Authors: Lisa See.
Paperback, 288 pages
Publisher: Random House Trade Paperbacks
Publication Date: 2006-02-21


Reviews :

    In nineteenth-century China, in a remote Hunan county, a girl named Lily, at the tender age of seven, is paired with a laotong, “old same,” in an emotional match that will last a lifetime. The laotong, Snow Flower, introduces herself by sending Lily a silk fan on which she’s painted a poem in nu shu, a unique language that Chinese women created in order to communicate in secret, away from the influence of men. As the years pass, Lily and Snow Flower send messages on fans, compose stories on handkerchiefs, reaching out of isolation to share their hopes, dreams, and accomplishments. Together, they endure the agony of foot-binding, and reflect upon their arranged marriages, shared loneliness, and the joys and tragedies of motherhood. The two find solace, developing a bond that keeps their spirits alive. But when a misunderstanding arises, their deep friendship suddenly threatens to tear apart....

Authors: Audrey Niffenegger.
Paperback, 560 pages
Publisher: Harvest Books
Publication Date: 2004-05-27


Reviews :

    ...

Authors: Diane Setterfield.
Paperback, 432 pages
Publisher: Washington Square Press
Publication Date: 2007-10-09


Reviews :

    Sometimes, when you open the door to thepast, what you confront is your destiny.

Reclusive author Vida Winter, famous for her collection of twelve enchantingstories, has spent the past six decades penning a series of alternate livesfor herself. Now old and ailing, she is ready to reveal the truth about herextraordinary existence and the violent and tragic past she has kept secret forso long. Calling on Margaret Lea, a young biographer troubled by her ownpainful history, Vida disinters the life she meant to bury for good. Margaret ismesmerized by the author's tale of gothic strangeness -- featuring the beautifuland willful Isabelle, the feral twins Adeline and Emmeline, a ghost, a governess,a topiary garden and a devastating fire. Together, Margaret and Vida confront the ghosts that have haunted them while becoming, finally, transformed by the truth themselves....

    Settle down to enjoy a rousing good ghost story with Diane Setterfield's debut novel, The Thirteenth Tale. Setterfield has rejuvenated the genre with this closely plotted, clever foray into a world of secrets, confused identities, lies, and half-truths. She never cheats by pulling a rabbit out of a hat; this atmospheric story hangs together perfectly.

There are two heroines here: Vida Winter, a famous author, whose life story is coming to an end, and Margaret Lea, a young, unworldly, bookish girl who is a bookseller in her father's shop. Vida has been confounding her biographers and fans for years by giving everybody a different version of her life, each time swearing it's the truth. Because of a biography that Margaret has written about brothers, Vida chooses Margaret to tell her story, all of it, for the first time. At their initial meeting, the conversation begins:

"You have given nineteen different versions of your life story to journalists in the last two years alone."

She [Vida] shrugged. "It's my profession. I'm a storyteller."

"I am a biographer, I work with facts."

The game is afoot and Margaret must spend some time sorting out whether or not Vida is actually ready to tell the whole truth. There is more here of Margaret discovering than of Vida cooperating wholeheartedly, but that is part of Vida's plan. The transformative power of truth informs the lives of both women by story's end, and The Thirteenth Tale is finally and convincingly told. --Valerie Ryan...

Authors: Julia Glass.
Hardcover, 304 pages
Publisher: Pantheon
Publication Date: 2008-10-14
Edition: 1

Reviews :

    From the author of the best-selling Three Junes comes an intimate new work of fiction: a tale of two sisters, together and apart, told in their alternating voices over twenty-five years.

Louisa Jardine is the older one, the conscientious student, precise and careful: the one who years for a good marriage, an artistic career, a family. Clem, the archetypal youngest, is the rebel: uncontainable, iconoclastic, committed to her work but not to the men who fall for her daring nature. Louisa resents that the charismatic Clem has always been the favorite; yet as Clem puts it, “On the other side of the fence–mine–every expectation you fulfill . . . puts you one stop closer to that Grand Canyon rim from which you could one day rule the world–or plummet in very grand style.”

In this vivid, heartrending story of what we can and cannot do for those we love, the sisters grow closer as they move farther apart. Louis settles in New York while Clem, a wildlife biologist, moves restlessly about until she lands in the Rocky Mountains. Their complex bond, Louisa observes, is “like a double helix, two souls coiling around a common axis, joined yet never touching.”

Alive with all the sensual detail and riveting characterization that mark Glass’s previous work, I See You Everywhere is a piercingly candid story of life and death, companionship and sorrow, and the nature of sisterhood itself....

Authors: Lauren Weisberger.
Hardcover, 288 pages
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Publication Date: 2008-05-27


Reviews :

    The bestselling author of The Devil Wears Prada and Everyone Worth Knowing returns with the story of three best friends who vow to change their entire lives...and change them fast.

Emmy is newly single, and not by choice. She was this close to the ring and the baby she's wanted her whole life when her boyfriend left her for his twenty-three-year-old personal trainer -- whose fees are paid by Emmy. With her plans for the perfect white wedding in the trash, Emmy is now ordering takeout for one. Her friends insist an around-the-world sex-fueled adventure will solve all her problems -- could they be right?

Leigh, a young star in the publishing business, is within striking distance of landing her dream job as senior editor and marrying her dream guy. And to top it all off, she has just purchased her dream apartment. Only when Leigh begins to edit the enfant terrible of the literary world, the brilliant and brooding Jesse Chapman, does she start to notice some cracks in her perfect life...

Adriana is the drop-dead-gorgeous daughter of a famous supermodel. She possesses the kind of feminine wiles made only in Brazil, and she never hesitates to use them. But she's about to turn thirty and -- as her mother keeps reminding her -- she won't have her pick of the men forever. Everyone knows beauty is ephemeral and there's always someone younger and prettier right around the corner. Suddenly she's wondering...does Mother know best?

These three very different girls have been best friends for a decade in the greatest city on earth. As they near thirty, they're looking toward their future...but despite all they've earned -- first-class travel, career promotions, invites to all the right parties, and luxuries small and large -- they're not quite sure they like what they see...

One Saturday night at the Waverly Inn, Adriana and Emmy make a pact: within a single year, each will drastically change her life. Leigh watches from the sidelines, not making any promises, but she'll soon discover she has the most to lose. Their friendship is forever, but everything else is on the table. Three best friends. Two resolutions. One year to pull it off....

Authors: Debbie Macomber.
Hardcover, 368 pages
Publisher: Mira Books
Publication Date: 2008-04-29
Edition: Library Ed

Reviews :

    What do you want most in the world?

Anne Marie Roche wants to find happiness again. At 38 her life s not what she d expected--she s childless, a recent widow, alone. She owns a successful bookstore on Seattle s Blossom Street, but despite her accomplishments, there s a feeling of emptiness.

On Valentine s Day, Anne Marie and several other widows get together to celebrate...what? Hope, possibility, the future. They each begin a list of twenty wishes, things they always wanted to do but never did.

Anne Marie s list starts with: Find one good thing about life. It includes learning to knit, doing good for someone else, falling in love again. She begins to act on her wishes and when she volunteers at a local school, an eight-year-old girl named Ellen enters her life. It s a relationship that becomes far more involving than Anne Marie intended. It also becomes far more important than she ever imagined.

As Ellen helps Anne Marie complete her list of twenty wishes, they both learn that wishes can come true--but not necessarily in the way you expect.

As millions of women know, Debbie Macomber understands their lives and writes the stories they want to read....

Authors: Jodi Picoult.
Paperback, 384 pages
Publisher: Berkley Trade
Publication Date: 2002-07-02


Reviews :

    Jodi Picoult's novels have been hailed as "engrossing" (People) and "addictively readable" (Entertainment Weekly). Now, the author of Salem Falls and Plain Truth examines the fault lines of a troubled marriage in Picture Perfect-an "unfailingly intelligent...undeniably literary psychological drama."(Booklist)

"Picoult writes with an all-knowing and piercing eye. Hers is an important book from a talented writer we hope to hear from again and again." (Library Journal)...

Authors: Toni Morrison.
Paperback, 352 pages
Publisher: Vintage
Publication Date: 2004-06-08


Reviews :

    Milkman Dead was born shortly after a neighborhood eccentric hurled himself off a rooftop in a vain attempt at flight. For the rest of his life he, too, will be trying to fly. With this brilliantly imagined novel, Toni Morrison transfigures the coming-of-age story as audaciously as Saul Bellow or Gabriel García Márquez. As she follows Milkman from his rustbelt city to the place of his family’s origins, Morrison introduces an entire cast of strivers and seeresses, liars and assassins, the inhabitants of a fully realized black world....

    Morrison's earthy, poetic voice compliments perfectly the fantastical and mythical elements of Song Of Soloman. A world where fathers fly in clouds of rose petals, and women can cast spells. The text is perfectly suited for an audio rendition - as poetry, songs and the spoken word feature so heavily in the book.

Morrison narrates for three hours and lays out before us the complex lives and backgrounds of four generations of black family life in the south. Central is the character Milkman--an unfortunate nickname owed to his lengthy nursing period and delayed coming of age. Although a late starter, Milkman develops into a fundamentally strong person, who eventually learns to cherish his family and the importance of his roots.

The narrator breathes life into an intriguing and diverse set of characters--from violent criminals to devout parents. Through them Morrison explores complex social and racial issues using luscious lyrical language This text refers to the audiobook edition of this title....

Authors: Christine Feehan.
Mass Market Paperback, 336 pages
Publisher: Jove
Publication Date: 2008-07-29


Reviews :

    An All-New Drake Sisters Novel

Bewitching rock superstar Joley Drake can have any lover she wants. But when her life is threatened, her dangerously sexy bodyguard is the only man she needs. There’s just one problem: his shadowy reputation as a secret Russian hit man may put Joley in even greater peril…...

Authors: Karen Kingsbury. Gary Smalley.
Paperback, 384 pages
Publisher: Tyndale House Publishers
Publication Date: 2002-08


Reviews :

    The Redemption series won Christian Retailing's 2005 Retailer's Choice Award for Best Series!

When Kari Baxter Jacobs finds out that her husband is involved in an adulterous relationship and wants a divorce, she decides she will love him and remain faithful to her marriage at all costs. This book shows how God can redeem seemingly hopeless relationships, and it illustrates one of Gary Smalley's key messages: Love is a decision.

Redemption is the first book in the five-book Redemption series that Gary and Karen will write about the Baxter family--their fears and desires, their strengths and weaknesses, their losses and victories. Each book will explore key relationship themes as well as the larger theme of redemption, both in characters' spiritual lives and in their relationships. Each book includes study questions for individual and small-group use as well as a "teaser" chapter of the next book in the series....