Ocean State Libraries

The multi-million bestselling novel about a young girl's journey towards healing and the transforming power of love, from the award-winning author of The Invention of Wings and The Book of Longings
Set in South Carolina in 1964, The Secret Life of Bees tells the story of Lily Owens, whose life has been shaped around the blurred memory of the afternoon her mother was killed. When Lily's fierce-hearted Black "stand-in...

A woman flees across the South, pursued by people who want to kill her. She is Kendall Burnwood, witness to a racial murder committed by her husband, a newspaper editor. She has been summoned to testify at the trial and the family want to silence her.

A transcendent tale of a woman's self-discovery—the New York Times–bestselling second work of fiction by the author of The Secret Life of Bees and The Book of Longings
Inside the church of a Benedictine monastery on Egret Island, just off the coast of South Carolina, resides a beautiful and mysterious chair ornately carved with mermaids and dedicated to a saint who, legend claims, was a mermaid before...

"Finding the family she has always longed for through her marriage to Lewis, Anny vows alongside her new friends that they will live together in old age rather than enter assisted-living facilities, a promise that is tested in the wake of painful challenges." --

From bestselling author Anne Rivers Siddons comes a bittersweet and finely wrought story of friendship, family, and Charleston society. At twelve, Emily Parmenter knows alone all too well. Left mostly to herself after her beautiful young mother disappeared and her beloved older brother died, Emily is keenly aware of yearning and loss. Rather than be consumed by sadness, she has built a life around the faded plantation where her remote father and...

When Jimmy McMullen, a fireman with the NYFD, is killed in the line of duty, his wife, Jackie, and ten-year-old son, Charlie, are devastated. Charlie idolized his dad, and now the outgoing, curious boy has become quiet and reserved. Trusting in the healing power of family, Jackie decides to return to her childhood home on Sullivans Island. Crossing the bridge from the mainland, Jackie and Charlie enter a world full of wonder and magic--lush green...

Newly graduated from college and an aspiring writer, Beth Hayes craves independence and has a world to conquer. But her notions of travel, graduate study, and writing the great American novel will have to be postponed--with her mother leaving to fulfill her own dreams in Paris and her Aunt Maggie, Uncle Grant, and stepfather Simon moving to California, Beth is elected by her elders to house-sit the Island Gamble. Buoyed by sentimental memories of...

"Leslie Anne Greene Carter is the last original wife among her husband's group of cronies. They've all traded in for younger... blonder... more enhanced models. But she is proud of her status and the longevity of her marriage. Sure the spark isn't quite there the way it once was. And it would be nicer if her husband paid a bit more attention to her desires but there's something to be said for a comfortable relationship. Or at least she thinks so until...

When Caroline Wimbley Levine returned to Tall Pines Plantation, she never expected to make peace with long-buried truths about herself and her family.

"Immerse yourself in the enchanting world of New York Times bestselling author Dorothea Benton Frank's Carolina Lowcountry in this evocative tale that returns at long last to her beloved Sullivan's Island. Beekeeper Holly McNee Kensen quietly lives in a world of her own on Sullivan's Island, tending her hives and working at the local island library. Holly calls her mother The Queen Bee because she's a demanding hulk of a woman. Her mother, a devoted...