Sheila Williams – författare

“This big-hearted, authentic portrayal of both friendship among middle-aged women and the mother-daughter bond will appeal to fans of Terry McMillan.” —BooklistElise Armstrong, Carmen Bradshaw, and DeeDee Davis meet in a yoga class. Though vastly different, these women discover they all have one thing in common: their mothers have recently passed away. Becoming fast friends, the trio make a pact to help each other sort through the belongings their mothers’ left behind. But when they find old letters and diaries, Elise, Carmen, and DeeDee are astonished to learn that each of their mothers hid secrets—secrets that will transform their own lives.Meeting each month over margaritas, the trio share laughter, advice, and support. As they help each other overcome challenges and celebrate successes, Elise, Carmen, and DeeDee gain not only a better understanding of the women their mothers were, but of themselves. They also come to realize they have what their mothers needed most but did not have during difficult times—other women they could trust.Filled with poignant life lessons, The Secret Women pays tribute to the power of friendship and family and the bonds that tie us together. Beautiful, full of spirit and heart, it is a thoughtful and ultimately uplifting story of unconditional love.“A moving examination of the complexities of motherhood and the strength of female friendship.” —Kirkus Reviews

“This is a truly character-driven novel that explores how people define themselves, the creation of family and home, and the importance of memory and language. . . . Fans of historical epics won’t be able to put this book down.”—Historical Novel Society“Emotionally satisfying. . . . A remarkable character portrait.”—Publishers WeeklyThe author of The Secret Women tells the story of a brave and enduring woman as indomitable as Ernest Gaines’ legendary Miss Jane Pittman, in a breathtaking novel that combines the epic romance and adventure of Outlander, the sweeping drama of Roots, and the haunting historical power of Barracoon.Things Past Telling is a remarkable historical epic that charts one unforgettable woman’s journey across an ocean of years as vast as the Atlantic that will forever separate her from her homeland. Born in West Africa in the mid-eighteenth century, Maryam Prescilla Grace—a.k.a “Momma Grace” will live a long, wondrous life marked by hardship, oppression, opportunity, and love. Though she will be “gifted” various names, her birth name is known to her alone. Over the course of 100-plus years, she survives capture, enslavement by several property owners, the Atlantic crossing when she is only eleven years of age, and a brief stint as a pirate’s ward, acting as both a spy and a translator. Maryam learns midwifery from a Caribbean-born wise woman, whose “craft” combines curated techniques and medicines from African, Indigenous, and European women. Those midwifery skills allow her to sometimes transcend the racial and class barriers of her enslavement, as she walks the razor’s edge trying to balance the lives and health of her own people with the cruel economic mandates of the slave holders, who view infants born in bondage not as flesh-and-blood children but as investment property. Throughout her triumphant and tumultuous life Maryam gains and loses her homeland, her family, her culture, her husband, her lovers, and her children. Yet as the decades pass, this tenacious woman never loses her sense of self.  Inspired by a 112-year-old woman the author discovered in an 1870 U.S. Federal census report for Ohio, loosely based on the author’s real-life female ancestors, spanning more than a hundred years, from the mid-eighteen-century to the end of America’s Civil War, and spanning across the globe, from what is now southern Nigeria to the islands of the Caribbean to North America and the land bordering the Ohio River, Things Past Telling is a breathtaking story of a past that lives on in all of us, and a life that encompasses the best—and worst—of our humanity.

“Just the novel to elevate these unforgettable voices.”—Shelf AwarenessThe acclaimed author of The Secret Women and Things Past Telling returns with an engrossing WWII historical novel about a little known aspect of World War II—the 6888th Central Postal Directory Battalion, the only Black WACs to serve overseas during the conflict. In the wake of the attack on Pearl Harbor in December 1941, Dorothy Thom, Spelman graduate, librarian and Francophile, joins the Women’s Army Corps wanting to do her part for the war effort. Longing for adventure, she has one question for the recruiter: “Do you think I’ll get to go abroad?”As Dorothy and her sister WACs discover, life in the Army is an adventure filled with unexpected deprivations and culture shock. Women from all levels of society, secretaries, teachers, and sharecroppers, work together to navigate a segregated military where race and gender define their every move. At boot camp, the “colored girls” are separated for processing. At Ft. Riley, the women’s barracks are rustic and heated by coal-burning pot-bellied stoves while German POWs spend their incarceration in buildings with central heat and hot water.In early 1945, Dorothy and eight hundred African American WACs cross the turbulent North Atlantic to their post in England. Their orders are to process the mail sent to GIs from their loved ones back home, an estimated 17 million pieces. The women arrive to find mail stockpiled for over two years in warehouses and airplane hangars, many pieces in poor condition, the names illegible. In England and France, the WACs traverse a landscape of unimagined possibilities. With their outlooks changed forever, they return to the United States as the catalysts for change in America and build lives that transcend anything their ancestors ever dreamed of.No Better Time illuminates a story of overlooked history, and a love of country and duty that has been forgotten until now.

Book club favorite and acclaimed author of No Better Time and The Secret Women makes her first foray into the mythical fantasy genre with this epic tale of legacy, power, sacrifice, and family bonds that is a call to action wrapped in elemental magic.Aeola St. James is no ordinary CEO. While navigating boardroom politics and the chaos of motherhood, she harbors a secret: she is Keeper of the Winds, an elemental being who can read the landscape and harness the wind. The planet is warming faster than it should and Aeola senses catastrophe.To ward off disaster, Aeola must gather “Daughters of the Wind” from every epoch and corner of the globe, including her own daughters whom she has hidden for their protection: Buran, mammoth hunter in Ice Age North America, Burga, her Eurasian counterpart, a skilled falconer, Siree, midwife to the Kushite royal house, Zonda of the Cloud People, masters of the Andean peaks, and Mistral, mercurial and fierce, survivor of a medieval witch hunt.As Aeola time-travels the globe, an enemy waits. Tech billionaire Wills Holloway has devised a plan to monetize climate correction by launching a missile into the stratosphere, seeding it with a cooling compound. His corporate intelligence reveals that Aeola’s company has a mechanism that will facilitate the dispersal of his creation and he initiates a hostile takeover. But Wills has no idea that the “mechanism” he seeks to acquire is Aeola herself.As the climate clock ticks, Aeola uses her gifts to outsmart the uber-introverted Holloway and persuade him to partner with her and the Daughters to give the blue planet a fighting chance.

At forty-one, Juanita Lewis is running away from home, courtesy of a one-way ticket to Montana, a place that seems about as far away from the violence and poverty of the Columbus, Ohio, projects as the moon. She wants adventure and excitement–if such things exist for a pre-menopausal African American woman with three grown, deadbeat children.Juanita’s new life in Paper Moon, Montana, begins at a local diner where a culinary face-off with chef and owner Jess Gardiner finds Juanita in front of Jess’s stove serving up home cookin’ that lures the townsfolk like a magic spell. And suddenly Juanita, who was just passin’ through, now has a job by popular demand.Out here in this wide-open space, Juanita’s heart can no longer hide, especially when she sees herself through the eyes of the wonderful and eccentric people of this down-to-earth town. She’s happy in Paper Moon; she’s found a home, but can she stay? And then there’s Jess. She has always dreamed of romance, but she never planned on falling in love.From the Trade Paperback edition.

“We didn’t know then that the dramas we imagined weren’t even warm-ups for what real life held for us.”From the fifth grade to their fifth decade, Vaughn, Reenie, Susan, and Audrey share secrets and dreams–their lives connected like silk threads through rich fabric, pulling but never breaking at life’s unexpected twists and turns. Meet the girls most likelyTO WRITE THE GREAT AMERICAN NOVEL: Vaughn has a flair for words that makes her the unofficial diplomat of the foursome. She’s great at keeping it together for everybody–but herself.TO MARRY A PRINCE: Sassy Reenie can break hearts as easily as she can take out a bully without breaking a nail. But her live-for-today attitude leads to a tragic mistake that will haunt the girls for years.TO BE FAMOUS: From the ashes of a ravaged home life, amid rumors and bad feelings, Susan rises to fame as a glamorous network anchorwoman, proving that success is the best revenge. But forgiveness is another matter.TO RUN THE WORLD: Audrey is the ultimate overachiever, but this takes a devastating toll on her health, her career, and her family. Perfection is a race where the finish line keeps moving. What will she sacrifice to win?Girls Most Likely is an emotional, uplifting, often hilarious glimpse into the lives of today’s ever-changing African American women, sustained by love, laughter, and sisterhood.Don’t miss the reading group guide in the back of the book.From the Trade Paperback edition.

Beloved author Sheila Williams beautifully captures the bittersweet humor and vivid adventures of women who survive the worst life can toss at them—and fight back to claim their right to be free, to be themselves, and to live in . . . The courage to change doesn’t come easy. When Opal Sullivan walks out on an abusive husband after fifteen years, she has only her dreams in her pocket. Her new beginning starts in Appalachian River country, where she sees a bit of herself in a graceful but dilapidated house. Like Opal, the house is worn-out and somewhat beaten up, but it still stands proudly and deserves a second chance.So Opal opens her doors—and her heart—to a parade of unforgettable characters. There’s sassy Bette Smith with her cantaloupe-colored hair and four-inch heels; short-tempered Gloria and her devilish son, Troy; the mysterious Dana, who dresses in black and keeps exclusively nocturnal hours; a dog named “Bear” who is afraid of his own shadow; and Jack, who doesn’t mind hanging out with an OBBWA (old black broad with an attitude). It is Jack who helps Opal understand a funny thing about life: You can’t move forward if you keep looking back. . . .From the Trade Paperback edition.

What are you supposed to do with a restored spirit? Eventually, I got some answers. I just didn’t expect to get so many.When Juanita Lewis arrived in Paper Moon, Montana, courtesy of a Greyhound bus, she was just looking for a brief respite. Instead, she found a home, friends, and a man to love. But this leave-your-attitude-by-the-door woman made a promise to herself–one that she intends to keep. Now that she’s got a place to come back to, Juanita wants to see the world.A trip out West with her eccentric trucker friend, Peaches, leads to a cooking stint at a new age spa for skinny celebrities. Crazy, but its here that Juanita decides to take her talent for cooking to a new level . . . and make it her dream. She also learns something about life: It does turn out the way you planned it–just be ready to change the plan a few times along the way.Just as Juanita’s journey begins, she’s called back to Paper Moon, having inherited an old, slightly haunted B&B, as well as a mountain of decisions. There’s her self-centered, irresponsible daughter, insisting that she get some sense and come back home to Columbus, and a son who’s doing things Juanita can’t bear to think about. So how does a middle-aged black woman from the projects follow her heart when it’s heading in so many different directions? By asking the right questions, then listening with her soul.From the Trade Paperback edition.

From the archives of Analog Science Fiction and Face and Asimov's Science Fiction magazines comes this thought-provoking anthology of stories by a group of acclaimed, bestselling female writers who have changed the nature of visionary fiction. These ten classic stories, each featuring well-developed, strong female characters, have garnered numerous literary awards and span every style and theme in speculative fiction. With an introduction by Connie Willis, this powerful collection includes gems from Anne McCaffey, Ursula Le Guinn and Octavia Butler.