First published in 1939, Steinbeck's Pulitzer Prize winning epic of the Great Depression chronicles the Dust Bowl migration of the 1930s and tells the story of one Oklahoma farm family, the Joads, driven from their homestead and forced to travel west to the promised land of California. Out of their trials and their repeated collisions against the hard realities of an America divided into haves and have nots evolves a drama that is intensely human...

"In 1945 Malaya, when her family is in terrible danger due to a choice she made 10 years earlier, Cecily Alcantara, who was lured into a life of espionage for the invading Japanese forces during World War II, finds her actions catching up with her and will do anything to save those she loves"-- Provided by publisher.

In 1923, fifteen-year-old Hattie Shepherd flees Georgia and settles in Philadelphia, hoping for a chance at a better life. Instead, she marries a man who will bring her nothing but disappointment and watches helplessly as her firstborn twins succumb to an illness a few pennies could have prevented. Hattie gives birth to nine more children whom she raises with grit and mettle and not an ounce of the tenderness they crave. She vows to prepare them for...

"On Memorial Day, 1958, as the people of Jewel, Minnesota gather to remember and honor the sacrifice of so many sons in the wars of the past, the half-clothed body of wealthy landowner Jimmy Quinn is found floating in the Alabaster River, dead from a shotgun blast. Investigation of the murder falls to Sheriff Brody Dern, a highly decorated war hero who still carries the physical and emotional scars from his military service. Even before Dern has the...

When tragedy strikes, forcing them down separate paths in 1967 Iowa, former nursing school roommates, against all odds, form a decades-long friendship that sees them through life's trials and tribulations until one snowy night leads their relationship to the ultimate crossroads.

Lottie Fairleigh, an aspiring Gothic novelist known as the Hertfordshire Hellion, finds herself in another scrape when she's discovered kissing Hayden St. Clair, the "Murderous Marquess," just before her coming-out ball. But for the first time, Lottie can't talk her way out of trouble, and she's swiftly married and packed off to Cornwall, where the ghost of the marquess's supposedly murdered first wife haunts the mansion. Faced with a bratty stepdaughter...

"Lady Elizabeth Neville-Ashford, has struggled against both her mother's expectations and the restrictions early 20th-century British society imposes upon women of "gentle breeding". Lilly longs to make a difference, to have a life of substance and meaning. Only one person other than her beloved brother Edward ever listened to what she really wanted-Robert Fraser, Edward's best friend. But that was many years ago when he was visiting and Lilly was...

"Thatcher Hutton, a war-weary soldier on the way back to his cowboy life, jumps from a moving freight train to avoid trouble . . . and lands in more than he bargained for"-- Provided by publisher.

"1950s Hollywood: Every actress wants to be Salome, the star-making role in a big-budget movie about the legendary woman whose story has inspired artists since ancient times. So when the film's mercurial director casts an unknown Mexican ingenue in the lead role, Vera Larios quickly becomes the talk of the town. She's also the object of envy of Nancy Hartley, a bit player whose career has stalled and who will do anything to win the fame she believes...

"August, 1943. Fourteen-year-old Massimo is all alone. Newly orphaned and fleeing from Rome after surviving the American bombing raid that killed his parents, Massimo is attacked by thugs and finds himself bloodied at the base of the Montecassino. It is there in the Benedictine abbey's shadow that a charismatic and cryptic man calling himself Pietro Houdini, the self-proclaimed 'Master Artist and confidante of the Vatican,' rescues Massimo and brings...