Women Friendship Fiction

She’s mastered the art of hiding. Now she has to find the courage to be seen. Jude Majors seems to have it all: a handsome astronaut husband, beautiful twin daughters, and a house on Florida’s sparkling Stardust Beach. But behind the polished smile and perfect life, Jude is drowning. Haunted by a painful childhood shaped by wartime prejudice, she’s spent decades silencing the parts of herself that felt too different, too broken, too “other.” Now, the cracks are starting to show. Drinking has helped her cope—until it nearly kills her. Faced with terrifying consequences, Jude must...

Ruby Hudson thought she knew how to handle grief. Until she lost someone who held a piece of her soul. At fifty, Ruby’s no stranger to life’s heartbreaks. She’s been a mother, a First Lady, and a widow. She’s weathered public scandals, private betrayals, and the messy, beautiful business of starting over. But nothing prepares her for this latest loss—unexpected, intimate, and earth-shifting. As she works through her grief, Ruby finds herself facing an uncomfortable truth: there was so much she didn’t know about the person she loved. Secrets. Stories. Sides of them she somehow ...

Eighteen months ago, Autumn Divac's husband went missing. Her desperate search has yielded no answers—she still has no idea where he went or why. After being happily married for twenty years, she can't imagine moving forward without him, but for the sake of their two teenage children, she has to try. Autumn takes her kids home for the summer to the charming beachside town where she was raised. She seeks comfort by working alongside her mother and aunt at their bookshop, only to learn that her daughter is facing a life change and her mother has been hiding a terrible secret.

Summer Sullivan, the youngest founding member of Elm Creek Quilts, has spent the last two years pursuing a master’s degree in history at the University of Chicago. Her unexpected return home to the celebrated quilter’s retreat is met with delight but also concern from her mother, Gwen; her best friend, Sarah; master quilter Sylvia; and her other colleagues—and rightly so. Stymied by writer’s block, Summer hasn’t finished her thesis, and she can’t graduate until she does. vElm Creek Manor offers respite while Summer struggles to meet her extended deadline.

Cinnamon Haynes has fought hard for a life she never thought was possible—a good man by her side, a steady job as a career counselor at a local community college, and a cozy house in a quaint little beach town. It may not look like much, but it’s more than she ever dreamed of or what her difficult childhood promised. Her life’s mantra is to be good, quiet, grateful. Until something shifts and Cinnamon is suddenly haunted by a terrifying question: “Is this all there is?”

Lily Bishop wakes up one morning to find a good-bye note and divorce papers from her husband on the kitchen counter. Having just moved to Alabama for his job only weeks before, Lily is devastated. New to town and knowing no one, Lily finds herself in desperate need of a job and a new place to live. When Lily hears that a hair stylist is needed at small retirement community, she decides to apply.

The last thing I expected during Bramble Dale’s big debut cook-off was a dead food critic face-first in a plate of my best friends winning but fatal almond chicken. It was an and accident because she wouldn’t poison him on purpose. Really? Now I’m knee-deep in flour, lies, and a whole lot of bad alibis, trying to figure out who really wanted this foodie dead. Between his baking co-star girlfriend stealing the show and a rival food critic cutting into his review columns this harsh baking judge had more enemies than a guy could choke on. With my pet detective yellow Lab, Peanut, and my ...

Justine is 21 years old, and has lived with her grandparents and her cousin Jules since the death of her parents. As a nursing assistant at a retirement home, she spends much of her days listening to her residents’ stories. After bonding with Hélène, an almost 100-year-old resident, the two women slowly reveal their stories to one another. Whilst Justine helps Hélène to relive her memories of love and war, Hélène encourages Justine to confront the secrets of her own past and the loss she keeps buried deep within.

England, 1835. London is awash with thrilling new ingredients, from rare spices to exotic fruits. But no one knows how to use them. When Eliza Acton is told by her publisher to write a cookery book instead of the poetry she loves, she refuses - until her bankrupt father is forced to flee the country. As a woman, Eliza has few options. Although she’s never set foot in a kitchen, she begins collecting recipes and teaching herself to cook. Much to her surprise, she discovers a talent - and a passion - for the culinary arts.

A delicious, sharp novel about a woman who jets off to France after her perfect marriage collapses, putting the broken pieces of herself back together while rediscovering her own joie de vivre - a lust for life, art, and steamy sex.

Always a bride's maid--never a bride. That's part of the story of the life of Mildred Budge in this third novel in the series. But there is more to know about this Sunday School teacher who has been recruited to be a maid of honor for her good friend's wedding. As someone who has routinely had to muzzle herself at weddings by not calling out when the preacher asks if anyone knows a reason these two should not be wed, "It's not going to work out," this new role of supporting the bride has its challenges for this church lady of the South, Mildred Budge. But being a bride's maid also has its ...

Elin Hilderbrand's brief, irresistible postscript to her number-one New York Times best-selling novel Summer of '69.

Leah was unemployed, broke, and desperate. A few years earlier, a fatal car crash took the lives of Leah’s beloved husband and their two babies, leaving her disabled. Life looked bleak. Then she met Mason. He was charming, charismatic, persuasive, and a successful businessman, well respected in the community. His teenage daughter did nothing to welcome Leah into the family, but life is never perfect. And the nightmares began the day the dog died… Two years into her second marriage, Leah Brand’s world is turned upside down. Inanimate objects move, her clothes are left out for the ...

Maggie is 36, recently divorced and embarrassingly unemployed. With a bank account nearing zero, she does the only thing she can think of: make a business proposition to her gorgeous and successful estranged mother. To Maggie’s utter surprise, her mother agrees. Any funds she can create off the sale of the dilapidated family inn on the island of Magnolia would be hers to invest.

London, 1938: The bookstore just doesn’t feel the same to Gertie Bingham ever since the death of her beloved husband Harry. Bingham Books was a dream they shared together, and without Harry, Gertie wonders if it’s time to take her faithful old lab, Hemingway, and retire to the seaside. But fate has other plans for Gertie. In Germany, Hitler is on the rise, and Jewish families are making the heart-wrenching decision to send their children away from the growing turmoil. After a nudge from her dear friend Charles, Gertie decides to take in one of these refugees.

It’s fair to say that Maddie’s life in London is far from rewarding. With a mother who spends most of her time in Ghana (yet still somehow manages to be overbearing), Maddie is the primary caretaker for her father, who suffers from advanced stage Parkinson’s. At work, her boss is a nightmare and Maddie is tired of always being the only Black person in every meeting.

After a developer comes into change the face of their small town, St. Sebastian and the defeated owners of The Little Shoppes begrudgingly move toward a new reality with a big corporate water park in their town and the dissolution of The Little Shoppes family, but filmmaker Ellen has one card up her sleeve. She suspects there’s an heir to Jane’s estate, a secret child, who may be able to change the course of the town. Attorney and shopkeeper Randa and Ellen work together to discover the clues to find the secret child and if there is any legal recourse to have them contest the will. But ...

Olivia Jones, hard-working and accomplished, has, against the odds, blazed an enviable career path in the finance world. But behind the veneer of her success, she is mourning several devastating losses and betrayals. Untethered from her life in New York City, Olivia moves to a summer home in The Hamptons. Here, Olivia finds a close-knit community of African American elites who escape New York City for the beautiful beaches of the Hamptons. Since the 1930s, very few have known about this Historically Black Beachfront Community, and the residents like it that way.

Surrey, England, 1938. After 30 devoted years of marriage, Ellie Endicott is blindsided by her husband’s appeal for divorce. It’s Ellie’s opportunity for change too. The unfaithful cad can have the house. She’s taking the Bentley. Ellie, her housekeeper Mavis, and her elderly friend Dora—each needing escape—impulsively head for parts unknown in the South of France.

Joy and Annie are friends and roommates whose thirty-something lives aren’t exactly what they’d imagined. To make ends meet, they decide to rent their extra bedroom to Theo, who charms Joy with his salt-and-pepper hair and adoration of their one-eyed cat. When Annie goes to live with her boyfriend, Theo and Joy settle into a comfortable domesticity. Then Theo brings home Celine, the girlfriend he’s never mentioned, who is possibly the most stunning woman Joy has ever seen. Joy resolves to do whatever it takes to hold on to him, falling deeper into a hellscape of her own making.