In five years, Jesmyn Ward lost five young men in her life --- to drugs, accidents, suicide, and the bad luck that can follow people who live in poverty, particularly black men. Dealing with these losses, one after another, made Jesmyn ask the question: Why? And as she began to write about the experience of living through all the dying, she realized the truth --- and it took her breath away.
NECESSARY LIES is the story of two young women, seemingly worlds apart, who are thrown together and must ask themselves: How can you know what you believe is right, when everyone is telling you it’s wrong?
Charlotte and Nicole were once the best of friends, spending summers together in Nicole's family's island house, but they have since grown apart. When Nicole returns to the island house, she invites her old friend Charlotte for both sentimental and practical reasons. But what both women don't know is that they are each holding a secret that may change their relationship forever. Are the bonds of friendship strong enough to weather past indiscretions and betrayals? Can love survive an honest mistake?
At the beginning of the Chinese Cultural Revolution of 1957, Kai Ying struggles to hold her family together after her husband is sent to a labor camp as punishment for writing a letter criticizing the Communist Party. When her young son breaks his leg, she must come to terms with the shattering reminder of her husband's absence. Meanwhile, other members of the household must face their own guilty secrets and strive to find peace in a world where the old sense of order is failing.
Millions of American parents sit down to dinner every night, wondering why fully grown children are joining them --- or, more likely, grunting good-bye as they head out for another night of who knows what. Sally Koslow, a journalist, novelist and mother of two “adultescents,” digs deep to reveal what lies behind the current generation's unwillingness --- or inability --- to take flight.
During World War II, a family finds life turned upside down when the government opens a Japanese internment camp in their small Colorado town. After a young girl is murdered, all eyes (and suspicions) turn to the newcomers, the interlopers, the strangers.
Adam, 46, is a ruthless self-made millionaire married to an icy socialite living a picture-perfect existence that includes a teen princess daughter. Then he loses his job for slapping his assistant, Sophie, full across the face. For his violent act, Adam is sentenced to perform community service at a homeless men's shelter where Chance, a scrappy pit bull mix trying to escape the illegal dogfight circuit, teaches Adam about survival and what matters. Chance tells his story in his own words, which makes his mistreatment powerfully disturbing.
