When Terry White, a former deputy sheriff and a failed politician, goes broke in the 2007–2008 financial crisis, he takes a job working for the UN, helping to train the Haitian police. He is sent to the remote town of Jérémie, where he is swept up in their complex politics when he befriends an earnest, reforming American-educated judge. Soon he convinces the judge to oppose the corrupt but charismatic Sénateur Maxim Bayard in an upcoming election. But when Terry falls in love with the judge’s wife, the electoral drama threatens to become a disaster.

The pieces in SHAME AND WONDER are born of a vast, abiding curiosity, one that has led David Searcy into some strange and beautiful territory, where old Uncle Scrooge comic books reveal profound truths and the vastness of space becomes an expression of pure love. Whether ruminating on an old El Camino pickup truck, those magical prizes lurking in the cereal boxes of our youth, or a lurid online ad for “Sexy Girls Near Dallas,” Searcy brings his unique blend of affection and suspicion to the everyday wonders that surround and seduce us.

When Amaterasu Takahashi opens the door of her Philadelphia home to a badly scarred man claiming to be her grandson, she doesn’t believe him. Her grandson and her daughter, Yuko, perished nearly 40 years ago during the bombing of Nagasaki. But the man carries with him a collection of sealed private letters that open a Pandora’s Box of family secrets Ama had sworn to leave behind when she fled Japan. Will she allow herself to believe in a miracle?

The movie business is booming in 1935 when 21-year-old Loretta Young meets 34-year-old Clark Gable on the set of The Call of the Wild. Though he's already married, Gable falls for the stunning and vivacious young actress instantly. Far from the glittering lights of Hollywood, Sister Alda Ducci has been forced to leave her convent and begin a new journey that leads her to Loretta. Over the course of decades, they forge an enduring bond of love and loyalty that will be put to the test when they eventually face the greatest obstacle of their lives.

A rare outburst from Caroline Jacobs has awakened something in her --- a realization that the roots of her tirade can be traced back to when her best friend very publicly betrayed her. So Caroline decides to go back to her home town and tell off her childhood friend. She busts her daughter out of school, and the two set off to deliver the perfect comeback…some 25 years later. But nothing goes as planned. Long-buried secrets rise to the surface, and Caroline finds that she has to face much more than one old, bad best friend.

As John Banville writes in his introduction to THE LOVE OBJECT, Edna O'Brien "is, simply, one of the finest writers of our time.” The 31 stories collected in this volume provide, among other things, a cumulative portrait of Ireland, seen from within and without. Coming of age, the impact of class, and familial and romantic love are the prevalent motifs, along with the instinct toward escape and subsequent nostalgia for home. Some of the stories are linked, while others carry O'Brien's distinct sense of the comical.

P.I. Leonid McGill isn’t usually one to refuse a case. But when Hiram Stent, a man down on his luck, begs him to find a cousin who is about to inherit millions of dollars, he senses something fishy. His instincts prove right: The night after he turns Hiram away, Hiram is found dead and Leonid’s office is broken into. Feeling partly responsible for this bizarre turn of events, Leonid is forced to open an investigation that will pull him into the lurid history of an old-money New York family.

In THE LIGHT OF THE WORLD, Elizabeth Alexander finds herself at an existential crossroads after the sudden death of her husband, who was just 49. Reflecting with gratitude on the exquisite beauty of her married life that was, grappling with the subsequent void, and feeling a re-energized devotion to her two teenage sons, Alexander channels her poetic sensibilities into a rich, lucid prose that describes a very personal and yet universal quest for meaning, understanding and acceptance.

As winter deepens in snowbound Pollard, Illinois, thirty-something Francis Falbo is holed up in his attic apartment, recovering from a series of traumas. Other than the agoraphobia that continues to hold him hostage, all he has left is his childhood home, the remaining rooms of which he rents to a cast of eccentric tenants. The tight-knit community has already survived a blizzard, but there is more danger in store for the citizens of Pollard before summer arrives.

Our hero Alby flails wildly against the world around him --- he punches his sister (she deserved it), "unprotectos" broads (they deserved it and liked it), gets drunk and picks fights (all deserved), defends defenseless creatures both large and small, and spews insults at children, slow drivers, old ladies, and every single surviving member of his family. In each of these stories, Alby distills the anguish, terror, humor and strange grace --- or lack of --- he experiences in the aftermath of his mother’s death.