Contemporary Family Life Women Fiction

For years, Avis lived under the weight of expectations- her family's, her church's, and a version of God that demanded perfection and punished honesty. But when pleasing everyone meant losing herself, she walked away. What followed was pain, clarity, and the kind of freedom that only comes after rock bottom. Told through the reflections and vulnerability, Avis's story is a journey of deconstructing harmful theology, confronting familial wounds, and rediscovering faith-not in a distant, angry deity, but in a Christ of radical love, justice, and compassion. This is not your mother's religion.

On a leafy suburban street in Dublin, beautiful, poised Stella Greene lives with her successful husband, Matt. They're the perfect couple in every way, and Stella appears to have it all. Next door, at number 72, however, lives Rea Brady. Gruff, bad tempered and rarely seen besides the twitching of her net curtains, rumour has it she's lost it all...including her marbles, if you believe the neighbourhood gossip. But appearances can be deceiving, and when Stella and Rea's worlds collide they realise they have much in common.

A tender affair and the redemptive power of art are at the core of this compelling novel from National Book Award finalist Allegra Goodman, “a romantic realist who dazzles with wit [and] compassion” (The Wall Street Journal). Collin James is young, creative, and unhappy. A college dropout...

From the author of the “bighearted . . . inspiring” (Vogue) memoir Kabul Beauty School comes a fiction debut as compelling as real life: the story of a remarkable coffee shop in the heart of Afghanistan, and the men and women who meet there—thrown together by circumstance, bonded by...

Acclaimed novelist Anne Rivers Siddons's new novel is a stunning tale of love and loss. For as long as she can remember, they were Cam and Lilly--happily married, totally in love with each other, parents of a beautiful family, and partners in life. Then, after decades of marriage, it ended as...

When life as you know it changes, will it define you, destroy you or make you stronger? Best friends Isla and Sophie made each other a promise a long time ago: to never let life pass them by. Years later Isla is in love, living abroad and fulfilling her dreams. But for Sophie things haven't turned out the way she was expecting, and she hasn't achieved any of the things she and Isla talked about. And then, in one sudden moment, life irrevocably changes for both women.

One year after her mother’s death, a woman prepares to celebrate her fortieth birthday. Digging through a trunk in the attic, looking for keepsakes for the occasion, she discovers photographs that call into question everything she believed about her life. The truth is a different story—one of a little girl in danger, a lie, and a mother’s love so fierce it led her to do the unimaginable.

The heralded Queen of Hip-Hop Lit presents an addictive collection of celebrated urban authors with their fingers on the pulse of the streets. Street lit’s finest female voices—Keisha Starr, Tysha, LaKesa Cox, and Monique S. Hall—deliver searing stories about women who make hard...

Rachel Lear lives in a dream world with her head in the clouds - and it’s starting to show. There’s the dissertation she can’t quite finish, the ex-boyfriend whom she has yet to kick to the curb, and those pesky 20 pounds she keeps meaning to lose. But when her overbearing father finally runs out of patience and cuts her off from the family fortune, Rachel finds herself thrust into the real world. She never could have guessed that’s where she would finally meet a knight in shining armor.

Pregnant. Single. Dating. It's going to be... a bumpy year! Trish Kirkpatrick never expected to find herself unmarried, pregnant... and not entirely sure who the baby's father is. With her ex, Pete, and her colleague, Elliot, in line for daddy duty while waiting on the DNA results, Trish finds her complicated world getting even more chaotic when a meet-cute on a plane to Tokyo with gorgeous architect Scott sparks a new flame. Now, as her bump grows so do Trish's troubles.

The Lucky Ones is a profound evocation of family and the magnetic bonds that can attract or repel. The five people whose lives converge here are also haunted by family: the longing for love, the struggle to connect. Here, a young pregnant mother wrestles with an utterly changed life; a new...

Genova. Quando Agata varca la soglia, l'appartamento è silenzioso e tremendamente buio. Sua madre non c'è più, da diversi mesi ormai. Resta soltanto l'odore delle stanze vuote, la polvere sui mobili, insieme all'eco dei ricordi e ai segreti, che ora nessuno può più mantenere, e che i vecchi quaderni dell'amata zia Alice, rimasti a lungo nascosti, sono pronti a rivelare. Quelle pagine custodiscono, infatti, il ritratto di una donna che Agata stenta a riconoscere come la sua zia Alice, e la storia di un grande amore proibito, di cui non ha mai saputo nulla.

1917. When dancer Viktoriya Budian flees war-torn Russia, she arrives in Paris, destitute and without hope. Her only chance of survival is to join the Ballets Russes, a controversial dance company that works with Pablo Picasso, Coco Chanel, and Henri Matisse. Present day. Lily Johansson returns to Paris, the city that broke her heart and destroyed her ballet career, hoping to ease the guilt over her fiancé’s death and to make amends with her estranged sister, Natalie, also a dancer.

A poignant, surprising love story told backwards over five decades, with a devastating secret at its heart. Robbie and Emily they have been together for decades. Now, their joints are creaking and their eyesight is failing - but their love for each other is as fresh and fierce as the day they first met. They have had children and grandchildren, lived full and happy and intimate lives. But they have been keeping a secret since the day they met, when their lives changed forever. Over the years, the sacrifices and choices they made have sealed their fates together.

Walking with Elephants, a lighthearted slice-of-life story, brings to the table the serious work/family issues facing women today. It explores the modern dichotomy of a workplace that is filled with homemakers who still must cook, clean, carpool on nights and weekends, shop for prom dresses, and create the holidays -- such as Suze. But it also is filled with women who have the same drive as men, have no family responsibilities, and will do what ever it takes to get ahead.

When a New England Christmas reunites two lifelong friends, romance blooms. From the author of Christmas in Vermont. Miracles are like snowflakes - no two are alike, but each one is precious and beautiful. This Christmas, Dr. Beth Harding could use a few miracles. The hospital she runs in River Dale, New Hampshire, is being shut down, unless she can convince the Scrooge-like board to save it. At least her closest friend, firefighter Logan Mitchell, is home for the holidays to offer a broad shoulder to lean on.

In a heartwarming novel of secret wishes and family lost and found, acclaimed New York Times bestselling author Fern Michaels creates a timeless Christmas story to cherish.

Julia Berkwith's daughter has moved to Alaska, her beloved mother-in-law is in a nursing home, and her ex-husband is in Hawaii - with a younger woman. In her late 40s, Julia is now used to being invisible. But even if she has to do it alone, she's determined to celebrate her victory over breast cancer by hiking Italy's Cinque Terre. Invigorated by the beauty of the Italian countryside, Julia seems unstoppable, until she's injured by a rock - one that happens to belong to 30-something stone mason Vitale DeLuca.

Cassie Callinan is a dutiful corporate wife, carefully preserving the safety of the status quo and her husband's camellias. When she learns she has lost her husband to a younger woman, she panics. Who is she without the familiar props of her marriage? Fleeing her own life, Cassie finds herself among the eccentric inhabitants of Shearwater, an isolated coastal village. She is gradually drawn into the life of the town with all its dramas, joy and secrets, and begins to discover who she really is.

When Milwaukee-area wife and mother MJ Boudreaux notices her husband, Chris, seems more interested in the casino than her, she's bothered that she isn't more upset. She picks up poker as a way for them to spend more time together - and reignite their marital flame. Although the game doesn't give her the quality time with Chris that she'd hoped, MJ finds she has a knack for it.