Winner Fiction: Women's Fiction 2022 Best Book Awards
When the Chatsworth library closes indefinitely, Dodie Fairisle loses her sanctuary. How is a small-town art teacher supposed to cope without the never-ending life advice and enjoyment that books give her? Well, when she’s as resourceful and generous as Dodie, she turns her sunroom into her very own little lending library.
At first just a hobby, this lit lovers’ haven opens up her world in incredible ways. She knows books are powerful, and soon enough they help her forge friendships between her zany neighbors—and attract an exciting new romance.
But when the chance to adopt an orphaned child brings Dodie’s secret dream of motherhood within reach, everything else suddenly seems less important. Finding herself at a crossroads, Dodie must figure out what it means to live a full, happy life. If only there were a book that could tell her what to do…
Winner Health: Women's Health 2022 Best Book Awards
Meet Rebecca, an adorable gal with an intimate secret…
For Rebecca, sex is a joke missing a punchline. No crashing waves. Only pangs of inadequacy. At twenty-eight, shouldn’t she have had one by now? Her snickering ex thought so. His taunts echo in her ears as he rolls out of her bed. Then out of her life.
After enrolling in an unconventional study for women, Rebecca is stunned by the power she holds inside. But her promise to avoid intimacy hits a snag when a handsome neighbor moves across the hall. Their chemistry is electric, but the timing couldn’t be worse!
If he learns her secret, she’ll lose her best chance at love. But if her intimacy lessons fail, she’ll be left eternally broken. Unlovable.
Can Rebecca find the answers she needs to love someone new—and finally love herself?
Finalist Fiction: Women's Fiction 2022 Best Book Awards
It’s 1972 and Isabelle is four years old. She, her eight-year-old brother, and their mother are grappling with yet another harsh Maine winter under crushing poverty. With their father absent, their mother takes the children South to Georgia to be near her family. Their extreme economic hardship continues as residents of a public housing complex in Albany. Their lives become juxtaposed with the phenomenon of “White Flight” as they, a Caucasian family, become a local minority living among a societal minority. The predominately white world outside the public housing development is largely unknown to Isabelle and her siblings. Meanwhile, those with whom they most identify (the children in “The Projects”) reject them or directly take their frustrations out on them. Subsequently, Isabelle struggles to figure out where she belongs. That is, until she becomes best friends with Evelyn, a Black girl who moves in across the driveway. Their friendship blossoms and flies in the face of typical racial attitudes of the day. They become each other’s lifeline and hope in an environment rife with adversity. Soon, however, they are confronted with an earth-shattering event that completely changes Isabelle’s view of the world.
Finalist Fiction: Women's Fiction 2022 Best Book Awards
When anxiety-prone Rachel Granza learns that her growing sense of emptiness is affecting her relationship with her almost perfect boyfriend and that she’s jeopardizing any possibility of a marriage proposal, she knows she must pull herself out of her funk. But how? A dream apartment in New York City, a thriving psychotherapy practice, and her unique obsessions with topics like the Titanic don’t even make her feel grounded anymore. Red alert!
Trying to find happiness and meaning again—in more than her beloved Italian food—she stumbles into a genealogy mission to discover childhood information about her idol, aka her grandpa, who died years ago. He never spoke about his Italian immigrant past and now she’s determined to find out the reason for his unusual secretiveness.
Finalist Fiction: Women's Fiction 2022 Best Book Awards
From Charming Falls Apart author Angela Terry comes a story about finding the courage to face your past, be true to your heart, and live your best life. Fans of Sophie Kinsella and Emily Giffin will enjoy cheering for Adeline Turner as she navigates the twists and turns of her newly complicated life in this fun, heartwarming novel.
Thirty-three-year-old corporate attorney Adeline Turner has built her adult life around stability. Her professional life is thriving, but her personal life . . . not so much. Deep down she wants more, but finds it’s easier to brush aside her dreams and hide behind her billable hours. That is, until a new client and a chance encounter with her high school crush have her taking leaps she never planned. Suddenly, unadventurous, nose-to-the-grindstone Adeline finds herself moving across the country from her predictable life in Chicago to San Francisco, falling into messy romantic situations, and trying to unravel an office-sabotage plot before it ruins her career.
Finalist Fiction: Women's Fiction 2022 Best Book Awards
Megan Barnes' life is in free fall. After losing both her job as a reporter and her boyfriend in the same day, she retreats to Chicago and moves in with Helen, her over-protective mother. Before long, the two are clashing over everything from pro-choice to #MeToo, not to mention Helen's run for U.S. Congress, which puts Megan's career on hold until after the election.
Desperate to reboot her life, Megan gets her chance when an altercation at a campus rally brings her face-to-face with Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Jocelyn Jones, who offers her a job on her PR team. Before long, Megan is pulled into the heady world of fame and glamour her charismatic new mentor represents.
Until an anonymous tweet brings it all crashing down. To salvage Jocelyn's reputation, Megan must locate the online troll and expose the lies. But when the trail leads to blackmail, and circles back to her own mother, Megan realizes if she pulls any harder on this thread, what should have been the scoop of her career could unravel into a tabloid nightmare.
Finalist Fiction: Women's Fiction 2022 Best Book Awards
In her second novel, Valerie Taylor—award-winning author of What’s Not Said—gives readers another romantic comedy interwoven with forbidden love, infidelity, and family.
With the court date set for her divorce and the future she’d planned with a younger man presumably kaput, Kassie O’Callaghan shifts attention to reviving her stalled marketing career. But that goal gets complicated when she unexpectedly rendezvous with her former lover in Paris. After a chance meeting with a colleague and a stroll along Pont Neuf, Kassie receives two compelling proposals. Can she possibly accept them both?
Kassie’s decision process screeches to a halt when her soon-to-be ex-husband has a heart attack, forcing her to fly home to Boston. There, she confronts his conniving and deceitful fiancée—a woman who wants not just a ring on her finger but everything that belongs to Kassie. In the ensuing battle to protect what’s legally and rightfully hers, Kassie discovers that sometimes it’s what’s not true that can set you free.
