The Secret Woman

"One of the best romantic-suspense novelists."—Associated Press The ship and her captain were supposed to be her salvation, but they both may end up leaving her in deep water Anna Brett fears she's doomed to be a governess to an English family for the rest of her life. But when the dashing captain Redvers Stretton struts back into her life, she is whisked away from the bleak English countryside forever. But is that such a good thing? While the charming blue-eyed captain makes Anna forget her troubled past, he is hiding dark secrets of his own. It's no coincidence that Stretton's ship is named The Secret Woman. During their voyage to the South Seas, with a murder dogging her steps and the mystery of a missing treasure haunting her dreams, Anna is forced to confront the clever captain—a man who may have just as many secrets as she.

TOP SUMMER 2020 BEACH READ PICK--theSKIMM, PopSugar, Time, Woman's World, Parade, and Bookstr The author of Dancing on the Edge of the Roof, now a Netflix film starring Alfre Woodard, returns with a riveting, emotionally rich, novel that explores the complex relationship between mothers and daughters in a fresh, vibrant way—a stunning page-turner for fans of Terry McMillan, Tayari Jones, and Kimberla Lawson Roby. Elise Armstrong, Carmen Bradshaw, and DeeDee Davis meet in a yoga class. Though vastly different, these women discover they all have one thing in common: their mothers have recently passed away. Becoming fast friends, the trio make a pact to help each other sort through the belongings their mothers’ left behind. But when they find old letters and diaries, Elise, Carmen, and DeeDee are astonished to learn that each of their mothers hid secrets—secrets that will transform their own lives. Meeting each month over margaritas, the trio share laughter, advice, and support. As they help each other overcome challenges and celebrate successes, Elise, Carmen, and DeeDee gain not only a better understanding of the women their mothers were, but of themselves. They also come to realize they have what their mothers needed most but did not have during difficult times—other women they could trust. Filled with poignant life lessons, The Secret Women pays tribute to the power of friendship and family and the bonds that tie us together. Beautiful, full of spirit and heart, it is a thoughtful and ultimately uplifting story of unconditional love.

Women's bodies and the study of anatomy in Italy between the late thirteenth and the mid-sixteenth centuries.

Within the origin of one of the world’s most iconic superheroes hides a fascinating family story—and a crucial history of feminism in the twentieth-century. “Everything you might want in a page-turner … skeletons in the closet, a believe-it-or-not weirdness in its biographical details, and something else that secretly powers even the most “serious” feminist history—fun.” —Entertainment Weekly The Secret History of Wonder Woman is a tour de force of intellectual and cultural history. Wonder Woman, Jill Lepore argues, is the missing link in the history of the struggle for women’s rights—a chain of events that begins with the women’s suffrage campaigns of the early 1900s and ends with the troubled place of feminism a century later. Lepore, a Harvard historian and New Yorker staff writer, has uncovered an astonishing trove of documents, including the never-before-seen private papers of Wonder Woman’s creator, William Moulton Marston. The Marston family story is a tale of drama, intrigue, and irony. In the 1920s, Marston and his wife brought into their home Olive Byrne, the niece of Margaret Sanger, one of the most influential feminists of the twentieth century. Even while celebrating conventional family life in a regular column that Marston and Byrne wrote for Family Circle, they themselves pursued lives of extraordinary nonconformity. Marston, internationally known as an expert on truth—he invented the lie detector test—lived a life of secrets, only to spill them on the pages of Wonder Woman. Includes a new afterword with fresh revelations based on never before seen letters and photographs from the Marston family’s papers, and 161 illustrations and 16 pages in full color.

Louise Terry is the quintessential, modern American woman; a successful and independent artist, sexually liberated and head strong, she’s determined to carve out a life for herself where her painting comes first and where she can avoid messy romantic entanglements. But when her estranged mother, Margaret, dies, leaving a box of documents, photos, and journals, Louise discovers in its contents a new and very different woman from the one who raised her. This Margaret was admired by Catholic priests and Wiccan priestesses alike for her spiritual gifts and was working, at the time of her death, on assembling her visions of a 12th-century cross-dressing woman mystic who not only managed to infiltrate the male bastion of Glastonbury Abbey, but who instigated the tragic fire that burned it to the ground in 1184. Determined to pursue the fragments her mother left behind, Louise travels to England where she meets a cast of characters whom she must depend on to find her way. Blurring the boundaries between past and present, between the body and the spirit, between female and male, this page-turning mystery is a sexy romp through time and space, a profound meditation on the mother-daughter connection, and an enlightening exploration of what it means to make love, to make art, and to make a life worth living.

Perfect for fans of Agatha Christie's mysteries, as well as Clare Mackintosh and Paula Hawkins, the ninth psychological thriller from Sophie Hannah is a literary mystery and a puzzle that's impossible to solve . . . 'Fiendishly clever' Sunday Express 'Exceptional' Elle Knowing the secret will kill you. All she wanted to do was take her son's forgotten sports kit to school. So why does Nicki Clements drive past the home of controversial newspaper columnist Damon Blundy eight times in one day? Blundy has been murdered, and the words 'HE IS NO LESS DEAD' daubed on his wall - in red paint, not blood. And, though Blundy was killed with a knife, he was not stabbed. Why? Nicki, called in for questioning, doesn't have any of the answers police are looking for. Nor can she tell them the truth, because although she is not guilty of murder, she is far from innocent. And the words on the wall are disturbingly familiar to her, if only she could remember where she has heard them before . . .

Learn to take ownership of your success, overcome self-doubt, and banish the thought patterns that undermine your ability to feel—and act—as bright and capable as others already know you are with this award-winning book by Valerie Young. It’s only because they like me. I was in the right place at the right time. I just work harder than the others. I don’t deserve this. It’s just a matter of time before I am found out. Someone must have made a terrible mistake. If you are a working woman, chances are this inter­nal monologue sounds all too familiar. And you’re not alone. From the high-achieving Ph.D. candidate convinced she’s only been admitted to the program because of a clerical error to the senior executive who worries others will find out she’s in way over her head, a shocking number of accomplished women in all ca­reer paths and at every level feel as though they are faking it—impostors in their own lives and careers. While the impostor syndrome is not unique to women, women are more apt to agonize over tiny mistakes, see even constructive criticism as evi­dence of their shortcomings, and chalk up their accomplishments to luck rather than skill. They often unconsciously overcompensate with crippling perfec­tionism, overpreparation, maintaining a lower pro­file, withholding their talents and opinions, or never finishing important projects. When they do succeed, they think, Phew, I fooled ’em again. An internationally known speaker, Valerie Young has devoted her career to understanding women’s most deeply held beliefs about themselves and their success. In her decades of in-the-trenches research, she has uncovered the often surprising reasons why so many accomplished women experience this crushing self-doubt. In The Secret Thoughts of Successful Women, Young gives these women the solution they have been seek­ing. Combining insightful analysis with effective ad­vice and anecdotes, she explains what the impostor syndrome is, why fraud fears are more common in women, and how you can recognize the way it mani­fests in your life.

'A cleverly crafted novel and an enthralling story... A triumph.' DINAH JEFFERIES A Russian grand duchess and an English journalist. Linked by one of the world's greatest mysteries . . .