Skip to main content

September 18, 2026

This was a week of bookish nights. It kicked off on Monday night when I went to Watchung Booksellers in Montclair, NJ to see Amanda Peters, author of THE BIRTHING TREE, in conversation with Alice Elliott Dark, who was a brilliant interviewer. Amanda discussed her Mi'kmaq ancestry; she is a member of Glooscap First Nation, an indigenous community located in Nova Scotia's Annapolis Valley. She was inspired to write the novel after hearing stories about a tree where women gave birth. She also talked about a custom where the first voices a baby hears when he or she is born should be that of the mother or father so he or she is united with them, which sounds like a lovely tradition.

Hank Phillippi Ryan, author of Mother Daughter Sister Stranger

The sole survivors of the fiery plane crash that killed their parents, Eliza Ramsey and her sister, Bea, share an unbreakable bond. But now, on the 11th anniversary of the tragedy, Bea fails to retrieve her preteen daughter from a sleepover at Eliza’s. Eliza knows her sister would never leave her precious Piper behind, and she fears the worst. But did Bea plan her own disappearance? The Ramseys’ lives have already crashed and burned once. Now, Eliza discovers she's the only one who can protect her niece from the horrifying legacy of her family’s sinister history. Together, the two must prevent their lives from going up in flames once again.

Amanda Peters, author of The Birthing Tree

Born under the shadow of a birthing tree sacred to generations of Mi’kmaq women, Aliet Paul grows up outside a small Nova Scotia town with her fierce, loving grandmother, Kiju. Her mother died bringing her into the world under that very tree. Her father remains a mystery no one will name. As Aliet comes of age, she navigates love, loss and a personal tragedy that veers her from the path her grandmother wanted for her. She becomes a nurse trained in modern medicine, yet she carries Kiju’s teachings close. Years later, when the call comes that Kiju has died, Aliet returns home to a crumbling house. As she digs to uncover who her family really is, each revelation pulls her deeper into a web of long-guarded silences, dangerous loyalties and generational wounds that refuse to stay buried.

Chloe Benjamin, author of Under Story

At the edge of the world, biologist Laurel Salter is hiding from everything she’s ever known. For 10 hours a day, six days per week, she works as a dishwasher at McMurdo Station, an isolated research base in Antarctica. She tells no one that before she arrived, she was a renowned young scientist with a promising career and a family. But even in this remote outpost, Laurel can’t escape her past. When a strange light appears across the ice --- and draws a group of physicists to McMurdo --- her former husband, Eli, won't be far behind. Laurel is captivated by the Arc: its surreal glow; the way it seems almost alive. And though Eli is reluctant to test her wildest theory, Laurel is convinced that the Arc leads down a rabbit hole and into a world they can barely imagine.

Ariel Lawhon, author of The Pirate Queen

As the only daughter of a powerful chieftain, Grace O’Malley’s role is to secure a strong alliance and bear children. But when she’s sent to foster with a nearby clan, she falls for a clever and open-minded second son --- a man she cannot have. Married off against her will to a brutal warrior, Grace performs her duty, all the while gathering followers loyal to her, and consolidating her husband’s power, only to be ousted from his lands. But this betrayal offers Grace the opportunity to return to sea, finally leading clan O’Malley’s mighty fleet. Just as Grace finds true independence, Queen Elizabeth’s incursions into Ireland grow bolder. She must fight to defend her land, her ships, and the people she loves most against the cruel and power-hungry English deputies.

Alice Hoffman, author of The Witches of Cambridge

By the 1950s, Cambridge, Massachusetts feels far removed from the legendary witch trials that marked its early days as a colony. Ava, a bright young woman from a small town in Maine, arrives for her first year at Radcliffe College. There, she meets Lauren, and both are recruited by the Lilith Society, a secret organization of witches at Radcliffe dating back to colonial times. They form a close bond that is put to the test as they learn to navigate their new power, friendship and love. While Radcliffe seems like a safe haven, the shadow of McCarthyism looms large. And as girls from the Lilith Society begin to go missing, Ava and Lauren realize that the witch trials of the past may not be as deeply buried as they once believed.

Liane Moriarty, author of Big Little Truths

The last time we saw the women of BIG LITTLE LIES, their children were five years old. Now they’re teenagers. When the high school principal receives a threatening package in the mail, word quickly spreads throughout the community. But Madeline, Celeste, Jane, Renata and Bonnie have other things to worry about. Celeste’s mother-in-law is behaving oddly. Madeline is facing perhaps the biggest challenge of her life. Jane is at a dangerous fork in her marriage. Bonnie has realized there’s only so much solace in yoga. And Renata is living her best life --- revenge is sweet. When a stranger begins lurking around the school asking supposedly innocent questions, this tightly connected group of women finally must face the full repercussions of the big little truths they have and haven’t shared with their kids.

Editorial Content for The Amateur

Teaser

When a young woman, a golf prodigy, kills a caddie with a stray ball at the country club, the investigation of this freak accident reveals a dark and shocking tale of secret affairs, predatory men and a teenager on trial.

Promo

When a young woman, a golf prodigy, kills a caddie with a stray ball at the country club, the investigation of this freak accident reveals a dark and shocking tale of secret affairs, predatory men and a teenager on trial.

About the Book

From the #1 New York Times bestselling author of MIDWIVES and THE FLIGHT ATTENDANT: When a young woman, a golf prodigy, kills a caddie with a stray ball at the country club, the investigation of this freak accident reveals a dark and shocking tale of secret affairs, predatory men and a teenager on trial.

1978: It is the first Thursday in August, and temperatures are flirting with 90 when 18-year-old Mira Winston drives a golf ball from her tee toward the practice net near the clubhouse and caddy shack. The golf ball, weighing 1.6 ounces, tears through the net, traveling 150 miles per hour and slams, with sickening force, into the temple of a high school junior named Kenny Foster, rupturing an artery and unleashing a torrent of blood. Kenny brings his hand to the side of his head, then topples onto his side. He’s dead before the ambulance even arrives.

In the wake of this terrible accident --- and everyone, at first, agrees it was an accident --- Mira looks for comfort in all the wrong places: In her lover, Theo Catton, a married man three decades her senior. In her mother, a well-kept woman with secrets of her own. In the dead caddie’s little sisters, girls bewildered by grief. But when the investigators look more closely at the torn net, when a detective recalls Mira’s history of recklessness, and when Kenny’s father spies Mira with her married lover, the affluent and mannered community turns on this once-promising young woman.

A gripping story that takes the reader from the sun-soaked greens of a tony Westchester country club to the fluorescent-lit stand of a county courtroom, THE AMATEUR asks: What happens when one small moment --- a swing, a ball, a piece of string --- changes the course of an entire life?

Editorial Content for Etna

Book

Teaser

Beloved author Paul Yoon, winner of The Story Prize, is back with the unforgettable story of a working dog, Etna, who, after a devastating war, embarks on an odyssey in the hopes of returning home.

Promo

Beloved author Paul Yoon, winner of The Story Prize, is back with the unforgettable story of a working dog, Etna, who, after a devastating war, embarks on an odyssey in the hopes of returning home.

About the Book

Beloved author Paul Yoon, winner of The Story Prize, is back with the unforgettable story of a working dog, Etna, who, after a devastating war, embarks on an odyssey in the hopes of returning home.

Set in a fictional country in the present day, this is a story told through the eyes of an ex-military dog, Etna. After surviving years of a devastating war, Etna decides one night to leave the men he has fought alongside for years and return home --- to the place where he was taken from when he was young, in the thin but persistent hope that if a home exists for him, it might be there.

Thus begins an exhilarating odyssey told through the eyes of a dog as he traverses across ruined landscapes and fights to survive in a world that, even in peacetime, proves to be just as precarious. Along the way, he encounters other animals and humans who are attempting to figure out how to start again. What makes a life when there is no home to go back to? How do we begin to trust each other again after such profound loss?

This is a novel about the power of an idea, about never giving up, and ultimately a novel about finding hope in the most dire of times.

Editorial Content for Majestic Hills

Teaser

A Black couple leaves their downtown Chicago condo for a new suburban subdivision, only to find themselves at the center of a maelstrom.

Promo

A Black couple leaves their downtown Chicago condo for a new suburban subdivision, only to find themselves at the center of a maelstrom.

About the Book

A Black couple leaves their downtown Chicago condo for a new suburban subdivision, only to find themselves at the center of a maelstrom, in this gripping page-turner from the award-winning author of THREE GIRLS FROM BRONZEVILLE.

Tired of the daily drama in his emergency room, Dr. Langdon Blaque is in search of a place where he can leave the world behind. He loves his job, and has no delusions about the suburbs being perfect, but he wants peace and quiet. His wife Josephine, a lawyer, grew up listening to her father’s stories about the Jim Crow South and sundown towns. She prefers the city. Still, she agrees to move with the caveat that they stay for a year and reassess.

The tight-knit, predominantly white group of neighbors in Majestic Hills initially welcomes them with open arms. But beneath the veneer of privileged harmony, tensions simmer. When a horrifying crime rocks the community, the illusion of safety is shattered, and Josephine and Langdon find themselves at the heart of a brewing storm that pits neighbor against neighbor, exposes deeply ingrained prejudices, and threatens to implode into violence.

As their experiment in suburban living ticks toward the one-year mark, the Blaques are pushed to a breaking point. Can they find a way to make a home in Majestic Hills? Or has the move put their future, their marriage and even their safety in jeopardy?