Marjan Kamali, author of The Lion Women of Tehran

In 1950s Tehran, seven-year-old Ellie lives in grand comfort until the untimely death of her father, forcing Ellie and her mother to move to a tiny home downtown. Luckily, on the first day of school, Ellie meets Homa, a kind, passionate girl with a brave and irrepressible spirit. Together, they play games, learn to cook in the stone kitchen of Homa’s warm home, wander through the colorful stalls of the Grand Bazaar, and share their ambitions for becoming “lion women.” But their happiness is disrupted when Ellie and her mother are afforded the opportunity to return to their previous bourgeois life. Now a popular student at the best girls’ high school in Iran, Ellie’s memories of Homa begin to fade. Years later, however, her sudden reappearance in Ellie’s privileged world alters the course of both of their lives.

Read more »

The Lion Women of Tehran by Marjan Kamali

July 2024

A few years ago, I read and loved Marjan Kamali’s THE STATIONERY SHOP, which was so beautifully done. I am happy to share that her latest book, THE LION WOMEN OF TEHRAN, is just as special. While readers will see it as a touching story of a friendship, it is much more as Marjan gives us an inside view of the political situation that erupts again and again in Tehran, Iran.

Read more »

Bad Tourists by Caro Carver

July 2024

Caro Carver’s BAD TOURISTS sets up as one kind of book but quickly flips to another. Then comes even more twists. Caro was inspired to write this thriller as she was on vacation in the Maldives. She envisioned a hotel, like Sapphire Island, a plush location where guests would have everything taken care of for them. This spectacular setting is a star and a character since the setup of these accommodations lends itself to the action. And the beautiful waters around them hide danger. There also is a page where Caro refers to a manta ray and shares, “How difficult can it be to tell innocent and villain apart?” That is the central theme of the novel, and a tone is set.

Read more »

Jamie Day, author of One Big Happy Family

The Precipice is a legendary, family-owned hotel on the rocky coast of Maine. With the recent passing of their father, the Bishop sisters --- Iris, Vicki and Faith --- have come for the weekend to claim it. But with a hurricane looming and each of the Bishop sisters harboring dangerous secrets, there's murder in the air --- and not everyone who checks into the Precipice will be checking out. Each sister wants what is rightfully hers, and in the mix is the Precipe’s 19-year-old chambermaid, Charley Kelley, who is smart, resilient, older than her years and in desperate straits. The arrival of the Bishop sisters could spell disaster for Charley. Will they close the hotel? Fire her? Discover her habit of pilfering from guests? Or, even worse, learn that she's using a guest room to hide a woman on the run?

Read more »

Claire Lombardo, author of Same As It Ever Was

After a youth marked by upheaval and emotional turbulence, Julia Ames has found herself on the placid plateau of mid-life. But Julia has never navigated the world with the equanimity of her current privileged class. Having nearly derailed herself several times, making desperate bids for the kind of connection that always felt inaccessible to her, at age 57 she finally feels that she has a firm handle on things. Julia is unprepared, though, for what comes next: a surprise announcement from her straight-arrow son, an impending separation from her spikey teenage daughter, and a seductive resurgence of the past, all of which threaten to draw her back into the patterns that previously had kept her on a razor’s edge.

Read more »

Beatriz Williams, author of Husbands & Lovers

New England, 2022. Three years ago, single mother Mallory Dunne’s 10-year-old son, Sam, suffered acute poisoning from a toxic death cap mushroom. Now, searching for a donor kidney, Mallory is forced to confront two harrowing secrets from her past: her mother’s adoption and her romance with her childhood best friend, Monk Adams, which was cut short by a devastating betrayal. Cairo, 1951. Hungarian refugee Hannah Ainsworth has married a wealthy British diplomat with a coveted posting in glamorous Cairo. But a fateful encounter with the enigmatic manager of a hotel bristling with spies leads to a passionate affair that will reawaken Hannah’s longing for everything she once lost. As revolution simmers in the Egyptian streets, a pregnant Hannah finds herself snared in a game of intrigue between two men --- and an act of sacrifice that will echo down the generations.

Read more »

Emily Giffin, author of The Summer Pact

Four freshmen arrive at college from completely different worlds: Lainey, a California party girl with a flair for drama; Tyson, a brilliant scholar and an aspiring lawyer from Washington, D.C.; Summer, an ambitious, recruited athlete from the Midwest; and Hannah, a mild-mannered southerner. Soon after arriving on campus, they strike up a conversation in their shared dorm. As their college years fly by, the four become inseparable. But as graduation nears, their lives are forever changed after a desperate act leads to tragic consequences. They make a pact, promising to always be there for one another. Ten years later, Hannah is anticipating what should be one of the happiest moments of her life when everything is suddenly turned upside down. Calling on her closest friends, it soon becomes clear that they are all facing their own crossroads.

Read more »