Book picks similar to
The Queen of Harlem: A Novel by Brian Keith Jackson
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My Policeman
Bethan Roberts - 2012
And when he comes home from National Service to be a policeman, Marion, a newly qualified teacher, is determined to win him. Unable to acknowledge the signs that something is amiss, she plunges into marriage, sure that her love is enough for both of them...But Tom has another life, another equally overpowering claim on his affections. Patrick, a curator at the Brighton Museum, is also besotted with his policeman, and opens Tom's eyes to a world previously unknown to him. But in an age when those of 'minority status' were condemned by society and the law, it is safer for this policeman to marry his teacher. The two lovers must share him, until one of them breaks and three lives are destroyed.Unfolding through the dual narratives of Marion and Patrick, both writing about the man at the centre of their lives, this beautifully-told, painful, tragic story is revealed.It is a tale of wasted years, misguided love and thwarted hope, of how at a time when the country was on the verge of change so much was still impossible.Bethan Roberts has produced an intense and exquisitely raw yet tender novel, which proves her to be one of our most exciting young writers.
Fortune's Rocks
Anita Shreve - 1999
On a beach in New Hampshire at the turn of the last century, a young woman is drawn into a rocky, disastrous passage to adulthood. Olympia Biddeford is the only child of a prominent Boston couple--a precocious and well-educated daughter, alive with ideas and flush with the first stirrings of maturity. Her summer at the family's vacation home in Fortune's Rocks is transformed by the arrival of a doctor, a friend of her father's, whose new book about mill-town laborers has caused a sensation. Olympia is captivated by his thinking, his stature, and his drive to do right--even as she is overwhelmed for the first time by irresistible sexual desire. She and the doctor--a married man, a father, and nearly three times her age--come together in an unthinkable, torturous, hopelessly passionate affair. Throwing aside propriety and self-preservation, Olympia plunges forward with cataclysmic results that are the price of straying in an unforgiving era. Olympia is cast out of the world she knows, and Fortune's Rocks is the story of her determination to reinvent her broken life--and claim the one thing she finds she cannot live without. A meditation on the erotic life of women, an exploration of class prejudices, and most of all a portrayal of the thoughts and actions of an unforgettable young woman, Fortune's Rocks is a masterpiece of narrative drama, beautifully written by one of the most accomplished novelists of our time.
In Too Deep: The Kennedy Family
Nako - 2018
In Too Deep: The Kennedy Family is an urban mystery by National Best-Selling Author, NAKO. Jacob Kennedy, leader of The Kennedy Family, is known in the underground as TKF. Jacob was never interested in settling down until he met the love of his life. After a million-dollar wedding that had the streets talking for months, five children, and a few fairytales in between, all hell breaks loose when his wife is found gunned down in the middle of the street. Jacob went to war to get to the bottom of who would even think about harming his wife, being that he had no beef with anyone. The Kennedy Family was devastated, but no one hurt more than Jacob’s children, Sienna, Savannah, JJ, Jordan, and baby Savona. Nako, the author of The Underworld series and The Connect’s Wife, has penned a book series so gritty and riveting that readers will hang on to every page in anticipation of wanting to solve the mystery and discover the hidden truth surrounding the death of Jackie Kennedy. It was unfair to be left alone without their mother, and once a few layers are peeled back, the children will bond together to bring justice for their mother. But what happens when loyalty is put to the ultimate test? When blood isn’t always thicker than water, can their relationships withstand the late nights and early mornings that come along with being a Kennedy? What if being a part of this family is a burden more than a blessing? The money and fame don’t impress everyone, especially not Savona, who’d rather be broke and, in the streets, than belong to The Kennedy clan. Author's Note: TKF Books 1-3 are INCLUDED in this book. For those that do not wish to read books 1-3 again, PART 4 starts after Chapter 33.
The Whole Day Through
Patrick Gale - 2009
Then she runs into Ben, the great love of her student days and, as she only now dares admit, the emotional yardstick by which she has judged every man since.Are Laura and Ben brave enough to take this second chance at the lasting happiness fate has offered them? Or will they be defeated by the insidious need, instilled in childhood, to do the right thing?Patrick Gale’s thirteenth novel is a brief, even terse, love story, in which a man and a woman are reunited after a twenty-year interval and have a short taste of delight. It is also a novel about obligation. Both Laura and Ben have turned their lives upside-down in order to care for relatives, she for her cranky, brilliant mother, and he, for his gay younger brother who has Mosaic Down’s Syndrome.But the implication is that, while the caring is genuine, it is also ever so slightly an excuse for failures elsewhere in their lives…The novel takes its structure from a high summer day in Laura’s life in her mother’s house, from a rude awakening to a late-night nightcap in the garden after her mother has gone to bed. This progression through her day is interleaved with a parallel journey through Ben’s, as he copes with the complications of young Bobby’s late-flowering sexuality and the myriad half-truths told him by patients attending his venereology clinic. Only as the day progresses and the weather experienced by the characters sharply differs do we begin to wonder if all is what it seems.
Crushed
Ivy Symone - 2018
May seem inconsolable and difficult to recover from…Heartbroken. While living vicariously through her friends’ enviable relationships, Tanya has grown weary of the single life. After being friend-zoned by every man she grows close to, her son’s father’s sudden interest in her gives her an inkling of hope. Her friends disapprove and say Tyrell doesn’t want her; he only wants the lifestyle Tanya can afford him. Will she see what they see and curve him, or will her insecurities cause her to settle? With the way things stand between her and Eli, Cassie never knows what their status is on a day to day basis. After the birth of their son, Cassie thought things would only improve between them; however, she didn’t expect for her and Eli to end up in a co-parenting situation. They have differences that need to be worked out, but with a little conflict, it doesn’t seem that working things out will be in Cassie’s favor. What’s a girl to do? For the past few years, Jazmin’s world couldn’t be better. With the shameful pain of the past behind her, she has established a wonderful life with her husband, Jah. At this point, nothing strong enough could disrupt their union…Or could it? There’s some shocking news that may disturb the discord of her household if Jah ever decides to reveal it. What’s Jah keeping from his Juicy? You asked for an update, so here they are: the old gang from the Crush series and If You’re Willing. Can’t say that I didn’t warn you, but everything can’t remain peaches and cream forever. Enjoy though!
Sister Caravaggio
Maeve Binchy - 2014
With no witnesses and no CCTV footage, the masterpiece is feared lost forever and the nuns, who depend on ticket sales to curious tourists, will have to sell up and leave. But the indomitable Sister Alice, who heard strange sounds on the night of the theft, persuades Sister Superior to allow her investigate. With the help of the abbey's computer-savvy librarian, Sister Mary Magdalene, the two nuns swap their habits for short skirts and high heels and set out into the criminal underworld to track down the painting. As the list of possible suspects - and the body count – rises, the sisterhood sleuths, Alice and Maggie, realize that the nearer they get to the Caravaggio, the more their lives are at risk. A classic whodunnit, led by one of the world’s favorite authors!
Gabriel's Story
David Anthony Durham - 2001
He does not dislike his new stepfather, a former slave, but he has no desire to submit to a life of drudgery and toil on the untamed prairie. So he joins up with a motley crew headed for Texas only to be sucked into an ever-westward wandering replete with a mindless violence he can neither abet nor avoid–a terrifying trek he penitently fears may never allow for a safe return. David Anthony Durham is a genuine talent bent on devastating originality and Gabriel’s Story is as formidable a debut as we have witnessed.
False Advertising
Dianne Blacklock - 2007
She recycles, obeys the water restrictions, she is even polite to telemarketers. as a mother, wife, daughter and nurse, Helen is used to putting everyone's needs before her own. But it only takes one momentary lapse of concentration to shatter her life forever.There was no momentary lapse for Gemma. Her customary recklessness leaves her pregnant, alone and estranged from her family with her one-promising advertising career in tatters.So when Gemma barges unceremoniously into Helen's life, things will never be the same again for either of them. Two very different women who have one thing in common - their lives have fallen short of their expectations. But is fate offering them a second chance?
The Vodka Dialogue
Kirsty Brooks
But when she helps a colleague spy on a wayward fiance, and gets paid rather well for her trouble, Cass realises she has the perfect credentials for any P.I. — she's tense, cynical and slightly grouchy. Plus she owes the VISA company a lot of cash.Assisted by the handy skills of her friends and her favourite cocktail, the Vodka Dialogue, Cass manages to follow the trail and escape from more embarrassing incidents than she's ever known in her life… this from a girl who's been drunk on Wheel of Fortune!Romance, adventure, humour and crime combine to make THE VODKA DIALOGUE the most entertaining Australian crime novel to hit the scene in years!
Juneteenth
Ralph Ellison - 1999
Brilliantly crafted, moving, and wise, Juneteenth is the work of an American master.Tell me what happened while there's still time, demands the dying Senator Adam Sunraider to the itinerate preacher whom he calls Daddy Hickman. As a young man, Sunraider was Bliss, an orphan taken in by Hickman and raised to be a preacher like himself. Bliss's history encompasses the joys of young southern boyhood; bucolic days as a filmmaker, lovemaking in a field in the Oklahoma sun. And behind it all lies a mystery: how did this chosen child become the man who would deny everything to achieve his goals?Here is the master of American vernacular at the height of his powers, evoking the rhythms of jazz and gospel and ordinary speech.An extraordinary book, a work of staggering virtuosity. With its publication, a giant world of literature has just grown twice as tall. --Newsday
Zami: A New Spelling of My Name
Audre Lorde - 1982
From the author's vivid childhood memories in Harlem to her coming of age in the late 1950s, the nature of Audre Lorde's work is cyclical. It especially relates the linkage of women who have shaped her . . . Lorde brings into play her craft of lush description and characterization. It keeps unfolding page after page.--Off Our Backs
Enigma Variations
André Aciman - 2017
Whether in southern Italy, where as a boy he has a crush on his parents’ cabinet maker, or on a snowbound campus in New England, where his enduring passion for a girl he’ll meet again and again over the years is punctuated by anonymous encounters with men; on a tennis court in Central Park, or a sidewalk in early spring New York, his attachments are ungraspable, transient and forever underwritten by raw desire—not for just one person’s body but, inevitably, for someone else’s as well. In mapping the most inscrutable corners of desire, Aciman proves to be an unsparing reader of the human psyche and a master stylist of contemporary literature. With language at once lyrical, bare-knuckled, and unabashedly candid, he casts a sensuous, shimmering light over each facet of desire to probe how we ache, want, and waver, and ultimately how we sometimes falter and let go of those who may want only to offer what we crave from them. Behind every step the hero takes, his hopes, denials, fears, and regrets are always ready to lay their traps. Yet the dream of love always casts its luminous halo. We may not always know what we want. We may remain enigmas to ourselves and others. But sooner or later we discover who we’ve always known we were.
No More Mr. Nice Guy: A Family Business Novel
Carl Weber - 2016
Nice Guy, the origin of Niles Monroe, the super-bad hitman who will one day become Paris Duncan’s one true love. Niles has just returned from eight years of serving his country as a Special Forces sniper. He’s looking forward to a consulting job with Dynamic Defense and spending time with his family, including his bi-polar mother, Lorna, and his hard-drinking uncle, Willie. What Niles doesn’t know is that Dynamic Defense is actually a CIA front. He’s not interested in joining them, but they won’t take no for an answer. Bridget St. John is one of the most beautiful women Niles has ever met, and she is also the most deadly. It is her job to recruit Niles to the Dynamic Defense team by any means necessary. When Niles is arrested for a murder he does not commit, Bridget makes him an offer he can’t refuse: working for Dynamic Defense in exchange for his freedom. With Niles on board, Bridget begins to train him in ways he never imagined. Sometimes, however, the student becomes the teacher. Before she realizes what’s happening, Bridget falls in love. When circumstances in his personal life collide with his work, Niles is forced to use his military skills to protect those closest to him. Fans are sure to appreciate this action-packed thriller that delivers love, drama, and suspense with Weber’s trademark flair for unexpected twists and turns.
Queen of Broken Hearts
Cassandra King - 2007
Just ask Clare, who has willingly assumed the mantle while her career as a divorce coach thrives. Now she's preparing to open a permanent home for the retreats she leads, on a slice of breathtaking property on the Alabama coast owned by her mother-in-law. Make that former mother-in-law, a colorful eccentric who teaches Clare much about love and sacrifice and living freely. When Clare's marriage ends in tragedy, her work becomes the sole focus of her life. While Clare has no problem helping the hundreds of men and women who seek her advice to mend their broken hearts, healing her own is another matter entirely. Falling in love again is the last thing she wants.So when Lex -- a charismatic, charming, burly sea captain -- moves to town to run the marina, Clare insists they remain friends and nothing more. But even though she fights it, she begins to fall for him -- and then finds she has a rival, his estranged wife Annalee.A story infused with all the flavors, textures, and intrigues of a small Southern town, with a rich, resonant center, Queen of Broken Hearts is a bold step forward for Cassandra King.
Royally Crushed
Niki Burnham - 2011
. . .When Valerie's parents split up and she has to move to a tiny European country called Schwerinborg, she's pretty sure her life is over. That is, until she meets Georg. He's smart, sweet, and unbelievably cute. And even better, he's a prince!But with Georg under so much pressure, and the press watching their every move, Valerie soon discovers dating a prince is not exactly the happily ever after she'd been hoping for. But Georg has swept her off her feet and Valerie's not ready to give up her prince just yet. . . .