"When Astrid Strick witnesses a school bus accident in the center of town, it jostles loose a repressed memory from her young parenting days, decades years earlier. Suddenly, Astrid realizes she was not quite the parent she thought she'd been to her three, now-grown children. But to what consequence? Astrid's youngest son is drifting and unfocused, making parenting mistakes of his own. Her daughter is intentionally pregnant yet struggling to give...

"The Frosts are a typical American family. Barb and John, married almost fifty years, are testy and bored with each other . . . who could blame them after all this time? At least they have their daughters -- Barb's favorite, the perfect, brilliant Juliet; and John's darling, the free-spirited Sadie. The girls themselves couldn't be more different, but at least they got along, more or less. It was fine. It was enough. Until the day John had a stroke,...

From the New York Times columnist, a portrait of a family and the cycles of joy and grief that mark the natural world: "Has the makings of an American classic." —Ann Patchett
Growing up in Alabama, Margaret Renkl was a devoted reader, an explorer of riverbeds and red-dirt roads, and a fiercely loved daughter. Here, in brief essays, she traces a tender and honest portrait of her complicated parents—her exuberant, creative mother;...

"For as long as Elizabeth can remember, she has watched her father trail after her mother, kissing her multiple times a day and holding her hand. She watched her mother smooth the lines in her father's face and pay attention to his every move, even when she was desperate for some time to herself. When her parents began to age, Elizabeth and her siblings are placed in the difficult position of taking over more and more supportive roles and tasks. They...

"Set in the French countryside on an idyllic summer vacation, a delicious, tender novel about finding every bit of joy in life no matter what's thrown at us Sick of his lies, cheating ways, and complete lack of interest in fatherhood, Jessica left her boyfriend, Adam, only months after she gave birth to their son--and never looked back. Adam moved to France to follow his dream, unencumbered by a serious relationship and the child he never wanted....

"Two sisters whose lives seemed forever intertwined are torn apart when a magical little black dress gives each one a glimpse of an unavoidable future"--p. [4] of cover.

"Family caregiving has its challenges: emotional overload, time constraints, anxiety, burnout, missed work, adult sibling conflicts, and marital issues. But caregivers also grow personally and spiritually by ensuring the well-being of a loved one. In AARP Meditations for Caregivers, clinical psychologists Barry J. Jacobs and Julia L. Mayer blend emotional and spiritual motivation to maximize the gains of caregiving while minimizing the strains. The...

Fleeing the retirement home where his son abandoned him, Abner Meecham sets out to reclaim his beloved Tennessee farmstead, only to find it's been leased to an old enemy, the volatile Lonzo Choat. After Abner intervenes to protect Choat's daughter from her drunken father's abuse, events spiral toward a startling, violent climax.

"A lucid and moving debut novel on the interconnection between work and life, loneliness and kinship, and the projects that occupy our time. How do we take stock of a life--by what means, and by what measure? This is the question that preoccupies Alice, a Taiwanese immigrant in her late thirties. In the off-hours from her day job, Alice struggles to create a project about the enigmatic downtown performance artist Tehching Hsieh and his monumental,...