Emily Woo Zeller

A half-Chinese orphan whose mother sacrificed everything to give him a better chance is raffled off as a prize at Seattle's 1909 World's Fair, only to land in the ownership of the madam of a notorious brothel where he finds friendship and opportunities, in a story based on true events. Half-Chinese Ernest Young, a charity student at a boarding school, is astounded to learn he will be raffled off-- a healthy boy 'to a good home' -- at Seattle's 1909...

Detroit newspaper reporter Julia Gooden returns in a twisting, superbly assured new mystery, where a brutal murder and a father's sudden return may provide the answers she's spent decades searching for . . . or lead deep into a fatal trap. The past never really leaves us. Crime reporter Julia Gooden sees proof of this every day in her stories. A dark childhood, a negligent parent, early abandonment-any one of them can seal a person's fate as either...