It has been two years since the death of Merritt Heyward's husband, Cal, when she receives unexpected news -- Cal's family home in Beaufort, South Carolina, bequeathed by Cal's reclusive grandmother, now belongs to Merritt. Charting the course of an uncertain life -- and feeling guilt from her husband's tragic death -- Merritt travels from her home in Maine to Beaufort, where the secrets of Cal's unspoken-of past reside among the pluff mud and jasmine...

"A...queer Victorian romance in which two debutantes distract themselves from having to seek husbands by setting up their widowed parents, and instead find their perfect match in each other"--

Hoping to help her deceased husband's alcoholic brother, Nash, make a fresh start, Ruby McGavin returns to Cardinal, California, where she must confront her estranged mother and a terrible secret.

When her husband dies suddenly, Jane Bell becomes the reluctant landlady of The Bell, an inn in the village of Ivy Hill. Jane has no idea how to manage a business, but with the town's livelihood at stake and a large loan due, she must quickly find a way to save the inn. Despite their strained relationship, Jane turns to her mother-in-law, Thora, for help.

Managing sudden widowhood and joblessness by cooking bounteous and sumptuous feasts that she shares with her neighbors, Angelina D'Angelo is offered a job as cook for a retiree and his elderly sister and finds her culinary talents winning her a circle of friends and protectors.

Returning to Folly Beach, her childhood home, newly widowed Cate Cooper, whose late husband's financial exploits have left her homeless and broke, discovers that it is possible to go home again and discover the person she was meant to become.

"An elderly Australian woman lets a mysterious and possibly sinister caretaker into her beach-side home and into her life"--

Scottish Lord Duncan Macrae is drawn to the young English widow Gwyneth Owens, but his passion for her may jeopardize his loyalty to his land and to his Guardian vows to end the strife between Scotland and England.

Judith Singer finds herself surrounded by crime and chaos when a Long Island socialite vanishes. Then Judith's old lover, policeman Nelson Sharpe, turns up.

Louisa Reeve, the daughter of a successful British gem trader, and her husband Elliot, a charming, thrill-seeking businessman, seem like the couple who have it all. Except what they long for more than anything: a child. While Louisa struggles with miscarriages, Elliot is increasingly absent, spending much of his time at a nearby cinnamon plantation, overlooking the Indian ocean. After his sudden death, Louisa is left alone to solve the mystery he...