The sheriff of Justice, Illinois, is hunting a killer. Women visiting town are being murdered, tourists in nice hotels, money still in their billfolds, jewelry still on the dresser. Quiet kills-they go to sleep and never awaken. The sheriff is not pleased to find the new detective in town, Rae Gabriella, working the case on behalf of one of the families. She's staying in the same hotel as one of the victims-and her looks suggest she could be the next...

A once-respected college professor and novelist, Dale Stewart has sabotaged his career and his marriage — and now darkness is closing in on him. In the last hours of Halloween he has returned to the dying town of Elm Haven, his boyhood home, where he hopes to find peace in isolation. But moving into a long-deserted farmhouse on the far outskirts of town — the one-time residence of a strange and brilliant friend who lost his young life in a

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The discovery of the mangled body of Wallace Flanagan in one of his father's cement mixers sends Father Dowling on an investigation into the secret past of the victim, the heir to a lucrative concrete business, who supposedly had left town more than a decade earlier.

A boy recounts his annual summer trips to rural Illinois with his sister during the Great Depression to visit their larger-than-life grandmother.

Sophie Heller's family emigrated from Germany to Victory, a small town in Illinois, before World War II began. Now that the war has affected the town, the townspeople discriminate against Sophie and her family. When a train derails by accident, the Heller family is blamed. A teacher from the local high school comes to Sophie's rescue, and despite their cultural differences, a romance starts to bloom.

Charles Dickinson's novels and short stories have won widespread acclaim for their deft characterization, humanity, and humor. Now Dickinson slips beyond the bounds of mundane realism to create a poignant fantasy that bears comparison to the work of Jack Finney and Jonathan Carroll. Euclid, Illinois, is a town of many shortcuts, between houses, through orchards, and across fields. Josh Winkler, a local artist and longtime resident, knows these irregular...

As letters flow back and forth--between the prairies of Illinois and the mountains of Afghanistan, across cultural and religious divides--sixth-grader Abby, ten-year-old Amira, and eleven-year-old Sadeed begin to speak and listen to each other.

Suffering a hangover from a graduation party, eighteen-year-old Whitley is blindsided by the news that her father has moved into a house with his fiancée, her thirteen-year-old daughter Bailey, and her son Nathan, in whose bed Whitley had awakened that morning.

"Beth Whitaker isn't supposed to be a small-town girl. She's always dreamed of leaving Willow Grove, Illinois, for the big city, but she feels trapped, struggling to make up for a mistake that's haunted her for years. Just when Beth is finally ready to break free, her sister impulsively buys a beloved but run-down farm on the outskirts of town, and she begs Beth to help with the restoration. Reluctantly, Beth agrees to help--and puts her own dreams...

"After fleeing her hometown three years earlier, Alyssa Harrison never planned to return. Then the Silicon Valley start-up she worked for collapsed and turned her world upside down. She is broke, under FBI investigation, and without a place to go. Having exhausted every option, she comes home to Winsome, Illinois, to regroup then move on as quickly as possible. Yet, as friends and family welcome her back, Alyssa begins to see a place for herself in...