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NEXT BOOK~~THE GIRL WHO STOPPED SWIMMING~The ghost of a young girl shows up in Laurel's bedroom in the middle of the night. When she follows it to the window she sees the body of her 13-year old daughter's best friend, Molly floating face down in her swimming pool. Of course that would turn anyone's life upside down. But Laurel Hawthorne isn't just anyone. She's a professional quilt designer who has created an orderly life with her video game designer husband, David, among the meticulous homes and gardens of their Victorianna subdivision. There is no room in their lives for this tragedy.

4TH BOOK~DISTANT SHORES~Having found her audience with Summer Island and On Mystic Lake, Hannah returns with another second-chance-at-love story, this one as bleak as the soggy Pacific Northwest setting. Perimenopausal former artist Elizabeth Shore is feeling lost and miserable these days, as daughters Jamie and Stephanie matriculate at Georgetown and husband Jack focuses on jump-starting his stalled sports broadcasting career. So Elizabeth, tellingly nicknamed "Birdie," compulsively redecorates her empty nest and pesters Jack with lugubrious questions about what's wrong with their lives. Then Jack scores a journalistic coup, and in his implausibly meteoric return to broadcasting glory, winds up in an efficiency apartment in New York City, halfheartedly fending off the advances of both a nubile assistant and a Hollywood bombshell. Meanwhile, back in rainy Oregon, Birdie grieves for her beloved late father, joins a support group for "passionless" women, starts to paint again and talks to herself in the self-help homilies Hannah favors ("No more cheerleader years for me. I need to get in the game"). She even has a rapprochement with newly widowed stepmother Anita, who, in a particularly explosive burst of character development, somehow transforms from a tacky Southern "Bette Midler on speed" to a white-haired sylph favoring "long, flowing" white dresses. (When Birdie finds her bliss, she discovers she's miraculously lost weight.) Hannah's tried-and-true formula includes the predictable happy ending, complete with life lessons tearfully learned, but only hardcore fans will make it to the last page of this dreary soap

5TH BOOK~~LAND OF A HUNDRED WONDERS~~~Set in Cray Ridge, Ky., in 1973, Kagen's winsome second novel (after Whistling in the Dark) offers laughter and bittersweet sighs. As a child, NQR (Not Quite Right) Gibby McGraw survived an auto accident that claimed her parents' lives, but left her somewhat mentally challenged. Now 20 and living with her beloved grampa, Gibby publishes Gibby's Gazette, distributed from local hot spots like Loretta's Candy World and Washateria. Gibby's latest scoop, complete with photos, is her discovery of the body of politician Buster Malloy, who aspired to become governor. Gibby launches a meticulous investigation complicated by nasty Sneaky Tim Ray Holloway stealing her briefcase. Other distractions include her best friend Clever's getting knocked up and disturbing times in Browntown, an African-American community. Though Gibby can get discombobulated, this wonderfully wise Nancy Drew strives mightily to become QR (Quite Right) in the head: she was already QR in the heart

6TH BOOK~~~THE OCEAN BETWEEN US~~~A midlife marital crisis threatens the stability of a squeaky-clean navy family in Wiggs's latest, which overcomes a listless, saccharine start thanks to a rousing finale aboard an aircraft carrier. Steve and Grace Bennett look like the perfect military couple: Steve, a former pilot, has become an ambitious officer, and Grace successfully cares for their three bright, talented kids while he's deployed. But rips appear in the marriage fabric when Grace, seeking more in life, starts a relocation business, begins a fitness program and buys a small but lovely house near the Seattle base they temporarily call home. Wiggs's light, engaging style keeps the story moving in the first half, despite too many syrupy family scenes and a far-fetched subplot in which Josh, a fledgling pilot under Steve's command, is revealed to be his long-lost son from a brief, ill-advised teen marriage. This revelation widens the gap between Grace and Steve, who never told her about wife number one, and Wiggs balances their turmoil with a subplot involving their oldest daughter, Emma, and a hunky but predatory high school boy whose father is Steve's boss. But the tension isn't all emotional: Josh goes on a training exercise that nearly turns deadly, and Steve, trying to stop a deadly fire aboard his aircraft carrier, gets swept overboard into the icy Pacific. While Wiggs tends to nip suspense in the bud and linger on overripe romantic sentiments, her characters are sympathetic and her tale of frayed loves mended is sure to strike a responsive chord in a maturing audience.

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