Adult

Devoted single mother Delphine Jones is an expert at putting her head down and moving through life one day at a time. Since getting pregnant at 16, her circle has only ever included her now 11-year-old daughter and best friend, Em, and her complicated father with whom they live. But when an opportunity for her to finish school presents itself, Delphine finally does something she hasn’t done in years: she takes a chance on herself. Sometimes all it takes is one chance. But as she rediscovers her passions and her belief in herself, Delphine also must face questions she’s stonewalled for more than a decade, questions about Em’s father. Is she brave enough?

The most pressing issue on Adam Hayes' mind is planning his son's upcoming fifth birthday party. After years of operating in the world's most dangerous spots for Treadstone, he's ready to call it quits, but the feeling isn't mutual. Levi Shaw, Treadstone's director, calls Hayes back for one more mission. "It's a walk in the park. You don't even have to go in with the strike team. I just need you to set up the safe house. You'll be home in time to pick up the birthday cake." But nothing is ever easy where Treadstone is concerned. When the mission is blown, only Hayes is left alive, and it seems that everyone is determined to correct that oversight.

In this deeply intimate second poetry collection, Ocean Vuong searches for life among the aftershocks of his mother’s death, embodying the paradox of sitting within grief while being determined to survive beyond it. Shifting through memory, and in concert with the themes of his novel ON EARTH WE’RE BRIEFLY GORGEOUS, Vuong contends with personal loss, the meaning of family, and the cost of being the product of an American war in America. At once vivid, brave and propulsive, Vuong’s poems circle fragmented lives to find restoration as well as the epicenter of the break.

Not since childhood has Faraz returned to the Mohalla, in Lahore’s walled inner city, where women continue to pass down the art of courtesan from mother to daughter. But he still remembers the day he was abducted from the home he shared with his mother and sister there, at the direction of his powerful father, who wanted to give him a chance at a respectable life. Now Wajid, once more dictating his fate from afar, has sent Faraz back to Lahore, installing him as head of the Mohalla police station and charging him with a mission: to cover up the violent death of a young girl. It should be a simple assignment to carry out in a marginalized community, but for the first time in his career, Faraz finds himself unable to follow orders.

In 1986, renowned nuclear scientist Anna Berkova is sleeping in her bed in the Soviet Union when Chernobyl’s reactor melts down. It’s the exact moment she tears through time --- and it’s an accident. When she opens her eyes, she’s landed in 1992 only to discover Molly, her estranged daughter, shot in the chest. Molly, with her dying breath, begs Anna to go back in time and stop the disaster, to save Molly’s daughter Raisa, and put their family’s future on a better path. As these remarkable women work together to prevent the greatest nuclear disaster of the 20th century, they grapple with the power their discoveries hold. Just because you can change the past, does it mean you should?

To the outside observer, Vivian is a success story --- a dedicated lawyer who advocates for mentally ill patients at a New York City psychiatric hospital. Privately, Vivian contends with the memories and aftereffects of her bad childhood --- compounded by the everyday stresses of being a Black Latinx woman in America. She lives in a constant state of hypervigilant awareness that makes even a simple subway ride into a heart-pounding drama. For years, Vivian has self-medicated with a mix of dating, dieting, dark humor and smoking weed with her BFF, Jane. But after a family reunion prompts Vivian to take a bold step, she finds herself alone in new and terrifying ways, and she starts to unravel.

Simon Riske is toasting the record hundred-million-dollar sale of a rare 1963 Ferrari that he restored himself. The buyer is a sophisticated French woman named Sylvie Bettencourt. Riske enjoys her company until her bodyguard storms in, claiming the vehicle is a fake. Riske must prove the car is the real thing…or else. Meanwhile, Carl Bildt, banker to the rich and nefarious, is killed by a powerful car bomb, moments before he can deliver evidence to the authorities. His daughter, Anna, rushes to Switzerland to investigate her father’s violent death. As Riske strives to prove the Ferrari’s authenticity and look deeper into Sylvie’s past, he crosses paths with Anna and discovers they have an enemy in common.

Delia Ephron had struggled through several years of heartbreak. She’d lost her sister, Nora, and then her husband, Jerry, both to cancer. Several months after Jerry’s death, she shut down his landline, which crashed her internet. She channeled her grief by writing a New York Times op-ed. The piece caught the attention of Peter, a Bay Area psychiatrist, who emailed her to commiserate. Recently widowed himself, he reminded her that they had shared a few dates 54 years before, set up by Nora. Delia did not remember him, but after several weeks of exchanging emails and ’60s folk songs, he flew east to see her. They were crazy, utterly, in love. But four months later, she was diagnosed with AML, a fierce leukemia.

Aloysius Archer is in Los Angeles to ring in the New Year with an old friend, aspiring actress Liberty Callahan, when their evening is interrupted by an acquaintance of Callahan’s: Eleanor Lamb, a screenwriter in dire straits. After a series of increasingly chilling events, Eleanor fears that her life is in danger, and she wants to hire Archer to look into the matter. Archer suspects that Eleanor knows more than she’s saying, but before he can officially take on her case, a dead body turns up inside of Eleanor’s home…and Eleanor herself disappears. With the help of Callahan and his partner, Willie Dash, Archer launches an investigation that will take him from mob-ridden Las Vegas to the glamorous world of Hollywood to the darkest corners of Los Angeles.

After a wild bet, gourmet grilled-cheese sandwich, and cuddle with a baby goat, Alexis Montgomery has had her world turned upside down. The cause: Daniel Grant, a ridiculously hot carpenter who’s 10 years younger than her and as casual as they come --- and their chemistry is undeniable. While her ultra-wealthy parents want her to carry on the family legacy of world-renowned surgeons, Alexis doesn’t need glory or fame. And every minute she spends with Daniel and the tight-knit town where he lives, she’s discovering just what’s really important. Yet letting their relationship become anything more than a short-term fling would mean turning her back on her family and giving up the opportunity to help thousands of people.