New Literary Fiction

Born in 1799, Cashel Greville Ross experiences myriad lives: joyous and devastating, years of luck and unexpected loss. Moving from County Cork to London, from Waterloo to Zanzibar, Cashel seeks his fortune across continents in war and in peace. He faces a terrible moral choice in a village in Sri Lanka as part of the East Indian Army. He enters the world of the Romantic Poets in Pisa. In Ravenna he meets a woman who will live in his heart for the rest of his days.

When young Mattie Silver arrives at her cousin Zeena Frome's farm in the New England village of Starkfield, no one could have imagined the tale of sublime and thwarted passion which ensues. Starkfield, like so many New England village communities, is a place where the emotional terrain resembles the physical: stony, hard, and snow covered much of the year. Ethan Frome - "the most striking figure in Starkfield" - ekes out a bleak living from his ungenerous farm, until Mattie brings love and a dream of escape. The powerful sway of obligation and duty and Ethan's inherent dignity make this novel a great American tragedy.

Late September 1957. Henry and Effie, very young newlyweds from Georgia, arrive in Cape May, New Jersey, for their honeymoon only to find the town is deserted. Feeling shy of each other and isolated, they decide to cut the trip short. But before they leave, they meet a glamorous set of people who sweep them up into their drama. The empty beach town becomes their playground, and as they sneak into abandoned summer homes, go sailing, walk naked under the stars, make love, and drink a great deal of gin, Henry and Effie slip from innocence into betrayal, with irrevocable consequences.

It's not easy getting close to people. Amelia's meeting a lot of men but once she gets the sex she wants from them, that's it for her: she can't connect further. A terrible thing happened to Daniel last year and it's stuck inside Amelia ever since, making her stuck too. Maybe being a cosmetician at her family's mortuary business isn't the best job for a young woman. It's not helping her social life. She loves her job, but she's not great at much else. Especially emotion.

Andy Wofford, middle-aged father and English teacher at a third-tier private school, receives a surprising invitation for a drink from an old college classmate. Once awkward and forgettable, Michael Kinnick has become a famous, wealthy, and absurdly confident lifestyle guru. Of all the people who’d want to catch up, why Michael? After thirty divergent years, why now? Mildly apprehensive, Andy is also very curious.

What if the one thing you wanted most was the one thing you could never have? What If you’d done something so terrible that you could never go back? Delia Reynolds has it all—money, social status, a husband who loves her. Then why is she so miserable? Why is she haunted by her past? Delia tries to mold her daughter, Sybil, into her debutante life, but it’s like trying to fit a square peg into a round hole. Needing a new life, Sybil flees the fast-paced life of Atlanta and takes her daughter to, of all places, Delia’s hometown, nearly sending Delia over the edge. Faced with the ...

The singles ministry at New Day Temple of Faith is beginning to unravel, and the pastor is considering dissolving it. Some members believe the only way to hold it together is by getting their pastor to join. And why shouldn't their leader show support by joining, considering the pastor's own single status? Some church members support the idea, while others frown upon the fact that they are being led by a shepherd who is single in the first place.

New Orleans, 1900: Mary Deubler makes a meager living as an "alley whore". That all changes when bible-thumping Alderman Sidney Story forces the creation of a red-light district that’s mockingly dubbed "Storyville". Mary believes there’s no place for a lowly girl like her in the high-class bordellos of Storyville’s Basin Street, where Champagne flows and beautiful girls turn tricks in luxurious bedrooms. But with gumption, twists of fate, even a touch of Voodoo, Mary rises above her hopeless lot to become the notorious Madame Josie Arlington.

Literary Titan says fans of short stories will enjoy the loosely threaded stories that show life cannot be seen as black and white, as every situation always has gray areas. Colin, a wealthy, unhappy businessman waits for his wife at Windows on the World and dreams about the only woman he ever loved. (Casualties). Clancy flirts with the young woman who swims laps with him as his stroke-damaged wife waits for him at her nursing home. (Freestyle) A father grieves for his fireman son who died on 9-11. (Without a Trace) Missy has too much drink, falls out of her truck and gets run over by it. ...

Everyone is invited to leave, but Will chooses earth. He has his reasons. Only, he didn't think about how hard it would be to stay clean, what might happen when he couldn't, or what kind of people would also choose to stay. When he lets Jack out of a jail cell, he has no idea what kind of evil he has just unleashed. Maybe Will should stop pretending to be a cop. Will finds light and a new chemistry in this dark world. Rachel believes in him, at first. A birthing civilization doesn't believe in Will at all, and they do not believe that Jack really exists. Will must learn to be a real sleuth ...

A mysterious girl birthed him, but couldn’t raise him Armed with an adoption diary written by his father and a picture of a young girl, Gadi searches for his roots in Brazil. He hunts down clues about the identity of his biological mother and wants to know what had happened that made her give him up and what is her life like. Gadi learns about Brazil’s adoption process and retraces the steps of his own adoption journey; from the arms of a young girl who could not raise him, to the arms of his adoptive parents who looked forward to his arrival. While traveling with two friends in Brazil,...

Roller-coastering from the mournful to the comical, Watson's work is both embedded in a literary heritage tied to place and at home in a universal literature of the absurd. His stories waltz with lovely and strange melancholy, infused with wit and astonishing beauty. There Is Happiness embodies the twisted hilarity and undeniable grace of an underrecognized literary genius.

Arriving at his fifth school in as many years, diplomat's son Osei Kokote knows he needs an ally if he is to survive his first day - so he's lucky to hit it off with Dee, the most popular girl in school. But one student can't stand to witness this budding relationship: Ian decides to destroy the friendship between the black boy and the golden girl. By the end of the day, the school and its key players - teachers and pupils alike - will never be the same again.

A year ago in the midst of his parent’s divorce Nate Handen surprised everyone in his extended family when he talked his father into leaving the family home and moving in with him and his friend and business partner. He also convinced him to go into business with the two of them. So far both ventures were working out better than anyone ever expected.His father was happy and despite the acrimonious divorce proceedings his parents were friends. The way he saw it they got along better now than he could ever remember when they were married. Now he was on his way to visit his mother. Livia ...

Kathryn Scanlan’s Kick the Latch vividly captures the arc of one woman’s life at the racetrack—the flat land and ramshackle backstretch; the bad feelings and friction; the winner’s circle and the racetrack bar; the fancy suits and fancy boots; and the “particular language” of “grooms, jockeys, trainers, racing secretaries, stewards, pony people, hotwalkers, everybody”—with economy and integrity. Whittled down with a singular artistry, Kick the Latch bangs out of the starting gate and carries the listener on a careening joyride around the inside track.

After the stunning historical novels The Clearing and The Missing, Tim Gautreaux now ranges freely through contemporary life with 12 new stories and eight from previous collections. Most are set in his beloved Louisiana, many hard by or on the Mississippi River, others in North Carolina, and even in midwinter Minnesota. But generally it's heat, humidity, and bugs that beset his people as they wrestle with affairs of the heart, matters of faith, and the pros and cons of tight-knit communities.

Clayton Miller's life is a mess. His career as one of the country's best comedy script writers has stalled and his long term girlfriend has left him for his ex best friend and ex writing partner. Just when he thinks his life couldn't get any worse, he commits a spectacularly public fall from grace and with the press hounding him, his agent banishes him to the middle of nowhere until the dust has settled.

So far, it had been a typical New Year's Eve house party. But Mr. Satterthwaite, a keen observer of human nature, sensed that the real drama of the evening was yet to unfold. So it proved when a mysterious stranger arrived after midnight. Who was this Mr. Quin? And why did his presence have such a pronounced effect on Eleanor Portal, the woman with the dyed-black hair?

Glancing sideways, she was intrigued by his flawless profile. He had bronzed skin and a straight nose, with tousled blond hair that was effortlessly stylish. Lounging in his chair elegantly, he looked like the type of guy you could place anywhere and he would look at ease. He turned suddenly and caught her staring at him. Their eyes locked and suddenly she felt lost. They were the bluest eyes she had ever seen… Lydia Kelly is in a good place. Determined to pursue her dream of being a writer, she enrols to do a Master’s degree in English. It means being separated from her handsome ...

A mother and daughter travel from abroad to meet in Tokyo. They walk along the canals through the autumn evenings, escape the typhoon rains, share meals in small cafes and restaurants, and visit galleries to see some of the city’s most radical modern art. All the while, they talk: about the weather, horoscopes, clothes, and objects, about family, distance, and memory. But uncertainties abound. Who is really speaking here - is it only the daughter? And what is the real reason behind this elliptical, perhaps even spectral journey?