Looking for Real Life The scrawled graffito on the bathroom wall might be clichéd, but for Claire Wilder, it's a wake-up call. Divorced from her high school sweetheart, she's lost the flavor of life waiting for Andrew to come back. So Claire leaves everything behind and ends up in her father's hometown of Valentine, Oklahoma. Before she knows it, an overnight stay at the Goodnight Motel has turned into weeks, and she's found something she'd almost forgotten existed—a place to call home. Life is sweet again…until the day her ex-husband arrives in town. Now Claire has to figure out whether home is truly where the heart is…and if that's with Andrew or in the sleepy town that helped her remember her dreams.

Matlock presents a story set in the small town of Valentine, Oklahoma. Recently divorced, Claire Wilder's arrival in her father's hometown upsets the residents' routine, yet results in her rediscovering life, love, and a place she can call home.

"Sentimental, heartfelt….the exploration of Henry’s changing relationship with his family and with Keiko will keep most readers turning pages...A timely debut that not only reminds readers of a shameful episode in American history, but cautions us to examine the present and take heed we don’t repeat those injustices."-- Kirkus Reviews “A tender and satisfying novel set in a time and a place lost forever, Hotel on the Corner of Bitter and Sweet gives us a glimpse of the damage that is caused by war--not the sweeping damage of the battlefield, but the cold, cruel damage to the hearts and humanity of individual people. Especially relevant in today's world, this is a beautifully written book that will make you think. And, more importantly, it will make you feel." -- Garth Stein, New York Times bestselling author of The Art of Racing in the Rain “Jamie Ford's first novel explores the age-old conflicts between father and son, the beauty and sadness of what happened to Japanese Americans in the Seattle area during World War II, and the depths and longing of deep-heart love. An impressive, bitter, and sweet debut.” -- Lisa See, bestselling author of Snow Flower and the Secret Fan In the opening pages of Jamie Ford’s stunning debut novel, Hotel on the Corner of Bitter and Sweet, Henry Lee comes upon a crowd gathered outside the Panama Hotel, once the gateway to Seattle’s Japantown. It has been boarded up for decades, but now the new owner has made an incredible discovery: the belongings of Japanese families, left when they were rounded up and sent to internment camps during World War II. As Henry looks on, the owner opens a Japanese parasol. This simple act takes old Henry Lee back to the 1940s, at the height of the war, when young Henry’s world is a jumble of confusion and excitement, and to his father, who is obsessed with the war in China and having Henry grow up American. While “scholarshipping” at the exclusive Rainier Elementary, where the white kids ignore him, Henry meets Keiko Okabe, a young Japanese American student. Amid the chaos of blackouts, curfews, and FBI raids, Henry and Keiko forge a bond of friendship–and innocent love–that transcends the long-standing prejudices of their Old World ancestors. And after Keiko and her family are swept up in the evacuations to the internment camps, she and Henry are left only with the hope that the war will end, and that their promise to each other will be kept. Forty years later, Henry Lee is certain that the parasol belonged to Keiko. In the hotel’s dark dusty basement he begins looking for signs of the Okabe family’s belongings and for a long-lost object whose value he cannot begin to measure. Now a widower, Henry is still trying to find his voice–words that might explain the actions of his nationalistic father; words that might bridge the gap between him and his modern, Chinese American son; words that might help him confront the choices he made many years ago. Set during one of the most conflicted and volatile times in American history, Hotel on the Corner of Bitter and Sweet is an extraordinary story of commitment and enduring hope. In Henry and Keiko, Jamie Ford has created an unforgettable duo whose story teaches us of the power of forgiveness and the human heart. BONUS: This edition contains a Hotel on the Corner of Bitter and Sweet discussion guide and an excerpt from Jamie Ford's Love and Other Consolation Prizes.

Marilee James has a complicated life—caring for her special-needs son, playing surrogate mother to an abandoned niece and temporarily running the local paper until the new managing editor arrives. She's so busy attending to everyone else that her own yearnings get pushed aside. Then Tate Holloway comes speeding into town in his BMW, bringing his whiz-bang laptop, journalistic integrity and the thrill of remembering what running a small-town newspaper is all about. Tate's a firm believer in the little things that make life worthwhile: overripe peaches, a good dog, a passionate kiss. The kinds of things he thinks Marilee needs to rediscover—with him. Problem is, she's already engaged. Not about to let a little thing like a fiancé stand in his way, Tate sets out to win Marilee's heart, little by little, starting with cold tea on a hot day.

It takes a lot of work to plan a wedding—and even more to save a marriage—but in Valentine, Oklahoma, there's always someone to help you keep your chin up. Emma Cole's son is getting married, and she's determined to make everything perfect—even if that means asking her estranged husband to come home and pretend they're still together. John may be an imperfect husband, but he's a devoted dad. He's happy to oblige Emma—especially since he didn't really much like living apart from her anyway. Now he wants a second chance. As Emma sorts through the mess of her own marriage, she puts her heart into planning Valentine's wedding of the century. But there's one big problem: the bride's ambitious mother wants more for her daughter than marriage to a small-town boy. As the wedding approaches, the many meanings of love, commitment and happiness capture the hearts of folks in town. And surrounded by the warmth and spirit of her neighbors, Emma starts to see new beginnings instead of endings.

As her mother always said, nothing happens by coincidence… Meet Rainey Valentine: thirty-five, twice divorced, a woman with broken dreams but irrepressible hope.When her mother dies, she inherits a truck, an old barrel-racing mare named Lulu and a lifetime supply of Mary Kay cosmetics. So taking a page from her mother’s life, Rainey packs it all up and heads off, leaving Valentine, Oklahoma, in her rearview mirror. Then, somewhere outside Abilene, she finds him. Dazed and wandering after a car accident, Harry Furneaux is a man as lost as she is.With nowhere else to go, he joins Rainey on her travels. But when their journey leads them back to Valentine, Harry and Rainey find an unexpected new direction…. Straight out of the heartland of the South, Lost Highways is a novel to gently rock the heart and soul…the story of a woman traveling too long on an endless stretch of lonesome road who finds her way home at last.

Includes, beginning Sept. 15, 1954 (and on the 15th of each month, Sept.-May) a special section: School library journal, ISSN 0000-0035, (called Junior libraries, 1954-May 1961). Also issued separately.

Carlos Bluhm leads the good life in upper-class Lima: He attends social functions with his elegant wife, goes out drinking with his three best friends, and has the occasional, fleeting assignation. Then he meets Maria Fernandez, a dancer at a tango bar in a rough part of town. The beautiful fifteen-year-old intoxicates him. An indigenous dark-skinned Peruvian, she represents everything his safe white world does not, and soon he can’t get her out of his mind. They begin a passionate affair, one that will destroy his marriage and shatter the only reality he’s ever known. Flash forward twenty years: Against all odds, Carlos and Maria have remained together. But when Maria finally presses for a formal commitment, feelings long suppressed erupt in a tense endgame that sends both of them hurtling toward a dangerous resolution that will forever alter their lives.