Adult

Òdòdó’s hometown of Timbuktu has been conquered by the warrior king of Yorùbáland, and living conditions for the women in her blacksmith guild, who were already shunned as social pariahs, grow even worse. Then Òdòdó is abducted. She is whisked across the Sahara to the capital city of Ṣàngótẹ̀, where she is shocked to discover that her kidnapper is none other than the vagrant who had visited her guild just days prior. But now that he is swathed in riches rather than rags, Òdòdó realizes he is not a vagrant at all; he is the warrior king, and he has chosen her to be his wife. In a sudden change of fortune, Òdòdó soars to the very heights of society. But after a lifetime of subjugation, she finds the power that saturates this world of battle and political savvy too enticing to resist.

In 1951, a mysterious old woman confronts Pilar Aguirre in the small border town of La Cienega, Texas. The old woman is sure Pilar stole her husband and, in a heated outburst, lays a curse on Pilar and her family. More than 40 years later, Lulu Muñoz is dodging chaos at every turn: her troubled father’s moods, his rules, her secret life as singer in a punk band, but most of all her upcoming quinceañera. When her beloved grandmother passes away, Lulu finds herself drawn to the glamorous stranger who crashed the funeral and who lives alone and shunned on the edge of town. Their unexpected kinship picks at the secrets of Lulu’s family’s past. As the quinceañera looms --- and we move between these two strong, irascible female voices --- one woman must make peace with the past, and one girl pushes to embrace her future.

The 20th-century American department store: a palace of consumption where women, shopper and shopgirl alike, could stake out a newfound independence. Whether in New York, Chicago or on Main Street, USA, men owned the buildings, but inside, women ruled. In this hothouse atmosphere, three women rose to the top. In the 1930s, Hortense Odlum of Bonwit Teller came to her husband's department store as a housewife and wound up running the company. Dorothy Shaver of Lord & Taylor championed American designers during World War II --- before which US fashions were almost exclusively Parisian copies --- becoming the first businesswoman to earn a $1 million salary. And in the 1960s, Geraldine Stutz of Henri Bendel reinvented the look of the modern department store and inspired a devoted following of ultra-chic shoppers, as well as decades of copycats.

In the summer of 1976, Duane Oshun finds himself stranded in a remote Montana town beset by a series of strange and menacing events. He takes a job as a logger and builds a cabin on an isolated road near a reclusive neighbor --- a hermit named Ted Kaczynski. The two men are captivated by the valley’s endangered old-growth forest, but Kaczynski’s violent grievances against modern society soon threaten the lives of all those around him. As Kaczynski’s bombs crescendo to the book’s devastating conclusion, OLD KING wrestles with the birth of the modern environmental movement, the accelerating dominion of technology in American life, and a new kind of violence that lives next door.

Mark Wolfe, a brilliant if self-thwarting technical writer, lives in Pittsburgh with his wife, Sushila, and their toddler daughter. His half-brother Geoff, born and raised in the United Kingdom, is a desperate young soccer agent. He pulls Mark across the ocean into a scheme to track down an elusive prospect known only as “Godwin” --- an African teenager Geoff believes could be the next Lionel Messi. Narrated in turn by Mark and his work colleague, Lakesha Williams, GODWIN is a tale of family and migration, as well as an international adventure story that implicates the brothers in the beauty and ugliness of soccer, the perils and promises of international business, and the dark history of transatlantic money-making.

In June 2022, Americans watched in shock as the Supreme Court reversed one of the nation’s landmark rulings. For nearly a half-century, Roe v. Wade was synonymous with women’s rights and freedoms. Then, suddenly, it was gone. In their groundbreaking book, THE FALL OF ROE, acclaimed New York Times journalists Elizabeth Dias and Lisa Lerer reveal the explosive inside story of how it happened. Their investigation charts the shocking political and religious campaign to take down abortion rights and remake American families, womanhood and the nation itself. In doing so, Dias and Lerer go beyond the traditional political narrative into the most personal reaches of American life.

Beth Ralston, a paralegal in Portland, Oregon, would rather be racking up billable hours than mingling at an office party --- especially when her sister Lindsay, aka her plus one, is a no-show. After making her obligatory rounds, Beth returns to her office to find that her boss has been murdered. She sees a woman fleeing the scene. Was that Lindsay? Unable to catch up to her in time, Beth waits for the police to arrive and notices that Lindsay has left her phone behind with an unsent text message to Beth displayed on the screen: “Don’t ask. Don’t follow.” While retracing Lindsay’s steps, determined to bring her home, Beth uncovers what her sister, an investigative reporter bent on changing the world, was trying to expose --- corruption, secrets and betrayal on an unimaginable level.

If Ted Ainsworth were to compare himself to one of the ice cream flavors made by his family’s company, it might be vanilla --- sweet, inoffensive and pleasantly predictable. At 43, Ted is convinced there’s nothing remotely remarkable about him, except perhaps his luck in having landed handsome, charismatic Giles as a husband. Then Giles suddenly leaves him for another man, filling his social media feed with posts about #newlove and adventure. And Ted, who has spent nearly 20 years living with, and often for, another person, must reimagine the future he has happily taken for granted. But perhaps there is another Ted slowly blossoming now that he’s no longer in Giles’ shadow --- one who is funny, sassy and more uninhibited. Someone willing to take chances on new friendships and even new love.

As a child in Beijing in the 1970s, Lai lives with her family in a lively, working-class neighborhood near the heart of the city. Only Lai’s grandmother seems to really see Lai and believe that she can blossom beyond their circumstances. A gifted student, Lai wins a scholarship to study at the prestigious Peking University, where she soon falls in with a theatrical band of individualists and misfits dedicated to becoming their authentic selves, despite the Communist Party’s insistence on conformity. When student resistance hardens under the increasingly restrictive policies of the state, the group joins the masses of demonstrators and dreamers who display remarkable courage and loyalty in the face of danger. As 1989 unfolds, the spirit of change is in the air.

When a Zoom disaster upends Addison Irwin’s decade-long career at a posh Manhattan advertising agency, things look bleak for the thirty-something mid-western transplant. But an unexpected inheritance from an aunt she barely remembers --- a property on Fire Island, complete with guest house and artist’s studio --- changes everything. While debating whether to stay or sell, Addison learns that she’s also inherited her aunt’s list of eclectic guests, tying her to the island for seven summer weekends. Eager to convince Addison to keep the house rather than let a new buyer build a monstrosity in its place, the neighbors welcome her to their laid-back community. Well, all except the moody guy next door, who seems intent on glowering his way through life. Addison is determined not to let this detour on Fire Island throw her off track.