Sam Hill always saw the world through different eyes. Born with red pupils, he was often called “Devil Boy” by his classmates; “God’s will” is what his mother called his ocular albinism. Her words were of little comfort, but Sam persevered, buoyed by his mother's devout faith, his father's practical wisdom, and his two other misfit friends.

Sam believed it was God who sent Ernie Cantwell, the only African American kid in his class, to be the friend he so desperately needed. And that it was God's idea for Mickie Kennedy to storm into Our Lady of Mercy like a tornado, uprooting every rule Sam had been taught about boys and girls.

Forty years later, Sam, a small-town eye doctor, is no longer certain anything was by design—especially not the tragedy that caused him to turn his back on his friends, his hometown, and the life he’d always known. Running from the pain, eyes closed, served little purpose. Now, as he looks back on his life, Sam embarks on a journey that will take him halfway around the world. This time, his eyes are wide open—bringing into clear view what changed him, defined him, and made him so afraid, until he can finally see what truly matters.

Spoon River Anthology by Edgar Lee Masters was an immediate commercial success when it was published in 1915. Unconventional in both style and content, it shattered the myths of small town American life. This collection of epitaphs of residents of a small town requires the reader to piece together narratives from fragments contained in individual poems.

In these pages, no less than 214 individual voices are heard — each voice distinct, yet universal in its resonance. The voices of Spoon River, although distinctively small-town Americans, evoke themes of love and hope, disappointment and despair that are universal in their resonance.

Daniel Mulligan is tough, snarky, and tattooed, hiding his self-consciousness behind sarcasm. Daniel has never fit in—not at home in Philadelphia with his auto mechanic father and brothers, and not at school where his Ivy League classmates looked down on him.

Now, Daniel’s relieved to have a job at a small college in Holiday, Northern Michigan, but he’s a city boy through and through, and it’s clear that this small town is one more place he won’t fit in.

Rex Vale clings to routine to keep loneliness at bay: honing his muscular body, perfecting his recipes, and making custom furniture. Rex has lived in Holiday for years, but his shyness and imposing size have kept him from connecting with people.

When the two men meet, their chemistry is explosive, but Rex fears Daniel will be another in a long line of people to leave him, and Daniel has learned that letting anyone in can be a fatal weakness.

Just as they begin to break down the walls keeping them apart, Daniel is called home to Philadelphia, where he discovers a secret that changes the way he understands everything.

Our Souls at Night is a spare yet eloquent, bittersweet yet inspiring story of a man and a woman who, in advanced age, come together to wrestle with the events of their lives and their hopes for the imminent future.

In the familiar setting of Holt, Colorado, home to all of Kent Haruf's inimitable fiction, Addie Moore pays an unexpected visit to a neighbor, Louis Waters. Her husband died years ago, as did his wife, and in such a small town they naturally have known of each other for decades; in fact, Addie was quite fond of Louis's wife.

His daughter lives hours away in Colorado Springs, her son even farther away in Grand Junction, and Addie and Louis have long been living alone in houses now empty of family, the nights so terribly lonely, especially with no one to talk with.

Their brave adventures—their pleasures and their difficulties—are hugely involving and truly resonant, making Our Souls at Night the perfect final installment to this beloved writer's enduring contribution to American literature.

Billy Liar captures brilliantly the claustrophobic atmosphere of a small town. It tells the story of Billy Fisher, a Yorkshire teenager unable to stop lying - especially to his three girlfriends. Trapped by his boring job and working-class parents, Billy finds that his only happiness lies in grand plans for his future and fantastical day-dreams of the fictional country Ambrosia.

Sophie May has a secret. One that she's successfully kept for years. It's meant that she's had to give up her dreams of going to university and travelling the world to stay in her little village, living with her mum and working in the local teashop.

But then Sophie unexpectedly meets the gorgeous Billy Buskin - a famous actor with ambitions to make it to the top. As they begin to grow closer, Sophie finds herself whisked away from the comfort of her life into Billy's glamorous - but ruthless - world.

After years of shying away from attention, can Sophie handle the constant scrutiny that comes with being with Billy? How much is she prepared to give up along the way? And is their love strong enough to keep them together against the odds?

Charming, heart-warming and utterly romantic, Billy and Me is an unforgettable story that will completely capture your heart.

Into This River I Drown is a tale of loss, grief, and the mysterious forces that shape our lives. Five years ago, Benji Green lost his beloved father, Big Eddie, who drowned when his truck crashed into a river. Although all called it an accident, Benji believed it was more than that. Even years later, he is buried deep in his grief, throwing himself into taking over Big Eddie's convenience store in the small town of Roseland, Oregon.

Surrounded by his mother and three aunts, Benji lives day by day, struggling to keep his head above water. But Roseland is no ordinary place. With ever-increasing dreams of his father's death and waking visions of feathers on the surface of a river, Benji's definition of reality starts to bend.

He thinks himself haunted, but whether by ghosts or memories, he can no longer tell. It's not until the impossible happens—a man falls from the sky and leaves the burning imprint of wings on the ground—that he begins to understand that the world around him is more mysterious than he could have possibly imagined. It's also more dangerous, as forces beyond anyone's control are descending on Roseland, revealing long-hidden truths about friends, family, and the man named Calliel, who Benji is finding he can no longer live without.

Hanna Boudreaux has lived in the small town of Willow all her life. She’s sweet, cute, and quiet. Hanna has a moment of epiphany when she realizes her crush for forever, Raiden Ulysses Miller, is not ever going to be hers. She sees her life as narrow and decides to do something about it.

Raiden Miller is the town’s local hero. A former Marine with the medal to prove his hero status, he comes home, shrouded in mystery. It takes a while, but eventually, Hanna catches his eye.

After all these years of Raid and Hanna living in the same town, the question is why? Is Raid interested in Hanna because she’s sweet and cute? Or does Raid have something else going on?

Elizabeth Berg, bestselling author of The Art of Mending and The Year of Pleasures, has a rare talent for revealing her characters' hearts and minds in a manner that makes us empathize completely.

It is the summer of 1964. In Tupelo, Mississippi, the town of Elvis's birth, tensions are mounting over civil-rights demonstrations occurring ever more frequently—and violently—across the state. But in Paige Dunn's small, ramshackle house, there are more immediate concerns.

Challenged by the effects of the polio she contracted during her last month of pregnancy, Paige is nonetheless determined to live as normal a life as possible and to raise her daughter, Diana, in the way she sees fit—with the support of her tough-talking black caregiver, Peacie.

Diana is trying in her own fashion to live a normal life. As a fourteen-year-old, she wants to make money for clothes and magazines, to slough off the authority of her mother and Peacie, to figure out the puzzle that is boys, and to escape the oppressiveness she sees everywhere in her small town. What she can never escape, however, is the way her life is markedly different from others'. Nor can she escape her ongoing responsibility to assist in caring for her mother.

Paige Dunn is attractive, charming, intelligent, and lively, but her needs are great—and relentless. As the summer unfolds, hate and adversity will visit this modest home. Despite the difficulties thrust upon them, each of the women will find her own path to independence, understanding, and peace. And Diana's mother, so mightily compromised, will end up giving her daughter an extraordinary gift few parents could match.

A novel full of heart, humor, and charm from Newbery Honor winner Joan Bauer!

When twelve-year-old Foster and her mother land in the tiny town of Culpepper, they don't know what to expect. But folks quickly warm to the woman with the great voice and the girl who can bake like nobody's business.

Soon Foster - who dreams of having her own cooking show one day - lands herself a gig baking for the local coffee shop, and gets herself some much-needed help in overcoming her biggest challenge - learning to read.

Just as Foster and Mama start to feel at ease, their past catches up to them. Thanks to the folks in Culpepper, though, Foster and her mama find the strength to put their troubles behind them for good.

Alice Bliss is a profoundly moving coming-of-age novel about love and its many variations. When Alice Bliss learns that her father, Matt, is being deployed to Iraq, she's heartbroken. Alice idolizes her father, loves working beside him in their garden, accompanying him on the occasional roofing job, playing baseball. When he ships out, Alice is faced with finding a way to fill the emptiness he has left behind.

Matt will miss seeing his daughter blossom from a tomboy into a full-blown teenager. Alice will learn to drive, join the track team, go to her first dance, and fall in love, all while trying to be strong for her mother, Angie, and take care of her precocious little sister, Ellie. But the smell of Matt is starting to fade from his blue shirt that Alice wears every day, and the phone calls are never long enough.

These characters' struggles amidst uncertain times echo our own, lending the novel an immediacy and poignancy that is both relevant and real. At once universal and very personal, Alice Bliss is a transforming story about those who are left at home during wartime, and a teenage girl bravely facing the future.

The Red Garden introduces us to the luminous and haunting world of Blackwell, Massachusetts, capturing the unexpected turns in its history and in our own lives. In exquisite prose, Hoffman offers a transforming glimpse of small-town America, presenting us with some three hundred years of passion, dark secrets, loyalty, and redemption in a web of tales where characters' lives are intertwined by fate and by their own actions.

From the town's founder, a brave young woman from England who has no fear of blizzards or bears, to the young man who runs away to New York City with only his dog for company, the characters in The Red Garden are extraordinary and vivid: a young wounded Civil War soldier who is saved by a passionate neighbor, a woman who meets a fiercely human historical character, a poet who falls in love with a blind man, a mysterious traveler who comes to town in the year when summer never arrives.

At the center of everyone's life is a mysterious garden where only red plants can grow, and where the truth can be found by those who dare to look. Beautifully crafted, shimmering with magic, The Red Garden is as unforgettable as it is moving.

Sugar Beth Carey is back in town, the small southern town she despised and never intended to return to. However, she's also on a mission, to find a painting willed to her worth millions. To gain access to the estate of her deceased father, she must 'make nice' with its current occupant, Colin Byrne. No easy task, because as her teacher 15 years earlier, she ruined his reputation by falsely accusing him of molesting her, and now he is a rich, famous author relishing his opportunity for revenge.

But, what neither of them foresee is the begrudging respect they will develop for one another's wit and intelligence as they struggle to maintain their emotional distance and prevent themselves from falling in love. Complicated not only by their pasts, but by others who were hurt in the past as well.

Ain't She Sweet? is a story of courage and redemption...of friendship and laughter...of love and the possibility of happily-ever-after.

Some secrets are too terrible to reveal...

Some crimes are too unspeakable to solve...

In the sleepy rural town of Painters Mill, Ohio, the Amish and "English" residents have lived side by side for two centuries. But sixteen years ago, a series of brutal murders shattered the peaceful farming community. In the aftermath of the violence, the town was left with a sense of fragility, a loss of innocence.

Kate Burkholder, a young Amish girl, survived the terror of the Slaughterhouse Killer but came away from its brutality with the realization that she no longer belonged with the Amish. Now, a wealth of experience later, Kate has been asked to return to Painters Mill as Chief of Police. Her Amish roots and big city law enforcement background make her the perfect candidate. She's certain she's come to terms with her past—until the first body is discovered in a snowy field.

Kate vows to stop the killer before he strikes again. But to do so, she must betray both her family and her Amish past—and expose a dark secret that could destroy her.

Amy Gaer is a busy working wife and mother with young twin boys and a precocious teenage daughter. After returning home from a hectic day at work, Amy greets her children and carves out a few minutes to listen to her daughter sing. A delicate, silky melody fills the air, and Amy's mind drifts back more than twenty years to a time when everything changed for her…

It's 1992. Grunge is on the rise. “Hair bands” are fading. Amy graduates from college and despite a talent for music, she's determined to chase the corporate ladder. Returning to rural Iowa for the summer to live at home with her parents, all her plans shift when Amy meets a local farmer named Nick. A romance blossoms and suddenly the previously banal landscape becomes beautiful.

But settling into a life with Nick is far more complicated than she expected, and she is faced with decisions that will alter her life forever.

For fans of Emily Giffin and Sophie Kinsella, Goodbye Def Leppard (I'll Miss Those Jeans) is a lighthearted yet poignant tale about life, fate, and the difficult choices we make.

Ben Wolf has big things planned for his senior year. Had big things planned. Now what he has is some very bad news and only one year left to make his mark on the world.

How can a pint-sized, smart-ass seventeen-year-old do anything significant in the nowheresville of Trout, Idaho? First, Ben makes sure that no one else knows what is going on—not his superstar quarterback brother, Cody, not his parents, not his coach, no one.

Next, he decides to become the best 127-pound football player Trout High has ever seen; to give his close-minded civics teacher a daily migraine; and to help the local drunk clean up his act.

And then there's Dallas Suzuki. Amazingly perfect, fascinating Dallas Suzuki, who may or may not give Ben the time of day. Really, she's first on the list.

Living with a secret isn't easy, though, and Ben's resolve begins to crumble... especially when he realizes that he isn't the only person in Trout with secrets.

From the author of the beloved #1 national bestseller Crow Lake comes an exceptional new novel of jealousy, rivalry, and the dangerous power of obsession.

Two brothers, Arthur and Jake Dunn, are the sons of a farmer in the mid-1930s, when life is tough and another world war is looming. Arthur is reticent, solid, dutiful, and set to inherit the farm and his father’s character; Jake is younger, attractive, mercurial, and dangerous to know – the family misfit. When a beautiful young woman comes into the community, the fragile balance of sibling rivalry tips over the edge.

Then there is Ian, the family’s next generation, and far too sure he knows the difference between right and wrong. By now it is the fifties, and the world has changed—a little, but not enough. These two generations in the small town of Struan, Ontario, are tragically interlocked, linked by fate and community but separated by a war which devours its young men—its unimaginable horror reaching right into the heart of this remote corner of an empire.

With her astonishing ability to turn the ratchet of tension slowly and delicately, Lawson builds their story to a shocking climax. Taut with apprehension, surprising us with moments of tenderness and humour, The Other Side of the Bridge is a compelling, humane, and vividly evoked novel with an irresistible emotional undertow.

Welcome back to Virgin River with the book that started it all…

Wanted: Midwife/nurse practitioner in Virgin River, population six hundred. Make a difference against a backdrop of towering California redwoods and crystal-clear rivers. Rent-free cabin included.

When the recently widowed Melinda Monroe sees this ad, she quickly decides that the remote mountain town of Virgin River might be the perfect place to escape her heartache, and to reenergize the nursing career she loves. But her high hopes are dashed within an hour of arriving—the cabin is a dump, the roads are treacherous, and the local doctor wants nothing to do with her. Realizing she’s made a huge mistake, Mel decides to leave town the following morning.

But a tiny baby abandoned on a front porch changes her plans…and former marine Jack Sheridan cements them into place.

The best con man in the Midwest is only ten years old. Meet Tom, a.k.a., the Great Brain, a silver-tongued genius with a knack for turning a profit.

When the Jenkins boys get lost in Skeleton Cave, the Great Brain saves the day. Whether it's saving the kids at school, or helping out Peg-leg Andy, or Basil, the new kid at school, the Great Brain always manages to come out on top—and line his pockets in the process.

Set in Kerrville, Kansas, The Center of Everything is narrated by Evelyn Bucknow, an endearing character with a wholly refreshing way of looking at the world. Living with her single mother in a small apartment, Evelyn Bucknow is a young girl navigating her way through adolescence.

With a voice that is as charming as it is recognizable, Evelyn immerses the reader in the dramas of an entire community. The people of Kerrville, stuck at once in the middle of nowhere but also at the center of everything, are the source from which Moriarty draws universal dilemmas of love and belief to render a story that grows in emotional intensity.

This novel takes the reader on an emotional journey, lifting them to heights achieved only by the finest of fiction.

Just about everything in Endora, Iowa (pop. 1,091 and dwindling) is eating Gilbert Grape, a twenty-four-year-old grocery clerk who dreams only of leaving. His enormous mother, once the town sweetheart, has been eating nonstop ever since her husband's suicide, and the floor beneath her TV chair is threatening to cave in.

Gilbert's long-suffering older sister, Amy, still mourns the death of Elvis, and his knockout younger sister has become hooked on makeup, boys, and Jesus--in that order. But the biggest event on the horizon for all the Grapes is the eighteenth birthday of Gilbert's younger brother, Arnie, who is a living miracle just for having survived so long.

As the Grapes gather in Endora, a mysterious beauty glides through town on a bicycle and rides circles around Gilbert, until he begins to see a new vision of his family and himself.

Capturing all the rueful irony and racial ambivalence of small-town Mississippi in the late 1950s, Melinda Haynes' celebrated novel is a wholly unforgettable exploration of family, identity, and redemption.

Mother of Pearl revolves around twenty-eight-year-old Even Grade, a black man who grew up an orphan, and Valuable Korner, the fifteen-year-old white daughter of the town whore and an unknown father. Both are passionately determined to discover the precious things neither experienced as children: human connection, enduring commitment, and, above all, unconditional love.

A startlingly accomplished mixture of beauty, mystery, and tragedy, Mother of Pearl marks the debut of an extraordinary literary talent.

The Butcher Boy is a precisely crafted, often lyrical portrait of the descent into madness of a young killer in small-town Ireland. The story follows Francis "Francie" Brady, a schoolboy whose life slowly becomes macabre. Set in Ireland in the early 1960s, the novel encapsulates the grim and troubled realities of the time.

Francie is the "pig boy," the only child of an alcoholic father and a mother driven mad by despair. Growing up in a soul-stifling Irish town, Francie is bright, love-starved, and unhinged, his speech filled with street talk, his heart filled with pain...his actions perfectly monstrous. Held up for scorn by Mrs. Nugent, a paragon of middle-class values, and dropped by his best friend, Joe, in favor of her mamby-pamby son, Francie finally has a target for his rage—and a focus for his twisted, horrific plan.

Dark, haunting, and often screamingly funny, The Butcher Boy chronicles the pig boy's ominous loss of innocence and chilling descent into madness. No writer since James Joyce has had such marvelous control of rhythm and language... and no novel since The Silence Of The Lambs has stunned us with such a macabre, dangerous mind.

Nobody's Fool by Richard Russo is a slyly funny and moving novel that follows the unexpected operation of grace in a deadbeat town in upstate New York—and in the life of one of its unluckiest citizens, Sully, who has been doing the wrong thing triumphantly for fifty years.

Divorced from his own wife and carrying on halfheartedly with another man's, saddled with a bum knee and friends who make enemies redundant, Sully now has one new problem to cope with: a long-estranged son who is in imminent danger of following in his father's footsteps.

With its sly and uproarious humor and a heart that embraces humanity's follies as well as its triumphs, Nobody's Fool is storytelling at its most generous.

High School is Heaven! It's Betsy Ray's freshman year at Deep Valley High School, and she and her best childhood chum, Tacy Kelly, are loving every minute. Betsy and Tacy find themselves in the midst of a new crowd of friends, with studies aplenty (including Latin and—ugh—algebra), parties and picnics galore, Sunday night lunches at home—and boys!

There's Cab Edwards, the jolly boy next door; handsome Herbert Humphreys; and the mysteriously unfriendly, but maddeningly attractive, Joe Willard. Betsy likes them all, but no boy in particular catches her fancy until she meets the new boy in town, Tony Markham... the one she and Tacy call the Tall Dark Handsome Stranger. He's sophisticated, funny, and dashing—and treats Betsy just like a sister. Can Betsy turn him into a beau?

An entertaining picture of school clubs, fudge parties, sings around the piano, and Sunday-night suppers in Betsy's hospitable home.

Life changed for me in three days - the day my mother died, the day my dad married Candice, and the day I met Kennedy Jenner. From the moment I saw him, I was drawn to him. Like a moth to a flame, I couldn't keep away from the irresistible heat of the fire.

That knowing, confident smile... those beautiful pale blue eyes... and those dimples... simply delicious. Who could resist such a beautiful strong man?

Hope York transformed herself from a boring small-town girl into a flawless beauty on the outside. But inside, she never changed. Kennedy Jenner was a successful, wealthy, and jaw-dropping handsome man that could have whatever he wanted, on his own terms. And he wanted Hope. But would he still want her after he saw her for who she really was, instead of what she carefully planned for everyone to see? And will his own secret past stand in his way of getting what he really wants?