Adult

Twentysomething Frida Rodriguez arrives in Paris in 1991, relishing the city’s butter-soaked cuisine and seeking her future as a war correspondent. But then she writes to a bookshop in Seattle and receives more than just the book she requests. A friendship begins that will redefine the person she wants to become. Seattle bookseller Kate Fair is transformed by Frida’s free spirit, spurred to believe in herself as a writer, kiss her handsome coworker, and find beauty even in loss. Through the most tumultuous years of their young lives --- personally and globally --- Kate and Frida sustain and nourish each other as they learn the necessity of embracing joy, especially through our darkest hours.

Florence Grimes is a 31-year-old party girl who always takes the easy way out. Single, broke and unfulfilled after the humiliating end to her girl band career, she has only one reason to get out of bed each day: her 10-year-old son, Dylan. But then Alfie Risby, her son’s bully and the heir to a vast frozen food empire, mysteriously vanishes during a class trip, and Dylan becomes the prime suspect. Florence, for once, is faced with a task she can’t quit: She has to find Alfie and clear her son’s name, or risk losing Dylan forever. The only problem? Florence has no useful skills, let alone investigative ones, and all the other school moms hate her. Oh, and Florence has a reason to suspect that Dylan might not be as innocent as she’d like to believe.

When innkeeper Dorthe Hyllested is found murdered, the police are surprised and puzzled to discover a concealed nursery in her upstairs apartment. As far as her friends and family knew, the recently widowed Dorthe was childless. So who lived in this secret toy-strewn room? And, more importantly, where is the child now? Detective Louise Rick has just taken on a challenging new job as head of the freshly created Mobile Task Unit, which is charged with solving the most difficult cases all over Denmark. Could the mystery of Dorthe’s murder and the hidden child have something to do with the cabin in the woods behind the inn where men are often seen coming and going at all hours? Louise finds herself grasping at unlikely connections, but the twisted story she begins to uncover turns out to be darker and more dangerous than she ever imagined.

On her second birthday in 1967, Bernice McFadden died in a car crash near Detroit, only to be resuscitated after her mother pulled her from the flaming wreckage. FIRSTBORN GIRLS traces her remarkable life from that moment up to the publication of her first novel, SUGAR. Growing up in 1980s Brooklyn, Bernice finds solace in books, summer trips to Barbados and boarding school to escape her alcoholic father. Discovering the works of Alice Walker and Toni Morrison, she finally sees herself and her loved ones reflected in their stories of “messy, beautiful, joyful Black people.” Interwoven with Bernice's personal journey is her family's history, beginning with her four-times enslaved great-grandmother, Louisa Vicey Wilson. Her descendants survived Reconstruction and Jim Crow, joined the Great Migration, and mourned Dr. King’s assassination during the Civil Rights Movement.

Siblings Hazel and Kagan Bailey haven’t been close for a long time. But when their mother passes under mysterious circumstances, an investigation quickly follows, and the siblings are high on the list of possible suspects. As they deal with the emotional tragedy of losing their only living parent, brother and sister are forced to team up against a master con man --- someone they once called “family.” After the silver-tongued trickster disappears with the family fortune, Hazel and Kagan must put aside their differences to track him down. Along the way, they encounter a host of secrets, lies and double-crosses as they dive into the murky waters of their family’s past. With an unlikely ally by their side, the siblings race against time, unraveling a web of deceit that is more tangled than they ever imagined.

HOPE is the first autobiography in history ever to be published by a Pope. Written over six years, this complete autobiography starts in the early years of the 20th century, with Pope Francis’ Italian roots and his ancestors’ courageous migration to Latin America, continuing through his childhood, the enthusiasms and preoccupations of his youth, his vocation, his adult life, and the whole of his papacy up to the present day. In recounting his memories with intimate narrative force (not forgetting his own personal passions), Pope Francis deals unsparingly with some of the crucial moments of his papacy and writes candidly, fearlessly and prophetically about some of the most important and controversial questions of our present times.

The arrival of an unexpected visitor to Oregon forces small-town lawyer Cal Claxton to revisit painful events from his previous life in Los Angeles. He feels compelled to return to the City of Angels to make up for a terrible injustice that caused an innocent man to spend 13 years in prison. Cal's return also brings back dark memories of his wife's suicide, a tragedy that triggered his escape to Oregon and a new life. The cold case, involving the murder of a beautiful young woman, quickly becomes one of the most dangerous and baffling of his storied career. Once a chief prosecutor for the city of L.A., he now finds himself alone, forced to operate with nothing but his wits in a city that is even meaner and less forgiving than when he left it. He soon finds himself pitted against an array of suspects who will stop at nothing to keep the truth hidden.

Brooke Shields has spent a lifetime in the public eye. Growing up as a child actor and model, her every feature was scrutinized, her every decision judged. Today she faces a different kind of scrutiny: that of being a “woman of a certain age.” And yet, for Brooke, the passage of time has brought freedom. At 59, she feels more comfortable in her skin, more empowered and confident than she did decades ago in those famous Calvin Kleins. Now, in BROOKE SHIELDS IS NOT ALLOWED TO GET OLD, she’s changing the narrative about women and aging. This is an era, she insists, when women are reclaiming agency and power, not receding into the shadows. With remarkable candor, Brooke paints a vibrant and optimistic picture of being a woman in the prime of her life, while dismantling the myths that have dimmed that perception for too long.

They call them wayward girls. Loose girls. Girls who grew up too fast. And they’re sent to Wellwood House in St. Augustine, Florida, where unwed mothers are hidden by their families to have their babies in secret, give them up for adoption and forget any of it ever happened. Fifteen-year-old Fern arrives at the home in the sweltering summer of 1970; she’s pregnant, terrified and alone. Under the watchful eye of the stern Miss Wellwood, she meets a dozen other girls in the same predicament. Everything they eat, every moment of their waking day, and everything they’re allowed to talk about is strictly controlled by adults who claim they know what’s best for them. Then Fern meets a librarian who gives her an occult book about witchcraft, and power is in the hands of the girls for the first time in their lives. But power can destroy as easily as it creates, and it’s never given freely.

Sybil Sweet is worried that she’s the directionless, floundering daughter her family thinks she is. All she really wants now is a little financial stability and carb comfort. Lucky for her, she has just enough in the bank to buy a lottery ticket, and the late-night donut store is open. Kieran Anderson put his dreams of becoming a doctor on hold to take over running his family’s bakery. After fighting a losing battle to save the place, he’s exhausted, broke and no closer to getting back to school. But when a whirlwind of a woman sweeps in late one night, flirty energy gives way to more…until she runs out the next morning, leaving behind her winning lottery ticket. Kieran’s attempt to return the ticket goes viral, sending sales through the roof. In an effort to keep the store afloat and to convince Sybil’s family she can make good relationship choices, they agree to fake a relationship for three months.