THE YEAR OF FOG BY Michelle Richmond

Six-year old Emma vanished into the thick San Francisco fog. Or into the heaving Pacific. Or somewhere just beyond: to a parking lot, a stranger's van, or a road with traffic flashing by. Now, as the days drag into weeks, as the police lose interest and flyers fade on telephone poles, Emmas's father finds solace in religion and scientific probability- but, Abby can only wander the beaches and city streets attempting to recover the past and the little girl that she lost. With her life at a crossroads, she will leave San Francisco for a country thousands of miles away. And there, by the side of another sea, Abby will make the most astonishing discovery of all- as the truth of Emma's disappearance unravels with stunning force.

This is a profoundly original novel of family, loss and hope, of the choices we make and those that are made for us.

LIT by Mary Karr

LIT follows the self-professed blackbelt sinner's descent into the inferno of alcoholism and madness and to her astonishing resurrection.

Karr's longing for a solid family seems secure when her marriage to Warren, a blueblood poet produces a son that they adore. But, she can't outrun her past. She drinks herself into the same numbness that nearly devoured her mother. She reaches the brink of suicide. A hair raising stint in "The Mental Marriot," with an oddball tribe of gurus and saviors, awakens her to the possibility of joy and leads her to an unlikely faith.

This is a conversion story that reads with dark hilarity.

LIT is about getting drunk and getting sober. It is about becoming a mother by letting go of a mother. It is the story of learning to write by learning to live. It is an electrifying story of how to grow up.