In 1969 Brooklyn, an aging deacon known as Sportcoat shoots the neighborhood's drug dealer in broad daylight for reasons no one, including himself, fully understands. What follows is a sprawling, big-hearted tangle of church ladies, cops, gangsters, and neighbors, all caught up in the fallout. By James McBride. We didn't finish this one as a club.

Best friends Vernice and Annie grow up together in Honeysuckle, Louisiana, but are set on very different paths. Vernice, raised by a fiercely protective aunt after her mother's death, leaves for Spelman College and marries into an affluent, well-connected family. Annie, abandoned by her mother as a child, becomes consumed with finding her, a search that pulls her into danger, love, and a fight for her own survival. By Tayari Jones.

Alicia Berenson seems to have it all: a career as a celebrated painter, a marriage to a successful photographer, a beautiful home. Then one night she shoots her husband five times and never speaks another word. Theo Faber, a psychotherapist obsessed with her case, takes a job at the facility where she's held in hopes of getting her to talk, and uncovers a mystery far more disturbing than anyone anticipated. By Alex Michaelides.

Lily Greene, shy and stuck in a publishing job that isn't the one she wants, has spent months exchanging emails with her favorite fantasy author under a pen name, never expecting anything more than an escape from her disappointing reality. When the correspondence turns into real feelings, Lily has to decide whether to reveal her true identity, especially once she realizes her anonymous pen pal is much closer to home than she ever imagined. By Kristina Forest.

Newlyweds Celestial and Roy are just beginning their life together when Roy is wrongfully convicted and sentenced to twelve years in prison for a crime he didn't commit. As Roy fights the system from behind bars, Celestial turns to Andre, her childhood best friend, for support, and their bond deepens in ways that complicate everything once Roy's conviction is unexpectedly overturned five years later. By Tayari Jones.

Set in the 1950s, this follows Eleanor Quarles, a scholarship student at Howard University who falls for a young man from a prominent Black family, and Ruby Pearsall, a driven high schooler dreaming of an Ivy League future while caring for her mentally ill mother. Both must navigate family expectations, class tensions within the Black community, and the sacrifices required to build the futures they want, even as their choices threaten to derail everything they've worked for. By Sadeqa Johnson.