Carrie Crumb

After her mother dies in an accident, 16-year-old Bree Matthews wants nothing to do with her family memories or childhood home. A residential program for bright high schoolers at UNC - Chapel Hill seems like the perfect escape - until Bree witnesses a magical attack her very first night on campus. A flying demon feeding on human energies. A secret society of so called “Legendborn” students that hunt the creatures down. And a mysterious teenage mage who calls himself a “Merlin” and who attempts - and fails - to wipe Bree’s memory of everything she saw.

Half-breeds are seen as dangerous freaks, rejects, misfits who are useful for absolutely nothing. But my parents made a place for people like us to be free, to live together in peace. It was a sanctuary for half-breeds, and the place all my happiest memories took place. But I should have known it wouldn’t last forever. That peaceful place was destroyed, everyone I loved was killed, and I was taken—and tortured. I don’t know how long I was in that dark place before I was freed, but now I’m a different kind of prisoner.

Hannah Rosenstein should be happy: after a lonely childhood of traipsing all over the world, she finally has a home as the co-owner of destination inn Carrigan’s All Year. But her thoughts keep coming back to Levi "Blue" Matthews: her first love, worst heartbreak, and now, thanks to her great-aunt’s meddling will, absentee business partner.

All Talasyn has ever known is the Hurricane Wars. Growing up an orphan in a nation under siege by the ruthless Night Emperor, she found her family among the soldiers who fight for freedom. But she is hiding a deadly secret: light magic courses through her veins, a blazing power believed to have been wiped out years ago that can cut through the Night Empire’s shadows.

Born and raised in the US, Tara Bajaj hides her family secrets. With beautiful clothes, a popular social media presence, and a spot on the Rutgers High Bollywood dance team, she does it well—until her carefully cultivated image shatters. Shut out by friends and with her future in flux, Tara accepts a guide position for a youth group’s temple tour through North India. Rediscovering the heart of her ancestry is as good a place as any to start over. Silas D’Souza-Gupta is an aspiring photojournalist retracing the journey his two mothers took when they fell in love.

Sloane: Dominic Alexander is my late husband's best friend and the last man that I should want. For the last ten years, he's taken a sick pleasure in making me feel paper thin, like my existence is of no consequence to him at all. But now, things are different. After a drunken night, and a surprisingly sexy act of heroism, he's started to be . . . nice. Treating me like something other than the embodiment of his annoyance, which would be nice if it didn't make me feel things I swore to never feel for another man after my husband died.

As a third-year PhD candidate, Olive Smith doesn't believe in lasting romantic relationships—but her best friend does, and that's what got her into this situation. Convincing Anh that Olive is dating and well on her way to a happily ever after was always going to take more than hand-wavy Jedi mind tricks: Scientists require proof. So, like any self-respecting biologist, Olive panics and kisses the first man she sees.