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Forward INDIEFAB Gold Medal for Literary Fiction and Bronze Medal for Historical Fiction Readers’ Favorite Gold Medal for Literary fiction IPPY (Independent Publishers Book Awards): Gold Medal for European Fiction Spanning a century and three continents, Even in Darkness tells the story of Kläre Kohler, whose early years as a dutiful daughter of a prosperous German-Jewish family hardly anticipate the often-harrowing life she faces as an adult—a saga of family, a lover, two world wars, a concentration camps and the unconventional life she builds in post-war Germany. As the world changes around her, Kläre makes boundary-crossing choicesin order to protect the people she loves—and to save herself. Based on a true story, Even in Darkness highlights the intimate experience of Kläre’s reinvention as she faces the destruction of life as she knew it, and traces her path beyond survival to wisdom, meaning, and—most unexpectedly—love. Author: Barbara Stark-Nemon Publication Date: April 7, 2015 -
Shortlisted for the 2016 William Saroyan International Prize for Writing “Faint Promise of Rain is a gorgeous book, a story that is at once spare and lush, wrenching and restoring. The characters are so fully realized, so keenly nuanced, that they linger with you long after the last page, like the sweet smell of a recent storm.” —Bret Anthony Johnston, author of Remember Me Like This and Director of Creative Writing at Harvard University It is 1554 in the desert of Rajasthan, and a new Mughal emperor is expanding his territory. In a family of Hindu temple dancers a daughter, Adhira, must carry on her family’s sacred tradition. Her father, against his wife and sons’ protests, insists Adhira “marry” the temple deity and give herself to a wealthy patron. But after one terrible evening, she makes a brave choice that carries her family’s story and their dance to a startling new beginning. Told from the perspective of this exquisite dancer and filled with the sounds, sights and flavors of the Indian desert, Faint Promise of Rain is the story of a family and a girl caught between art, duty, and fear in a changing world. Author: Anjali Mitter Duva Publication Date: October 7, 2014 -
With its delightful adaptation of Napoleon Bonaparte’s real attempt to write romantic fiction, Finding Napoleon: A Novel offers a fresh take on Europe’s most powerful man after he’s lost everything—except his last love. A forgotten woman of history—the audacious Countess Albine—helps narrate their tale of intrigue, desire, and betrayal. After the defeated Emperor Napoleon goes into exile on tiny St. Helena Island in the remote South Atlantic, he and his lover, Albine de Montholon, plot to escape and rescue his young son. Banding together enslaved Africans, British sympathizers, a Jewish merchant, a Corsican rogue, and French followers, they confront British opposition—as well as treachery within their own ranks—with sometimes subtle, sometimes bold, but always desperate action. Amid his passions and intrigues, Napoleon finishes his real novel Clisson that he started writing as a young man. Now it's a father's message to the young son whom his enemies took from him, but how can they get it to the boy? When Napoleon and Albine break faith with one another, ambition and Albine’s husband threaten their reconciliation. To succeed, Napoleon must learn whom to trust. To survive, Albine must decide whom to betray. This elegant, richly researched novel reveals the Napoleon history conceals and the Countess Albine history has forgotten. Publication Date: April 6, 2021 Author: Margaret Rodenberg -
A fictional diary set in interwar Germany and Spain allows us to peek into the life of Klara Philipsborn, the only Communist in her merchant-class, German-Jewish family.Klara’s first visit to Seville in 1925 opens her eyes and her spirit to an era in which Spain’s major religions, Judaism, Christianity, and Islam, shared deep cultural connections. At the same time, she is made aware of the harsh injustices that persist in Spanish society. By 1930, she has landed a position with the medical school in Madrid. Though she feels compelled to hide her Jewish identity in her predominantly Christian new home, she finds that she feels less “different” in Spain than she did in Germany, especially as she learns new ways of expressing her opinions and desires. And when the Spanish Civil War erupts in 1936, Klara (now “Clara”) enlists in the Fifth Regiment, a step that transports her across the geography of the embattled peninsula and ultimately endangers a promising relationship and even Clara’s life itself. A blending of thoroughly researched history and engrossing fiction, Home So Far Away is an epic tale that will sweep readers away. Author: Judith Berlowitz Pub Date: June 21, 2022 -
When Ida and her daughter Bessie flee a catastrophic pogrom in Ukraine for America in 1905, they believe their emigration will ensure that their children and grandchildren will be safe from harm. But choices and decisions made by one generation have ripple effects on those who come later—and in the decades that follow, family secrets, betrayals, and mistakes made in the name of love threaten the survival of the family: Bessie and Abe Weissman’s children struggle with the shattering effects of daughter Ruby’s mental illness, of Jenny’s love affair with her brother-in-law, of the disappearance of Ruby’s daughter as she flees her mother’s legacy, and of the accidental deaths of Irene’s husband and granddaughter. A sweeping saga that follows three generations from the tenements of Brooklyn through WWII, from Woodstock to India, and from Spain to Israel, How to Make a Life is the story of a family who must learn to accept each other’s differences—or risk cutting ties with the very people who anchor their place in the world. Author: Florence Reiss Kraut Publication Date: October 13, 2020 -
2015 American Library Association: Winner, Over the Rainbow Book “Coffey has created a stimulating interpretation of the Freud family through Anna’s eyes.” —Kirkus Reviews “Mental health journalist Coffey’s (Unspeakable Truths and Happy Endings) effective creation of Anna’s cool, somewhat clinical voice will hold the attention of readers already curious about the Freuds or psychoanalytic theory.” —Library Journal There are several serviceable biographies about child psychoanalyst Anna Freud, who lived from 1895 to 1982. But as a fictional memoir, Hysterical is the first novel to reveal Anna’s secrets—and two are blockbusters: 1) At around the time that the young Anna began having intense “friendships” with other women, her father Sigmund began psychoanalyzing her—dissecting her dreams, memories, and, most disturbingly, her sexual fantasies, and writing about them; 2) While Anna publicly supported her father’s “wisdom” about lesbianism and remained his favorite family member, she enjoyed a monogamous relationship with Tiffany fortune heiress Dorothy Burlingham for fifty-four years. Weaving a good story out of a pile of crazy facts, Hysterical lets Anna freely examine the forces that shaped her. Author: Rebecca Coffey Publication Date: May 13, 2014 -
2016 Best Book Awards: Fiction: Multicultural Finalist “In a Silent Way offers a moving portrayal of a committed, young teacher-activist, Jeanna, who is determined to effect change in her urban school and community. Jeanna's culturally relevant and inclusive pedagogy, and her determination to never give up on her students, ultimately wins their respect and admiration. All the while, Hetzel makes sure to shine a much needed light on undemocratic practices and unequal gendered power dynamics in social and racial justice movements.” ―Jonathan Kozol, education activist and award-winning author of Death at an Early Age and Savage Inequalities: Children in American Schools In a Silent Way chronicles the coming of age in the late sixties of young Jeanna Kendall as she quietly facilitates a close-knit community of learners in a progressive urban school, grapples with racism and sexism within her community activist group, and experiences the extreme highs and lows of her first intimate relationship—which happens to be with a revered and powerful community leader. Jeanna encounters all the same issues we confront today: youth of color demeaned and destroyed, wise community elders discounted by leaders who “know better,” and the “sexploitation” of women in the movement. Gradually overwhelmed by the mounting challenges she faces on all fronts, and on the verge of a breakdown, a crisis emerges within her movement group that transforms everything and everyone and opens up a new world of possibilities—ones deeply relevant to us today. Author: Mary Jo Hetzel Publication Date: October 18, 2016 -
2015 Best Book Awards Finalist in Women’s Fiction 2016 International Book Award Finalist in Fiction: General 2016 Indie Excellence Finalist in General Fiction When English major Nora Plowright finds herself staring at college graduation as if at the edge of a cliff, she decides to become a newspaper reporter—and right away, she manages to get a job at a local paper (which you could still do in 1978). Although fearful by nature, Nora pursues a tip from a stranger and soon is investigating corruption at the Maryland State Highway Authority regarding the controversial placement of a major highway. The developing scandal, with its shady “players,” tests both her budding reportorial skills and her appetite for danger. Also, her passion for storytelling makes it increasingly difficult for her to stick to the facts. Honest and humorous, Just the Facts is a coming-of-age novel about finding one’s way in the real world that will resonate with anyone who has struggled with figuring out what to do when she or he grows up. Publication Date: September 8, 2015 -
Twenty-year-old Kate is poised to launch into a long-anticipated life of independence when Britain declares war in 1939. After that announcement, her dream of escaping the London suburb she grew up in and pursuing a singing career is quashed: she must stay put with her family and prepare for bombing and possible invasion by Germany. Living in these anxious times, Kate strives to achieve balance in her life, though a speech disability interferes with her singing and a failed romance adds to her distress. But when a young Jewish girl whose parents have been deported comes to her for help, Kate’s goals change. Taking on a responsibility she never could have imagined, she learns that freedom and survival cannot be taken for granted—and as new responsibilities outweigh earlier goals, she learns that assisting others to escape unspeakable evil requires new perspective, as well as courage she didn’t know she had. Author: Linda Stewart Henley Publication Date: April 9th, 2024 -
It’s 1977 and Cassie Lyman, a graduate student in women’s history, is struggling to find a topic for her doctoral dissertation. When she discovers a trove of drawings, suffrage cartoons, letters, and diaries at Smith College belonging to Kate Easton, founder of the Birth Control League of Massachusetts in 1916, she believes she has located her subject. Digging deeper into Kate’s life, Cassie learns that she and Kate are related—closely. Driven to understand why her family has never spoken of Kate, Cassie travels to Cape Ann to attend her sister’s shotgun wedding, where she questions her female relatives about Kate—only to find herself soon afterward in the same challenging situation Kate faced. Publication Date: May 11, 2021 Author: Ames Sheldon -
Gold Medal IPPY Winner in Religious Fiction Finalist in the novel/fiction category of the Next Generation Indie Book Award Winner: Best Religious Fiction, International Book Award 2017 The Divine Shekinah seeks deliverance from exile to heal a world desperately in need of Her wisdom. Her chosen mission keepers, three generations of kabbalists from places as diverse as a 19th century Polish shtetl and modern day Israel/Palestine, must grapple with profound injustices and the shadows of humanity. If they choose the path of righteousness, love, and forgiveness, Her light can return to the world. Will the mission succeed? Will the divine feminine return to this world? The Shekinah calls to all of us to find our own way to ‘knit the world back together.’ Author: Leah Chyten Publication Date: May 16, 2017 -
“Little Woman in Blue is an inspiring and engaging fictional portrait of the artist May Alcott, written with knowledge, sensitivity, and beauty. It is wonderful to see May Alcott gain the center of her own story, and inhabit it with such generosity and grace.” —Harriet Scott Chessman, author of Lydia Cassatt Reading the Morning Paper May Alcott spends her days sewing blue shirts for Union soldiers, but she dreams of painting a masterpiece—which many say is impossible for a woman—and of finding love, too. When she reads her sister’s wildly popular novel, Little Women, she is stung by Louisa’s portrayal of her as “Amy,” the youngest of four sisters who trades her desire to succeed as an artist for the joys of hearth and home. Determined to prove her talent, May makes plans to move far from Massachusetts and make a life for herself with room for both watercolors and a wedding dress. Can she succeed? And if she does, what price will she have to pay? Based May Alcott’s letters and diaries, as well as memoirs written by her neighbors, Little Woman in Blue puts May at the center of the story she might have told about sisterhood and rivalry in an extraordinary family. Author: Jeannine Atkins Publication Date: September 8, 2015 -
“. . . amazing, heart-grabbing, and stunning . . .” —Readers’ Favorite, 5-star review June 1941. Hitler’s armies race toward vulnerable Leningrad. In a matter of weeks, the Nazis surround the city, cut off the food supply, and launch a vicious bombardment. Widowed violinist Sofya Karavayeva and her teenage granddaughter, Yelena, are cornered in the crumbling city. On Leningrad’s outskirts, Admiral Vasili Antonov defends his homeland and fights for a future with Sofya. Meanwhile, Yelena’s soldier fiancé transports food across the Ice Road— ;part of the desperate effort to save Leningrad. With their help, the two women inch toward survival, but the war still exacts a steep personal price, even as Sofya’s reckoning with a family secret threatens to finish what Hitler started. Equal parts war epic, family saga, and love story, Lost Souls of Leningrad brings to vivid life this little-known chapter of World War II in a tale of two remarkable women—grandmother and granddaughter—separated by years and experience but of one heart in their devotion to each other and the men they love. Neither the oppression of Stalin nor the brutality of Hitler can destroy their courage, compassion, or will in this testament to resilience. Author: Suzanne Parry Publication Date: November 8, 2022 -
For fans of Marie Benedict, Lauren Willig, and Diana Gabaldon, comes a Gothic romance about the charming and ambitious glassmaker René Lalique, the mysterious Englishwoman he falls in love with and their haunting encounters. Fascinated by the occult, René feels stifled, apprenticed to a traditional jeweler. Yearning for the creative freedom to explore the mythical world in his art, he leaves Paris to study at the Crystal Palace outside London. There, he meets Lucinda Haliburton and her dysfunctional family. Having returned from an archaeological dig and tomb discovery in Egypt, Lucinda believes she is preyed upon by ancient spirits. Rene finds her unearthly situation both enchanting and frightening. Is it imagination, delusional, or a real ghostly encounter? Magician of Light illuminates the dark side of Lalique’s life while spinning a suspenseful tale of twisting fates. An enthralling love story filled with historical intrigue and overshadowed by the unknowable. Author: J. Fremont Pub Date: May 17, 2022 -
When Quenton wants to take Alix home to France after years of exile in England, she is torn between the restoration of her fortune and her dream to build her Sterling Wood Stable into a successful racing business. She finds an unlikely friend in her uncle’s companion, Nicholas Griffon. Caught by her surprising fondness for him, Alix does not realize shadows from the past are stalking her—until she’s trapped by their darkness. Author:Diane Shute Publication Date: June 5, 2018 -
Set in the Blue Ridge Mountains during the summer of 1969, Moon Water finds Nettie, sixteen, with her boyfriend wanting to break up just as they are figuring out the sex thing. Nettie’s lifelong nemesis is jabbing her with perfectly polished nails, while her hellfire- and- brimstone preacher refuses to baptize her. Amid this turmoil, a Monacan Indian medicine woman gives her a cryptic message about a coming darkness, a blood moon whose veiled danger threatens Nettie and those she loves. To prepare for the darkness, Nettie and her best friend, Win, make a treacherous journey into the mountains to build a mysterious dreamcatcher from ancient elements. A captivating, suspenseful standalone sequel to The Wiregrass, a Historical Novel Society’s Editor’s Choice and Southern Literary Review’s Read of the Month. Author: Pam Webber Publication Date: August 20, 2019 -
Thirteen-year-old Elisha lives in a village near Shechem in the Land of Canaan in ancient Israel. She wants to be like other girls but is unmarried, speaks to an angel, and composes and sings her own songs—a pursuit her parents disapprove of. When she tells the village women to stand up for themselves, the men are outraged he tribe banishes her. After journeying alone through the desert, escaping bandits, wild animals, and men who would sell her as a servant, Elisha makes it to Jerusalem, where the angel guides her to study with Abraham and Sarah. She learns much including reading and writing, and Abraham even gives her Doron, his servant, to accompany her as she sings her songs throughout the country. Doron becomes her lover and her songs are well accepted—until she sings one about equality for women. Mountain of Full Moons explores how we overcome our fears, go out into the world, and gain the courage to speak up and be whom we choose to be. Author: Irene Kessler Publication Date: April 14, 2020 -
More than a year has elapsed since the ghetto gates were destroyed and Ancona’s Jewish community liberated by Napoleon’s troops. Yet Mirelle is ostracized—by the community, her erstwhile best friend, and even her mother—and labeled a “ruined woman.” As her efforts to nurture her family’s legacy are thwarted, she realizes she might have lost her last chance at love. Meanwhile, Daniel, now a lieutenant in the French army, and Christophe, the man responsible for Mirelle’s disgrace, set sail to an unknown destination with General Bonaparte’s forces. There, Napoleon and his men face a harsh and unforgiving landscape and new, implacable enemies, and Daniel’s faith in and loyalty to the commander he once worshiped are put to the test. Epic and rich with well-researched detail, Napoleon’s Mirage is a novel of misguided ambition leading to brutal warfare, failures of cultural appropriation, and a military defeat that just may have changed the course of history. Author: Michelle Cameron Publication Date: November 12, 2024 -
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 -
It’s the season of siren songs and loosened bonds―as well as war, campaign slogans, and assassination. At the height of the Vietnam War protests, Washington lawyer Tom Rayson uproots his family for the freewheeling city of Berkeley. While Tom pursues a romance with a sexy colleague in the Marin County woods, Marian joins a peace party that’s running a Black Panther for president and meets the Berkeley revolution. But for young Alice, her parents’ liberating forays become a blind leap in a city marked by beauty and social change―and for a girl, that’s no Summer of Love. Feeling estranged from her family, Alice embraces the moment and falls in with Jim and Valerie Dupres. Jim and Valerie have been learning the ropes on Telegraph Avenue, cadging meals at a nearby communal house and camping out in People’s Park. Soon they’re confronting National Guardsmen. As family and school fade away in a tear-gas fog, Alice feels an ambiguous freedom. Caught up in a rebellion that feels equally compelling, scary, and absurd, Alice could become a casualty—or she could defy the odds and become her own person. One thing is sure: there’s no going back. Author: Sarah Relyea Publication Date: June 9, 2020 -
NOMINATED for Library of Virginia Literary Awards in the ART in LITERATURE: Mary Lynn Kotz Award category. “Two cultured French families lose everything in the Second World War, even each other. Winkler spins from this tragic tale a thing of beauty, as delicately radiant as the imagined painting at its core, even as she keeps the pages turning until the end.” ―Nicole Mones, author of Night in Shanghai France, 1940. Nazi forces march towards Paris. Lili Rosenswig’s wealthy and eccentric family is ensconced in their country chateau with their sumptuous collection of arts and antiques. The beloved Matisse portrait of Lili’s mother has been brought from their Paris salon for safety. It is the day before young lovers Lili and Paul are to be married that they are forced to flee and their fortunes change irrevocably. Lili and her family escape but Paul must stay behind to defend his country. In their struggle to adapt to changing circumstances in an unpredictable world, all are pushed to reinvent themselves. When top Nazi Herman Goring loots their Matisse portrait, their story is intertwined with the fate of the painting. Portrait of a Woman in White is a moving family saga, an obsessive search for lost love and lost art and how far we will go to survive. Author: Susan Winkler Publication Date: September 2, 2014 -
Elisabeth Goodwin comes to California from Massachusetts in 1849 with her new husband, Nate, to reunite with her father, who’s struck gold on the American River. But she soon realizes her husband is not the man she thought—and neither is her father, who abandons them shortly after they arrive. As Nate struggles with his sexuality, Elisabeth is forced to confront her preconceived notions of family, love, and opportunity. She finds comfort in corresponding with her childhood friend back home, writer Louisa May Alcott, and spending time in the company of a mysterious Californio. Armed with Ralph Waldo Emerson’s Self-Reliance, she sets out to determine her role in building the West, even as she comes to terms with the sacrifices she must make to achieve independence and happiness. A gripping and illuminating window into life in the Old West, Prospects of a Woman is the story of one woman’s passionate quest to carve out a place for herself in the liberal and bewildering society that emerged during the California gold rush frenzy. Author: Wendy Voorsanger Publication Date: October 20, 2020 -
This book continues the story of Rebecca from Walter Scott’s 1820 novel Ivanhoe. The Ivanhoe backstory: Jewish women in medieval England do not fall in love with Christian knights like Ivanhoe. Neither do they heal knights from battle wounds. But Rebecca does both—and nearly pays with her life. Rescued by Ivanhoe from being burnt at the stake as a sorceress, she flees from England and the man she loves. Rebecca of Salerno: In Salerno, Kingdom of Sicily, Rebecca pursues her dreams by attending medical school. Practicing her profession, she defies family pressure to marry Rafael, the man who loves her. But more pressing is the conquest of Sicily by the Hohenstaufens and the arrival of rogue crusaders, both of which threaten Salerno’s long-standing atmosphere of tolerance. When a rabbi is falsely accused of murdering a crusader, Rebecca and Rafael commit to pursuing justice and protecting the Jewish community. This story provides fascinating history, as of the medical school in Salerno, where women and men—Christians, Muslims, and Jews—studied together. It also exemplifies the recurring Jewish experience of persecution, search for refuge, and resilience to remake lives. Rebecca struggles to balance community expectations and traditions with her desire for fulfillment—one of the great challenges facing women throughout the ages. Author: Esther Erman Publication Date: August 2, 2022 -
It's Berkeley in the 1960s, and all Martha Goldenthal wants is to do well at Berkeley High and plan for college. But her home life is a cauldron of kooky ideas, impossible demands, and explosive physical violence. Her father, Jules, is an iconoclast who hates academia and can’t control his fists. Her mother, Willa, has made a career of victimhood and expects Martha and her siblings, Hildy and Drew, to fend for themselves. Meanwhile, Jules’s classical record store, located directly across the street from the U.C. Berkeley campus, is ground zero for riots and tear gas. Martha perseveres with the help of her best friend, who offers laughter, advice about boys, and hospitality. But when Willa and Jules divorce and Jules loses his store and livelihood, Willa goes entirely off the rails. A heartless boarding school placement, eviction from the family home, and an unlikely custody case wind up putting Martha and Drew in Jules's care. Can Martha stand up to her father to do the one thing she knows she must—go to college? With its running "soundtrack" of classical recordings and rock music and its vivid scenes of Berkeley at its most turbulent, Shrug is the absorbing, harrowing, and ultimately uplifting story of one young woman’s journey toward independence. Author: Lisa Braver Moss Publication Date: August 13, 2019
