Adult

One beautiful September day, three men convene on Martha's Vineyard, friends ever since meeting in college circa the '60s. They couldn't have been more different then, or even today --- Lincoln is a commercial real estate broker, Teddy a tiny-press publisher, and Mickey a musician beyond his rocking age. But each man holds his own secrets, in addition to the monumental mystery that none of them has ever stopped puzzling over since a Memorial Day weekend right here on the Vineyard in 1971: the disappearance of the woman each of them loved --- Jacy Rockafellow. Now, more than 40 years later, as this new weekend unfolds, three lives are displayed in their entirety while the distant past confounds the present like a relentless squall of surprise and discovery.

For half a century, Hadrian Marlowe has searched the farther suns for the lost planet of Vorgossos, hoping to find a way to contact the elusive alien Cielcin. He has not succeeded, and for years has wandered among the barbarian Normans as captain of a band of mercenaries. Determined to make peace and bring an end to nearly 400 years of war, Hadrian must venture beyond the security of the Sollan Empire and among the Extrasolarians who dwell between the stars. There, he will contend with creatures that once were human, with traitors in his midst, and with a meeting that will bring him face to face with no less than the oldest enemy of mankind. If he succeeds, he will usher in a peace unlike any in recorded history. If he fails, the galaxy will burn.

The peaceful town of Painters Mill is shattered when an Amish grandmother is brutally murdered on an abandoned farm. When Chief of Police Kate Burkholder arrives on the scene, she learns that the woman’s seven-year-old granddaughter is gone, abducted in plain sight. The girl’s family is a pillar of the Amish community, well-respected by all. But Kate soon realizes they’re keeping secrets --- and the sins of their past may be coming back to haunt them. What are they hiding and why? Kate’s investigation brings her to an isolated Old Order Amish settlement along the river, a community where family is everything and tradition is upheld with an iron fist. But the killer is close behind, drawing more victims into a twisted game of revenge.

Jules Larsen has just gotten a job as an apartment sitter at the Bartholomew, one of Manhattan's most high-profile and mysterious buildings. As she gets to know the residents and staff, Jules finds herself drawn to fellow apartment sitter Ingrid, who comfortingly reminds her of the sister she lost eight years ago. When Ingrid confides that the Bartholomew is not what it seems and the dark history hidden beneath its gleaming facade is starting to frighten her, Jules brushes it off as a harmless ghost story. Until the next day, when Ingrid disappears. What Jules discovers pits her against the clock as she races to unmask a killer, expose the building’s hidden past, and escape the Bartholomew before her temporary status becomes permanent.

After a messy divorce from her surgeon husband nearly 20 years ago, Jenna Boltz raised her two children on her own, juggling motherhood with her beloved job as a Seattle intensive-care nurse. Now that Paul and Allie have gone to college and moved out, Jenna can’t help but wonder what her future holds. Her best friend, Maureen, is excited for Jenna’s newfound independence. Now is the perfect time to finally book the trip to Paris they’ve been dreaming of since their college days. But when it comes to life’s other great adventure --- dating --- Jenna still isn’t sure she’s ready to let love in…until an unexpected encounter begins to change her mind.

Nofar is an average teenage girl --- so average, in fact, that she's almost invisible. Serving customers ice cream all summer long, she is desperate for some kind of escape. One afternoon, a terrible lie slips from her tongue. And suddenly everyone wants to talk to her: the press, her schoolmates, even the boy upstairs. He is the only one who knows the truth, and he is demanding a price for his silence. Then Nofar meets Raymonde, an elderly immigrant whose best friend has just died. Raymonde keeps her friend alive the only way she knows how, by inhabiting her stories. But soon, Raymonde's lies take on a life of their own.

In its kaleidoscopic sweep, MAKE IT SCREAM, MAKE IT BURN creates a profound exploration of the oceanic depths of longing and the reverberations of obsession. Among Leslie Jamison's subjects are 52 Blue, deemed "the loneliest whale in the world"; the eerie past-life memories of children; the devoted citizens of an online world called Second Life; the haunted landscape of the Sri Lankan Civil War; and an entire museum dedicated to the relics of broken relationships. Jamison follows these examinations to more personal reckonings --- with elusive men and ruptured romances, with marriage and maternity --- in essays about eloping in Las Vegas, becoming a stepmother and giving birth.

The chimneys of industry rise over Adua, and the world seethes with new opportunities. But old scores run deep as ever. On the blood-soaked borders of Angland, Leo dan Brock struggles to win fame on the battlefield and defeat the marauding armies of Stour Nightfall. He hopes for help from the crown. But King Jezal's son, the feckless Prince Orso, is a man who specializes in disappointments. Savine dan Glokta --- socialite, investor and daughter of the most feared man in the Union --- plans to claw her way to the top of the slag-heap of society by any means necessary. But the slums boil over with a rage that all the money in the world cannot control. With the help of the mad hillwoman Isern-i-Phail, Rikke struggles to control the blessing, or the curse, of the Long Eye.

Nine-year-old Levi King knew he should have left for home sooner; now he's alone in the darkness of vast Caddo Lake. A sudden noise distracts him, and all goes dark. Darren Matthews is trying to emerge from another kind of darkness. After the events of his previous investigation, his marriage is in a precarious state of rebuilding, and his career and reputation lie in the hands of his mother. She now holds the key to his freedom, and is not above a little maternal blackmail to press her advantage. Levi's disappearance has links to Darren's last case, and to a wealthy businesswoman --- the boy's grandmother --- who seems more concerned about the fate of her business than that of her grandson.

A marketing director in a biotech company, Asmi rose through the corporate ranks and never really took the time to think about couplehood. She has good friends, a terrific sister who lives close by, and a married on-again, off-again lover in Paris she sees while she travels around the world for work. As Asmi reaches the big 4-0 and contemplates making some life choices, her boss announces he is retiring, and she is suddenly thrown into a corporate Hunger Games against her nemesis Scott Beauregard III to win a promotion. Worried that her inability to commit to a real relationship with a man is a personality flaw and afraid that she's unqualified for the job she desperately wants, Asmi must learn to lean in to have the career and life she wants and deserves, without worrying about what society expects from her.