A frank and funny yet emotionally resonant tale set within a vivid work day world, from the author of Emily, Alone and Henry, Himself—named a Best Book of the Year by The Washington Post, the San Francisco Chronicle, and Entertainment Weekly

A Finalist for the Los Angeles Times Book Prize
Perched in the far corner of a run-down New England mall, the Red Lobster hasn't been making...

Publisher Annotation: "That book. It was about two women, and they fell in love with each other." And then Lily asked the question that had taken root in her, that was even now unfurling its leaves and demanding to be shown the sun: "Have you ever heard of such a thing?" Seventeen-year-old Lily Hu can't remember exactly when the question took root, but the answer was in full bloom the moment she and Kathleen Miller walked under the flashing neon sign...

"Perhaps the best place in 1943 Hollywood to see the stars is the Hollywood Canteen, a club for servicemen staffed exclusively by those in show business. Murder mystery playwright Annie Laurence, new in town after a devastating breakup, definitely hopes to rub elbows with the right stars. Maybe then she can get her movie made. But Hollywood proves to be more than tinsel and glamour. When despised film critic Fiona Farris is found dead in the Canteen...

Youngstown, Ohio, 1977. Between the closing of the city's largest steel mill and the worst blizzard in more than 40 years, the table is set for remarkable change. Unemployed steel worker Bobby Wayland is trying hard to help his family and still pay for his wedding, but the only solution he can think of involves breaking the law. On the other side of town, a little girl named Hope is keeping a big secret, one she won't even share with her Great Uncle...

Paul Galambos is an ordinary professor of psychology, struggling to glean any degree of satisfaction or success from his family and his career - until one day he is recruited by a top-secret organization and given carte blanche to pursue experiments and studies as he sees fit, no longer confined to lab rats. This is the life that Paul was destined for, replete with money and respect, if only he can ignore the incessant pull of his conscience. Alternately...