Follow Mira's story as she faces life as a single mother, wrestles with the constant call of the ocean to her mermaid nature, and joins an all-male salvage team who is less than thrilled to have her. When my mother died, I ran to the ocean like a coward. Its cradle of salt puckered my memories and withered my sorrow like a grape drying in the sun. I had cheated grief and was foolish enough to think I had gotten away with it.When Nathan died, I couldn’t run away. No matter how much I flinched, bending toward the Atlantic the way ivy strains for rays of light, I could not leave. Grief was back to take what belonged to it for the time it was allotted. I had everything I wanted a few short years ago. My mate. My daughter. A home, a family. It made my head spin to think how much could change so suddenly. I mused, wondering later if I was the only mermaid to ever walk fully through the five stages of grief. But I had my daughter.Targa had yet to turn, the color and shape of her fins were yet to be revealed, but she would. I had been so sure of it then. Siren genes are passed from mother to daughter, without fail. Young legs melded into a shimmering virgin tail in response to a salty sea. But Targa didn’t turn in response to ocean water, not the first time, not any time after that. Something was wrong. I shoved my fear down deep into some dark corner where Targa would not see it and said with a smile that we’d just have to keep trying. I had turned at the age of three, but if there could be late-bloomers in the human race, why not ours too?Her fifth birthday came and went, still she hadn’t turned. Concern sent its barbs into me like a thistle, then it rooted and grew.Targa and I had weekly late night secret swims in the Atlantic, which had once been fun but were now polluted with expectation and suspense. Coaching sessions (my idea), where I attempted human psychology exercises I’d found in outdated textbooks at the library; guided visualization, breathing techniques, and even a failed go at hypnosis. The memory of her skinny little frame sitting in a bathtub containing more salt than water (Targa’s idea) is still enough to fill my eyes with moisture.I don’t know exactly when she lost hope, but she hid it expertly, patiently participating however I asked.I ignored the creeping thoughts that whispered in my mind; she didn’t even like water, didn’t really want to go for swim, couldn’t hear the ocean calling her. I would shove the thoughts away violently, excusing them as nothing but my own anxiety. It was ridiculous. A daughter of a mermaid who disliked the ocean. Impossible. When I muzzled those fears, I became aware of others of a different kind. Not my own, but hers, for me.She could see the want in my eyes. Whatever mechanism bees and dogs used to smell fear, Targa had it for despair. She could sense it on me, reeking like cheap perfume. Her eyes dipped in desperation, her obvious desire not to disappoint me sliced through me like a white-hot blade from heart to gut. She thought she was my tormentor. The realization struck like a hammer and gave me the strength to do what was needed: Let it go.The ocean could call. I’d let the smell of it crucify me, the sound of its waves crash against me, echo through me, call me, beg me.Targa’s need and my love for her was greater. If she never turned and I was locked in a land-cycle for the rest of our lives, so be it.So be it.

    Absorbing, resonant, emotionally satisfying and quite magical' - Stephen Volk 'Eloquent, shimmering writing unfurls a haunting story of childhood, grief and obsession' – Simon Clark'I adored every line. I can’t recommend it highly enough... Book of the Year!' - The Eloquent Page ‘The Electric is an impressive first novel. Andrew David Barker’s style is whimsical and nostalgic, and the work reads like the haziest recollections of a childhood long since gone.’- Starburst Magazine‘The Electric is more than a book – just as its namesake is more than a cinema – it’s an experience to dive into and wallow in. It’s a link to the past and a way to think about what’s really important about life. Its heart beats beautiful pulses of nostalgia and grief, but it is full of affirmation too: the joy of discovery; the value of insight; the depths of friendship, love and family ties, and the powerful cement of a shared experience.’- Geek SyndicateIn the summer of 1985, fifteen-year-old Sam Crowhurst discovers an old abandoned cinema that screens movies made by ghosts, for ghosts. Sam, along with his friends, Emma and David, find themselves drawn into a world where the likes of Humphrey Bogart, Lon Chaney and Theda Bara are still making pictures; where Harold Lloyd and John Belushi team up for roustabout comedies, and Karloff and Lugosi appear in films scripted by Edgar Allan Poe. Sam comes to learn the mysteries of the Electric cinema and his part to play in its long and strange history. With shades of Ray Bradbury, the more nostalgic work of Stephen King, and the early films of Steven Spielberg, THE ELECTRIC is about movies, ghosts, and that ephemeral moment in all of our lives, childhood.

    

    Societies and religions force us into models and thought-forms that are often in opposition to an organic model of love, which is instead institutionalized by marriage, religious affiliations, and nationalism. This results in love that is, for most people, a painful challenge in one form or another throughout life. In these modern days, where the focus shifts more and more to realizing one's individual potential, Osho helps us to direct our search for love by widening our view - showing us that love has many manifestations and is not limited to the 'other'. One manifestation of love is meditation, a life-changing experience that allows the flowering of real love within oneself and toward others.The Osho Life Essentials series focuses on the most important questions in the life of the individual. Each volume contains timeless yet contemporary investigations and discussions into questions vital to our personal search for meaning and purpose. The Osho Life Essentials series focuses on questions specific to our inner life and quality of existence; for example, is it possible to have an authentic spirituality without a belief in God? What is meditation and how does it work? What can I do as an individual to make the world a better place?

    But the house sits on a nexus point; a gateway to demonic realms.Amid a turbulence of twisting realities, and facing legions of fallen angels and nightmarish servitors, Frank and Roz become separated. Frank turns to a local pensioner for assistance. But the enigmatic George Smoke is a man who offers more questions than answers.Confronted by dark gods and cosmic abominations, Frank faces a battle for his wife's soul. It seems a fight he is destined to lose... but he must succeed. Saving Roz is the key to everything.

    

    That's what the locals are saying about Llandegwen, deep in the Welsh valleys. The village choir, once a source of pride for the small mining community, has been forced to disband; the elderly choirmaster heartbroken by the empty seats belonging to those who'll never return from the battlefields. The arrival of a young war widow from the East End with her little boy sets tongues wagging, not least when rumours abound that she's looking to revive the choir. Can the community set aside their grief and lift their voices, and the village's hopes, once more?

     A bright, young Texas lawyer determined to make it on his own leaves the DA's Office to pursue a career as a criminal defense attorney. Just months later, he finds himself at the center of an international Ecstasy drug trafficking ring. As a charismatic negotiator, Lawyer X ignores danger and resurrects a deal gone bad. Caught red-handed in Paris, France, he lands in prison indefinitely. Isolated from his culture and marked as l'Américain, he is focused on staying alive at a time when Anglo – Franco relations are at an all time low. Facing years in French prison and multiple life terms in the United States, Lawyer X must protect his best friend’s innocence and salvage his own dignity. His mentor, a legendary Dallas attorney, fights to keep him from becoming a casualty in the War on Drugs. A TRUE STORY Hardcover available in 2016

    The stories reveal their characters and histories, but the scrabble itself is a mere transient remission from the vagaries and harshness of prison life, which continues unabated around them and through them.We are party to a voyage through calm settled waters of support, camaraderie and story-telling, to storms of violence, abuse and abject despair in a rigid, alien and unforgiving environment. We feel the emotions of the highs and lows of prison life through the victimisation, determination and hope of our players, who ultimately all show resilience in one way or another.It is a fable about humanity, garnered with wit, insight and encouragement, with a little whodunnit? thrown in for good measure.