The unsolved case of a young girl’s disappearance reopens after twenty years in this moody, atmospheric debut of suspense set in Reykjavík and the Icelandic coast. Unnur has secrets. A single mother to a beloved daughter, Lilja, she lives a deliberately quiet life in Reykjavík, working at a bakery under an assumed last name and pushing away haunting visions of the last summer of her childhood. Her safety—and Lilja’s—now hinges on discretion. But when her ex-husband returns to Iceland and brings with him a new girlfriend, who seems to know more about Unnur than she’s letting on, Unnur may finally have to face what happened long ago on a black sand beach in the remote Dark Valley—and the possibility that she might be responsible for the disappearance of her otherworldly friend Freyja. As a cold case investigation reopens and the intricate threads of past and present begin to tangle, Unnur must race to recover the broken memory of what happened all those years ago, or risk losing her daughter. Steeped in Icelandic folklore and myth, Freyja is at once a gripping story of a child’s disappearance, a testament to the power of a mother’s love, and an enthralling tale of redemption and forgiveness from a gifted new voice.

A city transplant in a dog-obsessed small town becomes the prime suspect when the local dog walker is murdered in this delightfully quirky cozy mystery.A LITERARY HUB MOST ANTICIPATED BOOK OF THE YEARMargot Cartwright is not exactly blending in with the residents of Glenville, South Carolina. An unwilling transplant from Washington, D.C., Margot feels like a fish out of water among the Lululemon-wearing, tiny-dog-owning, non-New Yorker-reading locals who are clamoring to have their fur babies star on Pawsh, a reality TV show about couture canines. (Sure, Margot loves her dog, but Sid Vicious is far too cool of a mutt for a show like that!) She even feels like an outcast amongst her family, and after she’s caught channeling her inner “Robin Hood” by stealing her neighbors’ pro-Pawsh signs, further cementing her title as the neighborhood pariah, she thinks things can’t possibly get any worse, right?Wrong. When the local dog walker is killed in a bizarre incident involving an over-the-top Halloween display featuring multiple Home Depot skeletons, all eyes turn to Margot. To clear her name and save her family from falling apart, Margot vows to find the real killer before they strike again—but she can’t do it alone.Enter Anne, a glamorous septuagenarian widow determined to maintain her reign over the HOA, and Sally-Claire, a "Mom Life" sweatshirt-clad member of the “Mommy Mafia” who might not be as perfect as she seems. Together, the unlikely trio (along with their canine companions) dives into the mystery, navigating the quirky and secretive world of Glenville’s residents. Can they solve the case before it’s too late, or will Margot’s reputation be permanently dog-eared?

In the early 1960s, in a small town near Dartmoor, the church bells ring. The people of North Tawton go about their days, catching glimpses of one another's lives.There's the local GP, who knows more about his patients than he would sometimes prefer. There's the young shop assistant at Kestrels, who understands that the ladies who come there for a new outfit sometimes hope to find a new self. There's the tenant farm labourer who rings the tower bells at the church three times a week, the notes – harmonious and clashing – rippling out across the rooftops of the town.Amid all these lives, a young couple move into focus. New to the town with their small daughter, they have escaped London for a quieter existence in the thatched house beside the church, Court Green. The life they intend to build here – out of fresh lino tiles, second-hand furniture painted with hearts and flowers, and expertly-cooked suppers for weekend guests – will be a good and happy one.The Daffodil Days depicts a pivotal year in the marriage of 20th-century literature's most infamous couple, witnessed by the people they lived among. It is a kaleidoscopic portrait of this enigmatic pair, refracted through the rich inner lives of a rural community caught – if only for a moment – in their light.

A debut family novel about four sisters growing up on the campus of the underfunded state mental hospital where their strong-willed mother serves as head of psychiatry. A richly moving story of sisterhood, loyalty, and mental health in America. The Cross sisters have lived their entire lives on the sprawling grounds of Mercy Hill, the embattled Raleigh mental hospital run by their formidable mother. Since childhood, JJ, Caro, Mimi, and Denise have been inculcated with their mother's mission: they'll work alongside her to protect Mercy Hill from the fate of other state hospitals across the country, which are being gutted and closed, one by one. After an incident involving the highest-security ward, Mercy Hill faces greater scrutiny than ever, and Lisa Cross pushes each of her daughters even harder in the name of her mission. As the sisters cross into adulthood, the pressures of their isolated environment and mercurial mother set them on different—and perilous—paths. And as the battle wages on, youngest sister and narrator Denise grapples with the added responsibility that comes from being the last hope for their mother’s dreams. Set in the late 1990s and early 2000s, with Mercy Hill’s fate hanging in the balance, Denise recounts the transformations that shape and destroy her family, along with the landscape of mental healthcare in the United States. With sharp insight and real humor, debut novelist Hannah Thurman captures the turmoil of growing up, the true meaning of a calling, and the indelible bonds of family.

A local legend gone haywire. A small-town cop. An impossible eyewitness testimony. Which is easier to believe—that killer mermaids exist, or that one person is worth risking everything for? For fans of THE SEVEN HUSBANDS OF EVELYN HUGO and INTO THE DROWNING DEEP comes a chilling horror story steeped in urban rumor.

In 1904 Chicago, where secrets cling as thickly as the soot on every windowsill, Jo earns her living by photographing the dead. The work is quiet and cloistered, allowing her to hide from a past that haunts the grief over her husband’s mysterious death, a spiraling addiction, and the guilt she carries over the things she’s done to survive. When a notorious crime family hires Jo to make a final portrait of their daughter Millie, it stirs up a spirit that refuses to rest. In opium-fueled dreams, Millie lures Jo into a realm called “the courtyard,” where the dead burn to tell her their half-finished stories. As Jo investigates Millie’s murder, she forms a fragile bond with her sister, Grace, who’s desperate for an escape of her own. Amid the whispers of the dead is a truth Jo must confront if she is to free them all from the shadows of the past.

All children mythologize their birth...So begins the prologue of reclusive author Vida Winter's collection of stories, which are as famous for the mystery of the missing thirteenth tale as they are for the delight and enchantment of the twelve that do exist. The enigmatic Winter has spent six decades creating various outlandish life histories for herself -- all of them inventions that have brought her fame and fortune but have kept her violent and tragic past a secret. Now old and ailing, she at last wants to tell the truth about her extraordinary life. She summons biographer Margaret Lea, a young woman for whom the secret of her own birth, hidden by those who loved her most, remains an ever-present pain. Struck by a curious parallel between Miss Winter's story and her own, Margaret takes on the commission. As Vida disinters the life she meant to bury for good, Margaret is mesmerized. It is a tale of gothic strangeness featuring the Angelfield family, including the beautiful and willful Isabelle, the feral twins Adeline and Emmeline, a ghost, a governess, a topiary garden and a devastating fire. Margaret succumbs to the power of Vida's storytelling but remains suspicious of the author's sincerity. She demands the truth from Vida, and together they confront the ghosts that have haunted them while becoming, finally, transformed by the truth themselves. The Thirteenth Tale is a love letter to reading, a book for the feral reader in all of us, a return to that rich vein of storytelling that our parents loved and that we loved as children. Diane Setterfield will keep you guessing, make you wonder, move you to tears and laughter and, in the end, deposit you breathless yet satisfied back upon the shore of your everyday life.

It’s been five years since Summer Marks was brutally murdered in the woods. Everyone thinks Mia and Brynn killed their best friend. That driven by their obsession with a novel called The Way into Lovelorn the three girls had imagined themselves into the magical world where their fantasies became twisted, even deadly. The only thing is: they didn’t do it. On the anniversary of Summer’s death, a seemingly insignificant discovery resurrects the mystery and pulls Mia and Brynn back together once again. But as the lines begin to blur between past and present and fiction and reality, the girls must confront what really happened in the woods all those years ago—no matter how monstrous.