SARAH PEKKANEN

Twenty-nine-year-old Lindsey Rose has, for as long as she can remember, lived in the shadow of her devestatingly beautiful twin sister, Alex. Determined to get noticed, Lindsey is finally on the cusp of being names creative vice president of an elite New York advertising agency, after years of eighty-plus hour weeks, migraines and profound loneliness. But during the course of one devastating night, Lindsey's carefully constructed life implodes. Humiliated and desperate, she flees the glitter of Manhattan and retreats to the time warp of her parents' Maryland home. As her sister plans her lavish wedding to her prince charming, Lindsey struggles to maintain her identity as the smart, responsible twin, while she furtively tries to put her career back together. But things get more complicated when a long held family secret is unleashed that forces both sisters to reconsider who they are and who they are meant to be.

The Opposite of Me

From the outside, Julia and Michael seem to have it all. Both products of difficult childhoods in rural West Virginia, they become high school sweethearts. Now in their thirties, they're living a rarified life in a multi-million-dollar, Washington, D.C. home. Julia is a sought-after party planner and Michael has just sold his beverage company for $70 million. Then Michael collapses. Four minutes and eight seconds after his cardiac arrest, a portable defibrillator jumpstarts his heart. But in those lost minutes he becomes a different man. Money is meaningless to him and he wants to give it all away. Julia, who sees her life reflected in scenes from the world's great operas, has three weeks to make a choice: Walk away from the man she once adored, but who became a stranger to her even before this pronouncement, or give in to her husband's pleas for a second chance and a promise of a poorer but happier life?

Skipping a Beat

Cate, Renee, and Abby have come to New York for very different reasons, and in a bustling city of millions, they are linked together through circumstance and chance. Cate has just been named the features editor of Gloss,a high-end lifestyle magazine. It's a professional coup, but her new job comes with more complications than Cate ever anticipated. Cate's roommate Renee will do anything to nab the plum job of beauty editor aGt loss. But snide comments about Renee's weight send her into an emotional tailspin. Soon she is taking black market diet pills, despite the racing heartbeat and trembling hands that signal she's heading for real danger. Then there's Abby. Once a joyful graduate student working as a nanny part time, she abruptly fled a seemingly happy life in the D.C. suburbs. No one knows what shattered Abby or why she left everything she once loved behind. Pekkanen's most compelling; true-to-life novel yet tells the story of three very different women as they navigate the complications of careers and love - and find the lifeline they need in each other.

SARAH PEKKANEN

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