Featuring such contributors as Juhu Thukral, Rachel Fudge, Kristy Harcourt, and Leslie Miller, a powerful collection of essays defines what it means to be a spouse in today's society, from a woman trying to cope with being identified as half of a couple to a woman who is attempting to balance a career and motherhood. Original. First serial to salon.com.

Three women unite—and fight back—after their husbands do them wrong, in this tale of “wickedly funny female bonding” by a New York Times–bestselling author (People). Angela, half-Jewish, half-Italian, and all New Yorker, is a lawyer married to Reid, a handsome old-money WASP. Michelle adores her childhood sweetheart husband, Frank, and the dream house he’s provided for her and their two beautiful children. Jada is an African American working mom trying to maintain a happy home, despite her husband Clinton’s failing business. But then, like a bad soufflé, the lives of these three thirtysomething women collapse as they each discover the truth about their dirty, rotten mates. Uniting for solace and support, they draw on one another’s friendship to heal their wounds. Bowed but not beaten, this smart, audacious trio will concoct a brilliant recipe to take back what’s theirs and serve justice on their duplicitous men—and transform them from victims to victors . . . This is a “riotous” tale from the bestselling author of such beloved novels as The First Wives Club and Fashionably Late (USA Today). “Chances are good that you’ll like these women and love this book.” —Daily News (New York)

Faith, I tell them, is a mystery, elusive to many, and never easy to explain. Sweeping and lyrical, spellbinding and unforgettable, David Ebershoff’s The 19th Wife combines epic historical fiction with a modern murder mystery to create a brilliant novel of literary suspense. It is 1875, and Ann Eliza Young has recently separated from her powerful husband, Brigham Young, prophet and leader of the Mormon Church. Expelled and an outcast, Ann Eliza embarks on a crusade to end polygamy in the United States. A rich account of a family’s polygamous history is revealed, including how a young woman became a plural wife. Soon after Ann Eliza’s story begins, a second exquisite narrative unfolds–a tale of murder involving a polygamist family in present-day Utah. Jordan Scott, a young man who was thrown out of his fundamentalist sect years earlier, must reenter the world that cast him aside in order to discover the truth behind his father’s death. And as Ann Eliza’s narrative intertwines with that of Jordan’ s search, readers are pulled deeper into the mysteries of love and faith. Praise for The 19th Wife “This exquisite tour de force explores the dark roots of polygamy and its modern-day fruit in a renegade cult . . . Ebershoff brilliantly blends a haunting fictional narrative by Ann Eliza Young, the real-life 19th “rebel” wife of Mormon leader Brigham Young, with the equally compelling contemporary narrative of fictional Jordan Scott, a 20-year-old gay man. . . . With the topic of plural marriage and its shattering impact on women and powerless children in today's headlines, this novel is essential reading for anyone seeking understanding of the subject.”—Publishers Weekly (starred review)