Adult

Twenty-year-old Violet Sorrengail was supposed to enter the Scribe Quadrant, living a quiet life among books and history. Now, the commanding general --- also known as her tough-as-talons mother --- has ordered her to join the hundreds of candidates striving to become the elite of Navarre: dragon riders. With fewer dragons willing to bond than cadets, most would kill Violet to better their own chances of success. The rest would kill her just for being her mother’s daughter --- like Xaden Riorson, the most powerful and ruthless wingleader in the Riders Quadrant. She’ll need every edge her wits can give her just to see the next sunrise. Yet, with every day that passes, the war outside grows more deadly, the kingdom’s protective wards are failing, and the death toll continues to rise. Even worse, Violet begins to suspect that leadership is hiding a terrible secret.

Gabby and Fred have just begun to adapt to their new life as empty nesters when Gabby makes a stunning realization: she can’t stand her husband. One night at a bar, Gabby meets an enigmatic younger woman named Ellis, and in a haze of drunkenness, she confesses that she wishes Fred dead. Surely she didn’t expect anything to come of it, but when she tries to track Ellis down again, she realizes that Ellis might not have been who she said she was. As Gabby begins to unravel the truth about Ellis, and what Fred might be hiding, she is thrown into a whirlwind of lies and manipulation. How much is she willing to risk to expose the truth? And who is the real target?

At the Vis Ta Vie inn, Reneé and Jean-Paul De La Rue face the daunting decision to close their beloved home for good. Their guests include three couples in crisis: Hollywood celebs Leo and Penny are spending their silver anniversary together while on the cusp of divorce. Lucy, a practical-minded therapist, and Henry, an astronomer with his head in the stars, are struggling to find common ground. And former lawyer and current stay-at-home mom Sienna and charismatic sports agent Adam look perfect but are hiding rifts of their own. Thrown into the mix are self-absorbed single mother Cassidy and her sullen 15-year-old daughter, Rosalie. The stage is set for a week of betrayals, regrets and shocking truths that can rend the heart or heal it.

War has come. The fire god Hseth is leading an unstoppable army south, consuming everything in her path. Middren's only hope of survival is to unify allies and old foes against a common enemy. Elo navigates an uneasy alliance with Arren --- his friend, his enemy and his king. Now they each must decide how much they're willing to sacrifice to turn the tides of war. Meanwhile, Inara joins her mother on their ship, the Silverswift, to seek aid. Still grappling with her powers, Inara must reconcile who she is and where she belongs, while Skediceth has to question if their bond will be enough to keep them safe. Kissen has no allegiance to the old ways of Middren. But as she tries to find her family, she is forced to question what, and whose, future she is fighting for.

When renowned anonymous author J. R. Alastor hires former aspiring writer Mila del Angél to host a writing retreat at his private manor off the coast of Maine, she jumps at the chance --- particularly since she has an axe to grind with one of the invitees. The guest list? Six thriller authors, all masters of deceit, misdirection and mayhem. Alastor and Mila have masterminded a week of games, trope-fueled riddles, and maybe a jump scare or two --- the perfect cover for Mila to plot a murder of her own. But when a guest turns up dead --- and it’s not the murder she planned --- Mila finds herself trapped in a different narrative altogether. With a storm isolating the island, and the body count rising, Mila must outwit a killer who knows literally every trick in the book.

Eilean Eadar is a barren, windswept rock best known for the unsolved mystery of the three lighthouse keepers who vanished back in 1919. But when a young man is found dead at the base of that same lighthouse, two detective inspectors are sent from Glasgow to investigate. Georgina “George” Lennox is happy to be back from leave after a devastating accident. That is, until she meets the hostile islanders and their enigmatic priest, who seem determined to thwart their investigation. George’s partner, Richie, just wants to close the case and head home to his family. But he hasn’t heard the wolves howling or seen the dark figures at their window at night. He’s too busy watching George as if waiting for her to break. With the dark secrets of the island swirling around them, George and Richie must decide who to trust and what to believe as they spin closer to the terrible truth.

It's 2004, and former reality TV star and party girl Maya Miller has just married the most eligible bachelor on the planet: Colin Sterling, of the globally famous Sterling family, whose history of aristocratic titles and land holdings rival a British royal and whose media empire is comparable to the Murdochs. But when Colin's cousin Arianna, the heiress to the family's immense fortune, is found murdered, Maya is thrust into the spotlight: first as she is revealed to be the next heiress to the fortune, and then as the prime suspect. Swiftly, the entire Sterling family goes into lockdown at Silver House, the family's ancestral estate in the English countryside. They're told it's for their own safety --- but Maya becomes convinced that it's not to keep threats out, but to keep secrets in.

At 63 years old, million-dollar lottery winner PJ Halliday would be the luckiest man in Pondville, Massachusetts, if it weren’t for the tragedies of his life: the sudden death of his eldest daughter and the way his marriage fell apart after that. He probably doesn’t have much time left as he’s had three heart attacks already. But when PJ reads the obituary of his old romantic rival, he realizes that his high school sweetheart, Michelle Cobb, is finally single again. So he decides to drive across the country to the Tender Hearts Retirement Community in Arizona to win Michelle back. Before he can hit the road, tragedy strikes Pondville, leaving PJ the sudden guardian of his estranged brother’s grandchildren. This could be the second chance PJ has long hoped for --- a fresh shot at love and parenting --- but does he have the strength to do both those things again?

Five high school friends are bonded by an oath to protect one another no matter what. Then, on a camping trip in the middle of the forest, they find something extraordinary: a mysterious staircase to nowhere. One friend walks up --- and never comes back down. Then the staircase disappears. Twenty years later, the staircase has reappeared. Now the group returns to find the lost boy --- and what lies beyond the staircase in the woods.

Alexandra Bouvier is born in Paris in 1900. At age 14, Alex’s comfortable life is upended as war erupts across Europe. Her parents follow their sense of duty to the front, performing triage at a field hospital and confronting the horrors of poison gas and trench warfare. The merciless fighting, coupled with the fast-spreading Spanish flu, wreaks havoc on the continent, as well as on Alex’s loved ones. By the time she is 18, she has suffered unimaginable losses. With her grandfather’s support, she attends the University of Chicago and decides to follow his footsteps into journalism. As a newspaper intern, she meets reporter Oliver Foster, who is covering the gang wars sparked by Prohibition. He too has known devastating loss, and the two are drawn to each other, though both fear any attachment. As it turns out, Alex has good reason to be cautious.