Velva Jean Learns to Drive by Jennifer Niven
Publisher: Plume
About the book: One Sunday when she is ten years old Velva Jean Hart is saved. But being saved isn't anything like Velva Jean expected, and life soon brings devastating changes, her father disappears on one of his adventures, and her loving mother becomes gravely ill. Before her mother dies, she urges Velva Jean to "live out there in the great wide world." The only world Velva Jean knows is her home in the gold-mining and moon-shining mountains of Appalachia. Her secret dream is to become a big time singer in Nashville--until she falls in love with Harley Bright, a handsome truant-turned revival preacher. As their tumultuous love story unfolds, Velva Jean struggles to find happiness. Will it be as the demure wife Harley wants her to be? (back cover)
Read an excerpt of Velva Jean.
Publisher: Atria
Now from the bestselling author of The Cure for Modern Life and Once Upon a Day comes a riveting story of suspense about a literature professor whose carefully constructed life is shattered after the death of her twin brother and the unraveling of the secret world they shared.
On a March afternoon, while Lila Cole is working in her quiet office, her twin brother Billy points an unloaded rifle out of a hotel window, closing down a city block. "Suicide by police" was obviously Billy's intended result, but the aftermath of his death brings shock after shock for Lila when she discovers that her brilliant but troubled twin -- the person she revered and was closer to than anyone in the world -- was not only estranged from his wife, but also charged with endangering the life of his middle child and namesake, eight-year-old William.
As Lila struggles to figure out what was truth and what was fiction in her brother's complicated past, her job, her marriage, and even her sanity will be put at risk. And when the hidden meaning behind Billy's stories comes to light, she will have to act before Billy's children are destroyed by the same heartbreaking reality that shattered her protector and twin more than twenty years ago.
A love song to the redemptive power ofbooks and stories, The Promised World is a mesmerizing tale of intimacy, betrayal, and lost innocence that will haunt readers long after they have turned the final page. (Simon & Schuster)
Read an excerpt of The Promised World.
Publisher/Publication Date: Plume, July 2009
ISBN: 978-0452289451
416 pages
The Promised World
Publisher/Publication Date: Atria, Sept 2009
ISBN: 978-1416575383
336 pages
What great books did you find this week?? Stop over at Should Be Reading and share yours!
