Fiction Realism

Leigh Chen Sanders is absolutely certain about one thing: When her mother died by suicide, she turned into a bird. Leigh, who is half Asian and half white, travels to Taiwan to meet her maternal grandparents for the first time. There, she is determined to find her mother, the bird. In her search, she winds up chasing after ghosts, uncovering family secrets, and forging a new relationship with her grandparents.

Born in the Argentine town of Mina Clavero, Camila is designated male but begins to identify from an early age as a girl. She is well aware that she’s different from other children and reacts to her oppressive, poverty-stricken home life, with a cowed mother and abusive, alcoholic father, by acting out—with swift consequences. Deeply intelligent, she eventually leaves for the city to attend university, slipping into prostitution to make ends meet. And in Sarmiento Park, in the heart of Córdoba, she discovers the strange, wonderful world of the trans sex workers who dwell there.

There is bad luck in New Felicity. The people of the small coastal village have taken in Milagros, an eleven-year-old Venezuelan refugee, just as Trinidad's government has begun cracking down on undocumented migrants—and now an American journalist has come to town asking questions. New Felicity's superstitious fishermen fear the worst, certain they've brought bad luck on the village by killing a local witch who had herself murdered two villagers the year before.

When the Night Foxes boldly break into the Fourth Precinct’s Evidence Building, it causes quite the stir. As a Magical Examiner, Henri Davenforth is immediately called in. To his astonishment, Captain Gregson has him work the case like a detective. More astounding, he assigns Henri a partner - The Shinigami Detective. The woman is famous for killing the most destructive rogue witch of the century, and no one is quite certain where she’s from. Every officer in the precinct is either in awe of her, or a little frightened by her. Henri is just baffled.

Our protagonist, an unnamed junior at a prestigious university in Kyoto, is on the verge of dropping out. After rebelling against the dictatorial jock president of the film club, he and his worst and only friend, the diabolical creep Ozu, are personas non grata on campus. For two years, our protagonist has made all the wrong decisions, and now he's about to make another mistake. He and Ozu are preparing for revenge—a fireworks attack at the film club's welcoming party for new members.

One spring afternoon after school, Amber arrives home on her bike. It’s just another perfectly normal day. But when Amber’s mom sees her, she screams. Because Amber died seven years ago, hit by a car while on the very same bicycle she’s inexplicably riding now. This return doesn’t only impact Amber. Her sister, Melissa, now seven years older, must be a new kind of sibling to Amber. Amber’s estranged parents are battling over her. And the changes ripple farther and farther out.

Outlander meets Dan Brown Das Zeitreisen ist für sie nur ein Job. Bis er auftaucht ... Mitch lebt in Rom und arbeitet für das ITR, das Institute of Timetravel and Research des Vatikans – ein gefährlicher und schlecht bezahlter Job ohne Karriereaussichten. Aber hey, nur noch fünf Zeitreisen, bis sie sich mit einer fetten Abfindung zurückziehen und endlich ihr eigenes Café aufmachen kann. Doch dann bekommt sie einen neuen Partner – ein Typ, der sich um Vorschriften und Zeitreisegesetze so wenig schert wie um den berühmten Sack Reis in China.

In 1967, the dancer Marta Becket and her husband were traveling through Death Valley Junction when they came across an abandoned theater. Marta decided it was hers. She painted her ideal audience on its walls and danced her own dances until her death five decades later. In the present day, Gia has ended a relationship and taken a leave from her job in film studies at a university. She is sleeping fifteen hours a night and ignoring calls from her mother.

Orphaned young, Ming Tsu, the son of Chinese immigrants, is raised by the notorious leader of a California crime syndicate, who trains him to be his deadly enforcer. But when Ming falls in love with Ada, the daughter of a powerful railroad magnate, and the two elope, he seizes the opportunity to escape to a different life. Soon after, in a violent raid, the tycoon's henchmen kidnap Ada and conscript Ming into service for the Central Pacific Railroad. Battered and yet defiant, Ming partners with a blind clairvoyant. Together the two set out to rescue his wife and to exact revenge.

The classic love story takes place on the De la Garza ranch, as the tyrannical owner, Mama Elena, chops onions at the kitchen table in her final days of pregnancy. While still in her mother's womb, her daughter to be weeps so violently she causes an early labor, and little Tita slips out amid the spices and fixings for noodle soup. This early encounter with food soon becomes a way of life, and Tita grows up to be a master chef. She shares special points of her favorite preparations with listeners throughout the story.

New Year's Eve is just a week away, and Raven Marigold knows exactly how she wants to spend the remainder of her holiday break before the glittery ball drops - solving a 53-year-old murder and clearing her grandmother's reputation! Raven doesn't have a lot of time between memorizing enchanting spells, creating magical tea blends, and finally going out on her first date in months, but she's willing to combine all three if it means eliminating the shadow of guilt that has loomed over her family's surname for over five decades.

When twelve year old Joseph tragically loses his mother, his world is shattered. Left with his angry, alcoholic father in their rundown apartment, he finds himself longing to be free of the life he’s been stuck with. Staring into a generic landscape painting in the church basement at his mother’s funeral, he almost gets his wish; a mysterious girl in an Iron Maiden vest steps out of the picture, opening his eyes to impossible and incredible worlds.

Elmwood Springs, Missouri, is a small town like any other, but something strange is happening out at the cemetery. Still Meadows, as it's called, is anything but still. Funny and profound, this novel in the tradition of Flagg's Can't Wait to Get to Heaven and Thornton Wilder's Our Town deals with universal themes of heaven and earth and everything in between, as Flagg tells a surprising story of life, afterlife, and the mysterious goings-on of ordinary people.

One morning, Hazel Brown awakes in a badly decorated hotel room to find that she’s written the complete works of Charles Baudelaire. In her bemusement the hotel becomes every cheap room she ever stayed in during her youthful perambulations in 1980s Paris. This is the legend of a she-dandy’s life. Part magical realism, part feminist ars poetica, part history of tailoring, part bibliophilic anthem, part love affair with nineteenth-century painting, The Baudelaire Fractal is poet and art writer Lisa Robertson’s first novel.

Sadie Way Scott has been avoiding her family and hometown of Sugarberry Cove, Alabama, since she nearly drowned in the lake just outside her mother’s B&B. Eight years later, Sadie is the host of a much-loved show about Southern cooking and family, but despite her success, she wonders why she was saved. What is she supposed to do? Sadie’s sister, Leala Clare, is still haunted by the guilt she feels over the night her sister almost died. Now, at a crossroads in her marriage, Leala has everything she ever thought she wanted - so why is she so unhappy?

The tales in Mark Haddon's lyrical and uncompromising new collection take many forms - Victorian adventure story, science fiction, morality tale, contemporary realism - but they all showcase his virtuoso gifts as a stylist and the deep well of empathy that made his three best-selling novels so compelling. The characters here are often isolated physically or estranged from their families, yet they yearn for connection.

In a place and time unknown, two elderly sisters live in a walled garden, secluded from the outside world. Evelyn and Lily have only ever known each other. What was before the garden, they have forgotten; what lies beyond it, they do not know. Each day is spent in languid service to their home: tending the bees, planting the crops, and dutifully following the instructions of the almanac written by their mother. So when a nameless boy is found hiding in the boarded house at the center of their isolated grounds, their once solitary lives are irrevocably disrupted.

The Seeker blends inspirational Visionary Fiction with Mythic Fiction in this epic reimagining of the tale of Icarus. In his plunge from glory, rather than perishing in the waters of the Aegean, Icarus is rescued by a passing mariner, fictional demigod Amitayus, who is unaware of his own divinity. The two embark on an epic odyssey, braving impediments only Zeus himself could whip up, as Amitayus seeks the truth that will earn him a place in Elysium. Told through the lens of Greek Classicism, The Seeker puts a modern spin on classic archetypes that lend it unmatched spiritual resonance.

Situated at the heart of a rapidly gentrifying district of Seoul, the Yeonnam-dong Smiley Laundromat is a place where the extraordinary stories of ordinary residents unfold. It is already a haven of tranquility and reflection for locals, but when someone leaves a notebook behind, the laundromat becomes a place that brings people together. One by one, customers start jotting down candid diary entries, opening their hearts and inviting acts of kindness from neighbors who were once just faces in the crowd.

When called upon, she can talk the death out of the dying and save their lives—only once, never twice. But this truly unique gift comes at a price, rooting Weatherly to people who only want her around when they need her and resent her backwater ways when they don’t. Weatherly’s cousin Adaire also has a gift: she’s a Scryer and can see the future reflected back in dark surfaces. Right before she is killed in an accident, Adaire saw something unnerving, and that’s why Weatherly believes she was murdered—never thinking for a moment that it was an accident.