Island Women

Adam McCarthy needs a few days at home on Gansett Island to soothe his battered soul. On the ferry ride home, he runs into an old family friend. Abby Callahan has come home to Gansett after two epic failures in the game of love. Before too long, Adam has appointed himself her guardian and is determined that the only sleeping around she's doing is with him. That is unless his brother Grant is willing to risk his newfound happiness to keep Adam from rebounding with his ex.

Emma Hooper thought coming home to small-town life and the family farm would give her a chance to rest and recover from a traumatic accident. But that was before she started seeing ghosts. It was before Grandma Hooper started singing on the roof, and it was way, way before anybody spotted a ghost in a 19th-century cavalry uniform coming out of an outhouse. Can Emma learn to handle her newfound ability to see spirits, while figuring out a confusing relationship with the handsome local doctor? All while solving the ghastly murder of Preacher Jacob?

Meg Gates could use a guidebook for life. Indeed, she's faced some challenges. She dropped out of college to work for a tech startup that failed—and her fiancé just took her bridesmaid to Italy on what was supposed to be Meg's honeymoon. Now, at twenty-six, Meg has taken the ferry ride of shame from Seattle back to Bainbridge Island to live with her family. At least she has her rescue cocker spaniel, Watson, by her side. But it's Meg who could use a rescue—and she's hoping it will come in the form of a part-time gig doing research for a bestselling mystery writer.

"Welcome spring with the newest treat from Brenda Novak. This is the book her fans, old and new, have been waiting for. A big, tantalizing read!"—Susan Elizabeth Phillips, New York Times bestselling author A summer of healing, friendship, love…and a secret that could change everything...

When Abby steps off the ferry and onto the isle of Kinlossay, she squeezes her daughter’s hand and prays this trip was not a mistake. For the last year she has been receiving letters from a mysterious stranger detailing every moment of his life on this rugged little island. Swept away by descriptions of buttercups dancing on rolling fields, his words were a lifeline to Abby, filling her grey life with colour. But then, one day, the messages stopped.

A legendary island steeped in the mystery and wisdom of centuries...A runaway heiress learning to trust life, and love...A mother and daughter, separated for years, searching for a way to face the future together...Years ago, Lyra Davis left behind a world of wealth and privilege and the people she loved most in the world, unable to reconcile the expectations of her celebrated family with the longings of her own wild heart. Now she lives quietly among a community of expatriates on the isle of Capri, slowly, carefully learning to live fully for the first time.

A powerful novel that's "hilarious, heartbreaking, and ass-kicking" (Jamie Ford) about a Puerto Rican family in Staten Island who discovers their long‑missing sister is potentially alive and cast on a reality TV show, and sets out to bring her home. Winner of the 2024 PEN/Faulkner Award for...

Shadow Island lore insists that anyone who steps in the shadow cast onto the old witch’s cottage is cursed. But when two bodies are discovered inside the cottage, their heads arranged in a ghastly tableau, Rebecca is more concerned about the real monsters—the human ones who’d commit such an atrocious murder.

Jersey, 1940. In the quiet of the English Channel, war is brewing. When the Nazis first set foot on her island home, 16-year-old Marcy comes to realize that nothing will ever be the same. Fueled by the devastating disappearance of the man she loves and in defiance of her distant mother, Violet, she joins forces with fellow islander Louisa to aid Jersey’s secret resistance.

Darkly handsome with an arrogant edge, architectural engineer Scout Ritland is the kind of American man who spells trouble. Chantal duPont should know, for she has experienced the best and worst of the country and its people. Yet here she is, home on Parrish Island, putting herself in the way of another bold Yankee. This time, however, it's for a good cause: Scout is the one man who can help her village.

When the town drunk ends up dead in a hit-and-run, FBI special agent Cate Wilde expects that solving the case will be cut and dried. But evidence quickly surfaces that the victim was involved with another crime. A crime that has gone cold for twenty years. A crime of personal importance to Cate. Cate’s best friend, Samantha, went missing at fourteen, leaving behind nothing except a jacket and an island full of unanswered questions. Samantha’s disappearance has haunted Cate for more than half her life, and she might finally be able to find some closure.

Island life can get pretty weird. Wiccan weddings, psychic brides, mermaid parades, eccentric parrots...novelist Liz Holt has gotten used to it since moving back to the barrier island of Melbourne Beach, Florida, and once again working in her family's hotel and emporium, the Indialantic by the Sea. But one thing she'll never get used to is murder.

Eloise has been waiting for her dream wedding for months. When the Cove Chronicles calls it "the wedding of the year" and literally the whole town is invited, she wants everything to be perfect. Burst pipes don't make for perfect wedding dresses, though. Laurel Baker has just been promoted to detective in the narcotics unit, and her first case is one that's gone unsolved for a year now. She's desperate to find out who's bringing drugs into the cove, but each clue she uncovers leads to one of the women she's grown to love.

When a man washes up onto Shadow Island, Sheriff Rebecca West has a moment of déjà vu. This isn’t the first body the ocean spat out on one of her beaches, but it’s the first one she’s found alive. Barely. The brutal gunshot wounds to the victim’s hand and the lower part of his face indicate he was shot offshore and dumped overboard, but there’s no boat or perpetrator. Just a few cryptic clues before the victim becomes unresponsive.

When a body washes up on the state park beach, Deputy Tessa Black’s experience as a former Seattle detective tells her that the death was not an accident. All evidence points to another murder on the remote island. The victim is a local contractor with a shockingly long list of enemies. The more locals Tessa interviews, the more people she suspects - from the bitter ex-wife and estranged current wife to disgruntled former clients and employees. They all have different reasons to want him dead.

Throughout the chaos of recent months, Emma found unexpected refuge in her friendship with Keith. She's long since made it clear that friendship is the only thing that she's open to, because she could never love anyone the way she loved her late husband. But as they spend more time together, feelings that she'd thought long dead begin to stir.

Young Princess Diana is fierce and whip-smart, and she loves her island home of Themyscira. Her deepest wish is to be able to train with the rest of the Amazons and protect her homeland—but she's told it's out of the question. This is the year Diana hopes to persuade her mother, Queen Hippolyta, to let her learn how to fight when the world's most powerful women gather on Themyscira for a festival to celebrate their different cultures.

Zara Reddy comes from a very traditional Indian family, but she's chosen a different path than the generational restaurant. She performs in some of Getaway Bay's biggest shows as an acrobat and synchronized swimmer and takes other odd jobs - anything to stay off her mother's "where's your boyfriend?" radar. When she lands a lucrative house-sitting job in the biggest mansion hideaway on the bluffs above the beach, Zara thinks she'll get some rest, plenty of sun, and time to make her life plan. But when she walks in, she comes face-to-face with Noah Wales, a man who makes her blood boil.

When Ellie Roberts inherits a cottage on a remote Scilly Isle, she's shocked. She's never heard of the previous owner, Patience Ellis, so why did she leave Ellie her legacy? Overwhelmed with unanswered questions, Ellie travels to the isolated island. The house feels strangely familiar, and she has a memory of her beloved mother in the window seat overlooking the sea. The mother she lost when she was only a child. Determined to find out more, Ellie meets enigmatic local Branok Shore.

When a Zoom disaster upends Addison Irwin’s decade-long career at a posh Manhattan advertising agency, things look bleak for the thirty-something mid-western transplant. But an unexpected inheritance from an aunt she barely remembers—a property on Fire Island, complete with guest house and artist’s studio—changes everything. While debating whether to stay or sell, Addison learns that she’s also inherited her aunt’s list of eclectic guests, tying her to the island for seven summer weekends.