"For years, rumors of the "Marsh Girl" have haunted Barkley Cove, a quiet town on the North Carolina coast. She's barefoot and wild; unfit for polite society. So in late 1969, when handsome Chase Andrews is found dead, the locals immediately suspect Kya Clark. But Kya is not what they say. Abandoned at age ten, she has survived on her own in the marsh that she calls home. A born naturalist with just one day of school, she takes life lessons from the...

"Travis Parker has everything a man could want: a good job, loyal friends, even a waterfront home in small-town North Carolina. In full pursuit of the good life-- boating, swimming, and regular barbecues with his good-natured buddies-- he holds the vague conviction that a serious relationship with a woman would only cramp his style. That is, until Gabby Holland moves in next door. Despite his attempts to be neighborly, the appealing redhead seems...

"When a mysterious young woman named Katie appears in the small North Carolina town of Southport, her sudden arrival raises questions about her past. Beautiful yet self-effacing, Katie seems determined to avoid forming personal ties until a series of events draws her into two reluctant relationships: one with Alex, a widowed store owner with a kind heart and two young children; and another with her plainspoken single neighbor, Jo. Despite her reservations,...

Sparks (A Bend in the Road, etc.) logs more miles on the winding high road of romance with the story of two middle-aged people who meet by chance in the small North Carolina coastal town of Rodanthe. The impassioned but doomed romance seems to owe much to Robert James Waller's The Bridges of Madison County. Once again, a housewife who has focused on everyone but herself indulges in a brief, intense, secret affair with a stranger who changes her life...

Colin Hancock is giving his second chance his best shot. At twenty-eight, he's focused only on walking a straight line-getting his teaching degree, working out at the gym religiously, and avoiding all the places and people that proved so destructive in his earlier life. The last thing he's looking for is a serious relationship. But when Maria Sanchez crosses paths with him on a rainswept night in North Carolina, his plans are upended in a way that...

Ira Levinson is in trouble. Ninety-one years old and stranded and injured after a car crash, he struggles to retain consciousness until a blurry image materializes beside him: his beloved wife Ruth, who passed away nine years ago. Urging him to hang on, she forces him to remain alert by recounting the stories of their lifetime together. Ira knows that Ruth can't possibly be in the car with him, but he clings to her words and his memories, reliving...

"A by-the-book literary agent must decide if happily ever after is worth changing her whole life for in this insightful, delightful new novel from the #1 New York Times bestselling author of Beach Read and People We Meet on Vacation. Nora Stephens life is books - she's read them all - and she is not that type of heroine. Not the plucky one, not the laidback dream girl, and especially not the sweetheart. In fact, the only people Nora is a heroine for...

Father Timothy Kavanagh is married to more than his lovable and eccentric Episcopal parishioners. He's also married to Cynthia, his vivacious and talented neighbor. Suddenly, the routine existence of a sixtysomething bachelor is out the window. How will they keep his sofa-sized dog at a safe distance from her arrogant, albeit famous, cat? Can he learn to love the old-Italian-villa look his wife is bent on giving the rectory? These concerns pale, however,...

"From the #1 New York Times bestselling author, a novel about the power of family to harm--and to heal. Within the walls of a tasteful, perfectly kept house in North Carolina's Blue Ridge Mountains, young Zane Bigelow feels like a prisoner of war. Strangers--and even Zane's own aunt across the lake--see his parents as a successful surgeon and his stylish wife, making appearances at their children's ballet recitals and baseball games. Zane and his...

The tale that unfolds is an unforgettable story of love on many levels--first love, love between parents and children -- that demonstrates, as only a Nicholas Sparks novel can, the many ways that love can break our hearts...and heal them. Seventeen year old Veronica "Ronnie" Miller's life was turned upside-down when her parents divorced and her father, a former concert pianist and teacher, moved from New York City to Wilmington, North Carolina. Three...