A big, strapping "steak-colored" man who is as strong as he is sensitive, Isaac is the man of Bebe's dreams. But he's also a father dealing with the challenges of raising a thirteen-year-old daughter on his own.Much to Bebe's surprise, Isaac's whip-smart daughter, Dashay, turns out to be the "other woman" who threatens to keep them apart. Meanwhile Sandy, Bebe's best friend, who is struggling in the workplace as she clashes with the new owners of the radio station, continues on her adventure in search of true love, refusing to give up. Set in Chicago and told in alternating voices, Bebe's By Golly Wow sparkles with Yolanda Joe's deft storytelling, in-your-face dialogue, and marvelous insight as she paints a sensitive and funny tale of modern romance, family transitions, and heartfelt friendships.

    the reader is seduced by that willful voice, wavering between shock and grudging admiration at Friedmann's high-wire balancing act. And laughing all the way." -The New Orleans Times-PicayuneA tour de force whose heroine falls somewhere between the southern elegance of Walker Percy and the zany black comedy of THE CONFEDERACY OF DUNCES.Surrounded by the splendor and excess of old money in New Orleans, Eleanor Rushing is a wry and witty young woman who first locks eyes with the love of her life at a City Council meeting—or so we’re led to believe. What starts as an innocuous infatuation with Dr. Maxim Walters, a Methodist minister who just so happens to be married already, quickly turns into an outrageous and obsessive passion: she orchestrates an automobile accident outside his house, volunteers to stuff envelopes at his church, follows him to Nashville on a business venture, sets up camp in the toolshed in his backyard… Eleanor’s voice is both acutely perceptive and macabrely unhinged. She considers herself blessed with the ability to “remember everything,” except that her recollections and impressions seem to be at odds with everyone around her. As her “relationship” with Dr. Walters begins to spin frantically out of control, we can't help being her willing and faithful admirers. Magnificently showcases Friedmann's touted powers of psychological acuity and laugh-out-loud black humor. A fitting Kindle addition for fans of THE SILVER LININGS PLAYBOOK.Excerpt:I think it is impossible to change the world unless you are truly evil and so mad for control you never sleep. And it’s ridiculous to try to change yourself at all. Scientists have studied identical twins who feel pain in the gut at the same time, as if everything were laid out from the moment they were conceived. Sometimes I figure all you can do is watch yourself, as if you’re viewing a simple, dull film; eventually you find out what was going to happen. Unless death catches you by surprise.So I go to City Council meetings. I haven’t missed one in four years, not even for a case of B-type influenza, which I probably picked up from a crowd in the City Council chambers. Sitting in those meetings is the only way I can pretend to feel any breezes of serendipity. Somewhere between the global and the personal, they play out the grandest battles of silliness, and I like to guess at them. When I was twenty-three I lived in Washington, DC and sat in regularly on the proceedings of the U.S. House of Representatives. But they mumbled and shuffled a lot, and you couldn’t see their eyes unless they passed close by. It was good to learn about carcinogens in the Iowa corn after the drought and how the turnips in western Montana swelled like giant melons for years after Mount Saint Helens blew, and I believed money should be set aside to study such matters, but I couldn’t see the congressmen’s eyes.

     'There are few things better in life than ... the latest novel by Penny Vincenzi' Daily Express1950s London. Tom Knelston is charismatic, working class and an active member of the Labour party, with a passion for the newly formed NHS. He is a man to watch. His wife Alice had a career as a nurse, and shares his ideals. It seems they are the perfect match.Then out of the blue, Tom meets beautiful and unhappily married Diana Southcott, a fashion model. An exciting but dangerous affair is inevitable and potentially damaging to their careers. And when a child becomes ill, Tom is forced to make decisions about his principles, his career, his marriage, and most of all, his love for his child.

    A. riots of the 1990s.Straight's brilliant story of the effects of violence in America on three generations of a family is told through the lives of the Thompsons, a large clan who live in Treetown, above downtown Rio Seco, California, and operate a car towing and repair business. Patriarch Hosea is a proud man, and a hardened one, whose father was killed in the violence that erupted in Tulsa many years earlier. All Hosea's memories come flooding black with ferocious force when the bodies of two white women are found engulfed in flames in an abandoned car on his property. These are the first signs that someone wants Hosea off his land; it is up to his son Marcus, the only one of the six children of Hosea and his half-Mexican wife who can negotiate with the white world, to help the family hold on to their home and their livelihood.But it is only when Marcus' nephew Motrice-a young man infatuated with guns and the power that they bring- comes back to Rio Seco from gang-ridden Los Angeles that the real secrets of the bodies found on Thompson land are revealed, as Rio Seco erupts in the same wave of trashing and looting that has engulfed the nearby metropolis.The Gettin Place is a powerful portrait of a family struggling to defend its turf in a changing world, to hold on to the gettin place, the source from which they derive the tools for survival.

    Lisa Miller has a wonderful life while her sister and their friends have been searching for love in the wildest of places. She invites them to join her in Jamaica where she plans to share heart-wrenching news, and hopes the pain in her life will give them a reason to stop taking theirs for granted. Renee Moore is a best-selling author with an insatiable appetite for men. She plans on spending her vacation, engaging in a fling that will give her reason to exhale. Unfortunately, she soon finds out it’s not always sunny in paradise. Attorney Nadine Hill has been living in denial for far too long. By the end of the trip, she needs to decide if she’s going to continue to live for everyone else or take a chance at her own happiness no matter the consequences. Kayla Sparks has always dreamed of being a preacher’s wife. When a handsome minister walks into her life, she thinks God has answered her prayers. Only his wife would probably disagree. **this book was originally published in 2006**

    In his fourteenth collection of poems, Pulitzer Prize winner Stephen Dunn reveals his concerns, ranging from meditations on salvation and time to the difficulties and pleasures of loving in this "already brutal century." In language that Gerald Stern has called "unbearably fearless and beautiful," Dunn continues to probe the elusive in the lives we live.

    

    He takes up the challenge of wintering it out on Bullock Creek Station,on the bleak slopes of the Barker Range,and has to use all his knowledge,experience,ingenuity and luck to get himself and the widow and the stock alive through the worst winter on record.There's a bit of skulduggery going on and The Doughroaster deals with it in his own unique and entertaining way. Bullock Creek is an adventure story about a rapidly-disappearing lifestyle,written in the vivid style that distinguishes Barry Crump's writing. and which has been enjoyed by hundreds of thousands of readers,both here and abroad.

    Fleeing boredom, bad marriages, and dead-end jobs, these adventurers wander south to Playa Paraiso—a lush, unspoiled village on Mexico’s idyllic Caribbean coast. There they find the unpredictable, hedonistic, and sometimes frightening world of the tropics.At the center of this extraordinary group is Poppa, the irreverent and savvy owner of the local beach bar. As he tries to make sense of his own vagabond existence, he offers his fellow expats booze, advice, and the occasional helping hand. It is Poppa who tells the tales of these intriguing runaways, as together they encounter true loves, vicious drug dealers, charming rogues, clueless do-gooders, and a devastating hurricane. Against a backdrop of stunning blue water and endless white sand, they experience the heart’s tug of war between the need for a place to call home and the desire for the freedom to roam.Author Anthony Lee Head is very familiar with the dream of living in paradise portrayed in Driftwood: Stories from the Margarita Road. After leaving a long career as a San Francisco trial lawyer, he moved to Playa del Carmen, Mexico where for ten years he ran a small hotel and margarita bar near the beach.Travelers, wanderers, explorers and dreamers alike will see themselves in these unforgettable characters, all the while craving an icy boat drink on a sprawling beach. But be careful: if you stick your feet in the sand and come along on this journey, you may not want to go home again."... Joseph Conrad collides with Jimmy Buffett in a journey through the dark heart of Mexico's Riviera Maya."~ Bob Calhoun, bestselling author and journalist"Truly wonderful and moving tales; the author is a writer to watch."~ Kirkus Reviews (starred review)"Beneath the 'palm and balmy breezes' tone, a deep, empathetic humanity affords each character and event vivid authenticity."~ Peter Coyote, bestselling author and actor

    A former resident of St. Louis, where he founded the Observable Poetry reading series, he now lives in Hillsborough, North Carolina.

    In November of 2010, I read at the ‘Ear Eater’ reading series in Chicago. Ana was another reader. She was reading via Skype. There were a lot of people at the reading. After I read, I walked out of the room and stood in a hallway, staring at the floor. After a few difficult conversations with people in the hallway, I heard the host of the reading talking to someone on the computer. It was Ana. Ana started reading. I laughed a lot and enjoyed her reading. Seemed like other people weren’t enjoying it as much as me but I was enjoying it a lot. I stood in the hallway laughing and shaking my head ‘Yes’ and people looked at me. I kept thinking, ‘I want to go into the room and watch her face reading’ but then I would think, ‘No, don’t do that, just listen.’ Not sure why I kept telling myself not to go into the room where she was reading but I stood in the hallway and listened and enjoyed it a lot. Two years later, Ana emailed me Baby Babe. I opened the PDF just to skim a few poems but then I read the whole book. When I was done reading the book, I thought, ‘I’ll be glad to have this book so I can look at it whenever I want.’” — Sam Pink

    But the stories end abruptly on the day Adele and her sister are orphaned, and they grow up with only each other to rely on. Adele finds work in an antiques shop but when a wrongful accusation robs her of her reputation, her future looks bleak. So it's not hard for Col Vincent, a successful businessman, to persuade Adele to marry him. Adele grows to love him - until she realises that her husband is a violent man. In the 1930s, a woman who leaves her husband faces penury. Somehow Adele survives, and then news comes that will transform her life, bringing back the haunting memory of the Lydgate Widow - and the man who has loved Adele for decades...

    

    From the foothills of North Carolina to the mountains of West Virginia, Birdie weaves her story with homespun simplicity, creating a tapestry that vibrates with the colors and textures of her life and times, spinning a tale from the years before the Great Depression on up through the end of World War II. Enthralled by her first taste of womanhood, she follows her heart with the man of her dreams, only to find that life is not fair. Or perfect. Or easy. Will she find the courage to risk everything in order to reclaim what she once had?

    To say the least. She calls Sweet Meadow, Georgia, home, where she works for her father doing auto repairs. She also drives the tow-truck, although Sweet Meadow's rather colorful denizens tend to treat Bertie more like the local, free taxi service. You know, someone has to get to a doctor's appointment or pick something up at the dry cleaners. Bertie's favorite day of the week is Friday, when she leaves the wrecker with her father for the whole weekend and joins her friends at the Dew Drop Inn for a night of dancing. Her best friend, Mary Lou, sometimes fixes her up with dubious dates, although Bertie has to remind her friend not to tease her hair too high for those occasions. Like the time when they went to Carrie Sue's open house, and a ceramic cow with angel wings hanging from a ceiling fan locked its hooves into Bertie's big hair and refused to let go. She had to wear it all night, dangling chain and all. Bertie's nearly perfect life is about to take a downhill turn, however. It starts when her landlord, Pete, currently a resident in a nearby nursing home, starts showing up at her house. In his birthday suit. A very badly wrinkled birthday suit. And then she goes to her mailbox, a rubber large mouth bass, and finds a notice from the zoning commission saying she can no longer park the wrecker in her driveway. The notice is signed by George Bigham. But when she goes to the courthouse to take care of her little problem, it is only to discover George Bigham is deceased. And Mary Lou's pregnancy test just came up positive. Can it get any worse? In a word... yes.