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Part One of this story takes place in 1947. A troubled soldier, returning from the war, meets his talented five-year-old nephew, leaves an indelible impression, and then disappears for twenty-three years.

Cut to 1970: The nephew, now drawing underground comic books in Oakland, California, reconnects with his uncle and, remembering the comic book he saw when he was five, draws a new version with his uncle as a World War II fighting hero.

Cut to the present day: A commercially successful director discovers the 1970 comic book and decides to turn it into a contemporary superhero movie.

Cue the cast: We meet the film’s extremely difficult male star, his wonderful leading lady, the eccentric writer/director, the producer, the gofer production assistant, and everyone else on both sides of the camera.

Bonus material: Interspersed throughout are three comic books that are featured in the story—all created by Tom Hanks himself—including the comic book that becomes the official tie-in to this novel’s “major motion picture masterpiece.”

Dominic and Daphne met in their first week of college, and they’ve been happily married for three years. They love each other deeply but perhaps have become too comfortable, and their sex life isn’t what anyone would call thrilling. So, on New Year’s Day, Dominic blurts out a suggestion before it’s fully worked out in his mind: what if they open up their marriage?

Daphne reluctantly agrees—with conditions. They can sleep with one other person, one night a year, and the agreement has a five-year expiration date. It’s not a total free-for-all on their vows, but an amendment. They call it the Freedom Clause.

It isn’t long before Daphne and Dominic find themselves—and their marriage—altered in unexpected ways. Embracing the spirit of the Clause, Daphne pushes herself to be more assertive in asking for what she wants. She begins chronicling her journey of self-discovery in an anonymous newsletter, sharing recipes inspired by her conquests, and soon realizes that one night off a year isn’t a small change . . . it’s a seismic one.

Eventually, Daphne and Dominic are reconsidering everything—each other, their relationship, and themselves. Can they survive the Freedom Clause? Do they even want to?

Piper Evans: elementary school teacher by day–avid romance reader and anonymous podcaster by night. She has a quiet, reclusive life, taking care of her mother, who lives with mental illness, avoiding her regrettable ex, who bartends in town, and trying to make inroads in the tight-knit island community that still sees her, five years in, as an outsider.
And she’s happy with how things are–really–until British royals rent the property next to hers and their brooding bodyguard decides she’s a security threat. Piper quickly realizes that one person’s fairy tale is an ordinary woman’s nightmare as a media frenzy takes over the island and each run-in with Harrison Cole is hotter and more confusing than the last. But beneath Harrison’s no-nonsense exterior lies a soft heart, one that could tempt a woman who’s sworn off attachments into believing in white knights.

But when Piper finds herself smack in the middle of a royal scandal that rocks the island she’ll need more than Harrison’s strong arms to shield her–she’ll have to do a little rescuing herself. With careers, hearts, and friendships on the line, Piper and Harrison will have to decide what they’re willing to give up for a chance at their own happily ever after.

Nathaniel Hawthorne’s masterpiece, an iconic fable of guilt and redemption set in Puritan Massachusetts, has long been considered one of the greatest American novels.

The story of Hester Prynne—found out in adultery, pilloried by her Puritan community, and abandoned, in different ways, by both her partner in sin and her vengeance-seeking husband—possesses a reality heightened by Hawthorne’s sympathy and his unmixed devotion to his supposedly fallen but fundamentally innocent heroine. The Scarlet Letter rightly deserves its stature as the first great novel written by an American, a work of moral force and narrative power that announced a literature equal to any in the world.