Adult

The Declaration of Independence announced equality as an American ideal, but it took the Civil War and the subsequent adoption of three constitutional amendments to establish that ideal as American law. The Reconstruction amendments abolished slavery, guaranteed all persons due process and equal protection of the law, and equipped black men with the right to vote. In grafting the principle of equality onto the Constitution, these revolutionary changes marked the second founding of the United States. Eric Foner’s history traces the arc of these pivotal amendments from their dramatic origins in pre-Civil War mass meetings of African-American “colored citizens” and in Republican party politics to their virtual nullification in the late 19th century.

With the threat of Mussolini’s army looming, recently orphaned Hirut struggles to adapt to her new life as a maid in Kidane and his wife Aster’s household. Kidane, an officer in Emperor Haile Selassie’s army, rushes to mobilize his strongest men before the Italians invade. Hundreds of thousands of Italians --- Jewish photographer Ettore among them --- march on Ethiopia seeking adventure. When Emperor Haile Selassie goes into exile, Hirut helps disguise a gentle peasant as the emperor and soon becomes his guard, inspiring other women to take up arms against the Italians. But how could she have predicted her own personal war as a prisoner of one of Italy’s most vicious officers, who will force her to pose before Ettore’s camera?

Seventeen-year-old Riggle is living in rural Indiana with his uncle and uncle’s girlfriend after the death of his parents. Now his uncle is missing, probably on a drug binge. It’s Monday, and $800 in rent is due Friday. Riggle, who’s been suspended from school, has to either find his uncle or get the money together himself. His mission exposes him to a motley group of Opioid locals --- encounters by turns perplexing, harrowing and heartening.

Still reeling from the scandal that cost him his badge, Randy Mayhill sees a return from community exile in the form of a dead hog trapper perched on a fence. The fence belongs to the late Van Woods, Mayhill’s best friend and the reason for his spectacular fall. Determined to protect Van’s land and family from another scandal, Mayhill ignores the sheriff who replaced him and investigates the death of the unidentified man. His quest crosses with two others: Birdie, Van’s surly, mourning daughter, who has no intention of sitting idly by and leaving her father’s legacy in Mayhill’s hands; and Bradley, Birdie’s slow, malnourished but loyal friend, whose desperation to escape a life of poverty has him working with local criminals, and possibly a murderer.

Catholics have gone underground in the new Puritan regime of King James I, and yet whispers of conspiracies continue to echo behind closed doors and down the halls of the royal palaces. Against this perilous backdrop, accompanied by her son George and her husband Sir Thomas Tyringham --- whom she married conveniently to mask the true identity of her son’s father --- Frances Gorges reunites with her former mistress, the Princess Elizabeth, now of marriageable age, as well as other less friendly members of the court. With more lives than merely her own on the line, Frances soon finds herself caught in a spider’s web of secrets, promises and plots.

When Carrie was accused of brutally murdering her husband’s lover, she denied it. Now she’s three years into her 15-year sentence, gradually losing hope and separated from her pregnant daughter, but she is still maintaining her innocence. Tess is the only paid employee of Innocence UK, a charity that helps clear people wrongfully convicted of crimes, and accepts Carrie’s case. Meanwhile, Tess is also paired with Avril, a naïve young investigator-in-training, but unexpectedly bolts when she’s tipped off to a witness who could possibly prove Carrie didn’t commit the crime. While Tess and Avril work the case, re-interviewing witnesses and testing assumptions made at the time of the arrest, the tension ratchets up in both the case and Tess’ personal life.

The small village of Puy-Larroque, southwest France, 1898. Éléonore is a child living with her father, a pig farmer whose terminal illness leaves him unable to work, and her God-fearing mother, who runs both farm and family with an iron hand. When World War I breaks out and the village empties, Éléonore gets a taste of the changes that will transform her world as the 20th century rolls on. In the second part of the novel, which takes place in the 1980s, the untamed world of Puy-Larroque seems gone forever. Now, Éléonore has herself aged into the role of matriarch, and the family is running a large industrial pig farm, where thousands of pigs churn daily through cycles of birth, growth and death.

A spate of violent deaths has horrified London, and Rachel Savernake --- the enigmatic daughter of a notorious hanging judge --- is on the killer’s trail. Jacob Flint, a young newspaperman temporarily manning The Clarion's crime desk, is looking for the scoop that will make his name. He's certain there is more to Miss Savernake's amateur sleuthing than meets the eye. He's not the only one. Flint's pursuit of Rachel Savernake will draw him ever deeper into a labyrinth of deception and corruption. Murder by murder, he'll be swept ever closer to its dark heart --- an ancient place of execution. Twisted family relationships add to a trust-no-one narrative positively reeking with atmosphere.

The nude bodies of a corrupt judge and a Jane Doe are found under the icy, black waters at Groward Bay Marina, chained to the prongs of a mammoth fork lift. A videotape points to Merlin Finn, a ruthless gang leader with a proclivity for bondage and S&M who recently had broken out of prison. Journalist Geneva Chase investigates pill mills, crooked doctors and a massive money laundering scheme in an attempt to identify the murdered woman and find the killer. She is clearly hot on the killer's trail, but when she is kidnapped and held at the mercy of the criminals she hoped to stop, it looks like her chance to uncover the darkness that has seeped through her hometown may be lost forever.

Nia, a gifted but desperately lonely hacker, is living in isolation with her strict single dad. As a social-media maven, she is wildly popular and has more than a million friends. But they are all strangers. Cameron is on a quest for YouTube fame as a vlogger focusing on exploring the mysteries of Lake Erie. While recording his latest video, he is knocked out by lightning in a freak storm that appears to defy the laws of physics. When Cameron awakens, he discovers an astonishing cyberkinetic talent: the ability to manipulate computers and electronics with his mind. After a chance meeting online, the two teenagers join together to right wrongs in the world --- but they draw the attention of dangerous forces, putting the future of the planet at risk.