How to Be Eaten

Maria Adelmann

This darkly funny and provocative novel reimagines classic fairy tale characters as modern women in a support group for trauma. In present-day New York City, five women meet in a basement support group to process their traumas. Bernice grapples with the fallout of dating a psychopathic, blue-bearded billionaire. Ruby, once devoured by a wolf, now wears him as a coat. Gretel questions her memory of being held captive in a house made of candy. Ashlee, the winner of a Bachelor-esque dating show, wonders if she really got her promised fairy tale ending. And Raina's love story will shock them all. Though the women start out wary of one another, judging each other’s stories, gradually they begin to realize that they may have more in common than they supposed . . . What really brought them here? What secrets will they reveal? And is it too late for them to rescue each other? Dark, edgy, and wickedly funny, this debut for readers of Carmen Maria Machado, Kristen Arnett, and Kelly Link takes our coziest, most beloved childhood stories, exposes them as anti-feminist nightmares, and transforms them into a new kind of myth for grown-up women.

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The Rachel Incident

Caroline O'Donoghue

Where would I start, and how would it even make sense? How could you understand the year in Shandon Street unless you were there, with us, living it? Rachel Murray is twenty-one years old, platonically infatuated with her housemate James, and less-than-platonically infatuated with her enigmatic, married English professor Dr Byrne. Over the course of a year, as Rachel and James's lives become more and more deeply entwined with those of Dr Byrne and his perfect wife Deenie, tensions rise, and a shocking secret threatens everything they hold dear. The Rachel Incident is a sharp, poignant, and beautifully told story of losing and finding yourself and the lengths we will go to for those we love.

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How to Fall Out of Love Madly

Jana Casale

Three women confront the compromises they've made to appease the men they love. Joy and Annie are friends and roommates whose thirty-something lives aren't exactly what they'd imagined. To make ends meet, they decide to rent their extra bedroom to Theo, who charms Joy with his salt-and-pepper hair and adoration of their one-eyed cat. When Annie goes to live with her boyfriend, Theo and Joy settle into a comfortable domesticity. Then Theo brings home Celine, the girlfriend he's never mentioned, who is possibly the most stunning woman Joy has ever seen. Joy resolves to do whatever it takes to hold on to him, falling ever deeper into an emotional hellscape of her own making. She is too obsessed to realize that Celine's beauty doesn't protect her from pain. Haunted by an event from her past, Celine can't escape her shame and finds herself in an endless cycle of self-sabotage. Annie is baffled by Joy's senseless devotion to Theo, but she's consumed by her own obsessions: she can't stop parsing her commitment-phobic boyfriend's texts in an exhausting mission to maintain his approval. At work, where she fully embraces her natural assertiveness, Annie is a star. But when an anonymous letter lands on her desk accusing her esteemed and supportive boss of sexual misconduct, she is forced to decide who and what she's willing to stand up for. Perceptive, mordantly funny, and full of heart, How to Fall Out of Love Madly examines women's many relationships--with one another, their mothers, their work, men, and themselves--to reveal their underlying power and complexity. It asks, why do so many smart, compassionate, otherwise empowered women tolerate egregious behavior from the men they love? And what will it take for them to reclaim control?

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After Hours at Dooryard Books

Cat Sebastian

1968 New York City News about the war might be keeping Patrick up at night--news in general might be keeping Patrick up at night--but he's doing fine. He's sure of it. He gets to spend his days selling books in the gayest neighborhood on the East Coast and his nights merrily sleeping his way through the rare book community. But when he takes in a drifter who seems to be hiding something, and his best friend and her newborn move into the apartment upstairs, his life gets turned on its head. A sleepy little bookstore should be the perfect place for Nathaniel to lie low, waiting for his past to catch up with him, but it turns out Dooryard Books is full of political radicals and anti-war agitators. If the FBI isn't actively surveilling this place, it will be. Nathaniel should go anywhere else. The last thing he expects is to like these subversives. There's a grieving folk musician and her baby--a demon of a child who will only sleep if Nathaniel, of all people, holds her. There's a pair of rabble-rousing teenagers who, upsettingly, seem to be right about everything. And then there's Patrick, who can't walk past anyone who needs his help--and who is perplexingly determined to help Nathaniel. As the world balances on the precipice of something new and scary and maybe even hopeful, Patrick needs to decide what he's willing to risk for this chaotic new community he's accidentally created. And Nathaniel needs to figure out whether he has a place in this messy, flawed world--and whether he can believe he deserves it.

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After Hours at Dooryard Books

Cat Sebastian

1968 New York City News about the war might be keeping Patrick up at night--news in general might be keeping Patrick up at night--but he's doing fine. He's sure of it. He gets to spend his days selling books in the gayest neighborhood on the East Coast and his nights merrily sleeping his way through the rare book community. But when he takes in a drifter who seems to be hiding something, and his best friend and her newborn move into the apartment upstairs, his life gets turned on its head. A sleepy little bookstore should be the perfect place for Nathaniel to lie low, waiting for his past to catch up with him, but it turns out Dooryard Books is full of political radicals and anti-war agitators. If the FBI isn't actively surveilling this place, it will be. Nathaniel should go anywhere else. The last thing he expects is to like these subversives. There's a grieving folk musician and her baby--a demon of a child who will only sleep if Nathaniel, of all people, holds her. There's a pair of rabble-rousing teenagers who, upsettingly, seem to be right about everything. And then there's Patrick, who can't walk past anyone who needs his help--and who is perplexingly determined to help Nathaniel. As the world balances on the precipice of something new and scary and maybe even hopeful, Patrick needs to decide what he's willing to risk for this chaotic new community he's accidentally created. And Nathaniel needs to figure out whether he has a place in this messy, flawed world--and whether he can believe he deserves it.

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