Linda O'Neal recounts the events surrounding the 2002 disappearance of her step-granddaughter and her best friend, and shares what her private investigation has revealed about the case.
In 1979, the Chinese government famously introduced The Single Child Policy to control population growth. Nearly 40 years later, the result is an estimated 20 million "missing girls" in the population from 1980-2010. In Lost and Found, John James Kennedy and Yaojiang Shi focus on village-level implementation of the one-child policy and the level of mutual-noncompliance between officials and rural families. Through in-depth interviews with rural parents and local leaders, they reveal that many had strong incentives not to comply with the birth control policy because larger families meant increased labor and income. In this sober exploration of China's Single Child Policy throughout the reform period, the authors more broadly show how governance by grassroots cadres with greater local autonomy has affected China in the past and the challenges for resolving center-versus-locality contradictions in governance that lie ahead.
He could be any man, any respectable, ordinary man. But he's not. This man watches the five Herbert girls—Beauty, Mim, Stevie, Fancy, and Autumn—with disturbing fascination. Unaware of his scrutiny and his increasingly agitated and forbidden thoughts about them, the sisters go on with their ordinary everyday lives—planning, arguing, laughing, and crying—as if nothing bad could ever breach the safety of their family. In alternating points of view, Norma Fox Mazer manages to interweave the lives of predator and prey in this unforgettable psychological thriller.
One of The New York Times 10 Best Books of the Year National Book Award Finalist Finalist for the National Book Critics Circle John Leonard Prize Finalist for the Center for Fiction First Novel Prize Finalist for the New York Public Library's Young Lions Fiction Award National Best Seller "Splendidly imagined . . . Thrilling" --Simon Winchester "A genuine masterpiece" --Gary Shteyngart Spellbinding, moving--evoking a fascinating region on the other side of the world--this suspenseful and haunting story announces the debut of a profoundly gifted writer. One August afternoon, on the shoreline of the Kamchatka peninsula at the northeastern edge of Russia, two girls--sisters, eight and eleven--go missing. In the ensuing weeks, then months, the police investigation turns up nothing. Echoes of the disappearance reverberate across a tightly woven community, with the fear and loss felt most deeply among its women. Taking us through a year in Kamchatka, Disappearing Earth enters with astonishing emotional acuity the worlds of a cast of richly drawn characters, all connected by the crime: a witness, a neighbor, a detective, a mother. We are transported to vistas of rugged beauty--densely wooded forests, open expanses of tundra, soaring volcanoes, and the glassy seas that border Japan and Alaska--and into a region as complex as it is alluring, where social and ethnic tensions have long simmered, and where outsiders are often the first to be accused. In a story as propulsive as it is emotionally engaging, and through a young writer's virtuosic feat of empathy and imagination, this powerful novel brings us to a new understanding of the intricate bonds of family and community, in a Russia unlike any we have seen before.
An “extremely intelligent, witty, nerdy, and oh-my-god over-the-top sexy” debut novel—first in a New Adult romance series (Fresh Fiction). Data, research, scientific formulae—Annabelle Coffey is completely at ease with all of them. Men, not so much. But that’s all going to change after she asks Dr. Charles Douglas, the postdoctoral fellow in her lab, to have sex with her. Charles is not only beautiful, he is also adorably awkward, British, brilliant, and nice. What are the odds he’d turn her down? Very high, as it happens. Something to do with that whole student/teacher/ethics thing. But in a few weeks, Annie will graduate. As soon as she does, the unlikely friendship that’s developing between them can turn physical—just until Annie leaves for graduate school. Yet nothing could have prepared either Annie or Charles for chemistry like this, or for what happens when a simple exercise in mutual pleasure turns into something as exhilarating and infernally complicated as love. “The smart characters and Annie’s earnestness as a heroine are so refreshing.” —Smart Bitches, Trashy Books
New York Times bestselling author Megan Miranda's masterful storytelling brings readers along for a ride to the edge of sanity and back again. Mallory killed her boyfriend, Brian. She can't remember the details of that night but everyone knows it was self-defense, so she isn't charged. But Mallory still feels Brian's presence in her life. Is it all in her head? Or is it something more? In desperate need of a fresh start, Mallory is sent to Monroe, a fancy prep school where no one knows her . . . or anything about her past. But the feeling follows her, as do her secrets. Then, one of her new classmates turns up dead. As suspicion falls on Mallory, she must find a way to remember the details of both deadly nights so she can prove her innocence-to herself and others.
From the New York Times bestselling author of All the Missing Girls and The Perfect Stranger comes a captivating thriller about two teens connected by family tragedies and a mysterious otherworldly radio frequency signal. Six months ago, Kennedy Jones suffered a horrible family tragedy, and since then she's lived with her uncle, sneaking out only occasionally to visit her childhood home. Nearby, Nolan Chandler is determined to find out what really happened to his brother, who disappeared without a trace two years earlier. Then Kennedy and Nolan find themselves drawn together by strange signs--for Kennedy, it's a disturbing pattern on her brother's radio telescope; for Nolan, it's a mysterious frequency coming from his brother's bedroom. When they realize their brothers also share dark pasts, they begin to wonder whether something is coming for them. Or are the signals a warning that something's already here? "[Miranda's] latest book for young adults ages the kids from Stranger Things and puts them in Gillian Flynn's Dark Places for a smart, dark, and ultimately hopeful story of the power of belief."--Booklist, starred review