mendel Kolopsky, considers an unexpected pregnancy and the hardships ahead for the children she already has. Soon after the child is born, Cossacks ransack the Kolopskys’ home, severely beating Mendel. In the aftermath, he tells Henya that, contrary to his brother Shimshon’s belief that socialism is their ticket to escaping the region’s brutal anti-Semitic pogroms, he still believes America holds the answer. Henya, meanwhile, understands that any future will be perilous: she now knows their baby daughter, who has slept through this night of melee, is surely deaf. So begins a beautifully told story that unfolds over decades of the 20th century―a story in which two families, joined in tradition and parted during persecution, will remain bound by their fateful decision to leave Odessa. Author: Barbara Artson Publication Date: September 11, 2018 -
“…Animal antics are on full, delightful display throughout these pages—and so is the pain of losing them, always affectingly related by the author.” —Kirkus Reviews Mary Carlson didn't start out to become a veterinarian, let alone the owner and caretaker of cats (many), dogs (two, both huskies), and horses (some with manners, some without) in Colorado. She was a suburban Chicago girl; all she knew of the American West came from the stories her uncle, who had settled in northern Colorado, told her during his annual visits. But thanks to him, she ended up moving to Fort Collins, Colorado for college―and after falling in love with a man she'd become friends with in her final year of college, when he was a student at the CSU School of Veterinary Medicine, she remained there. Watching the work Earl did as a veterinarian inspired Mary to eventually leave her tenured teaching position and enter vet school, after which she opened her own, feline-exclusive clinic. Along the way, there were numerous pets, grueling years of vet school, a shattered hip, an enduring love, illness, and death―and the rediscovery that life, especially a life full of delightful animals, is worth living. Author: Mary Carlson, DVM Publication Date: August 28, 2018 -
From the outside, Vanya’s childhood looked idyllic: she rode horses with her father in the solitude of the Sierra Nevada Mountains and attended flamboyant operas with her mother in the city. But life for Vanya and her family turned dark when ghosts from her father’s service on a Pacific destroyer in World War II tore her family apart. Set in postwar California, this is the story of a girl who tried to make sense of her parents’ unpredictable actions―from being left to lie in her own blood-soaked diaper while her Christian Scientist mother prayed, refusing to get medical help to watching her father writhe on his bed in the detox ward, his hands and feet tethered with leather straps―by immersing herself in the beauty and solitude of the wilderness around her. It was only decades later, when memories began to haunt her, that Vanya was able to look back with unflinching honesty and tender compassion for her family and herself. In this elegant, haunting narrative, Erickson invites us to witness it all―from the gripping, often disturbing, truths of her childhood to her ultimate survival. Author: Vanya Erickson Publication Date: August 21, 2018
