Taking three boarders into her turn-of-the-century West Village townhouse, a woman forges ties with strangers who become friends and then family-like as each shares respective stories about lives shaped by contemporary issues.

Her protective instincts brought out by Emma, who was sent to New Mexico to marry a man she has never met, Addie French takes her new friend under her wing, and the pair begins unfolding secrets, hatching schemes, and questioning everything they once believed.

After twelve-year-old Lark, determined to escape her squalid life, steals a magical sword from the Royal Museum, she reluctantly becomes the next Nightingale, destined to vanquish an ancient evil.

In 1932, Kit faces a very different Christmas because of her family's financial problems and allows her pride to estrange her from her best friend.

"When their father's death leaves them impoverished, the Summers sisters open their home to guests to provide for their ailing mother. But instead of the elderly invalids they expect, they find themselves hosting eligible gentlemen. Sarah must confront her growing attraction to a mysterious widower, and Viola learns to heal her deep-hidden scars."--

In 1934 Kit finds that she has hard lessons to learn about the Depression both at home, where she is helping her mother run a boarding house while her father looks for a new job, and at school, where a fight spoils the preparations for the Thanksgiving pageant.

"When the Duke and Duchess of Kent rent a nearby house for the winter, the Summers sisters are called upon to host three of the royal couple's male staff in their seaside cottage--but soon they realize they've invited mysterious secrets into their home. With the arrival of their new guests, the sisters face surprising romance and unexpected danger."--

Delilah Swanpoole, Countess of Derring, learns the hard way that her husband, "Dear Dull Derring," is a lot more interesting--and perfidious--dead than alive. It's a devil of an inheritance, but in the grand ruins of the one building Derring left her, are the seeds of her liberation. And she vows never again to place herself at the mercy of a man. But battle-hardened Captain Tristan Hardy is nothing if not merciless. When the charismatic naval hero...

"The one thing Sylvie Townsend wants most is what she feared she was destined never to have--a family of her own. But taking in Polish immigrant Rose Dabrowski to raise and love quells those fears--until seventeen-year-old Rose goes missing at the World's Fair, and Sylvie's world unravels. Brushed off by the authorities, Sylvie turns to her boarder, Kristof Bartok, for help. He is Rose's violin instructor and the concertmaster for the Columbian Exposition...

Anne Shirley has left Redmond College behind to begin a new job and a new chapter of her life away from Green Gables.