Skip to main content

Editorial Content for Where the Rivers Merge

Teaser

From New York Times bestselling author Mary Alice Monroe comes her highly anticipated WHERE THE RIVERS MERGE, the first of two epic and triumphant novels celebrating one intrepid woman's life across multiple generations in the American South.

Promo

From New York Times bestselling author Mary Alice Monroe comes her highly anticipated WHERE THE RIVERS MERGE, the first of two epic and triumphant novels celebrating one intrepid woman's life across multiple generations in the American South.

About the Book

From New York Times bestselling author Mary Alice Monroe comes her highly anticipated WHERE THE RIVERS MERGE, the first of two epic and triumphant novels celebrating one intrepid woman's life across multiple generations in the American South.

1908: The Lowcountry of South Carolina is at the cusp of change. Mayfield, the grand estate held for generations by the Rivers family, is the treasured home of young Eliza. A free spirit, she refuses to be confined by societal norms and spends her days exploring the vast property, observing wildlife and riding horses. But the Great War, coastal storms and family turmoil bring unexpected challenges to Eliza, putting her on a collision course with the patriarchal traditions of a bygone era.

1988: At 88, Eliza is the scion of the Rivers/DeLancey family. She has fought a lifetime to save her beloved Mayfield and is too independent and committed to quietly retire and leave the fate of the estate to her greedy son. She must make decisions that will assure the future of the land and her family --- or watch them both be split apart.

Set against the evocative landscape of the 20th-century Lowcountry, WHERE THE RIVERS MERGE is a dramatic and sweeping multigenerational family story of unyielding love, lessons learned, profound sacrifices, and the indomitable spirit of a woman determined to persevere in the face of change in order to protect her family legacy and the land she loves.

May 28, 2025

This Bookreporter.com Special Newsletter spotlights a book that we think is a great summer reading selection. Read more about it, and enter our Summer Reading Contest by Thursday, May 29th at noon ET for a chance to win one of five copies of THE GUEST COTTAGE: A Firefly Summer Novel by Lori Foster, which is now available. Please note that each contest is only open for 24 hours, so you will need to act quickly!

May 27, 2025

In this newsletter, you will find books releasing the weeks of May 26th and June 2nd that we think will be of interest to Bookreporter.com readers, along with Bonus News, where we call out a contest, feature or review that we want to let you know about so you have it on your radar.

This week, we are calling attention to our Nonfiction Author Spotlight of Brenda Coffee’s newly released book, MAYA BLUE: A Memoir of Survival, along with our review. This searingly honest and unforgettable memoir challenges women to rethink everything they know about survival, resilience and finding their voice.

May 27, 2025

This Bookreporter.com Special Newsletter spotlights a book that we think is a great summer reading selection. Read more about it, and enter our Summer Reading Contest by Wednesday, May 28th at noon ET for a chance to win one of five copies of BEACH HOUSE RULES by Kristy Woodson Harvey, which is now available. Please note that each contest is only open for 24 hours, so you will need to act quickly!

Summer Preview Evening Program Signup

Summer Preview Evening Program Signup

Editorial Content for Maya Blue: A Memoir of Survival

Contributors

Reviewer (text)

Bronwyn Miller

A memorable opening line sets the tone for every great book. In Brenda Coffee’s MAYA BLUE, the reader is warned upfront: “It was a fairy tale until it wasn’t.” Read More

Teaser

At 21, Brenda Coffee surrendered herself to her marriage and became a woman who would do almost anything her charismatic and powerful older husband, Philip Ray, wanted. Regardless of whether it was dangerous, adventurous, sexual or illegal, she wanted to be the one woman he couldn’t live without. Brenda and Philip’s life together was a fairy tale until it wasn’t. Until Philip, the founder of two high-profile, groundbreaking public companies, began making real cocaine in their basement and became addicted. Until the Big Six tobacco companies threatened their lives for creating the first smokeless cigarette --- Brenda coined the terms vape and vaping --- and brutal Guatemalan military commandos forced her into the jungle at gunpoint.

Promo

At 21, Brenda Coffee surrendered herself to her marriage and became a woman who would do almost anything her charismatic and powerful older husband, Philip Ray, wanted. Regardless of whether it was dangerous, adventurous, sexual or illegal, she wanted to be the one woman he couldn’t live without. Brenda and Philip’s life together was a fairy tale until it wasn’t. Until Philip, the founder of two high-profile, groundbreaking public companies, began making real cocaine in their basement and became addicted. Until the Big Six tobacco companies threatened their lives for creating the first smokeless cigarette --- Brenda coined the terms vape and vaping --- and brutal Guatemalan military commandos forced her into the jungle at gunpoint.

About the Book

For fans of "Breaking Bad" and "Narcos," a searingly honest and unforgettable memoir that challenges women to rethink everything they know about survival, resilience and finding their voice.

At 21, Brenda Coffee surrendered herself to her marriage and became a woman who would do almost anything her charismatic and powerful older husband, Philip Ray, wanted. Regardless of whether it was dangerous, adventurous, sexual or illegal, she wanted to be the one woman he couldn’t live without.

Brenda and Philip’s life together was a fairy tale until it wasn’t. Until Philip, the founder of two high-profile, groundbreaking public companies, began making real cocaine in their basement and became addicted. Until the Big Six tobacco companies threatened their lives for creating the first smokeless cigarette --- Brenda coined the terms vape and vaping --- and brutal Guatemalan military commandos forced her into the jungle at gunpoint.

A suspenseful, fast-paced memoir that reads like a thriller, MAYA BLUE will strike a chord with those who have lost their voice or had trouble finding their power. It will resonate with those who live with an addict or have grieved the loss of a spouse. But above all, it is an inspiring reminder that as long as you never surrender your voice and always keep your wits about you, you can survive almost anything.

Linwood Barclay, author of Whistle

Annie Blunt has had an unimaginably terrible year. First, her husband was killed in a tragic hit-and-run accident, then one of the children’s books she’s built her writing and illustrating career on ignited a major scandal. Desperate for a fresh start, she moves with her son, Charlie, to a charming small town in upstate New York. Bored and lonely in their isolated new surroundings, Charlie is thrilled when he finds a forgotten train set in a locked shed on their property. But there’s something unsettling about his new toy. Strange sounds wake Annie in the night --- she could swear she hears a train, but there isn’t an active track for miles --- and bizarre things begin happening in the neighborhood. Worse, Annie can’t seem to stop drawing a disturbing new character that has no place in a children’s book.

Chris Pavone, author of The Doorman

Chicky Diaz is everyone’s favorite doorman at the Bohemia, the most famous apartment house in the world. But gathered in the Bohemia’s bowels, the building’s almost entirely Black and Hispanic working-class staff is taking in the news that just a few miles uptown, a Black man has been killed by the police, leading to a demonstration, a counterdemonstration, and a long night of violence across the tinderbox city. As Chicky changes into his uniform for tonight’s shift, he finds himself breaking a cardinal rule of the job. Tonight, he’ll be carrying a gun, bought only hours earlier, but before he knew of the pandemonium taking over the city. Chicky knows that there’s more going on in his patch of sidewalk in front of the Bohemia than anyone is aware of.

Michael Connelly, author of Nightshade

Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Detective Stilwell has been “exiled” to a low-key post policing rustic Catalina Island, after department politics drove him off a homicide desk on the mainland. But while following up the usual drunk-and-disorderlies and petty thefts that come with his new territory, Detective Stilwell gets a report of a body found weighed down at the bottom of the harbor --- a Jane Doe identifiable at first only by a streak of purple dye in her hair. At the same time, a report of poaching on a protected reserve turns into a case fraught with violence and danger as Stilwell digs into the shady past of an island bigwig. Crossing all lines of protocol and jurisdiction, Stilwell doggedly works both cases.