From a bestselling author in Mexico comes her English-language debut—an enthralling historical novel about the tragic reign of Empress Carlota of Mexico. It’s 1863. Napoleon III has installed a foreign monarch in Mexico to squash the current regime. Maximilian von Habsburg of Austria accepts the emperor’s crown. But it is his wife, the brilliant and ambitious Princess Charlotte, who throws herself passionately into the role. Known to the people as Empress Carlota, she rules deftly from behind the scenes while her husband contents himself with philandering and decorating the palace. But Carlota bears a guilty secret. Trapped in a loveless marriage, she’s thrown herself into a reckless affair. Desire has blinded Carlota to its consequences, for it has left her vulnerable to her sole trusted confidante. Carlota’s devious lady-in-waiting has political beliefs of her own—and they are strong enough to cause her to betray the empress and join a plot to depose her from the throne. As Carlota grows increasingly, maddeningly defenseless, both her own fate and that of the empire are at stake. A sweeping historical novel of forbidden love, dangerous secrets, courtly intrigue, and treachery, The Empress passionately reimagines the tragic romance and ill-fated reign of the most unforgettable royal couple of nineteenth-century Europe during the last throes of the Second Empire.

From the bestselling author of The Murmur of Bees comes a transportive novel of two families uprooted by war and united by the bonds of love and courage. With war looming dangerously close, Ilse's school days soon turn to lessons of survival. In the harshness of winter, her family must join the largest exodus in human history to survive. As battle lines are drawn and East Prussia's borders vanish beneath them, they leave their farm and all they know behind for an uncertain future. But Ilse also has Janusz, her family's young Polish laborer, by her side. As they flee from the Soviet army, his enchanting folktales keep her mind off the cold, the hunger, and the horrors unfolding around them. He tells her of a besieged kingdom in the Baltic Sea from which spill the amber tears of a heartbroken queen. Neither of them realizes his stories will prove crucial and prophetic. Not far away, trying and failing to flee from a vengeful army, Arno and his mother hide in the ruins of a Koenigsberg mansion, hoping that once the war ends they can reunite their dispersed family. But their stay in the walled city proves untenable when they find themselves dodging bombs and scavenging in the rubble. Soon they'll become pawns caught between two powerful enemies, on a journey with an unknown destination. Hope carries these children caught in the crosshairs of war on an extraordinary pilgrimage in which the gift of an amber teardrop is at once a valuable form of currency and a symbol of resilience, one that draws them together against insurmountable odds.

What does the perfect family have to fear most? The perfect stranger. From the outside, Frank and Grace seem to have the perfect family. He's a loving husband, she's a devoted wife, and together they have two happy children. But appearances can be deceiving. A strange series of misfortunes has left them reeling: an unexplained break-in, a catastrophic accident, and a bizarre poisoning that's left Grace feeling especially unnerved. Packing up their RV for a move across the country, they're ready for a fresh start, expecting to leave all their problems safely behind. Then one night on the road to their new home, the figure of a young woman emerges from the darkness, causing them to swerve off the road. The injured stranger says her name is Mara. Miles from help, they invite her to stay. But Mara is hiding a secret. And she is not the only one. Was it all just another inexplicable accident? Or have they opened the door to an escalating family nightmare designed to tear their perfect world apart?

The charismatic protagonist from María Dueñas’s international bestseller The Time In Between returns in a sweeping novel of love and intrigue set against the tumultuous aftermath of World War II. Former seamstress turned couturier turned spy Sira Quiroga is finally ready to embrace serenity with her British diplomat husband, Marcus, and the upcoming prospect of motherhood. But tranquility proves elusive. Fate has other plans for Sira. Installed in Jerusalem under the British Mandate, and enmeshed in the murky world of shady operators, political menace, and catastrophic violence, Sira finds her future with Marcus put to the ultimate test. Forced to reinvent herself again, Sira travels to England and adopts a new identity as a journalist dispatched to Spain. But as her skills at cunning duplicity are put into play, the ghosts of her past follow, bent on wreaking havoc in her life. Moving from turbulent Jerusalem and austere London to Franco’s Madrid and colonial Tangier, and peopled with formidable real-life historical figures, Sira cuts an unforgettable path through the danger, stratagems, chaos, and promise of some of the most momentous events of the postwar era.

From a beguiling voice in Mexican fiction comes an astonishing novel-her first to be translated into English-about a mysterious child with the power to change a family's history in a country on the verge of revolution. From the day that old Nana Reja found a baby abandoned under a bridge, the life of a small Mexican town forever changed. Disfigured and covered in a blanket of bees, little Simonopio is for some locals the stuff of superstition, a child kissed by the devil. But he is welcomed by landowners Francisco and Beatriz Morales, who adopt him and care for him as if he were their own. As he grows up, Simonopio becomes a cause for wonder to the Morales family, because when the uncannily gifted child closes his eyes, he can see what no one else can-visions of all that's yet to come, both beautiful and dangerous. Followed by his protective swarm of bees and living to deliver his adoptive family from threats-both human and those of nature-Simonopio's purpose in Linares will, in time, be divined. Set against the backdrop of the Mexican Revolution and the devastating influenza of 1918, The Murmur of Bees captures both the fate of a country in flux and the destiny of one family that has put their love, faith, and future in the unbelievable.