Life's a bit of a beach these days for Ginger Walsh, who's single at forty-one and living back home in the family FROG (finished room over garage). Geri, her BlackBerry-obsessed sister, is also nearly off the deep end about her pending fiftieth birthday (and might just drag Ginger with her). Toss in a dumpster-picking father, a Kama Sutra T-shirt –wearing mother, a movie crew come to town with a very cute gaffer, an on-again, off-again glassblower...

Follows Tate, Rae, Caroline, and Oliver, ages nine to eleven, both on and off-camera as they compete in a televised cooking competition. Includes cooking tips.

When Noreen takes a buyout and gets dumped by a boyfriend in one fell swoop, she finds herself with nothing but time to notice everything that's missing in her life. Tess is the teacher next door, who thought she'd be spending the summer with her college-bound daughter, but now that daughter isn't speaking to her. The Wildwater Walking Club is complete when they meet Rosie, the dutiful daughter who moved onto her parents' lavender farm after her mother...

"A beautifully written tribute to the people who teach us to cook and guide our hands in the kitchen, by the founding editor of Saveur"--

Since childhood, Rosa Fiore -- daughter of a sultry Sicilian matriarch and her hapless husband -- found solace in her family's kitchen. La Cucina, the heart of the family's lush estate, was a place where generations of Fiore women prepared sumptuous feasts and where the drama of extended family life was played out around the age-old table. When Rosa was a teenager, her own cooking became the stuff of legend in this small community that takes pride...

Floy Hutchings, nearly twelve, struggles against the expectations of 1876 society as she fights to protect her beloved Yosemite Valley and dreams of climbing Half Dome. Includes tips for visiting wild areas and historical note.

Bernadette and Libby Simmons have been working twelve-hour days at their store, A Taste of Heaven. And in between whipping up sweet treats and catering high school graduation parties, the sisters have to fit one more event into their busy schedule: catering a high-society wedding that takes a very low turn. . . Leeza Sharp is getting ready to have the wedding of her dreams. She's got a $25,000 dress (gorgeous and made to order), a rich Estonian fiancé...

Two teenagers--a heavy-metal-music-loving boy who is still mourning the death of his mother years earlier, and a beautiful, popular girl whose parents divorced because her father is gay--try to negotiate the complications of family and peer relationshipsas they get to know each other after learning that their father and mother are marrying each other.

Against the wishes of his business partners, a dying Chef Julien decides to publish his secret recipes, and his daughter Chloe must search for the source of her father's seasonings while avoiding trouble from the opposition.