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Buddy is seven years younger than his brother, Lee, but they have always been close. After their praents die in a car crash, the two young men sell what is left of their dusty Oklahoma farm and travel north to Snake Junction, Idaho. There, while Lee sings in a bar, 17-year-old Buddy is at loose ends -- until he meets Irene. Beautiful, mysterious, and almost twice his age, Irene leads Buddy into manhood.

At the shabby boarding house in the rue Neuve-Sainte-Genevi�eve, petty Madame Vauquer and her tenants wonder at the plight of the aging resident Goriot. Once a well-heeled merchant, Goriot was--at first--afforded special treatment from the Madame. But now something is clearly amiss in his financial affairs, and his increasingly tawdry appearance makes him a subject of ridicule in the household. Some think he lost in the markets, others see him as a lecherous patron of prostitutes, but one thing is clear: his selflessness and complete devotion to his two daughters.

Jermaine Banks is a pot dealer in his Philadelphia neighborhood. He's also father to a three-year-old boy and a committed partner to his pregnant girlfriend. As he approaches his 30th birthday and suffers the loss of a close friend to gang violence, he realizes it's time for some changes. Being a good father, and possibly a good husband, means finding a legitimate job and getting away from the ghetto. Does he have what it takes to stop being a trouble man?

The oldest Mariss brother, fourteen-year-old Dewey, attempts to be the "embodiment of responsibility" as he juggles the management of the family's bicycle repair business while sharing the household and farm duties with his siblings after a sudden energy crisis strands their parents far from home.

Terri Mills' star is on the rise. A smart and ambitious lawyer engaged to a successful man, she has escaped her small-town roots and hopes to never look back. But then her man is unfaithful. Grandma Ollie knows something is wrong when her pen runs out of ink as she tries to enter Terri's engagement in her bible. Before long, Terri returns to Arkansas and Grandma Ollie, where she absorbs plenty of sage wisdom and struggles to cope with her upturned life.

When Tyrone Stokes was sent to prison, he left his wife to raise their son, Marcus, alone. Now Tyrone is free, but 17-year-old Marcus is on Louisiana's death row for the murder of a young white girl. Convinced of his son's innocence, Tyrone will sacrifice everything to keep Marcus alive. But first he must overcome his wife's insistence that he stay away from his family.

Jonathan is a Jewish college student searching Europe for the one person he believes can explain his roots. Alex, a lover of all things American and unsurpassed butcher of the English language, is his lovable Ukrainian guide. On their quixotic quest, the two young men look for Augustine, a woman who might have saved Jonathan's grandfather from the Nazis. As past and present merge, hysterically funny moments collide with episodes of great tragedy -- and an unforgettable story of one family's extraordinary history unfolds.

When a horrible accident kills Blaze James' father and scars her twin sister Aerial, Blaze is left in the care of exotic Felicity Hardaway. Felicity opens new vistas for Blaze. And as their relationship grows more intense, Blaze faces intolerance in their Shreveport, Louisiana, home and an unexpected betrayal.

When a handsome evangelist marries 13- year-old Layla's attractive mother, all seems idyllic. But soon her grandmother dies, her mother has a near-fatal accident, and a family member tries to rape her. After her mom interrupts the assault, Layla must do all she can to protect her--even consider perjury.

Sonja is seen as a curiosity in the minuscule Texas town of Dorfburg. Twenty-nine years old and big-boned, she is purported to be the daughter of a famous Native American trick-roper. Now that her mother is marrying a fang-toothed linoleum salesman, Sonja may finally get the chance to move out of the stifling burg and begin a search for the father she has never known.