Erin Edwards is an up-and-coming marketing exec who frequents New York’s hippest eateries—until the tables are turned. Now, newly unemployed, Erin only has days to transform herself into a first-class server at Roulette, one of Manhattan’s top restaurants. Can she make it in a world where survival is all about . . . But life behind the apron is even worse than Erin imagined—within days she finds herself in hot water with Roulette’s egomaniacal celebrity chef and the owner’s outrageous wife. And then there’s the surly, dismissive clientele—all but Daniel Fratelli, the flirtatious TV news producer who may just be as nice as he seems. Determined not to crack under pressure, Erin sets out to master the art of waitressing—becoming part shrink, part slave, and partfoie gras pusher. It seems like she’ll be hustling for that twenty percent for the rest of her life, until her quirky best friend comes up with the perfect recipe for success—or a second course of disaster. In this smart, sexy, and wickedly observant novel, identical twins and onetime real-life waitresses Heather and Rose MacDowell bring a deliciously tart verisimilitude to this story of a young woman’s adventures at Manhattan’s most exclusive new haunt.

Turning Tables: A Novel

Literature & Fiction

MacDowell, Heather

MacDowell, Rose

Humor & Satire

Bantam Discovery

Sometimes to be who you really are, you have to pretend you’re already who you want to be. At two, Delores’s mother dropped her into the shallow end of a lake, trusting instinct would teach her daughter to swim. From then on, the water is where Delores Walker feels most at home. Now, nearly seventeen, she’s boarding a Greyhound bus leaving the Bronx for sunny Weeki Wachee Springs, a tacky roadside attraction in the shadow of Walt Disney’s new Florida phenomenon. With a hundred silver dollars left behind by her runaway dad, Delores is chasing her dream of being a mermaid with a group of other aquatic hopefuls—girls just as awkward and uncertain out of water as they are beautiful and graceful in it. And in this make-believe world of sequined tails and amphibious fantasy, Delores will learn some very real lessons about growing up and surviving in a world where everyone sometimes feels like a fish out of water. A heartfelt novel of coming-of-age no matter what age you are, populated with characters offbeat, outcast, and thoroughly lovable, Swim to Me is filled with the kind of wise magic that’ll have you believing in the impossible before the final page.

Swim to Me: A Novel

Carter, Betsy

United States

Life changes in an instant. On a foggy beach. In the seconds when Abby Mason—photographer, fiancée soon-to-be-stepmother—looks into her camera and commits her greatest error. Heartbreaking, uplifting, and beautifully told, here is the riveting tale of a family torn apart, of the search for the truth behind a child’s disappearance, and of one woman’s unwavering faith in the redemptive power of love—all made startlingly fresh through Michelle Richmond’s incandescent sensitivity and extraordinary insight. Six-year-old Emma vanished into the thick San Francisco fog. Or into the heaving Pacific. Or somewhere just beyond: to a parking lot, a stranger’s van, or a road with traffic flashing by. Devastated by guilt, haunted by her fears about becoming a stepmother, Abby refuses to believe that Emma is dead. And so she searches for clues about what happened that morning—and cannot stop the flood of memories reaching from her own childhood to illuminate that irreversible moment on the beach. Now, as the days drag into weeks, as the police lose interest and fliers fade on telephone poles, Emma’s father finds solace in religion and scientific probability—but Abby can only wander the beaches and city streets, attempting to recover the past and the little girl she lost. With her life at a crossroads, she will leave San Francisco for a country thousands of miles away. And there, by the side of another sea, on a journey that has led her to another man and into a strange subculture of wanderers and surfers, Abby will make the most astounding discovery of all—as the truth of Emma’s disappearance unravels with stunning force. A profoundly original novel of family, loss, and hope—of the choices we make and the choices made for us—The Year of Fog beguiles with the mysteries of time and memory even as it lays bare the deep and wondrous workings of the human heart. The result is a mesmerizing tour de force that will touch anyone who knows what it means to love a child.

The Year of Fog: A Novel (Bantam Discovery)

Richmond, Michelle

A novel for anyone who’s ever had to risk it all to be the person they wanted to be… From the critically acclaimed authors of Literacy and Longing in L.A. comes the ultimate story for late bloomers of every exotic shade. And a quirky young heroine with a knack for reinvention and a flair for the unexpected no reader will ever forget.Thirty, newly single, and desperately in need of a paycheck, inveterate bird-watcher Cassie Shaw finds herself doing something that goes against all her principles. She lies on a résumé to land a job and finds herself employed at an elite university working for a pair of professors as unique as the rare birds she covets. One of them is the sexy, handsome, cheerfully aristocratic expert in animal behavior, Professor William Conner. Under his charismatic tutelage, Cassie begins her personal transformation into the person she was meant to be while meeting the kinds of people she has never met before. But when your entire future and your unlikely new career teeters on an unbearable untruth, the masquerade can’t go on forever. And when Cassie steps out from behind her mask it will transform her life—and the lives of those around her—forever.

A Version of the Truth: A Novel

Kaufman, Jennifer

Mack, Karen

In a smart, sexy, wickedly funny new novel, the acclaimed author of Right Before Your Eyes introduces an unforgettable and irresistibly real heroine: Michaela“Mike” Edwards, a woman who is forced to reinvent herself— and discovers that the biggest risk is not taking one at all…. Fiercely independent and seriously lacking in social graces, Mike Edwards doesn’t do sugar and spice. Instead she writes great copy and stays above the fray—until mishandled office politics get her unexpectedly fired. Suddenly the young ad hotshot finds herself doing the unimaginable: moving back in with her widowed father, hiding from her lecherous mentor, rethinking her entire career—and trying to unravel complex feelings for her best guy pal, an Aussie journalist named Gunther. For Mike, a few wrenching twists of fate are leading to a job she never expected: teaching “life skills” to seventh-grade girls. But sometimes the best makeovers are the ones you never see coming. Because with a classroom full of kids who need her, a best friend who’s fast becoming something more, and a family she’s only just discovering, Mike has a few surprises in store…and she’s about to discover that going places in life doesn’t have to mean going it on your own.

Everything Nice: A Novel

Shanman, Ellen

Dramas & Plays

At twelve, Lucy Marie McGowan already knows she’ll be a psychologist when she grows up. And her quirky and conflicted family provides plenty of opportunity for her to practice her calling. Now Lucy, her “profoundly gifted” twin brother, Milo, her commitment-phobic mother, and her New Age grandmother are leaving Chicago for Timber Falls, Wisconsin, to care for her dying grandfather—a complex and difficult man whose failure as a husband and father still painfully echoes down through the years. Lucy believes her time in the rural town where the McGowan story began will provide a key piece to the puzzle of her family’s broken past, and perhaps even reveal the truth about her own missing father. But what she discovers is so much more—a lesson about the paradoxes of love and the grace of forgiveness that the adults around her will need help in remembering if their family is ever to find peace and embrace the future. By turns heart-wrenching and heart-mending, Thank You for All Things is a powerful and poignant novel by a brilliant storyteller who illustrates that when it comes to matters of family and love, often it is the innocent who force others to confront their darkest secrets.

Thank You for All Things: A Novel

Kring, Sandra

Nicholas Lyon is the perfect husband—a handsome divorce attorney who dotes on his wife and family. Sara Kaplan is the perfect seductress—a vivacious young lawyer tired of being single. And Malinche Lyon is the perfect wife—a still-beautiful cookbook writer and mother to three darling daughters. Now, in this smart, wickedly sexy novel, Nick, Sara, and Malinche are all about to join…The Adultery Club Suddenly Nicholas—a man totally in love with his wife—is fantasizing about Sara. Sara is toying with Nick. And Malinche is facing temptations of her own. While appetites are whetted and sated from London to the English countryside, what began as instant animal attraction is spinning wildly out of control, turning lives upside down—and hearts inside out. And now one heretofore happily married man and two very different women are about to discover the difference between fulfilling your wildest desires—and getting your just deserts.

The Adultery Club: A Novel

Stimson, Tess

Genre Fiction

How far would you go for the best friend who broke your heart? This internationally bestselling novel tells an enchanting tale of life’s most unpredictable loves and heartaches, and the unforgettable bond between a single woman and an extraordinary five-year-old girl. From the moment they met in college, best friends Adele Brannon and Kamryn Matika thought nothing could come between them—until Adele did the unthinkable and slept with Kamryn’s fiancé, Nate. Now, after years of silence, the two women are reuniting, and Adele has a stunning request for her old friend: she wants Kamryn to adopt her five-year-old daughter, Tegan. Besides the difference in skin color—many will assume that headstrong, impulsive Kamryn is Tegan’s nanny—there’s the inconvenient truth that Kamryn is wholly unprepared to take care of anyone, especially someone who reminds her so much of Nate. With crises brewing at work and her love life in shambles, can Kamryn somehow become the mother a little girl needs her to be? In My Best Friend’s Girl, Dorothy Koomson takes us on a warm and wondrous journey through laughter and tears, forgiveness and hope—and the enduring love forged by the unlikeliest of families.

My Best Friend's Girl: A Novel

Koomson, Dorothy

Contemporary

All you need is love? For the residents of swanky Mayfair Estates, a pre-nup is just another item on the wedding to-do checklist—but three friends get more than they bargained for when they promise to love, cherish . . . and sign on the dotted line. Ellie married her handsome, wealthy Prince Charming when she was young, naive, and willing to sign a one-sided pre-nup in the name of true love. But seven years and one toddler later, her happily-ever-after has come screeching to a halt. If she can’t save her marriage, she’s determined to save her divorce, and she’s not about to let a lot of legalese stand in her way. When Jen married Eric, he knew she wasn’t head over heels. Still, he insisted that they were perfect together and even bankrolled her blossoming business. But when Jen’s career finally takes off, she realizes that she may lose her husband. If Eric leaves, Jen will lose everything—including the marriage she values more than she thought. Up-and-coming attorney Mara is sure her fiancé has forgiven her for a foolish one-night fling—until he adds a “cheating clause” to the pre-nup she had demanded. If he really trusts her, why the clause? And if she’s really trustworthy, why is she objecting? As romance collides with real life, three very different women turn to each other for moral support and insights about how to safeguard their most valuable assets: their hearts.

The Pre-Nup: A Novel

Kendrick, Beth

Erin Edwards is an up-and-coming marketing exec who frequents New York’s hippest eateries—until the tables are turned. Now, newly unemployed, Erin only has days to transform herself into a first-class server at one of Manhattan’s top restaurants. Can she make it in a world where survival is all about…Life behind the apron is even worse than Erin imagined—within days she finds herself in hot water with Roulette’s egomaniacal celebrity chef and the owner’s outrageous wife. And then there’s the surly, dismissive clientele—all but Daniel Fratelli, a flirtatious producer who may just be as nice as he seems. Determined not to crack under pressure, Erin sets out to master the art of waitressing—becoming part shrink, part slave, and part foie gras pusher. It seems like she’ll be hustling for that twenty percent for the rest of her life, until her quirky best friend comes up with the perfect recipe for success—or a second course of disaster.In this smart, sexy, and wickedly observant novel, identical twins and onetime real-life waitresses Heather and Rose MacDowell bring a deliciously tart verisimilitude to the story of a young woman’s adventures at Manhattan’s most exclusive new haunt.

Turning Tables

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