Seventeen-year-old Greg has managed to become part of every social group at his Pittsburgh high school without having any friends, but his life changes when his mother forces him to befriend Rachel, a girl he once knew in Hebrew school who has leukemia.

For the people of Bakerton, and the five children of the Novak family, the years after World War II alter their lives in unforeseen and irrevocable ways. Dorothy is a fragile beauty hooked on romance. Brilliant Joyce, the family's keystone, is bitter

"When Lorenzo adopts a runt piglet destined for auction, an unexpected, life-changing friendship forms"--

One sultry summer, Maureen Haddaway arrives in the wealthy town of Opal Beach to start her life anew -- to achieve her destiny. There, she finds herself lured by the promise of friendship, love, starry skies, and wild parties. But Maureen's new life just might be too good to be true, and before the summer is up, she vanishes. Decades later, when Allison Simpson is offered the opportunity to house-sit in Opal Beach during the off-season, it seems like...

When their hard-drinking, but loving, father dies in a car accident, teenage brothers Kyle and Klint Hayes face a bleak prospect: leaving their Pennsylvania hometown for Arizona and the mother who ran out on them. Then Candace Jack, a wealthy eccentric whose family once owned the county coal mines, decides for reasons even she doesn't understand to offer them a home--a stately mansion of a home full of artwork centered, oddly, on bullfighting. Under...

On a Mennonite farm at harvest time, every family member, including Elva, helps gather fruits and vegetables then pitches in to preserve the bounty, but much can happen between chores as Elva decides to teach herself to play her brother's guitar and Teacher plans a sleepover. Based on a true story.

"On a bitter December day in 1784, Silas Ballantyne arrives at the door of blacksmith Liege Lee in York County, Pennsylvania. Silas is determined to finish his apprenticeship quickly and move west. But because he is a fast worker and superb craftsman, Liege endeavors to keep him in Lancaster by appealing to an old tradition: the apprentice shall marry one of his master's beautiful daughters. In this sweeping family saga, one man's choices in love...