Best friends Etho and Birt love going up Sudden Hill and sitting in simple cardboard boxes imagining they are kings, soldiers, astronauts, or pirates until Shu asks to join them, and their "two-by-two rhythm" is disturbed.

"A literature professor tries to rediscover who she is after the sudden death of her husband, even as a series of family and political jolts force her to ask what we owe those in crisis in our families, biological or otherwise" -- Provided by publisher.

Newly orphaned children of immigrants, Lucy and Sam are suddenly alone in a land that refutes their existence. Fleeing the threats of their western mining town, they set off to bury their father in the only way that will set them free from their past. Along the way, they encounter giant buffalo bones, tiger paw prints, and the specters of a ravaged landscape as well as family secrets, sibling rivalry, and glimpses of a different kind of future.

"When two young women leave their college campus in the dead of winter for a 700-mile drive north to Minnesota, they suddenly find themselves fighting for their lives in the icy waters of the Black Root River, just miles from home. One girl's survival, and the other's death--murder, actually--stun the citizens of a small Minnesota town, thawing memories of another young woman who lost her life in the same river ten years earlier, and whose killer...

"Zo Grey is reeling from the sudden death of her mother when she receives a surprising call from an attorney in Divinity, Louisiana, with the news she has been left an inheritance by a distant relative, the terms of which he will only discuss in person. Destitute and alone, with nothing left to lose, Zo heads to Divinity and discovers she is the sole beneficiary of a huge fortune and a monstrosity of a house that sits ominously at the peak of Watch...

Suddenly sent from their home in Brooklyn to Bird Hill in Barbados after their mother can no longer care for them, sisters Phaedra and Dionne spend the summer of 1989 living with their grandmother Hyacinth, a midwife and practitioner of the local spiritual practice of obeah.

A brutal tragedy ended Ivy Hill's happy family and childhood. Now in her twenties and severely troubled, she barely has a life--or much to live for. Until the day she discovers the name of the woman who destroyed her world: Lola Maxwell--the mega-wealthy socialite with a heart, Miami's beloved "first lady" of charity. Accomplished, gorgeous, and oh-so-caring, Lola has the best of everything--and doesn't deserve any of it. So it's only right that Ivy...

"Maddy Donaldo, homeless at twenty, has made a family of sorts in the dangerous spaces of San Francisco's Golden Gate Park. She knows whom to trust, where to eat, when to move locations, and how to take care of her dog. It's the only home she has. When she unwittingly witnesses the murder of a young homeless boy and is seen by the perpetrator, her relatively stable life is upended. Suddenly, everyone from the police to the dead boys' parents want...

Mary Ingles is a Virginia homesteader whose family is suddenly attacked by a Shawnee war party. After Mary is taken captive, the leader of the war party is impressed by her courage and strength, and decides to make her his mate. Mary then makes the dangerous decision to escape the Shawnee village with another captive woman. Together they embark on a harrowing journey through the Virginia wilderness toward freedom and home.

"On an island nation in the Indian Ocean, the explorers venture through a vast underwater world and take part in a friendly robotics competition. But the tides of good fortune change quickly. Suddenly, Team Cousteau jumps into action to rescue a faculty member from the brink of death. Meanwhile, the team follows the Cruz's mother's clues to a magnificent tomb and center of spirituality precariously perched on the side of a cliff. There, Cruz is confronted...