Relegated to the status of schoolteacher and friendly neighbor after abandoning her dreams of becoming an artist, Nora advocates on behalf of a charismatic Lebanese student and is drawn into the child's family until his artist mother's careless ambition leads to a shattering betrayal.

It was supposed to be a relaxing vacation in sweet, sunny Cape Cod-just me and my beloved brother-but discovering a corpse in our rental house really throws a wrench into our tanning schedule. Now a rude, crude bounty hunter has arrived on the back of his motorcycle to catch the killer and refuses to believe I can be helpful, despite countless hours of true crime podcast listening. Not to mention a fulfilling teaching career of wrangling second graders....

When Jodi Winfield comes to Lancaster to house-sit, the last thing she expects to find is a disheveled little girl alone on the side of the road. The young teacher is mystified when she learns there have been no reports of a missing child, and the girl herself is of no help, since she can't speak English. It's as if the child appeared out of nowhere. Then Jodi turns her attention to Hickory Hollow--and the cloistered world of the Old Order Amish--in...

"October, 1944. It has been a challenging season for Elderberry's favorite first grade teacher, Miss Dimple Kilpatrick. A beloved former student was recently killed in the war, her brother has become distant, and her friend Odessa, the cook at Pheobe's rooming house, has taken a leave of absence to care for a relative. Still, when Dimple's librarian friend, Virginia, finds a young woman, Dora, on the library porch looking for a place to spend the...

When their teacher has to go away for a week, the kids in room 207 plan to "really act up."

"The drawback to having a picture-perfect life is that there's nowhere to go but down--and Annalise Haverford is falling fast. Once, she was the self-proclaimed queen bee of Magnolia, North Carolina. Now her husband has been arrested for fraud, and she's become an outcast in the shallow circles she used to rule. There's only one affordable rental in town, and it's owned by the woman Annalise got fired from a lucrative job. Much as single mother Shauna...

"Omar is going on his biggest adventure yet--a trip to Pakistan! But his excitement about the trip is interrupted by some shocking news: his amazing teacher is not coming back to school, and no one will say why. When Omar and his friends start investigating, the hints they overhear and clues they find lead them to an alarming conclusion--it must be aliens! Omar has a huge imagination, but saving his teacher from aliens seems far-fetched even to him....

"When Mrs. Hartwell is out sick and her substitute doesn't show up, the teachers and staff at the school pitch in to help"--Provided by publisher. Mrs. Hartwell is home sick today, and throughout the day her students send her emails informing her about what is happening as the other teachers take turns watching the class--and the room becomes increasingly messy.