Children of the promise ;

A collection of three m/m sci-fi novellas: Following the Sun - The nearly fatal crash of their spacecraft leaves Jack and Samuel stranded on a verdant planet far from civilization. Discovered and sheltered by a native tribe, the two resign themselves to new lives - lives that include a new culture, a new language, and even new love. But their new home isn't at all what it seems, and when war and illness strike, they find out just how far from home they are. Close Encounter - Space privateer Tris is just doing his job - delivering canisters to a military science vessel - when he discovers that he is transporting people infected with an engineered virus designed to exterminate the human race. In the midst of an alien attack, can the rogue pilot save patient Retter - the key to the cure? Or will he lose both humanity's salvation and his heart? Enhanced - In Earth's not-too-far future, a talented scientist stumbles over a plot to use the genetically enhanced military to declare martial law and take over the government. Dr. Ryne Siler enlists his friend, Dr. Cary Matthews, a brilliant engineer, to figure out how to stop it. When the investigation goes awry, they're on the run, and the only thing between them and capture is a hidden cache of sleeping soldiers with enhancements of their own. Ryne and Cary are desperate, but will waking these soldiers help - or just make things worse?

Drawn from a large archive of wartime correspondence, Since You Went Away collects hundreds of letters written by women of all backgrounds and ages from all over the United States: from Midwestern farms to the Hawaiian Islands, from young girls to anxious mothers. The letters are sometimes touching, sometimes anguished, and always packed with intimate glimpses of the World War II era. With men on the frontlines, women took to repairing cars, balancing budgets, and responding with imagination to all kinds of hardships and wartime shortages ("I stopped at the Piggly Wiggly but could not get fresh meat of any kind, so found that Spam fried in butter made a very tasty Easter dinner."). An entire section is devoted to courtship, so much of which took place through the mail, and another chapter concentrates on letters written by women about their experiences at work ("The more I see of war plants the more I believe that they're dragging this damn war out as long as possible on purpose ... here it seems as tho' they have so much money they don't know what to do with it."). Nor does this collection spare the pain women felt upon learning about the loss of their husbands, lovers, or sons. A pictorial essay gives readers a further window into the war, displaying images, cartoons, and posters. One poster reads: "Be With Him at Every Mail Call," giving an idea of just how important letters were to the men and women of this time. In Since You Went Away we find letters by factory workers, farmers, and nurses, letters written to husbands, brothers, and even a series to General MacArthur. For each thematic section the editors include a brief introduction, and a capsule portrait of each woman and the man to whom she wrote accompanies the letters. These letters capture both the most intimate details in a woman's life, and the great transformations which society at large was undergoing.

"Emily thinks she's lost everything...until a mysterious painting leads her to what she wants most in the world. The new novel from the author of international bestsellers The Sweetness of Forgetting and The Life Intended shows why her books are hailed as "engaging" (People), "absorbing" (Kirkus Reviews) and "enthralling" (Fresh Fiction). Emily Emerson is used to being alone; her dad ran out on the family when she was a just a kid, her mom died when she was seventeen, and her beloved grandmother has just passed away as well. But when she's laid off from her reporting job, she finds herself completely at sea...until the day she receives a beautiful, haunting painting of a young woman standing at the edge of a sugarcane field under a violet sky. That woman is recognizable as her grandmother--and the painting arrived with no identification other than a handwritten note saying, "He always loved her." Emily is hungry for roots and family, so she begins to dig. And as she does, she uncovers a fascinating era in American history. Her trail leads her to the POW internment camps of Florida, where German prisoners worked for American farmers...and sometimes fell in love with American women. But how does this all connect to the painting? The answer to that question will take Emily on a road that leads from the sweltering Everglades to Munich, Germany and back to the Atlanta art scene before she's done. Along the way, she finds herself tempted to tear down her carefully tended walls at last; she's seeing another side of her father, and a new angle on her painful family history. But she still has secrets, ones she's been keeping locked inside for years. Will this journey bring her the strength to confront them at last?"--