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Keeping the House
Ellen Baker - 2007
Like Whitney Otto’s How to Make an American Quilt in its intimate portrayal of women’ s lives, and reminiscent of novels by Elizabeth Berg and Anne Tyler, Keeping the House is a rich tapestry of a novel that introduces a wonderful new fiction writer. When Dolly Magnuson moves to Pine Rapids, Wisconsin, in 1950, she discovers all too soon that making marriage work is harder than it looks in the pages of the Ladies’ Home Journal. Dolly tries to adapt to her new life by keeping the house, supporting her husband’s career, and fretting about dinner menus. She even gives up her dream of flying an airplane, trying instead to fit in at the stuffy Ladies Aid quilting circle. Soon, though, her loneliness and restless imagination are seized by the vacant house on the hill. As Dolly’s life and marriage become increasingly difficult, she begins to lose herself in piecing together the story of three generations of Mickelson men and women: Wilma Mickelson, who came to Pine Rapids as a new bride in 1896 and fell in love with a man who was not her husband; her oldest son, Jack, who fought as a Marine in the trenches of World War I; and Jack’s son, JJ, a troubled veteran of World War II, who returns home to discover Dolly in his grandparents’ house. As the crisis in Dolly’s marriage escalates, she not only escapes into JJ’s stories of his family’s past but finds in them parallels to her own life. As Keeping the House moves back and forth in time, it eloquently explores themes of wartime heroism and passionate love, of the struggles of men’s struggles with fatherhood and war and of women’s conflicts with issues of conformity, identity, forbidden dreams, and love.Beautifully written and atmospheric, Keeping the House illuminates the courage it takes to shape and reshape a life, and the difficulty of ever knowing the truth about another person’s desires. Keeping the House is an unforgettable novel about small-town life and big matters of the heart.
Wedding Bells at Villa Limoncello
Daisy James - 2019
Perfect for fans of Sarah Morgan, Jenny Oliver and Kat French When Isabella Jenkins is unceremoniously fired from her fancy London job, she escapes to Tuscany. A few weeks hiding amongst rolling hills and grape vines at Villa Limoncello sounds exactly like the distraction she needs.But Italy holds emotional memories for Izzie and with a hapless handyman, a matchmaking village matriarch and a gorgeous – if infuriating – local chef named Luca Castelotti, her quiet Italian get away turns into an unending cacophony of chaos.Suddenly Izzie finds herself on a mission to pull off the wedding of the century and maybe get her life in order in the process. If only Luca’s gorgeous smile wasn’t such a powerful distraction…
Moon's Artifice
Tom Lloyd - 2013
R. Martin, Joe Abercrombie and, of course, Tom Lloyd!In a quiet corner of the Imperial City, Investigator Narin discovers the result of his first potentially lethal mistake. Minutes later he makes a second.After an unremarkable career Narin finally has the chance of promotion to the hallowed ranks of the Lawbringers - guardians of the Emperor's laws and bastions for justice in a world of brutal expediency. Joining that honoured body would be the culmination of a lifelong dream, but it couldn't possibly have come at a worse time. A chance encounter drags Narin into a plot of gods and monsters, spies and assassins, accompanied by a grief-stricken young woman, an old man haunted by the ghosts of his past and an assassin with no past.On the cusp of an industrial age that threatens the warrior caste's rule, the Empire of a Hundred Houses awaits civil war between noble factions. Centuries of conquest has made the empire a brittle and bloated monster; constrained by tradition and crying out for change. To save his own life and those of untold thousands Narin must understand the key to it all - Moon's Artifice, the poison that could destroy an empire.
The Shrine of Jeffrey Dahmer
Brian Masters - 1993
A severed head lay in the refrigerator. A freezer contained two more heads and a human torso. Two skulls and a complete skeleton were found in a filing cabinet. A styrofoam box concealed two more skulls, and a large blue plastic drum was found to contain three further human torsos in various stages of decomposition. This is the story of the mass murderer, Jeffrey Dahmer.
Ever Present Danger
Kathy Herman - 2007
Ivy watches in horror as her boyfriend and his friends murder a teammate and bury his body in a remote location. The four friends make a pact to keep the killing quiet, and Ivy flees her parents’ Colorado home for college and never looks back.Now, after ten years of numbing her guilt with drugs, she’s finally clean. The single mom of a seven-year-old son, Montana, Ivy returns home to the tiny town of Jacob’s Ear, hoping for courage to reveal the shocking truth of her past and be rid of this baggage forever.But when disaster strikes at her high school reunion, she’s the only one left alive who witnessed that fateful night so long ago…Or is she? Who else could’ve known about the pact and who would want Pete and his co-conspirators dead? As the investigation heats up and the death toll rises, Ivy is forced to decide if confessing the truth is really worth risking her own life.
Don't Die Under the Apple Tree
Amy Patricia Meade - 2012
. . Never one to sit back and hope for the best, Rosie discovers that everyone who knew the foreman had good reasons to kill him off. She also finds that she has a surprise ally in the darkly handsome police lieutenant Jack Riordan. But Jack also has to produce a viable suspect for his captain in five days--even if it has to be Rosie. . . Before long, the mystery spirals onto the streets of wartime New York. With the clock ticking and her freedom on the line, Rosie and Lieutenant Riordan will need to join forces to find the truth and catch the now very desperate killer. . .who may be much closer then they think! Raves for the novels of Amy Patricia Meade "If only Katharine Hepburn, Cary Grant, and Jimmy Stewart were still alive. They would be fabulous in the movie version. . .Meade's kickoff mystery is a winner." --"Booklist "on "Million Dollar Baby" "Nary a dull moment." --"Publishers Weekly" on "Black Moonlight " Amy Patricia Meade is the author of the The Marjorie McClelland Mysteries, published by Midnight Ink, including such titles as "Black Moonlight, Shadow Waltz, " and "Ghost of a Chance." She is a member of Sisters in Crime and Mystery Writers of America. She grew up watching black-and-white movies from the World War II period, especially anything with the Andrews Sisters. Amy lives in Vermont with her husband and their two cats.
Court of Lions
Jane Johnson - 2017
Ken Follett meets Jodi Picoult in a stunning new novel from Jane Johnson.Kate Fordham, escaping terrible trauma, has fled to the beautiful sunlit city of Granada, the ancient capital of the Moors in Spain, where she is scraping by with an unfulfilling job in a busy bar. One day in the glorious gardens of the Alhambra, once home to Sultan Abu Abdullah Mohammed, also known as Boabdil, Kate finds a scrap of paper hidden in one of the ancient walls. Upon it, in strange symbols, has been inscribed a message from another age. It has lain undiscovered since before the Fall of Granada in 1492, when the city was surrendered to Queen Isabella and King Ferdinand. Born of love, in a time of danger and desperation, the fragment will be the catalyst that changes Kate's life forever.An epic saga of romance and redemption, Court of Lions brings one of the great hinge-points in human history to life, telling the stories of a modern woman and the last Moorish sultan of Granada, as they both move towards their cataclysmic destinies.
Nothing You Don't Already Know
Alexander Den Heijer - 2018
It's for everyone who wants to take on the journey of fulfilling their potential and live a deeply meaningful life. In 2015, the author started sharing his writings about life on his Instagram page. This book holds a selection of his most popular quotes and writings that have already positively impacted thousands of people. Alexander is a Dutch inspirational speaker who's teachings are about living with purpose, overcoming fear, transformation, and making a difference.This concise handbook is full of remarkable reminders about meaning, purpose, and self-realization.The title refers to the idea that if you learn something profound, it's not as if you have learned something new. Rather, it's as if something is being unveiled to you that you have always known.
The Artist's Daughter: A Memoir
Alexandra Kuykendall - 2013
The only daughter of a single, world-traveling mother and an absent artist father, Alexandra shares her unique quest to answer universal questions: Am I lovable? Am I loved? Am I loving? In short, moving episodes, Alexandra transports readers into a life that included a childhood in Europe, a spiritual conversion marked more by questions than answers, a courtship in the midst of a call to be with troubled teens, marriage and motherhood--and always, always, the question of identity. Through her personal journey, women will discover their own path to understanding the shape of their lives and a deeper sense of God's intimate presence within it.
The January Dancer
Michael Flynn - 2008
Heinlein Award-winning SF writer Michael Flynn now turns to space opera with stunningly successful results. Full of rich echoes of space opera classics from Doc Smith to Cordwainer Smith, "The January Dancer" tells the fateful story of an ancient pre-human artifact of great power, and the people who found it. Starting with Captain Amos January, who quickly loses it, and then the others who fought, schemed, and killed to get it, we travel around the complex, decadent, brawling, mongrelized interstellar human civilization the artifact might save or destroy. Collectors want the Dancer; pirates take it, rulers crave it, and they'll all kill if necessary to get it. This is a thrilling yarn of love, revolution, music, and mystery, and it ends, as all great stories do, with shock and a beginning.
Cruise Into Eden
Lexi Post - 2014
It seems her luck has changed when two handsome men with ripped bodies, enticing accents, and hearts of gold invite her into their stateroom. But if this erotic ménage seems too good to be true, then… Nassic Wild and Wareson Night hail from the planet Eden, where women are scarce, and their mission is simple—meet the woman they’ve been waiting for for the last eleven years, bond with her and take her home. At first all goes according to plan as they pleasure her with their bodies and their special abilities. But when their best intentions lead to the worst results they lose her, along with their hearts. Now they must find a way to woo her back or return to Eden with no hope for the future.
Act of Fear
Michael Collins - 1967
In fact, it was such a lousy place to live, you could hardly give the real estate away. Populated by gangsters, muggers, grandmothers with baseball bats, and parents working long hours on the wrong side of the law to pay for tenement apartments with no view, the place was also colorful, with memorable characters straight out of a Damon Runyon novel. It was in this live-by-your-wits atmosphere that Dan Fortune grew up. One of his best boyhood friends was Andy Pappas. They broke into the holds of ships together, stealing cargo, watching one another’s back. But things happen. Dan lost his arm in a failed robbery attempt, and decided it was time to figure out another way to make a living. With the people and geography of Chelsea his only areas of expertise, he put out his shingle: Dan Fortune, Private Detective. But Andy liked his life of crime, and power was addictive. Andy stayed the course, killing his way up until he took over the docks. He was boss of bosses, a vicious racketeer. Still, he’d let Dan be familiar, call him by his first name, even give him crap – until now. Now Dan is trying to track down a teenager named Jo-Jo Olsen. It looks like a routine missing-persons case, until Jo-Jo’s friends start dying violently, one by one, just before Dan can question them. Then Andy Pappas warns Dan that unless he cools it on Jo-Jo, he’ll end up on the rapidly growing pile of corpses. It doesn’t make sense. Why does Andy Pappas care about Jo-Jo, and what does Dan need to do to stay alive long enough to find out and save the kid? Act of Fear is the winner of the Edgar Allan Poe Award for Best First Novel “Collins has the ability to set in motion a sequence of events that moves with the inevitability of a huge boulder rolling down a mountainside.” – New York Times “A master of crime fiction.” – Ellery Queen “Act of Fear is the most interesting private detective novel I have read in a long time. It is a highly original piece of work in a field not noted for much originality. Mr. Collins is a writer to watch and, above all, to read.” – Ross Macdonald
Elizabeth's Bondage Boxed Set
Nikki Sex - 2013
But their celebrations quickly take an unexpected turn when Elizabeth wakes up naked and tied to a bed with no recollection of what happened. Where is she? Where is her husband? And who is the strangely seductive captor of hers? And so begins Elizabeth's and Mark's journey of sexual discovery through bondage, submission and domination.Sex Stories 2: Elizabeth's Anal Submission (Sex Stories #2)Anal toys, bondage, and shower sex. Elizabeth is further seduced by her captor, "Sir" and becomes sexually awakened through bondage and domination during sex. Having never experienced BDSM she now finds that it is what has been missing from her marriage. Elizabeth finds herself unintentionally confessing things to "Sir" that she has never told anyone, not even her husband Mark. For a start she has been faking orgasms. But how can she tell her husband that? Or that "Sir" really gets her off? Sex Stories 3: Elizabeth's Pain and Pleasure (Sex Stories #3)Bondage, spanking, nipple clamps, vibrators, riding crops and VERY hot chocolate! Our prisoner is given a choice, and finds that she chooses to submit completely to her sexy captor, "Sir." For some strange reason she trusts him. Elizabeth's inability to climax is a thing of the past. In this book Elizabeth discovers indescribable pleasure through sex. Meanwhile her captive husband, Mark, gets some training from "Sir," too.Sex Stories 4: Elizabeth's Cherry (Sex Stories #4)Corsets, cuffs, and canes. "Sir" having stretched Elizabeth's derrière through the use of butt plugs and vibrators, finally takes Elizabeth's anal cherry. Yet the seductive kidnapper gets far more than he expected. Not to mention real difficulties with Elizabeth's husband Mark. What is in Mark's past that makes him so dangerous?Elizabeth's Love Ties (Sex Stories #5))Elizabeth has lots of secrets she doesn't want her husband to find out, and she is worried that she might be forced to tell him. Mark however, already knows all her secrets – and there is going to be trouble. Will Sir and Mark come to blows? Will Mark and Elizabeth's abduction end in divorce? Or will it all be resolved with a delicious Ménage à Trois?Elizabeth’s Bondage is XXX erotica for women, and is definitely for adults only! If you are into hot and sexy stories, and don’t mind Sex Toys, Anal Sex, Oral Sex, Rough Fucking, Rope Bondage Stories, Submission and Domination, Spanking, BDSM Stories, Handcuffs, Hot Wife Stories, and the occasional MFM Threesome, then this might be just the series for you. If you like adult stories with a bit twist, then you should definitely try the ‘Elizabeth’s Bondage’ collection!
Odessa, Odessa
Barbara Artson - 2018
Soon after the child is born, Cossacks ransack the Kolopskys’ home, severely beating Mendel. In the aftermath, he tells Henya that, contrary to his brother Shimshon’s belief that socialism is their ticket to escaping the region’s brutal anti-Semitic pogroms, he still believes America holds the answer. Henya, meanwhile, understands that any future will be perilous: she now knows their baby daughter, who has slept through this night of melee, is surely deaf. So begins a beautifully told story that unfolds over decades of the 20th century—a story in which two families, joined in tradition and parted during persecution, will remain bound by their fateful decision to leave Odessa.
Body of Work
Karla Doyle - 2013
Brian is friendly, but never more—until he appears on her doorstep and shows her how much her flirting has affected him. The more she’s with him, the more Cassie wants the fairytale, not just hot sex with the 6'2" hunk. She can give Brian full access to her body, but after her ex’s reaction to her explicit photography business, sharing her secrets, and her heart, isn't an option.Brian knows better than to break the rules. Don’t date gym members. Keep his inner beast on a leash during sex. Cassie tested his resolve on number one her first day in the gym. Shattered the second rule when he touched her. The petite pixie shares his preferences in the bedroom. She makes him laugh and love—but past mistakes haunt him, emotionally and tangibly. Cassie’s worth the price he’ll pay for breaking the rules. Now he must convince her to give him her heart.