After her daughter contracts a fatal disease, Charlotte O'Keefe must confront some serious questions that ultimately lead to one final epiphany: what constitutes a valuable life.

"An evocative family drama and a riveting mystery about the ferocious pull of motherhood for two very different women in New York City"-- Provided by publisher. Jasmine Yang arrives in New York City from her rural Chinese village without money or family support, fleeing a controlling husband, on a desperate search for the daughter who was taken from her at birth -- another female casualty of China's controversial One Child Policy. But with her husband...

In 1949 four Chinese women, recent immigrants to San Francisco, gather to play mah jong, remember the past, and gossip into the night. United in unspeakable loss and new hope, they call themselves the Joy Luck Club. With wit and sensitivity, Amy Tan examines the sometimes painful, often tender, memories that reveal these women's strength, worries, and determination, which their American-born daughters reject as irrelevant. The daughters, in turn,...

"Alison has never been a fan of Christmas. But with it right around the corner and her husband busily decorating their cozy Vermont home, she has no choice but to face it. Then she gets the call. Mavis, Alison's estranged mother, has been diagnosed with cancer and has only weeks to live. She wants to spend her remaining days with her daughter, son-in-law, and two granddaughters. But Alison grew up with her mother's alcoholism and violent abuse and...

Elv, Claire, and Meg are the Story Sisters, and each has a fate she must meet alone. One on a country road, one in the streets of Paris, and one in the corridors of her own imagination. At once a coming-of-age tale, a family saga, and a love story of erotic longing.

"A funny, touching, unforgettable story of an invisible everywoman pushed to the brink -- who finally pushes back. Grace Adams gave birth, blinked, and now suddenly she is forty-five, perimenopausal and stalled -- the unhappiest age you can be, according to the Guardian. And today she's really losing it. Stuck in traffic, she finally has had enough. To the astonishment of everyone, Grace gets out of her car and simply walks away. Grace sets off across...

"Helen Grant, known to her acquaintances as Hen, is a mystery to her daughter. An extrovert with few friends who has sought intimacy in the wrong places; a twice-divorced mother of two now living alone surrounded by her memories, Helen has always haunted Bridget. Now Bridget sees Helen once a year, and considers the problem to be contained. As she looks back on their tumultuous relationship -- the performances and small deceptions -- she tries to...

When all of their special Saturday plans go awry, Ava and her mother still find a way to appreciate one another and their time together.

"Our rage-filled hero Alby is flailing wildly against the world around him -- he punches his sister (she deserved it), 'unprotectos' broads (they deserved it and liked it), gets drunk and picks fights (all deserved), defends defenseless creatures both large and small, and spews insults at children, slow drivers, lunch ladies, and every single surviving member of his family. It seems he is the angriest young man in the history of angry young men, and...