In Apple & Palm, a linked story collection set in and around the town of Whistle Pig in the Western Maryland mountains, a web of characters navigate unexpected pitfalls, relationships, and aging.
LitStackers! Get ready to add another title to your “TBR” list! Apple & Palm stories by Patricia Henley is in presale and generating serious buzz. This short story collection from Cornerstone Press | Caitlin Hamilton Marketing & Publicity is set for publication Mar 10, 2026, and has early readers buzzing. We’ll show you what’s on the book cover, from the publisher’s official description to the early reviews that suggest this book is one you want to pre-order today. Here we go!
In This Spotlight On Apple & Palm
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About Apple & Palm
Fragile, elderly Roxy now lives in a studio behind Tansy, the women’s arts co-op, instead of with the other women. She wants Lulu nearby. Lulu is her philandering grandson’s wife, a free spirited mother who keeps Roxy connected, alive.
Jill is in her sixties. She’s resilient, a little fierce, and rescues others—lets them find peace working in her apple orchard or respite on her sprawling property, which gives her a love and connection she prizes far more than any romance.
And then there’s Maddy, who loves books but has to read on the sly. She came up poor and married young, and her unreliable and violent husband doesn’t trust books. Or her.
Exploring faded dreams, newly found independence, memory, desire, and more, the women in Henley’s stories clarify their identities and grasp their own narratives, in a world where men are rarely soulmates but share the reckoning of change. Sentence by sentence, Patricia Henley demonstrates in Apple & Palm why she is a master of the short story craft.
Praise for Apple & Palm
“We have all stood at the intersection of Apple and Palm, but only Patricia Henley could deliver such involving, heartening, memorable stories about what happened there and beyond. I loved this collection.”—Jo-Ann Mapson, author of The Return of Lindsay Moon and other novels
“…exquisite…these stories will leave you profoundly moved.”—Andrew Porter, author of The Disappeared and The Imagined Life
“Henley is …. a Mistress of the short story craft and her mastery of the genre not only glistens, it tugs at heart and mind. Apple & Palm – a literal intersection in Whistle Pig – is a place that defies pervasive stereotypes that typecast rural Americans as less educated and more conservative than their urban counterparts….Flawed but fully human, [her characters] both inspire and entertain.”—Turned Page Review
“A masterful collection that will surprise and charm the reader.”—Rob Davidson, author of Welcome Back to the World: A Novella and Stories
“These deeply atmospheric, sensuous, richly textured stories have a Winesburgian feel. We quickly grow close to Henley’s intricately connected ensemble of brave, striving women….Wonderfully imagined and compassionately told….”—Joan Frank, author of Juniper Street and Late Work
About Patricia Henley, Author of Apple & Palm
Patricia Henley is the author of three novels, five collections of stories, two chapbooks of poetry, and a stage play. Her first novel, Hummingbird House, was a finalist for the National Book Award and The New Yorker Fiction Prize. Her short fiction has appeared in The Atlantic, The Boston Globe Sunday Magazine, and other journals. Her work has been anthologized in Best American Short Stories, The Pushcart Prize Anthology, and other anthologies.
Her new collection of stories, Apple & Palm, is forthcoming from Cornerstone Press in March 2026. She taught in the MFA Program in Creative Writing at Purdue University for 26 years. She lives in Kingston, Washington.
You can connect with Patricia Henley on her website, and on LinkedIn.
Source: Publisher
Publisher: Cornerstone Press | Caitlin Hamilton Marketing & Publicity
ISBN Softcover 9781968148218
Pub Date Mar 10, 2026
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