Junior barrister Daniel Pitt is summoned to the scene of a murder in the London district known as Mile End. The victim is a senior barrister from the same firm. The firm’s head, Marcus fford Croft, may know more than he admits, but his memory is not what it used to be. Daniel and Kitteridge’s inquiries lead them to a local brothel and to an opium den, but also to a wealthy shipbuilder crucial to Britain’s effort to build up its fleet, which may soon face the fearsome naval might of Germany. Daniel finds his path blocked by officials at every turn, and even his father receives a chilling warning from a powerful source. Suddenly, not just Daniel but his whole family --- including his beloved mother, Charlotte --- is in danger.

For 30 years, the Fellowship of the Anointed isolated its members, conditioning them to believe that pain is power and magic is suffering. But when their leader is arrested, all her teachings come into question. How will they adjust to the world they were taught to fear, and how will they relate to the cult's last crusader, Lark? For Kane, survival means rejecting the magic he and his lover suffered for. For Deryn, the cult's collapse is an opportunity to prove they are worth as much as their Anointed brother. For Calvin, lark is the alluring embodiment of the magic he's been seeking his entire life. But for Lark, the Fellowship isn’t over. Before he can begin to discover himself and heal a lifetime of traumas, he has a monster to slay.

In the middle of the bustle of Soho sits a building that young millionaire Agatha Howard wants to convert into luxury condos as soon as she can kick out all the tenants. However, the building in question houses a brothel, and Precious and Tabitha, two of the women who live and work there, are not going to go quietly. The fight over this piece of property also draws in the men who visit, including Robert, a one-time member of a far-right group and enforcer for Agatha’s father; Jackie, a policewoman intent on making London a safer place for all women; Bastian, a rich and dissatisfied party boy who pines for an ex-girlfriend; and a collection of vagabonds and strays who occupy the basement.

When Lauren returns home to her flat in London late one night, she is greeted at the door by her husband, Michael. There’s only one problem --- she’s not married. She’s never seen this man before in her life. But according to her friends, her much-improved decor, and the photos on her phone, they’ve been together for years. As Lauren tries to puzzle out how she could be married to someone she can’t remember meeting, Michael goes to the attic to change a lightbulb and abruptly disappears. In his place, a new man emerges, and a new, slightly altered life re-forms around her. Realizing that her attic is creating an infinite supply of husbands, Lauren confronts the question: If swapping lives is as easy as changing a lightbulb, how do you know you’ve taken the right path?

After suffering an epic tumble down the corporate ladder, Cassie Woodson takes a thankless temp job reviewing correspondence for a large-scale fraud suit. While sorting through a relentless deluge of emails, something catches her eye: the tender (and totally private) exchanges between a partner at the firm, Forest Watts, and his enchanting wife, Annabelle. By peeking into their apparently perfect life, Cassie finds renewed purpose and happiness. But when she orchestrates a “chance” meeting with Forest in the real world and sees something that throws the state of his marriage into question, the fantasy she’s been carefully cultivating shatters. Suddenly, she doesn’t simply admire Annabelle --- she wants to take her place. And she’s armed with the tools to make that happen.

In 1892, Bombay is the center of British India. Nearby, Captain Jim Agnihotri lies in Poona military hospital recovering from a skirmish on the wild northern frontier, with little to do but re-read the tales of his idol, Sherlock Holmes, and browse the daily papers. The case that catches Captain Jim's attention is being called the crime of the century: Two women fell from the busy university’s clock tower in broad daylight. Moved by Adi, the widower of one of the victims --- and his certainty that his wife and sister did not commit suicide --- Captain Jim approaches the Parsee family and is hired to investigate what happened that terrible afternoon. But in a land of divided loyalties, asking questions is dangerous.

Aidan Marlowe has been playing the same lottery numbers for 15 years, never hitting the jackpot. Until now. On the day of his wife's funeral. Aidan struggles to cope with these two sudden extremes. But the money gives him and his kids options they didn't have before. They can leave everything behind and start a new life in a new town. So they do. But a huge new house and all the money in the world can't replace what they've lost, and it's not long before Aidan realizes he's merely trading old demons for new ones. Because someone is watching him and his family very closely. Someone who knows exactly who they are, where they've come from and what they're trying to hide. Someone who will stop at nothing to get what they want.

Siobhan is a quick-tempered life coach with way too much on her plate. Miranda is a tree surgeon used to being treated as just one of the guys on the job. Jane is a soft-spoken volunteer for the local charity shop with zero sense of self-worth. These three women are strangers who have only one thing in common: they’ve all been stood up on the same day, the very worst day to be stood up --- Valentine’s Day. And, unbeknownst to them, they’ve all been stood up by the same man. Once they've each forgiven him for standing them up, they are all in serious danger of falling in love with a man who may have not just one or two but three women on the go. Is there more to him than meets the eye?

To her adoring fans, Emmy Jackson, aka @the_mamabare, is the honest “Instamum” who always tells it like it is. To her skeptical husband, a washed-up novelist who knows just how creative Emmy can be with the truth, she is a breadwinning powerhouse who is chillingly brilliant at monetizing the intimate details of their family life. To one of Emmy’s dangerously obsessive followers, she’s the woman who has everything --- but deserves none of it. As Emmy’s marriage begins to crack under the strain of her growing success and her moral compass veers wildly off course, the more vulnerable she becomes to a very real danger circling ever closer to her family.

On a brilliantly sunny July day, six-year-old Ruby is abandoned by her father in the suffocating dark of a Tennessee cave. Twenty years later, transformed into soap opera star Eleanor Russell, she is fired under dubious circumstances. Fleeing to Europe, she marries a glamorous stranger named Orlando Montague and keeps her past closely hidden. Together, Eleanor and Orlando start afresh in LA. Setting up house in a storybook cottage in the Hollywood Hills, Eleanor is cast in a dream role --- the lead in a remake of REBECCA. As she immerses herself in that eerie gothic tale, Orlando’s personality changes, ghosts of her past re-emerge, and Eleanor fears she is not the only person in her marriage with a secret.

Camden, NJ, 1948. When Sally Horner steals a notebook from the local Woolworth's, she’s accosted by an FBI agent. Sally dutifully follows his orders, oblivious to a haunting reality: he’s not an FBI agent. And he’s going to kidnap her. RUST & STARDUST traces the next two harrowing years for Sally as she’s held captive, forever altering her life and the lives of her family, friends and those she meets along the way as they travel from Camden to San Jose. Sally must overcome the impossible when all hope seems lost, waiting for the day she can return home and tell her story.

For the last 20 years, George Saunders has been teaching a class on the Russian short story to his MFA students at Syracuse University. In A SWIM IN A POND IN THE RAIN, he shares a version of that class with us, offering some of what he and his students have discovered together over the years. Paired with iconic short stories by Chekhov, Turgenev, Tolstoy and Gogol, the seven essays in this book are intended for anyone interested in how fiction works and why it’s more relevant than ever in these turbulent times.

On a rainy October night in Kentucky, recently divorced therapist Tallie Clark is on her way home from work when she spots a man precariously standing at the edge of a bridge. Without a second thought, Tallie pulls over and jumps out of the car into the pouring rain. She convinces the man to join her for a cup of coffee, and he eventually agrees to come back to her house, where he finally shares his name: Emmett. Over the course of the emotionally charged weekend that follows, Tallie makes it her mission to provide a safe space for Emmett, though she hesitates to confess that this is also her day job. What she doesn’t realize is that Emmett isn’t the only one who needs healing --- and they both are harboring secrets.

Duchess Day Radley is a 13-year-old self-proclaimed outlaw. Rules are for other people. She is the fierce protector of her five-year-old brother, Robin, and the parent to her mother, Star, a single mom incapable of taking care of herself, let alone her two kids. Walk has never left the coastal California town where he and Star grew up. He may have become the chief of police, but he’s still trying to heal the old wound of having given the testimony that sent his best friend, Vincent King, to prison decades before. And he's in overdrive protecting Duchess and her brother. Now, 30 years later, Vincent is being released. And Duchess and Walk must face the trouble that comes with his return.

Avery Keene, a brilliant young law clerk for the legendary Justice Howard Wynn, is doing her best to hold her strained personal life together. But when the shocking news breaks that Justice Wynn --- the cantankerous swing vote on the court --- has slipped into a coma, Avery’s life turns upside down. She learns that Wynn has appointed her to serve as his legal guardian and hold his power of attorney. Avery finds that Justice Wynn had been secretly researching one of the most controversial cases before the court --- a proposed merger between an American biotech company and an Indian genetics firm, which promises to unleash breathtaking results in the medical field. She also discovers that Wynn suspected a dangerous conspiracy was infiltrating the highest corridors of power in Washington.