Maugham found a parallel to the turmoil of our own times in the duplicity, intrigue and sensuality of the Italian Renaissance. Then and Now enters the world of Machiavelli, and covers three important months in the career of that crafty politician, worldly seducer and high priest of schemers

Following a devastating train wreck, a small group of survivors emerge from the wreckage to discover New York City is the target of an attack and millions of bodies line the streets. Harry Hayward is one of those survivors. He served his country, fought two wars, and in his eighty years on the earth could say he had seen it all. Until that day. Surprised that the group separates, Harry is left alone to care and guide an eight-year-old boy out of the devastation of New York and hopefully to safety. But finding safety isn’t easy. The destruction extends far beyond New York. A massive strike has commenced on the Eastern Seaboard of the United States and for the first time since the War of 1812, America has been invaded. Harry and the boy, along with the other survivors are deep inside occupied territory. As they journey and struggle through the front lines of a war that will rage for decades, they discover just how hard they have to fight for the price of freedom. A freedom they all had taken for granted. First there was normalcy… then came war. Then Came War is the prequel to Wasteland and is part of the America’s Demise Series

Veterinary intern Emily can’t believe she wound up in the small town of Sunshine, Idaho, instead of the Los Angeles clinic she had always imagined. Now she has to put her plans to move to L.A. on hold for a whole year while she fulfills the obligation of her vet school scholarship. Then Wyatt, her gorgeous one-night stand from a Reno vet conference, introduces himself as her new boss. And Emily is just as drawn to his seductive looks and quiet strength as she was on that very steamy night. She soon learns that Wyatt isn’t just a laid-back doctor, but a delicious alpha male tempting her away from her carefully laid-out plans

Jules Strauss is a Princeton senior with a full scholarship, acquaintances instead of friends, and a family she’s ashamed to invite to Parents’ Weekend. With the income she’ll receive from donating her “pedigree” eggs, she believes she can save her father from addiction. Annie Barrow married her high school sweetheart and became the mother to two boys. After years of staying at home and struggling to support four people on her husband’s salary, she thinks she’s found a way to recover a sense of purpose and bring in some extra cash. India Bishop, thirty-eight (really forty-three), has changed everything about herself: her name, her face, her past. In New York City, she falls for a wealthy older man, Marcus Croft, and decides a baby will ensure a happy ending. When her attempts at pregnancy fail, she turns to technology, and Annie and Jules, to help make her dreams come true. But each of their plans is thrown into disarray when Marcus’ daughter Bettina, intent on protecting her father, becomes convinced that his new wife is not what she seems… With startling tenderness and laugh-out-loud humor, Jennifer Weiner once again takes readers into the heart of women’s lives in an unforgettable, timely tale that interweaves themes of class and entitlement, surrogacy and donorship, the rights of a parent and the measure of motherhood

At four in the morning, the night of his twenty-fifth birthday, Baron Montford finds himself quite sauced with a large group of gentlemen in his library. Spurred on by revelry, pride, and drink, Montford takes on a wager he'll soon regret: to successfully seduce the virtuous Katherine Huxtable within the coming fortnight. The Huxtables have recently fallen into a great deal of wealth and prominence, and Katherine Huxtable knows that she's been lucky in every way but one. Despite her great beauty and newfound life of leisure, Katherine believes she is not made for passion or romance. She has avoided any suitors and all men of the ton, Lord Montford most of all due to his notoriety of as a dangerous rakehell. With a sour reputation, Baron Montford certainly has a steep hill to climb - will he lose his wager or perhaps even his heart?

A storm is brewing in the all-but-forgotten backcountry of Kentucky. And, for Orbie Ray, the swirling heavens may just have the power to tear open his family’s darkest secrets. Then Like the Blind Man: Orbie’s Story is the enthralling debut novel by Freddie Owens, which tells the story of a feisty wunderkind in the segregated South of the 1950s, and the forces he must overcome to restore order in his world. Evocative of a time and place long past, this absorbing work of magical realism offered with a Southern twist will engage readers who relish the Southern literary canon, or any tale well told. Nine-year-old Orbie has his cross to bear. After the death of his father, his mother Ruby has off and married his father’s coworker and friend Victor, a slick-talking man with a snake tattoo. Now, Orbie, his sister Missy, and his mother haven’t had a peaceful moment with the heavy-drinking new man of the house. Orbie hates his stepfather more than he can stand; a fact that lands him at his grandparents’ place in Harlan’s Crossroads, Kentucky. Orbie grudgingly adjusts to life with his doting Granny and carping Granpaw, who are a bit too keen on their black neighbors for Orbie’s taste, not to mention their Pentecostal congregation of snake handlers. And, when he meets the black Choctaw preacher, Moses Mashbone, he learns of powers that might uncover the true cause of his father's death. As a storm of unusual magnitude descends, Orbie happens upon the solution to a paradox at once magical and ordinary. Question is, will it be enough? Equal parts Hamlet and Huckleberry Finn, it’s a tale that’s rich in meaning, socially relevant, and rollicking with boyhood adventure. The novel mines crucial contemporary issues, as well as the universality of the human experience while also casting a beguiling light on boyhood dreams and fears. It’s a well-spun, nuanced work of fiction that is certain to resonate with lovers of literary fiction, particularly in the Southern tradition of storytelling. Then Like The Blind Man: Orbie’s Story wins Indiereader Discovery Award for literary fiction

San Diego P.I. Roland Ford has taken a job for fellow former Marine and rising politician Dalton Strait. Even as Strait contends with unexplained bombings of government buildings in his district, his wife, Natalie, has gone missing, leaving behind a cryptic plea for help. But as Ford digs into the details of a troubled marriage, Natalie’s disappearance becomes more complicated. Meanwhile, the bombings in the city intensify, with a mysterious group known only as the Chaos Committee claiming responsibility. Ford soon learns that the seemingly random attacks may be connected to the case he’s on — and suddenly, his hunt for a missing woman might decide the fate of an entire city

**THE #1 INTERNATIONAL BESTSELLER!** **"Jewell teases out her twisty plot at just the right pace, leaving readers on the edge of their seats. Her multilayered characters are sheer perfection, and even the most astute thriller reader won't see where everything is going until the final threads are unknotted." —** Booklist **, starred review** **"More than a whiff of** The Lovely Bones **wafts through this haunting domestic noir...Skillfully told by several narrators, Jewell's gripping novel is an emotionally resonant story of loss, grief, and renewal." —** Publishers Weekly **"Sharply written with twists and turns, Jewell's latest will please fans of** Gone Girl, The Girl on the Train **, or** Luckiest Girl Alive **." —** Library Journal Ellie Mack was the perfect daughter. She was fifteen, the youngest of three. She was beloved by her parents, friends, and teachers. She and her boyfriend made a teenaged

For anyone who has ever worked in an office, hating everything and everyone in it, yet fell apart when it was time to leave — this book is for you. Heartbreaking, yet hysterically funny, Then We Came to the End is the definitive novel about the contemporary American workplace. With an irresistibly casual writing style, Ferris makes readers a part of his fictional advertising agency from the moment we open the book. Through numerous impromptu conversations, colleagues come alive. We learn that Larry and Amber have had an affair, and that Amber is pregnant. We know that Chris Yop is panicking because he exchanged his office chair without permission, and that Joe Pope is universally despised because he got promoted and now everyone has to listen to him. No one likes Karen Woo because she's always trying to seem smarter than everyone else. And the head boss, Lynn, has cancer, but she doesn't want anyone to know. We understand that the agency is in trouble, and that the unstable Tom Mota is being laid off. We realize that anyone could be next. And we're dying to know what's going to happen. By the time readers finish the book, they'll swear that Ferris has spent time in their own offices. And they'll thank him for capturing so knowingly what makes it so horrible, and what makes it our own

It is April 1962. The Korean War has escalated and the US is struggling to keep the Russians and Chinese north of the 38th parallel. All the men are away fighting, but that doesn’t mean the Space Race is lost. NASA decides to look elsewhere for its astronauts: the thirteen women pilots who passed the same tests as the original male candidates. These are the Mercury 13: Jerrie Cobb, Janey Hart, Myrtle Cagle, Jerri Sloan, Jan Dietrich, Marion Dietrich, Bernice Steadman, Wally Funk, Sarah Gorelick, Gene Nora Stumbough, Jean Hixson, Rhea Hurrle and Irene Leverton. One of these women will be the first American in space. Another will be the first American to spacewalk. Perhaps one will even be the first human being to walk on the Moon. Beneath the surface of the Atlantic Ocean, deep in the Puerto Rico Trench north of San Juan, lies a film bucket from a KH-4 Corona spy satellite. It should have been caught in mid-air by a C-130 from the 6549th Test Group. That didn’t happen. So the US Navy bathyscaphe Trieste II must descend twenty thousand feet to retrieve the bucket, down where light has never reached and the pressure is four tons per square inch. But there is more in the depths than anyone had expected, much more. This is not our world. But it very nearly was