American Literature

As a young woman, Naomi Simmons grabbed her one chance to escape the overwhelming demands of her selfish family by marrying devout older man Jacob Purcell. But it only landed her with a controlling, unfaithful husband who delights in hurling insults at her and their troubled now-teenage daughter, Ethel Mae. So, Naomi is amazed and touched when Homer Clark sees her for the vibrant, intelligent woman she truly is. Believing the handsome, worldly widower is her love of a lifetime, Naomi plans to leave with Homer and start fresh in the big city.

Locked behind bars for three years, Shadow did his time, quietly waiting for the day when he could return to Eagle Point, Indiana. A man no longer scared of what tomorrow might bring, all he wanted was to be with Laura, the wife he deeply loved, and start a new life. But just days before his release, Laura and Shadow's best friend are killed in an accident. With his life in pieces and nothing to keep him tethered, Shadow accepts a job from a beguiling stranger he meets on the way home, an enigmatic man who calls himself Mr. Wednesday.

Light-skinned Selina Standish lives a life of emotional pain and torment. In 1906, at the age of eight, she is convinced by her mother, actress Lavinia Standish, the daughter of a slave, to pass as white. Although Selina yields to her mother's insistence to pass, she refuses to cut ties completely with her Negro relatives, including her twin brother, a child her mother deems too dark. However, at age 17, in the year 1915, Selina meets wealthy Southerner Jack Cosgrove, the man of her dreams. Keeping her ancestry a secret, Selina is conflicted by Jack's negative attitude toward her race.

She gave away her child to save his life. Another woman took him in, at risk to herself. Viviane Renaud is a young mother living on the French Riviera in the Second World War. Times are hard but she is not the sort to be dismayed by circumstances. One day her life changes forever. A young Jewish woman, fleeing from the authorities, begs her to take care of her four year old boy, David. Almost without thinking, Viviane agrees. Viviane’s life is never the same again. She fabricates a story to explain how David came to be with her and must tip-toe around the suspicions of her neighbours, her...

To Adele Wilson the answer is clear: of course not. She has seen her two sisters dragged through scandal and heartbreak (not to mention every ballroom in London) to find the husbands of their dreams. And that's why she said yes to the first amiable British lord who requested her hand. And why shouldn't she marry him? He is kind, honest, and not sentimental in the least.

Should we still read William Faulkner in this new century? What can his works tell us about the legacy of slavery and the Civil War, that central quarrel in our nation's history? These are the provocative questions that Michael Gorra asks in this historic portrait of the novelist and his world.

Nobody ever gave Jamil Rock anything - much less hope. To survive a rough home life and one bad break after another, he became his hood's most successful drug dealer. With loyal friends at his back, Jamil coolly takes care of business and never thinks too far ahead - until Gia Ellis walks into his life. Suddenly, ruling the streets is nothing compared to the instant heat, and alluringly innocent aura, Jamil can't resist....

Before he was considered a CIA superagent, before he was thought of as a terrorist's worst nightmare, and before he was both loathed and admired by the politicians on Capitol Hill, Mitch Rapp was a gifted college athlete without a care in the world...and then tragedy struck.

Best-selling author La Jill Hunt dishes the dirt in Old Habits Die Hard. Hunt focuses her attention on the fine ladies of the premier nail salon After Effex. Ya Ya, Camille, Taryn, and Monya bring the crazy drama as their love lives go for a rollercoaster ride.

Harney County, Oregon, 1968: Nick Drake has a chest full of medals and enough demons to fill a duffel bag. He's been trained to kill but was never retrained to rejoin society. Drake flees to the lonesome high desert in search of redemption and takes a job patrolling wildlife refuges where the only conflicts are keeping out stray cows and ticketing poachers. But then he stumbles across a girl's body ritually placed in a gully. Her murder is only the beginning, and Drake must face humanity's heart of darkness once again if he's to stop a killer from turning even more gullies into graves.

Must a young woman choose between her commitment to her marriage…and to God? Brianna was 10 years old when she first met 25 year old David R. Shepherd, a devout and gifted gospel recording artist who would ultimately become world renowned megastar, King d.Avid. He left an impression on Brianna she would never forget. And they were destined to meet again…

One of the 20th-century's most darkly beautiful works of crime fiction - a story of carny life, spiritualism, and a con man of merciless resolve.

Meet Anthony Stone, one of the best detectives that New York City has ever seen. He lives by the motto shoot first and ask questions never. Stone's life changes when his lieutenant assigns him to a bank robbery case. His job is to take down four ruthless and vicious bank robbers who will do anything to stay alive, and more importantly, stay out of jail. The leader of the bank robbers is a man that goes by the name Ghost. When it comes to money, Ghost and his team will do anything it takes to get it, even if that means taking innocent lives.

If there's one thing that Bureau of Indian Affairs Investigator Emmett Quanah Parker knows, it's that the dead don't always stay dead. When the corpse of a woman, brutally murdered and bizarrely mutilated, is discovered on Havasupai Nation land, Parker is paired with FBI Special Agent Anna Turnipseed in a hastily assembled task force of two. The two share a mixed Native American ancestry - and little else.

When Ian Blackheath and Lucy have an altercation in Emily d'Autrecourt's millinery shop, the lovely Englishwoman is horrified at Blackheath's insensitivity toward his ward. Then Lucy steals a doll from Emily's shop-secreted inside the plaything is evidence of Emily's role as a spy. Accepting Ian's offer that she be Lucy's governess is dangerous, but how else can Emily search for the doll without arousing suspicion?

Faced with an overwhelming infestation of living dead on the US mainland, the US Pacific Fleet manages a strategic withdrawal of civilians and supplies. Aboard the USS Ronald Reagan, Dr. Henry Damico advises the remnants of the civilian government and military leadership on how to survive in a world overrun with zombies.

Justin and Toni were friends. Besties, with a whole list of life rules developed over a friendship that started when they were kids. As long as they stuck to the rules, even when they blended a business relationship into the friendship, things went off without a hitch. But then one of them broke the rules - it was Justin. Justin broke the rules - and Toni has been mad about it ever since.

With the skills of Michael Vick and the looks of Tyreese, Andrew "Amir" Davis, a.k.a. Amir, is destined to be a star. But in the streets of Raleigh, North Carolina, NFL dreams can quickly vanish, and a Black man can either go with the flow or become another name added to the local obituaries. Amir has the whole hood behind him. He's a beacon of hope for young men who feel they've been discarded by society. North Carolina is breeding him to be their star, but he has other plans in mind.

At thirty, eldest brother Byron hasn't dated seriously in a while--not since he became a single dad to his beloved baby girl. Besides, he's found that most women can't see past his job as a bus driver, and he's not interested in that type of superficial foolishness. When he meets Cynthia Hall, her disinterest is obvious. Still, there's something about her. . .

You’re Not a Girl in a Movie is a new collection of powerful poems by Hala Alyan, winner of the Arab American Book Award in Poetry and the Dayton Literary Peace Prize. In these nine extraordinary poems, Alyan wrestles with the intimate themes that have driven her acclaimed body of work to date: the aching loss of homeland, the image and worth of women, and the violence of love. In Beirut, Brooklyn, and roads in the American West, she unravels the effects of decades of war and displacement on love and human worth and identity.