Showing titles in Coming of Age

In Jesmyn Ward's first novel since her National Book Award-winning Salvage the Bones, this singular American writer brings the archetypal road novel into rural 21st-century America. An intimate portrait of a family and an epic tale of hope and struggle, Sing, Unburied, Sing journeys through Mississippi's past and present, examining the ugly truths at the heart of the American story and the power - and limitations - of family bonds.

It’s hot, Texas, and the year 1977. Jimmy Carter is in office. Family patriarch and fanatic preacher, Victor Black, knows many things for sure, including the fact that abortion is murder and should be punishable by death—a position he defends live in a televised debate. Black’s youngest granddaughter, Stephanie Walters, sits in the front row wearing her frilly Sunday dress, listening carefully to every word. But it doesn't take long for cracks to appear in the Walters upstanding family façade.

It's 1969, and 16-year-old Lucy is about to run away with a much older man to live off the grid in rural Pennsylvania, a rash act that will have vicious repercussions for both her and her older sister, Charlotte. As Lucy's default caretaker for most of their lives, Charlotte's youth has been marked by the burden of responsibility, but never more so than when Lucy's dream of a rural paradise turns into a nightmare.

After their mother’s probable suicide, Jazz and Olivia Moon struggle to move on with their lives. Olivia, an 18-year-old who can taste words and see sounds, blinds herself by staring at the sun, then decides to walk to the remote setting of her mother’s unfinished novel to resuscitate her hopes and dreams. Jazz, plagued by unresolved conflict with her mother and a hidden trove of her unsent letters, takes a job in a funeral home before being forced back into the role of her sister’s keeper.

In God Don't Like Ugly, she weaves a powerful tale of devastating abuse, the strength of friendship, and the burden of terrible secrets. Shy, overweight Annette Goode is only seven years old when Mr. Boatwright, a boarder in her house, begins sexually abusing her. She keeps this information to herself for years, until gorgeous, self-assured Rhoda Nelson becomes her new friend. Annette confides in Rhoda and finds the strength and courage to survive to adulthood.

A riveting story of World War II and the courage of one young woman as she is drafted into Churchill's overseas spy network, aiding the French Resistance behind enemy lines and working to liberate Nazi-occupied Paris.

Ten years ago, Izzy Stone's mother fatally shot her father while he slept. Devastated by her mother's apparent insanity, Izzy, now 17, refuses to visit her in prison. But her new foster parents, employees at the local museum, have enlisted Izzy's help in cataloguing items at a long-shuttered state asylum. There, amid piles of abandoned belongings, Izzy discovers a stack of unopened letters, a decades-old journal, and a window into her own past.

On a stifling summer day, an old Chevy Impala ignored the warning signals and was annihilated by the oncoming train. What no one realized until much later was that the driver had paused just before entering the tracks and kicked a small boy out of the car. A small boy with broken glasses who is clutching a notebook with all his might...but who never speaks.

With the epic sweep of Min Jin Lee's Pachinko and Yaa Gyasi's Homegoing and the lyrical beauty of Vaddey Ratner's In the Shadow of the Banyan, The Mountains Sing tells an enveloping, multigenerational tale of the Trần family, set against the backdrop of the Việt Nam War. Trần Diệu Lan, who was born in 1920, was forced to flee her family farm with her six children during the Land Reform as the Communist government rose in the North.

In the winter of 1926, when everybody everywhere sees nothing but good things ahead, Joe Trace, middle-aged door-to-door salesman of Cleopatra beauty products, shoots his teenage lover to death. At the funeral, Joe’s wife, Violet, attacks the girl’s corpse. This novel “transforms a familiar refrain of jilted love into a bold, sustaining time of self-knowledge and discovery. Its rhythms are infectious” (People).

The Sixth Order wields the sword of justice and smites the enemies of the Faith and the Realm. Vaelin Al Sorna was only a child of 10 when his father left him at the iron gate of the Sixth Order. The Brothers of the Sixth Order are devoted to battle, and Vaelin will be trained and hardened to the austere, celibate, and dangerous life of a Warrior of the Faith. He has no family now save the Order.

Persomi is young, white, and poor, born the middle child of illiterate sharecroppers on the prosperous Fourie farm in the South African Bushveld. Persomi’s world is extraordinarily small. She has never been to the local village and spends her days absorbed in the rhythms of the natural world around her, escaping the brutality and squalor of her family home through the newspapers and books passed down to her from the main house and through her walks in the nearby mountains.

Tenderness and cruelty, loyalty and betrayal, ambition and regret - Alexia Arthurs navigates these tensions to extraordinary effect in her debut collection about Jamaican immigrants and their families back home. Sweeping from close-knit island communities to the streets of New York City and midwestern university towns, these 11 stories form a portrait of a nation, a people, and a way of life.

Growing up in the mill slums of Pittsburgh, Daniel Robinson was a punching bag for his drunken father, ignored by his mentally ill mother, and trapped in the grip of poverty. He’s finally freed from the torture of that home only to crash land in another hell when he’s abused by the pastor who takes him in. Daniel escapes once again, spending the next decade wandering homeless throughout the country during the turbulent 1960s.

In a stunning narrative combining the gritty rhythms of Junot Diaz with the noir genius of Walter Mosley, Bodega Dreams pulls us into Spanish Harlem, where the word is out: Willie Bodega is king. Need college tuition for your daughter? Start-up funds for your fruit stand? Bodega can help. He gives everyone a leg up, in exchange only for loyalty - and a steady income from the drugs he pushes.

In the vibrant city-state of Castellane, the richest of nobles and the most debauched of criminals have one thing in common: the constant search for wealth, power, and the next hedonistic thrill. Kel is an orphan, stolen from the life he knew to become the Sword Catcher—the body double of a royal heir, Prince Conor Aurelian. He has been raised alongside the prince, trained in every aspect of combat and statecraft. He and Conor are as close as brothers, but Kel knows that his destiny is to die for Conor. No other future is possible.

Raised in Marrakech by a French mother and English father, a 17-year-old girl has learned above all to avoid mauvais ton ("bad taste" loses something in the translation). One should not ask servants to wait on one during Ramadan: they must have paid leave while one spends the holy month abroad. One must play the piano; if staying at Claridge’s, one must regrettably install a Clavinova in the suite so that the necessary hours of practice will not be inflicted on fellow guests.

The first novel in a brand-new series from award-winning author G. Younger about a small Midwestern town filled with cute girls, Friday night football games, and life lessons that stir up some major drama and fun. To everyone who knows him, David Dawson is your stereotypical nerd, the good kid who has a great family life and good friends. A cute girl, way out of his league—according to his friends—leads him astray. His sudden shift to hanging out with the wrong crowd sends him spiraling into teenage depression and upsets his best friends. It all comes to a sudden end when a girl at a ...

Ever since she was a child, Ivy has been gripped by visions of strange realms just beyond her own. But when her sister goes missing, Ivy discovers the truth is far worse - her hallucinations are real, and her sister is trapped in a parallel realm. And the one person who believes her is the dangerously attractive guy who's bound by an ancient legacy to betray her. Adrian might have turned his back on those who raised him, but that doesn't mean he can change his fate, no matter how strong a pull he feels toward Ivy.

In a violent world, peace always comes at a cost. And to pay for this expansive commodity, to give those he cares about a chance, Jack has to step up... Even if it means doing things he would have never imagined.