celestey

Jutting from sparkling turquoise waters off the Italian coast, Isle Isola is an idyllic setting for a wedding. In the majestic cliff-top villa owned by the wealthy Compton family, up-and-coming artist Claire Hunter will marry handsome, charming Jack Compton, surrounded by close family, intimate friends…and a host of dark secrets.

When five New Yorkers receive an anonymous, mysterious invitation to the Fifth Avenue Story Society, they suspect they’re victims of a practical joke. No one knows who sent the invitations or why. No one has heard of the literary society. And no one is prepared to reveal their deepest secrets to a roomful of strangers. Yet curiosity and loneliness bring them back week after week to the old library. And it’s there they discover the stories of their hearts, and the kind of friendship and love that heals their souls.

Beth Montgomery seems to have the perfect life: a beautiful house in the hills above Los Angeles, a handsome, ambitious husband, and plans of starting a family. So it doesn't occur to her to worry when the news breaks of a quadruple homicide across town, a botched drug deal that leaves an undercover officer among the dead. Beth certainly would never think to tie the murders to the sudden reappearance in her life of wild, sexy Cassie Ogilvy, the estranged best friend she hasn't seen since they were college roommates.

The Christmas party at the Sea Glass Inn is a long-held tradition, one the townspeople of Blackbird Beach consider the kick-off of the Christmas season. Until, of course, the inn closed, and the party stopped happening. Now Georgia Carpenter has decided it’s time to restart that tradition, even though the party is a massive undertaking and one that will influence how people feel about the inn for the rest of the year. With the help of her sister, Lilly, Georgia hopes to put on an event that will be merry and bright and spark new interest in the business.

Ariadne Hui thrives on routine. So what if everything in her life is planned down to the minute: That’s the way she likes it. If she’s going to make partner in Toronto’s most prestigious law firm, she needs to stay focused at all times. But when she comes home after yet another soul-sucking day to find an unfamiliar, gorgeous man camped out in her living room, focus is the last thing on her mind. Especially when her roommate explains this is Choi Jihoon, her cousin freshly arrived from Seoul to mend a broken heart. He just needs a few weeks to rest and heal.

At 19 years old, college student Josie Stratton was kidnapped by a madman and held shackled for 10 months in an abandoned warehouse before she finally escaped her hellish prison. Eight years later, when the body of a young woman is found chained in the basement of a vacant house, Cincinnati Police Detective Zach Copeland is instantly reminded of the crime committed against Josie Stratton. Zach was just a rookie on the perimeter of that case, but he's never forgotten the traumatized woman with the haunted eyes.

The only thing about me that’s a size zero is the filter on my mouth. I’ve got a big personality, a big rack, and a big number on the scale. And I’m perfectly fine with that. But when some random guy suggests I might not be eating alone if I’d ordered a salad instead of a hamburger I’m shocked silent, which is a feat, trust me. That brings us to one sexy fireman named Frankie Hartigan. He’s hot. He’s funny. And he’s just apologized for being late for our “date” then glared at the fat-shaming jerk.

Jo Slater has it all. The queen of Manhattan society, she has dealt successfully with a tricky period in which she lost her husband, her fortune, and her reputation. But she bounced back, and now, newly single in the greatest city in the world, there is not a cloud in the sky.

Paint your toes. Pick up the wrong coffee and bagel order. Drive from Brooklyn to Jersey in traffic so slow you want to tear your hair out. It’s amazing all the useless things I can accomplish while on hold for three hours with customer service. Three hours when I should be getting the Date-in-a-Box website ready to launch at the big business expo in a few days. Except my shiny new website is glitching, and my inner rage-monster is ready to scorch some earth...when he finally picks up. Not the robot voice I expected but a real live human named Kal.

Eva - known to all as Lovey - grew up safe and secure in Oxford, Mississippi, surrounded by a rich literary history and her mother's stunning flower gardens. But a shed fire, and the injuries that it caused, seemed to change everything...especially when her older sister, Bitsy, blamed Lovey for the irreparable damage. Bitsy became the cheerleader. The homecoming queen. All the while, Lovey served as the family scapegoat, always bearing the brunt when Bitsy threw blame her way. At 18, Lovey fled to Arizona. In time, she became a successful advertising executive....