Such A Pretty Girl

Meredith was promised nine years of safety, but they only gave her three. Her father, who was sent to prison for sexually abusing Meredith and other children in the small town, has been released early on good behaviour. He was supposed to be locked up until Meredith's eighteenth birthday, when she would be free of her abusive father and her delusional mother, who dwells on a fantasy that the three of them will be a happy family once more. But Meredith is only fifteen, and her father is out of prison…and her mother is bringing him home. And Meredith won't let him hurt her, or anyone else, ever again. No matter what the cost. Lyrical, suspenseful, and emotionally shattering, SUCH A PRETTY GIRL is the compelling story of one young woman's painful fight for survival - and her journey back to herself.

The phenomenally successful creator of "Forrest Gump" turns to the suspenseful tale of a beautiful woman threatened by blackmail because of her sexual past.

A memoir by a disability rights activist Such a Pretty Girl is Nadina LaSpina's story—from her early years in her native Sicily, where still a baby she contracts polio, a fact that makes her the object of well-meaning pity and the target of messages of hopelessness; to her adolescence and youth in America, spent almost entirely in hospitals, where she is tortured in the quest for a cure and made to feel that her body no longer belongs to her; to her rebellion and her activism in the disability rights movement. LaSpina’s personal growth parallels the movement’s political development—from coming together, organizing, and fighting against exclusion from public and social life, to the forging of a common identity, the blossoming of disability arts and culture, and the embracing of disability pride. While unique, the author's journey is also one with which many disabled people can identify. It is the journey to find one's place in an ableist world—a world not made for disabled people, where disability is only seen in negative terms. La Spina refutes all stereotypical narratives of disability. Through the telling of her life’s story, without editorializing, she shows the harm that the overwhelming focus on pity and on a cure that remains elusive has done to disabled people. Her story exposes the disability prejudice ingrained in our sociopolitical system and denounces the oppressive standards of normalcy in a society that devalues those who are different and denies them basic rights. Written as continuous narrative and in a subtle and intimate voice, Such a Pretty Girl is a memoir as captivating as a novel. It is one of the few disability memoirs to focus on activism, and one of the first by an immigrant.

In a gripping romantic thriller from Tess Diamond, an FBI profiler becomes a killer’s deadly obsession… In Grace Sinclair’s bestselling crime novels, the good guys win and the bad guys always get caught. As the FBI’s top profiler, she knows that real life is rarely so straightforward. But her new case isn’t just brutal—it’s also personal. The victims look like Grace. And the FBI recruit assigned to her team is trouble of another kind. This isn’t how Special Agent Gavin Walker imagined running into Grace again. Two years ago they shared one earth-shattering night, then she vanished from his life. She’s brilliant, fiercely independent, and in mortal danger from a killer masterminding a twisted game … The body count is rising. Entangled in the case and in each other, Gavin and Grace are running out of time and chances. And as Grace puts the pieces together, she knows she’ll have to confront her own deepest secrets before the final, fatal move is played.

A Best Book of the Year: The Washington Post • Chicago Tribune • NPR • Vogue • Elle • Real Simple • InStyle • Good Housekeeping • Parade • Slate • Vox • Kirkus Reviews • Library Journal • BookPage Longlisted for the 2020 Booker Prize An Instant New York Times Bestseller A Reese's Book Club Pick "The most provocative page-turner of the year." --Entertainment Weekly "I urge you to read Such a Fun Age." --NPR A striking and surprising debut novel from an exhilarating new voice, Such a Fun Age is a page-turning and big-hearted story about race and privilege, set around a young black babysitter, her well-intentioned employer, and a surprising connection that threatens to undo them both. Alix Chamberlain is a woman who gets what she wants and has made a living, with her confidence-driven brand, showing other women how to do the same. So she is shocked when her babysitter, Emira Tucker, is confronted while watching the Chamberlains' toddler one night, walking the aisles of their local high-end supermarket. The store's security guard, seeing a young black woman out late with a white child, accuses Emira of kidnapping two-year-old Briar. A small crowd gathers, a bystander films everything, and Emira is furious and humiliated. Alix resolves to make things right. But Emira herself is aimless, broke, and wary of Alix's desire to help. At twenty-five, she is about to lose her health insurance and has no idea what to do with her life. When the video of Emira unearths someone from Alix's past, both women find themselves on a crash course that will upend everything they think they know about themselves, and each other. With empathy and piercing social commentary, Such a Fun Age explores the stickiness of transactional relationships, what it means to make someone "family," and the complicated reality of being a grown up. It is a searing debut for our times.

One of Goodreads Most Popular Horror of 2022 Named one of Esquire's Best Horror of the Year "Brutal and shocking." - emily m. danforth “Razor-sharp. This one will cut you.” - Christopher Golden In this biting and electrifying novel from bold horror talent Kristi DeMeester, there’s something out there that’s murdering young women—until an overwhelmed mother and her secretive daughter refuse to live without answers any longer. He’s known as The Cur, and he leaves no trace—except for the victims he most viciously slays every fifteen years. Young women who refuse to conform and don’t know when to shut up. 2019: Thirteen-year-old Lila Sawyer has secrets she can’t share with anyone. But when young women around her begin dying, wild speculation ensues. Soon Lila feels haunted from within, terrorized by a delicious evil that shows her how to find her voice—until she’s in danger for using it. 2004: Caroline Sawyer sees dogs everywhere that no one else seems to notice. As these snarling, teeth-bared delusions begin to take shape in the sculptures she makes in a trance-like state, her fiancé is convinced she needs help from a professional. But Caroline’s past is a dark cellar, filled with repressed memories and a lurking horror that others around her can’t understand. As past and present demons converge, Caroline and Lila must chase the source of the unrelenting, oppressive power to its core. Brilliantly paced and unapologetically fierce, Such a Pretty Smile will make you want to stand up and rage at everyone who ever told you to shut up and smile pretty. "Compulsive and horrifyingly entertaining." - Liz Nugent

A devastating novel of desperation and revenge from Laura Wiess. This follow-up to her heartbreaking debut, Such a Pretty Girl, once again spins a shattering tale of the tragedies that befall young women who are considered society’s leftovers. Blair and Ardith are best friends who have committed an unforgivable act in the name of love and justice. But in order to understand what could drive two young women to such extreme measures, first you'll have to understand why. You’ll have to listen as they describe parents who are alternately absent and smothering, classmates who mock and shun anyone different, and young men who are allowed to hurt and dominate without consequence. You will have to learn what it's like to be a teenage girl who locks her bedroom door at night, who has been written off by the adults around her as damaged goods. A girl who has no one to trust except the one person she's forbidden to see. You’ll have to understand what it's really like to be forgotten and abandoned in America today. Are you ready?

Seventeen-year-old Hanna has been in love with Seth for as long as she can remember, but now that her feelings are requited and she and Seth are in an actual relationship, it feels like love just isn't enough. Seth is controlling and all they seem to do anymore is hurt each other. If that's what love is, Hanna doesn't want any part of it. Besides, she has something else on her mind: graduation. But she's been ignoring the school's community service requirement for years, and now she needs to clock in some hours in a hurry. She volunteers as a caretaker for the Schoenmakers, an elderly couple who live on a farm behind Hanna's house. Mrs. Schoenmaker has advanced Parkinson's, and her husband can't always be there to watch over her. While caring for Mrs. Schoenmaker, Hanna gets drawn into an audiobook that the older woman is listening to, a love story of passion and sacrifice and shared hurts and complete devotion. She's fascinated by the idea that love like that can truly exist, and without her even realizing it, the story begins to change her. But what Hanna doesn't know is that the story she's listening to is not fiction -- and that Mrs. Schoenmaker and her husband's devotion to each other is about to reach its shattering, irrevocable conclusion...