Books by Lauren K. Denton
Hurricane Season
by Nicole Melleby, Lauren K. Denton, Fernanda Melchor, Sonja Bentley Zant
A USA TODAY bestseller! Hurricane Season is the story of sisterhood, motherhood, and an unconventional journey to healing—and the relationships that must be mended along the way.
Betsy and Ty Franklin, owners of Franklin Dairy Farm in southern Alabama, have long since buried their desire for children of their own. While Ty manages their herd of dairy cows, Betsy busies herself with the farm’s day-to-day operations and tries to forget her dream of motherhood.
But when her free-spirited sister, Jenna, drops off her two young daughters for “just two weeks,” Betsy’s carefully constructed wall of self-protection begins to crumble. As the two weeks stretch deeper into the Alabama summer, Betsy and Ty learn to navigate the new additions in their world—and revel in the laughter that now fills their home. Meanwhile, record temperatures promise to usher in the most active hurricane season in decades.
Attending an art retreat four hundred miles away, Jenna is fighting her own battles. She finally has time and energy to focus on her photography, a lifelong ambition. But she wonders how her rediscovered passion can fit in with the life she’s made back home as a single mom. But when Hurricane Ingrid aims a steady eye at the Alabama coast, Jenna must make a decision that will change her family’s future, even as Betsy and Ty try to protect their beloved farm . . . and their hearts.
Praise for Hurricane Season:
“A poignant and heartfelt tale of sisterhood, motherhood, and marriage, Hurricane Season deftly examines the role that coming to terms with the past plays in creating a hopeful future. Readers will devour this story of the hurricanes—both literal and figurative—that shape our lives.” —Kristy Woodson Harvey, national bestselling author of Slightly South of Simple Full-length contemporary Southern fiction Stand-alone novel Includes discussion questions for book clubs
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Hurricane Season
by Nicole Melleby, Lauren K. Denton, Fernanda Melchor, Sonja Bentley Zant
The English-language debut of one of the most thrilling and accomplished young Mexican writers
Winner of the Queen Sofía Spanish Institute's Tanslation Prize
Longlisted for the National Book Award
Shortlisted for the Booker Prize
Winner of the Internationaler Literaturpreis
New York Public Library Best Books of 2020
Chicago Public Library Best Book of 2020
The Witch is dead. And the discovery of her corpse has the whole village investigating the murder. As the novel unfolds in a dazzling linguistic torrent, with each unreliable narrator lingering on new details, new acts of depravity or brutality, Melchor extracts some tiny shred of humanity from these characters―inners whom most people would write off as irredeemable―forming a lasting portrait of a damned Mexican village.
Like Roberto Bolano’s 2666 or Faulkner’s novels, Hurricane Season takes place in a world saturated with mythology and violence―real violence, the kind that seeps into the soil, poisoning everything around: it’s a world that becomes more and more terrifying the deeper you explore it.
Copies
No copies available.
Hurricane Season
by Nicole Melleby, Lauren K. Denton, Fernanda Melchor, Sonja Bentley Zant
The English-language debut of one of the most thrilling and accomplished young Mexican writers
Longlisted for the National Book Award
Shortlisted for the Booker Prize
Winner of the Internationaler Literaturpreis
New York Public Library Best Books of 2020
Chicago Public Library Best Book of 2020 The Witch is dead. And the discovery of her corpse―by a group of children playing near the irrigation canals―propels the whole village into an investigation of how and why this murder occurred. Rumors and suspicions spread. As the novel unfolds in a dazzling linguistic torrent, with each unreliable narrator lingering on new details, new acts of depravity or brutality, Melchor extracts some tiny shred of humanity from these characters that most would write off as utterly irredeemable, forming a lasting portrait of a damned Mexican village.
Like Roberto Bolano’s 2666 or Faulkner’s greatest novels, Hurricane Season takes place in a world filled with mythology and violence―real violence, the kind that seeps into the soil, poisoning everything around: it’s a world that becomes more terrifying and more terrifyingly real the deeper you explore it.
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Hurricane Season
by Nicole Melleby, Lauren K. Denton, Fernanda Melchor, Sonja Bentley Zant
Eloise Butts is still "waiting" at age 33. Living in Miami's South Beach, where being a virgin is highly unusual, Eloise finds herself strangely aware of her unique situation. But when she gets a chance to move to Italy for three months, she opens herself up to the complete possibilities of love for the very first time. When a dashing Italian man named Marco Maselli sweeps her off her feet, Eloise struggles to discover the difference between lust and love while remaining true to her self in the process. In the end, when what she thought was love blows in, blows up and blows out of her life, all that remains is who she is as a person. It's the story of holding on to a deeper sense of self-no matter how counter-culture or strange that may seem.
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Hurricane Season
by Nicole Melleby, Lauren K. Denton, Fernanda Melchor, Sonja Bentley Zant
“Fig Arnold is an original and irresistible heroine in a story full of hope, art, and love.” —R. J. Palacio, author of Wonder
"A thoughtful portrayal of mental illness with queer content that avoids coming-out clichés.” —Kirkus Reviews
For Fig’s dad, hurricane season brings the music.
For Fig, hurricane season brings the possibility of disaster.
Fig, a sixth grader, loves her dad and the home they share in a beachside town. She does not love the long months of hurricane season. Her father, a once-renowned piano player, sometimes goes looking for the music in the middle of a storm. Hurricane months bring unpredictable good and bad days. More than anything, Fig wants to see the world through her father’s eyes, so she takes an art class to experience life as an artist does. Then Fig’s dad shows up at school, confused and looking for her. Not only does the class not bring Fig closer to understanding him, it brings social services to their door.
As the walls start to fall around her, Fig is sure it’s up to her alone to solve her father’s problems and protect her family’s privacy. But with the help of her best friend, a cute girl at the library, and a surprisingly kind new neighbor, Fig learns she isn’t as alone as she once thought . . . and begins to compose her own definition of family.
Nicole Melleby’s Hurricane Season is a radiant and tender novel about taking risks and facing danger, about friendship and art, and about growing up and coming out. And more than anything else, it is a story about love—both its limits and its incredible healing power.
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The Hideaway
When her grandmother’s will wrenches Sara back to her small hometown of Sweet Bay, Alabama, she must face family secrets and difficult choices. In the South, family is always more complicated than it seems.
After her last remaining family member dies, Sara Jenkins goes home to The Hideaway, her grandmother Mags’s ramshackle B&B in Sweet Bay. She intends to quickly tie up loose ends then return to her busy life and thriving antique shop in New Orleans. Instead, she learns Mags has willed The Hideaway to her and charged her with renovating it—no small task considering her grandmother’s best friends, a motley crew of senior citizens, still live there.
Rather than hurrying back to New Orleans, Sara stays in Sweet Bay and begins the biggest house-rehabbing project of her career. Amid drywall dust, old memories, and a charming contractor, she discovers that slipping back into life at The Hideaway is easier than she expected.
Then she discovers a box Mags left in the attic with clues to a life Sara never imagined for her grandmother. With help from Mags’s friends, Sara begins to piece together the mysterious life of bravery, passion, and choices that changed her grandmother’s destiny in both marvelous and devastating ways.
When an opportunistic land developer threatens to seize The Hideaway, Sara is forced to make a choice—stay in Sweet Bay and fight for the house and the people she’s grown to love or leave again and return to her successful but solitary life in New Orleans
Praise for The Hideaway:
“A story both powerful and enchanting: a don’t-miss novel in the greatest southern traditions of storytelling.”—Patti Callahan Henry, New York Times bestselling author
“Two endearing heroines and their poignant storylines of love lost and found make this the perfect book for an afternoon on the back porch with a glass of sweet tea.”—Karen White, New York Times bestselling author USA TODAY and Amazon Charts bestseller Full-length Southern Women’s Fiction Includes Discussion Questions for Book Clubs
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A Place to Land
Two sisters run an art shop in a quiet town—until a boat rises in the local river and their past threatens to ruin everything they’ve built.
Violet Figg and her sister Trudy have lived a quiet life in Sugar Bend, Alabama, since a night forty years ago that stole Trudy’s voice and cemented Violet’s role as her sister’s fierce and loyal protector. Now Trudy spends her days making sculptures from found objects and speaking through notes written on scraps of paper, while Violet runs their art shop, monitors bird activity up and down the water, and tries not to think of the one great love she gave up to keep her sister safe.
Eighteen-year-old Maya knows where everyone else belongs, but she’s been searching for her own place since her grandmother died seven years ago. Moving in and out of strangers’ houses has left her exhausted. After seeing a flyer on a gas station window for a place called Sugar Bend, Maya chooses to follow the strange pull she feels and finds herself on the doorstep of an art shop called Two Sisters.
When a boat rises to the surface of Little River in the middle of the night, the present and no-longer-buried past collide, and the future becomes uncertain for Maya, Violet, and Trudy. As history creeps continuously closer to the present and old secrets come to light, the sisters must decide to face the truth of what happened that night forty years ago, or risk losing each other and those they’ve come to love.
USA TODAY bestselling author Lauren K. Denton delivers another distinctly Southern story that shimmers with beauty and possibility.
“Denton is a masterful storyteller who makes magic on every perfect page.” —Kristy Woodson Harvey, New York Times bestselling author of The Wedding Veil Full-length Southern women’s fiction Stand-alone novel Includes discussion questions for book clubs
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$17.99
A Place to Land
"A delightful Southern story extolling the deep bond of sisters, Lauren Denton’s?A Place to?Land?has a heartwarming tone as it unravels a 40-year-old mystery coming back to haunt a cast of small-town characters whose lives are entwined in Sugar Bend, Alabama." --New York Journal of Books.
Violet Figg and her sister Trudy have lived a quiet life in Sugar Bend, Alabama, since a night forty years ago that stole Trudy's voice and cemented Violet's role as her sister's fierce and loyal protector. Now Trudy spends her days making sculptures from found objects and speaking through notes written on scraps of paper, while Violet runs their art shop, monitors bird activity up and down the water, and tries not to think of the one great love she gave up to keep her sister safe.
Eighteen-year-old Maya knows where everyone else belongs, but she's been searching for her own place since her grandmother died seven years ago. Moving in and out of strangers' houses has left her exhausted. After seeing a flyer on a gas station window for a place called Sugar Bend, Maya chooses to follow the strange pull she feels and finds herself on the doorstep of an art shop called Two Sisters.
When a boat rises to the surface of Little River in the middle of the night, the present and no-longer-buried past collide, and the future becomes uncertain for Maya, Violet, and Trudy. As history creeps continuously closer to the present and old secrets come to light, the sisters must decide to face the truth of what happened that night forty years ago, or risk losing each other and those they've come to love.
"A touching tribute to sisterhood, first loves, and promises kept." --Susan Meissner, USA TODAY bestselling author of The Nature of Fragile Things
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The Summer House
It's never too late to start over. The Summer House weaves Lauren K. Denton’s inviting Southern charm around a woman’s journey to find herself in a small beach town—with a little help from the local retirement community.
Lily Bishop wakes up one morning to find a good-bye note and divorce papers from her husband on the kitchen counter. Having just moved to Alabama for his job only weeks before, Lily is devastated. New to town and knowing no one, Lily finds herself in desperate need of a job and a new place to live. When Lily hears that a hair stylist is needed at small retirement community, she decides to apply.
Rose Carrigan built the small retirement village of Safe Harbor years ago—just before her husband ran off with his assistant. Now she runs a tight ship, making sure the residents follow her strict rules. Rose keeps everyone at arm’s length, including her own family. But when Lily shows up asking for a job and a place to live, Rose’s cold exterior begins to thaw.
Lily and Rose form an unlikely friendship, and Lily’s salon soon becomes the place where the colorful residents share town gossip and a few secrets. Lily soon finds herself drawn to Rose’s nephew, Rawlins—a single dad and shrimper who’s had some practice at starting over—and one of the residents may be carrying a torch for Rose as well.
Neither Lily nor Rose is where she expected to be, but the summer makes them both wonder if there’s more to life and love than what they’ve experienced so far.
The Summer House is a: Cozy novel full of charm and heart that’s perfect vacation reading Celebration of new beginnings, friendship, and family Sweet, clean romance set on the Gulf Coast
“The perfect summer read! Situated on the Alabama Gulf Coast, you’ll feel the sun, taste the salt, and linger with new friends—you won’t want to leave. And with lyrical prose and rich characters, The Summer House is a beautifully poignant reminder that we are never too young to find a good place to stand nor too old to start over.”—Katherine Reay, bestselling author of The Printed Letter Bookshop and Dear Mr. Knightley
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