Tom’s lost his job and now he’s been labelled useless. It’s surprisingly easy to set up a double life but rather harder to keep the deceit going. As Tom’s identity threatens to unravel, he starts to lose the plot… All the while, it turns out that one of Tom’s nearest and dearest has been leading his own double life – though for very different reasons.  This book tackles hard issues such as depression, dysfunctional families and degenerative diseases in an honest, life-affirming and often humorous way. It focuses particularly on the challenges of being male in today’s world and explores how our silence on these big issues can help push men to the brink.

    And when a vicious migraine sends her to a saggy hotel bed and him to the marketing conference in her place, she is first relieved and then thankful.Weeks later, upon discovering she’s pregnant, Claire has no reason for concern. With the help of genetic counselors and fertility specialists, she and her college-sweetheart husband, Tim, have been striving for a sibling for their ten-year-old daughter, Ally. And now they have one: a precious baby boy they name Owen.But all is not well, and soon Claire begins spotting alarming quirks in Owen’s behavior that suggest he may be stricken with Batten Disease, the terminal illness that took her brother, Ricky, back in nineteen seventy-nine. If Claire is right and Owen is sick, other disturbing things may also be true. Things like: Claire has been raped; Owen is not Tim’s son; and Owen is going to die. As events unfold, Claire finds herself confronting unthinkable choices, the consequences of which could jeopardize her career, her marriage, and even her freedom.

    In this sordid and hilarious tale of whopping academic grants, sleeping on the job, sexual confusion and consenting adults, terrifying departmental secretaries, surprise impregnations and alcoholic lecturers we might conclude that most people are just not cut out for university life.

    headmistress at an elite girl’s school in Glasgow, is determinedly single, adroitly avoiding all attempts at matchmaking by a close friend.Widower Alasdair MacLeod is grieving for the wife he lost two years earlier, struggling as the single father of two teenagers, and frustrated by the well-meaning interference of his in-laws.When a proposed school trip to France brings Isla and Alasdair together, they find a connection in the discovery that each is suffering the loss of a loved one, but neither is interested in forming a relationship,As their friendship grows, Alasdair struggles with his increasing attraction to the elegant schoolmistress, while Isla harbours concerns about the complications a relationship with him would bring.Can Alasdair overcome his natural reserve, and can Isla open her heart to love again? ***Readers of Christensen’s earlier books, The Good Sister and Isobel’s Promise, will love reconnecting with Bel and Matt while enjoying Isla Cameron’s unique story.

    He is the kind of man that will savagely kill you then deliver the most heartfelt eulogy at your funeral.Carpious Mightson is not who he appears to be, wearing the guise of a handsome leader of virtue. He appears friendly, God-fearing, hard working and loving. Little do his neighbors, co-workers, and girlfriend know that he harbors a disturbing secret that contradicts his polished reputation. That secret is threatened to be unearthed when Ian Kaplan, a registered sex-offender, moves into the neighborhood.While Carpious is struggling to maintain his manufactured life, someone is brutally murdered in the neighborhood and his ex-wife resurfaces. Will the consequences of new crimes exhume buried ones?

    It’s a world of all-night beach parties and constant cocktail receptions, and within its languorous embrace her attraction for her much younger cousin grows.But the gilded lives of her aunt Julia’s family and their fellow white Africans on the coast are under threat — Islamist terror attacks are on the rise and Rebecca knows more about this violence than she is prepared to reveal. Will she be able to save her newfound family from the violence that encroaches on their seductive lives? Or, amidst growing unrest, will the true reason for her hasty exit from her posting be unmasked? Rebecca finds herself torn between the family she hardly knows and a past she dares not divulge.

    Now that I am finally an adult and soon to be married, I feel like my real life is about to begin. I have decided to document everything that happens to me, for my children and my grandchildren…As Sarah Lacey reads the scrawled handwriting in her great-aunt's journal on a trip to Portugal, she discovers a life filled with great passion, missed chances and lost loves – memories that echo Sarah's own life. Because Sarah's marriage is crumbling, her love for her husband ebbing away, and she fears the one man she truly loves was lost to her many years ago…But hidden within the faded pages of the journal is a secret Inês has kept locked away her entire life, and one final message for her beloved niece – a chance for Sarah to change her life, if she is brave enough to take it.

    Upon recovering he meets Captain Horatio Nelson, newly appointed to command of the Northern Leeward Islands squadron and the Royal Navy Dockyard at English Harbour in Antigua. Nelson's primary task is stamping out rampant American smuggling activity. But to succeed, Nelson needs information.Lieutenant Ross serves as a spy for Nelson against the smugglers, but they aren't his only foe. French and American spies supporting the smugglers are playing for far higher stakes, sowing the seeds of violent unrest. Lieutenant Ross is soon in the midst of desperate action and working with a beautiful slave woman to gain information as he struggles to stop to their plot.Dockyard Dog is the first novel in the Evan Ross series. Fans of Julian Stockwin, Dewey Lambdin, and Alexander Kent will enjoy reading this series.

    Now, at the end of her life, she has completed a book about what really happened on that fateful night of Christmas Eve, 1989.The tragic and beautiful Mercy has devoted her life to protecting Star from her grandfather. His behavior so blighted her own life as a child – she never wanted it to touch her darling daughter.Yet Star refuses to read a word. Her contempt for Mercy is as painful as it is inexplicable. What has Mercy done? What is she hiding? Was her father's death, as many believe, an assisted suicide?Or something even more sinister?In this book, nothing is what it seems on the surface, and everywhere there are emotional twists and surprises.Set in Ireland and California, Blue Mercy is a compelling family mystery, combing lyrical description with a page-turning style. Praise for Orna Ross and Blue Mercy“A lyrical, gripping and heartbreakingly beautiful tale of love, loss and the ever-present possibility of redemption.” — WE Magazine for Women“Epic sweep...ambitious scope... an intelligent book”. — Sunday Tribune“A riveting story...vividly brought to life.” — Emigrant Online

    There, in a cottage in the woods, she looks for peace and renewal as she heals from the loss and alienation of her former life in Vermont. But her new home and the man who owns it are shrouded in mystery. And Lucy must learn to live without certainty. Follow Lucy as she navigates a fresh start for herself and her family in regard to matters of home, loss, love, and hope.

    30 pages of summaries and analysis on The Kalahari Typing School for Men by Alexander McCall Smith.This study guide includes the following sections: Plot Summary, Chapter Summaries & Analysis, Characters, Objects/Places, Themes, Style, Quotes, and Topics for Discussion.

    Tadie Longworth doesn't mind acting the maiden aunt in Beaufort, North Carolina. She has a gift shop full of her own jewelry designs and a sweet little sailboat to take her mind off the guy who got away. But now he’s back . . . with the fashion-plate wife he picked instead of Tadie . . . and he’s hitting on her again. When widower Will Merritt limps into town with a broken sailboat and a perky seven-year-old daughter, he offers the perfect distraction — until that distraction turns into fascination when Tadie offers shelter during a hurricane. Over candlelit games of Slap-Jack and Monopoly, Jilly becomes the daughter she could have had and Will the man she always wanted. Only, he’s sworn never to let another woman in his life. Any day now, he’s going to finish those repairs, and that ship's going to sail — straight out of Tadie’s life.

    Fleeing his debtors, Adam abandons his family and takes to sleeping rough in a local park, where a fraternity of homeless men befriend him. As the months pass, Adam gradually learns to appreciate the tough new regime, until winter arrives early, threatening to turn his paradise into a nightmare. Starving, exhausted and sick of the constant infighting, Adam decides to return to his family. The men, however, have other plans for him. With time running out, and the stakes raised unbearably high, Adam is forced to question whether any of us can truly escape the wildness within.

    It's a story about a single mother, Jackie Martin, who has two objectives: First to raise her daughter, Gina with her self-esteem unscathed by her father’s abandonment; Second, to see her daughter’s father, Tony Salvucci suffer for his abandonment. Both objectives come to pass. With lots of twists and turns and memorable characters, Once Broken is an inspirational story about forgiveness vs. revenge and living one's life moving forward, no matter how painful the past.

    Rusty, ornery, and down at the heels, Zadoorian's characters have made the wrong choices, been worn down by bad news, or survived traumatic events, but like the city they live in, they are determined not to let tragedy and rotten luck define them. Rich with detail and brimming with feeling, Zadoorian's deceptively simple stories lead readers into the inner lives of those making the best of their flawed surroundings and their own imperfections.Zadoorian's stories are drawn from the everyday events that come to define his characters' lives. A woman responsible for putting down animals at a veterinary clinic travels to Mexico to stage a ritual for her victims, a veteran returns a flag stolen from a Japanese soldier he killed in World War II, an elderly couple takes a final road trip to a mystery spot out west, and a man spends his life waiting to inherit his parents' kitschy 1960s furniture but instead sells it all. Characters also find their lives shaped by seemingly random occurrences, like the junk shop owner who must stop the stranger with a vendetta against him, the woman who becomes obsessed with her in-laws' talking dog, and the urban spelunker who finds love and acceptance with a reader of his blog. Their close connection to Detroit also infuses Zadoorian's stories with themes significant to the city, including issues of racial tension, political unease, and economic hardship.Zadoorian's writing throughout this collection is clear and vivid, never getting in the way of his characters or their stories. The unique but relatable characters and unexpected stories in The Lost Tiki Palaces of Detroit will appeal to all readers of fiction.