A fatherless family, happy despite its impoverished condition, is befriended by a boy and his wealthy father.

""Commonwealth is the story of two broken families and the paths their lives take over the course of 40 years, through love and marriage, death and divorce, and a dark secret from childhood that lies underneath it all""-- ""The acclaimed, bestselling author--winner of the PEN/Faulkner Award and the Orange Prize--tells the enthralling story of how an unexpected romantic encounter irrevocably changes two families' lives. One Sunday afternoon in Southern...

A black American traces his family's origins back to the African who was brought to America as a slave in 1767.

Unaware of the long-standing grievances harbored by their divorced parents, three adult siblings embark on a tumultuous summer when the oldest, a successful Manhattan doctor, investigates his sister's chromosomal disorder against his mother's wishes.

Annie Harlow knows how lucky she is. The producer of a popular television cooking show, she loves her handsome husband and the beautiful Los Angeles home they share. And now, she's pregnant with their first child. But in an instant, her life is shattered. And when Annie awakes from a yearlong coma, she discovers that time isn't the only thing she's lost. Grieving and wounded, Annie retreats to her old family home in Switchback, Vermont, a maple farm...

A memoir by two children of the Gilbreth clan recounting the lives of their parents, Frank Bunker Gilbreth and Lillian Moller Gilbreth, discussing their careers as industrial engineers, work with scientific management, and the adventures they encountered raising a family with twelve children.

A farce telling the story of the Hardcastle family's mishaps and adventures in their undertaking to marry off a single daughter.

"A sweeping and enchanting new novel from the widely beloved, award-winning author Elizabeth McCracken about three generations of an unconventional New England family who own and operate a candlepin bowling alley. From the day she is discovered unconscious in a New England cemetery at the turn of the twentieth century--nothing but a bowling ball, a candlepin, and fifteen pounds of gold on her person--Bertha Truitt is an enigma to everyone in Salford,...

Three generations of women converge on the family beach house in this wickedly funny, emotionally resonant story of love and dysfunction.

An autobiography describing her time as governess to a retired Austrian captain's seven motherless children, her marriage, and the Trapp family's tours in Europe and America.