Two young people from different social backgrounds form a fraught, recurring relationship from secondary school into university.

Set against the realities of a mid-20th-century reform school in the American South, the novel follows young boys who confront daily physical and moral violence inside a state institution.

A contemporary, character-focused novel centered on characters navigating fraught private relationships and ethical pressure in an American setting. The narrative opens from intimate vantage points and builds tension through choices, secrets, and the slow widening of consequences rather than by external action.

Set in mid-20th-century England, the story focuses on a physician who becomes entwined with a once-grand house and its family as strange occurrences and social decline intensify. The pressure comes from the intersection of a medical, rational viewpoint with uncanny events tied to a deteriorating domestic world.

Set in a recent historical past, the story focuses on a coal-merchant and shopkeeper whose ordinary routines are interrupted when he encounters evidence of suffering connected to a local institution.

Set before and after a fictional, devastating influenza pandemic, the book traces several connected people — including actors who tour small settlements — as they navigate loss, survival, and the persistence of art.

A Philadelphia patrol officer working in a struggling neighborhood pursues a string of murders while also searching for her own missing sister.

A midcareer novelist-turned-MFA-teacher recognizes a student’s apparently brilliant plot idea and later faces a career- and conscience-shaped crisis tied to that idea. The setup focuses on intellectual ownership, ambition, and how one striking idea can change a writer’s fortunes and ethical choices.

A short, focused novella that focuses on a strained father–child relationship set against motifs of dance, clothing, and sleepwalking. The narrative applies fantastical or uncanny touches to private family dynamics and rites, creating a blend of cultural detail and subtle horror without sprawling plot breadth.

A multi-part novel that follows members of a single Irish family across interlinked sections, each devoted to one of four family figures.

An elderly Congregational minister composes an extended letter to his young son late in life, recounting his own family history, the tensions between pacifism and militant abolitionism in his forebears, and the spiritual convictions that shape his sense of duty and affection.

An upper-class girl makes a misjudgment with far-reaching consequences; the novel follows the fallout across pre-war, wartime, and later life, and includes a self-aware reflection on writing and responsibility.