Dispatches from Berlin: Wall and Secrets is a historical thriller by Carol J. Williams, the second novel in the Iron Curtain Chronicles. On the night the Berlin Wall opens in November 1989, veteran foreign correspondent Natalie Chester expects the story of a lifetime. Instead her editor sidelines her and pairs her with a photographer who wants nothing to do with her — and a name in an East German guidebook turns the assignment personal.

Winner of the 2025 Sarton Award in historical fiction

A Family of Good Women by Teddy Jones is a historical mystery set in Borger, Texas, during the oil boom. When Imogene Good, still grieving her mother’s death, leaves behind a promising teaching career to open a boarding house in a rough, near-lawless town, she faces danger, loneliness, and a question that cuts to the heart of the story: what does family really mean?

A young woman on the run. A life built in the shadows. A story that refuses to be forgotten. At fifteen, Frankie ran from an abusive home with nothing but her wits and a gambler’s promise of escape. What she found was a world of speakeasies, bootlegging, and survival on the edge of the law. Now, decades later, her story is ready to be told—one of grit, defiance, and a woman who refused to be broken.

The Mushroom Girl is Dagmar Grieder’s memoir of childhood in Germany at the end of the Second World War. Her father was conscripted and has not been heard from in months; her mother takes her and her younger brother west ahead of the advancing Russian Army. Food is scarce, so she learns the forests, and becomes expert at finding the best mushrooms.

2026 Spur Award-Winning Finalist for Best Western Contemporary novel. 

Everyone knows who killed Maggie Schneider. But why? Inspired by true events, novelist Cynthia Leal Massey weaves an intricate tale that spans the decades from the Great Depression to the crippling drought of the fifties. The 1958 murder of champion turkey breeder Maggie Schneider in south central Texas is not a whodunnit. The mystery here is more profound: Why did he do it?