Arcadia Public Library

Her happiness shattered by her movie director boyfriend's announcement that he intends to reconnect with a woman from his past, travel columnist Annie Adams impulsively marries a charming chef and attempts to restart her life in rural Massachusetts.

Bill Bryson was born in the middle of the American century--1951--in the middle of the United States--Des Moines, Iowa--in the middle of the largest generation in American history--the baby boomers. As one of the funniest writers alive, he is perfectly positioned to mine his all-American childhood for memoir gold. Like millions of his generational peers, Bill Bryson grew up with a rich fantasy life as a superhero. In his case, he ran around his house...

Enchanting Regency-era gothic romance intertwined with inspiration from Mary Shelley's Frankenstein. Travel writer Amelia Balfour's dream of touring Egypt is halted when she receives news of a revolutionary new surgery for her grotesquely disfigured brother. This could change everything, and it does. . .in the worst possible way. Surgeon Graham Lambert has suspicions about the doctor he's gone into practice with, but he can't stop him from operating...

Set in the stunning southern French countryside, this honest and poignant memoir conveys hunger for authentic food and a universal hunger for home. In Cassoulet Confessions, Sylvie travels across the Atlantic from her home in New York to the origin of cassoulet - the Occitanie region of Southern France. There she immerses herself in all things cassoulet: the quintessential historic meat and bean stew. From her first spoonful, she is transported back...

Like many others, around the time Elizabeth Gilbert turned 30, she went through an early-onslaught midlife crisis. Although she had everything an educated, ambitious American woman was supposed to want, including a husband, a home, and a successful career as a magazine writer, she was consumed with panic, grief, and confusion. This is an account of her yearlong worldwide pursuit of pleasure, spiritual devotion, guidance, and what she really wanted...

A happily married woman who is trying to get pregnant realizes that her life needs to go in a new direction. After a very painful divorce, she risks everything and embarks on a journey around the world that becomes a quest for self-discovery.

If you've ever studied a foreign language, you know what happens when you first truly and clearly communicate with another person. As Zora O'Neill recalls, you feel like a magician. They say that Arabic takes seven years to learn and a lifetime to master. Steeped in grammar tomes and outdated textbooks, O'Neill faced an increasing certainty that she was not only failing to master Arabic, but also driving herself crazy. She took a decade-long hiatus,...