Why are books so very powerful? What do the books we’ve read over our lives make of us? What does the unraveling of our tradition of public libraries, so hard-won but now in jeopardy, say about us? The stories in Ali Smith’s collection are about what we do with books and what they do with us: how they travel with us; how they shock us, change us, challenge us, banish time while making us older, wiser and ageless all at once; how they remind us to pay attention to the world we make. Woven between the stories are conversations with writers and readers reflecting on the essential role that libraries have played in their lives.

When Bish Ortley, a suspended cop, receives word that a bus carrying his daughter has been bombed, he rushes to be by her side. A suspect has already been singled out: a 17-year-old girl who has since disappeared from the scene. Thirteen years earlier, her grandfather set off a suicide bomb in a grocery store, a bomb her mother confessed to building. Has the girl decided to follow in their footsteps? To find her, Bish must earn the trust of her friends and family, including her infamous mother, now serving a life sentence in prison. But even as he delves into the deadly bus attack that claimed five lives, the ghosts of older crimes become impossible to ignore.

Felix is at the top of his game as Artistic Director of the Makeshiweg Theatre Festival. His productions have amazed and confounded. Now he's staging a “Tempest” like no other: not only will it boost his reputation, it will heal emotional wounds. Or that was the plan. Instead, after an act of unforeseen treachery, Felix is living in exile in a backwoods hovel, haunted by memories of his beloved lost daughter, Miranda. And also brewing revenge. After 12 years, revenge finally arrives in the shape of a theatre course at a nearby prison. Here, Felix and his inmate actors will put on his “Tempest” and snare the traitors who destroyed him. It's magic! But will it remake Felix as his enemies fall?

After besting (and arresting) a ruthless silk factory owner and his gang of thugs in GIRL WAITS WITH GUN, Constance Kopp became one of the nation’s first deputy sheriffs. But when the wiles of a German-speaking con man threaten her position and her hopes for this new life, and endanger the honorable Sheriff Heath, Constance may not be able to make things right. LADY COP MAKES TROUBLE sets Constance loose on the streets of New York City and New Jersey --- tracking down victims, trailing leads, and making friends with female reporters and lawyers at a hotel for women. Cheering her on, and goading her, are her sisters Norma and Fleurette.

Zoe Maisey is a 17-year-old musical prodigy with a genius IQ. Three years ago, she was involved in a tragic incident that left three classmates dead. She served her time, and now her mother, Maria, is resolved to keep that devastating fact tucked far away from their new beginning, hiding the past even from her new husband and demanding Zoe do the same. Tonight Zoe is giving a recital that Maria has been planning for months. But, by the end of the evening, Maria is dead. In the aftermath, everyone tries to piece together what happened. But as Zoe knows all too well, the truth is rarely straightforward, and the closer we are to someone, the less we may see.

One Sunday afternoon in Southern California, Bert Cousins shows up at Franny Keating’s christening party uninvited. Before evening falls, he has kissed Franny’s mother, Beverly --- thus setting in motion the dissolution of their marriages and the joining of two families. Spanning five decades, COMMONWEALTH explores how this chance encounter reverberates through the lives of the four parents and six children involved. Spending summers together in Virginia, the Keating and Cousins children forge a lasting bond that is based on a shared disillusionment with their parents and the strange and genuine affection that grows up between them.

Maribeth Klein is a harried working mother who’s so busy taking care of her husband and twins that she doesn’t even realize she’s had a heart attack. Surprised to discover that her recuperation seems to be an imposition on those who rely on her, Maribeth does the unthinkable: she packs a bag and leaves. But, as is often the case, once we get where we’re going, we see our lives from a different perspective. Far from the demands of family and career, and with the help of liberating new friendships, Maribeth is able to own up to secrets she has been keeping from herself and those she loves.

In rural, impoverished Burgoyne County, New York, a pattern of strange deaths begins to emerge: adolescent boys and girls are found murdered, their corpses left hanging in gruesome, ritualistic fashion. Senior law enforcement officials are quick to blame a serial killer, but their efforts to apprehend this criminal are peculiarly ineffective. Meanwhile, in the county's small town of Surrender, Trajan Jones, a psychological profiler, and Michael Li, a trace evidence expert, teach online courses in profiling and forensic science from Jones' family farm. Alone and armed mainly with their wits, protected only by farmhands and Jones' unusual ''pet,'' the outcast pair are secretly called in to consult on the case.

It’s 2011, and Samuel Andresen-Anderson hasn’t seen his mother Faye in decades --- not since she abandoned the family when he was a boy. Now she’s reappeared, having committed an absurd crime that electrifies the nightly news and inflames a politically divided country. The media paints Faye as a radical hippie with a sordid past, but as far as Samuel knows, his mother was an ordinary girl who married her high-school sweetheart. Which version of his mother is true? Two facts are certain: she’s facing some serious charges, and she needs Samuel’s help. To save her, Samuel will have to embark on his own journey, uncovering long-buried secrets about the woman he thought he knew.

Edie was the kind of girl who immediately caused a stir when she walked into your life. Now, at 33, she is working as a waitress, pregnant and alone. When she becomes overwhelmed by the needs of her new baby and sinks into a bleak despair, she thinks that there’s no one to turn to. But someone has been watching Edie, waiting for the chance to prove once again what a perfect friend she can be. It’s no coincidence that Heather shows up on Edie’s doorstep, just when Edie needs her the most. Edie is about to learn a new lesson: Those who have hurt us deeply --- or who we have hurt --- never let us go, not entirely.