The Talk-Funny Girl

The Talk-Funny Girl by Roland Merullo

Seventeen-year-old Marjorie Richards is frightened. Teenage girls have gone missing in her rural New Hampshire town, never to be seen alive again. But her fear that she harbors runs deeper than what is currently making the headlines. She lives in constant worry and fear at home as well.

Marjorie's parents live deep in isolation from normal society. So isolated that they've developed their own dialect, which they've passed onto their daughter. They have also fallen under the seduction of a sadistic cult leader who has his own ideas about how to discipline sinners.

After being sent out on a job search (the check that her father receives each month for a fake back injury isn't covering their monthly expenses), failing and then being physically abused by her family's minister, a kind aunt steps in and finds Marjorie work with a young man who is building a cathedral in town, stone by stone.

As Marjorie learns and develops the skill of working with stone, her self-confidence develops as well and she soon realizes that hope does exist and that she can eventually break free from a life of torment and bleakness.

The Goodbye Quilt by Susan Wiggs

Susan Wiggs writes straight from the heart about the bonds between mother and daughter.

The Goodbye Quilt is the perfect read for any woman who's had to let go of someone special.

Linda Davis's local fabric shop is a place where women gather to share their creations: quilts commemorating important events in their lives. Wedding quilts, baby quilts, memorial quilts - each is bound tight with dreams, hopes and yearning.

Now, as her only child readies for college, Linda is torn between excitement for Molly and heartache for herself. Who will she be when she is no longer needed in her role as mom? What will become of her days? Of her marriage?

Mother and daughter decide to share one last adventure together-a cross-country road trip to move Molly into her dorm. As they wend their way through the heart of the country, Linda stitches together the scraps that make up Molly's young life. And in the quilting of each bit of fabric-the hem of a christening gown, a snippet from a Halloween costume-Linda discovers that the memories of a shared journey can come together in a way that will keep them both warm in the years to come.

Save Me by Lisa Scottoline

Nobody could have foreseen what would happen the day that Rose McKenna volunteers as a lunch mom in the cafeteria of her daughter's elementary school. Rose dose it to keep a discreet eye on her third grader, Melly, a sweet, if shy, child who was born with a facial birthmark that has become her won personal bull's-eye. Melly has been targeted by the mean girl at their new school & gets bullied every day, placing Rose in a no-win position familiar to parents everywhere: Do we step in to protect our children when they need us or does that make things worse?

When the bully starts to tease Melly yet again, Rose is about to leap into action - but right then, that unthinkable happens, Rose finds herself in a nightmare, faced with an emergency decision that no mother should ever have to make. What she decides in that split second derails Rose's life & jeopardizes everyone she holds dear, until she takes matters into her own hands & lays her life on the line to save her child, her family, her marriage and herself.

A Matter of Faith

Jennifer Haigh's new novel, Faith, is further proof of her amazing talent. Faith looks at one family and examines their faith in God, family, and the world through the lens of a scandal that has become all too familiar in the last few years. The narrator, Sheila, leads us through the story of how Arthur, her brother and a Catholic priest, is accused of inappropriate sexual activity with a young boy. All through the book, we accompany Sheila, Arthur, and their brother Mike on this journey through their childhood and subsequent years, seeing Arthur as the family knows him and also as the world views him. Sheila and Mike are sometimes at cross-purposes, and their faith in Arthur tips and sways throughout. The reader is taken along on this emotional ride and allowed to speculate on the truth until the final pages. The book is heartbreaking, sensitive, and somewhat critical of the Catholic heirarchy, but readers of all faiths will enjoy it.

Beautiful Boy

From as early as grade school, the world seemed to be on Nic Sheff's string. Bright and athletic, he excelled in any setting and appeared destined for greatness. Yet as childhood exuberance faded into teenage angst, the precocious boy found himself going down a much different path. Seduced by the illicit world of drugs and alcohol, he quickly found himself caught in the clutches of addiction. Beautiful Boy in Nic's story, but from the perspective of his father, David. Achingly honest, it chronicles the betrayal, pain, and terrifying question marks that haunt the loved ones of an addict. Many respond to addiction with a painful oath of silence, but David Sheff opens up personal wounds to reinforce that it is a disease, and must be treated as such. Most importantly, his journey provides those in similar situations with a commodity that they can never lose: hope.

Publisher's Weekly review.