Sophie Littlefield

Awakening in a bleak landscape as scarred as her body, Cass Dollar vaguely recalls surviving something terrible. Having no idea how many weeks have passed, she slowly realizes the horrifying truth: Ruthie has vanished.And with her, nearly all of civilization.Where once-lush hills carried cars and commerce, the roads today see only cannibalistic Beaters -- people turned hungry for human flesh by a government experiment gone wrong.In a broken, barren California, Cass will undergo a harrowing quest to get Ruthie back. Few people trust an outsider, let alone a woman who became a zombie and somehow turned back, but she finds help from an enigmatic outlaw, Smoke. Smoke is her savior, and her safety.For the Beaters are out there.And the humans grip at survival with their trigger fingers. Especially when they learn that she and Ruthie have become the most feared, and desired, of weapons in a brave new world….

A Manhattan socialite turns her spin instructor into a fitness superstar to impress her friends. But can she keep her little project under control? Or has she created a monster? Julia Summers seems to have it all: a Fifth Avenue apartment, a successful husband, and two adorable children attending the best private school in the city. She relishes wielding influence over her well-heeled girlfriends . . . but her star appears to be fading. That's why, when stranded in Manhattan for the summer as the entire Upper East Side flees to the Hamptons, Julia is on the hunt for the next big thing--the hot, new fad that will put her back on top. Enter Flame, the new elite fitness craze. Seductive and transformative, Flame is exactly what Julia needs--and demure, naïve instructor Tatum is her ticket in. Turning Tatum from giggly blonde to trendy guru proves hard work. Yet Julia's triumphant comeback at summer's end doesn't quite go as planned, and when things suddenly get ugly--and even deadly--she realizes she may have been in way over her head. And Tatum, waiting in the wings, begins to grasp just how much power her newfound stardom holds . . . Then, with Julia's life already spiraling out of control, her husband is arrested for fraud and bribery. As her so-called friends turn their backs on her, and Tatum pursues her own agenda, Julia is forced to rethink everything she knew about her world to reclaim her perfect life. But does she even want it back?

The end of the world was just the beginning Civilization has fallen, leaving California an unforgiving, decimated place. But Cass Dollar beat terrible odds to get her missing daughter back—she and Ruthie will be happy. Yet with the first winter, Cass is reminded that happiness is fleeting in Aftertime. Ruthie retreats into silence. Flesh—eating Beaters still dominate the landscape. And Smoke, Cass's lover and strength, departs on a quest for vengeance, one that may end him even if he returns. The survivalist community Cass has planted roots in is breaking apart, too. Its leader, Dor, implores Cass to help him recover his own lost daughter, taken by the totalitarian Rebuilders. And soon Cass finds herself thrust into the dark heart of an organization promising humanity's rebirth—at all costs. Bound to two men blazing divergent paths across a savage land, Cass must overcome the darkness in her wounded heart, or lose those she loves forever.

Twenty-year-old Taylor Capparelli and Paul Mitchell go missing in Lawton, North Dakota, where they have been working on rigs owned by Hunter-Cole Energy. The boys stayed in Black Creek Lodge, a "man camp" providing room and board. The mothers of the two boys come to Lawton to find out what happened to their sons and form an uneasy alliance. Shay Capparelli, a 41-year-old single grandmother, has more grit than resources; for wealthy suburban housewife Colleen Mitchell, the opposite is true. Overtaxed by worry, exhaustion, and fear, they question each others' methods and motivations - but there is no one else to help, and they must learn to work together if they are to have any chance of breaking through the barriers put up by their sons employer, the indifference of an overtaxed police department, and a town of strangers with their own secrets against a backdrop of a modern day gold rush.