Book picks similar to
The Bonnie Road by Suzanne d'Corsey
scotland
mystery
women
humour
The Tour
Jean Grainger - 2013
But this particular tour with its cast of unintentionally hilarous characters leaves seasoned tour guide Conor speechless for the first time in his life. Among this eclectic group are Corlene, a gold digging multiple divorcee on the prowl; Patrick, a love-starved Boston cop; Dylan, a goth uilleann piper; Dorothy, a poisonous college professor who wouldn't spend Christmas; Elliot, a wall street shark who finally shows his true colours, and then there's Ellen, back on Irish soil after so many years to discover a truth no-one could have guessed, least of all herself. And thats just a few of the colourful cast.The locals they meet on their journey, eccentric West Brits, passionate musicians, Ukranian waitresses and Garda high flyers all help to make this a tour that nobody will ever forget. And of course, there's Conor, stuck in the thick of it all, solving problems and mending hearts, but what about his own?
Brahma Rakshas: The Monster Within
Sandiip N. Paatil - 2021
At 11, he looks big and strong for his age. His kind mother, Geeta is a rural Indian archetype: the overworked, stressed-out, barely-keeping-it- together single mother. His father is in prison for multiple robbery cases. The villagers are cold and overbearing, and his schooldays are made hellish by bullies. If this wasn’t enough, he has nightmares and uncanny callings from the age-old monstrous Peepal tree that lays on his way to school. The legend is a monster called Brahma Rakshas, living under this tree, for years unknown to people, lures kids with the black devil fruits and then makes them wrestle until one dies.And, one stormy night, the legend comes true when Brahma Rakshas meets Sarja. Set in a fictional village of Deogiri; a small haven of human civilization, away from the din of city life, this story is an adventure ride filled with riddles and monster wrestling.
The Long, Sandy Hair of Neftoon Zamora
Michael Nesmith - 1998
Beginning in Mississippi, he soon finds himself traveling through the New Mexico desert, encountering strange and mystical inhabitants who all have conflicting yarns to spin about the ephemeral Neftoon. Is she an Indian High Priestess? Is she part martian, part Delta blues singer? Was she born in Mississippi -- or on Mars?As the story continues, Neftoon's spirit grows stronger, gradually encompassing everything. People, animals, objects -- all are affected by her legend, and all are imbued with a greater meaning beyond their mere existences. Therein lies the beauty of the Neftoon myth. By encircling all, it excludes none. Ultimately, this is a look at a unity so complete, a peace so profound, that we cannot bear to look away.
Fludd
Hilary Mantel - 1989
He is the curate sent by the bishop to assist Father Angwin-or is he? In the most unlikely of places, a superstitious town that understands little of romance or sentimentality, where bad blood between neighbors is ancient and impenetrable, miracles begin to bloom. No matter how copiously Father Angwin drinks while he confesses his broken faith, the level of the bottle does not drop. Although Fludd does not appear to be eating, the food on his plate disappears. Fludd becomes lover, gravedigger, and savior, transforming his dull office into a golden regency of decision, unashamed sensation, and unprecedented action. Knitting together the miraculous and the mundane, the dreadful and the ludicrous, Fludd is a tale of alchemy and transformation told with astonishing art, insight, humor, and wit.
The Book of X
Sarah Rose Etter - 2019
From childhood with her parents on the family meat farm, to a desk job in the city, to finally experiencing love, she grapples with her body, men, and society, all the while imagining a softer world than the one she is in.
Chasing Moonbeams in Merriment Bay
Emily Harvale - 2020
Will a discovery in Devon Villa change that? Cat Devon is finally with the love of her life – and she couldn’t be happier about that. But discovering the identity of her real dad and the fact she has two half-brothers was a shock. Getting to know her new family is now a priority. Kyra Devon is only eighteen, but she’s more mature than her mum in many ways and is coping far better with everything that’s happened. Kyra knows what she wants and unlike Cat, she’s not going to let opportunities slip away. Mary Devon has regained her daughter and her granddaughter, but she’s grieving for her mother, and also for the loss of the love she thought she’d found. Putting on a brave face may not be the best way for Mary to get over it. When a long-lost painting called Moonbeams Kiss is discovered in a hidden cellar beneath the floorboards in Devon Villa, a story of love, loss and treachery unfolds, bringing with it repercussions for each of the Devon women. This is Book Two in Emily Harvale's Merriment Bay series which is interconnected to her Wyntersleap series. Each series can be read alone, but several characters appear in both series.
The Peach Keeper
Sarah Addison Allen - 2011
The Blue Ridge Madam—built by Willa’s great-great-grandfather during Walls of Water’s heyday, and once the town’s grandest home—has stood for years as a lonely monument to misfortune and scandal. And Willa herself has long strived to build a life beyond the brooding Jackson family shadow. No easy task in a town shaped by years of tradition and the well-marked boundaries of the haves and have-nots.But Willa has lately learned that an old classmate—socialite do-gooder Paxton Osgood—of the very prominent Osgood family, has restored the Blue Ridge Madam to her former glory, with plans to open a top-flight inn. Maybe, at last, the troubled past can be laid to rest while something new and wonderful rises from its ashes. But what rises instead is a skeleton, found buried beneath the property’s lone peach tree, and certain to drag up dire consequences along with it.For the bones—those of charismatic traveling salesman Tucker Devlin, who worked his dark charms on Walls of Water seventy-five years ago—are not all that lay hidden out of sight and mind. Long-kept secrets surrounding the troubling remains have also come to light, seemingly heralded by a spate of sudden strange occurrences throughout the town.Now, thrust together in an unlikely friendship, united by a full-blooded mystery, Willa and Paxton must confront the dangerous passions and tragic betrayals that once bound their families—and uncover truths of the long-dead that have transcended time and defied the grave to touch the hearts and souls of the living.Resonant with insight into the deep and lasting power of friendship, love, and tradition, The Peach Keeper is a portrait of the unshakable bonds that—in good times and bad, from one generation to the next—endure forever.
Secrets in Prior's Ford
Eve Houston - 2008
It will be disruptive, noisy, and dusty, despite bringing in some new jobs. Publican Glen organizes a protest group, but when the local newspaper takes an interest in him and the story, he starts to feel nervous. When Jenny Forsyth attends a protest meeting and sees the quarry surveyor she discovers a ghost from her past that she would rather keep to herself. Clarissa Ramsay, newly widowed, is too preoccupied to care much about the new threat facing the village—she has just discovered her husband's secret life, and has resolved to make some radical changes to her own.
Blue Moon Investigations: Boxed Set Part 2
Steve Higgs - 2019
They say everyone has a skeleton in their closet, but why are so many of them coming to life? Tempest and Amanda work at the only paranormal detective agency in the book and business is booming. This second box set gives you over 1000 pages of pulse-pounding hilarious paranormal mayhem as they get themselves into yet more hot water solving cases no one else would be dumb enough to take. Dead Pirates of Cawsand – A ghost ship has been spotted off the coast of a quiet Cornish village where gold coins were recently found. Now skeletal pirates are wandering the streets, hiding in the mist to strike fear into the local community because they want their gold back. But they didn’t count on England’s best paranormal P.I. turning up. His well-earned break soon goes sideways as murder, kidnap, and ghost hunters ruin his vacation and threaten more than just his life. In the Doodoo with Voodoo – A client cursed by a voodoo priest is the start of a case that will push Amanda to her very limits. With Tempest away in Cornwall, Amanda has no back up, but she wants to do this for herself even though the priest is a scary character. However, when BFF Patience goes missing, it’s a race against time to solve the case before someone dies and she is about to find out just how badly she underestimated her suspect. The Witches of East Malling – There’s a storm brewing. It’s late Autumn in England, but the wet weather is hiding a dark crime – witches using lighting to kill! Hired to investigate, Tempest soon becomes a target himself when he comes face to face with a witch and she knows who and what he is. Is he closing in on the coven, or are they closing in on him? The deadly conclusion with leave you breathless. Crop Circles, Cows, and Crazy Aliens – Aliens? Really? There are lights in the sky, crop circles in the fields and the cows are producing glowing milk. It’s Amanda’s case, and seems a simple one until the first body shows up. Suddenly she has a mystery person leaving her clues, an internet star trying to help her investigation and conspiracy nuts raining from the sky. Is this the first wave of an alien invasion, or something far worse? Whispers in the Rigging – His dad reported stories of a ghost in the old Royal Dockyard, but that’s not why Tempest is going undercover. He’s there because his dad was found unconscious in a dumpster when he tried to poke around. Now Tempest must find out what is going on, but all too soon he realises there’s something beneath the dockyard that is much worse than ghosts. The paranormal? It’s all nonsense, but proving might just get them killed.
Everything Under
Daisy Johnson - 2018
Gretel, a lexicographer by trade, knows this better than most. She grew up on a houseboat with her mother, wandering the canals of Oxford and speaking a private language of their own invention. Her mother disappeared when Gretel was a teen, abandoning her to foster care, and Gretel has tried to move on, spending her days updating dictionary entries.One phone call from her mother is all it takes for the past to come rushing back. To find her, Gretel will have to recover buried memories of her final, fateful winter on the canals. A runaway boy had found community and shelter with them, and all three were haunted by their past and stalked by an ominous creature lurking in the canal: the bonak. Everything and nothing at once, the bonak was Gretel’s name for the thing she feared most. And now that she’s searching for her mother, she’ll have to face it.
Maid of the Mist
Colin Bateman - 1999
It's a sleepy Canadian town full of honeymooners and tourists, and that's how Inspector Frank Corrigan likes it. He saw enough trouble as a cop in Northern Ireland. Now he's happy dealing with parking offences and the odd drunk, although since his wife left him and took their daughter, 'happy' may not be quite the word.Then a reincarnated Native American princess by the name of Lelewala canoes over the Falls - and survives. Or so she says. And Frank falls in love. And finds himself confronting the greatest terrorist of the age at an international gathering of drug dealers.And that's before the music starts...
Vivian Apple at the End of the World
Katie Coyle - 2013
But when Vivian returns home the night after the supposed "Rapture," all that’s left of her parents are two holes in the roof. Suddenly, she doesn't know who or what to believe. With her best friend Harp and a mysterious ally, Peter, Vivian embarks on a desperate cross-country roadtrip through a paranoid and panic-stricken America to find answers. Because at the end of the world, Vivan Apple isn't looking for a savior. She's looking for the truth.
Literary Witches: A Celebration of Magical Women Writers
Taisia Kitaiskaia - 2017
Through poetic portraits, Taisia Kitaiskaia and Katy Horan honor the witchy qualities of well-known and obscure authors alike, including Virginia Woolf, Mira Bai, Toni Morrison, Emily Dickinson, Octavia E. Butler, Sandra Cisneros, and many more.Perfect for both book lovers and coven members, Literary Witches is a treasure and a source of inspiration. Kitaiskaia and Horan bring fresh insights on your most beloved authors, suggest enchanting new writers, and invite you to rediscover the magic of literature.
Finding Charlie
Katie O'Rourke - 2015
When Charlie vanishes without warning, the people who love her are worried sick. Even if the law considers her an adult at nineteen, Charlie's still the baby of her already broken family. Older sister Olivia is determined to figure out what's happened. She finds a lost cell phone, an abandoned car and a shady boyfriend she's never met before. And he's not the only secret Charlie's been keeping.This disappearance feels uncomfortably familiar, reminding Olivia and her father of another loss years before. But this will be different, Olivia swears. Charlie's coming back.
PWNED: A Gamers Novel
Matt Vancil - 2014
Reid is having a rough week. He's not sleeping well. He's just been saddled with an impossible project at work. And his girlfriend has disconnected her phone and left him for Fartherall Online. When Reid dives into the massively multiplayer pwn-or-be-pwned world of Fartherall Online, he's only got one quest in mind: to find and win back the love of his life. After all, it's just a game-how hard can it be? Written by Matt Vancil, creator of the Gamers movies, PWNED is the lost chapter of the Gamers movie franchise produced by Dead Gentlemen Productions and Zombie Orpheus Entertainment (The Gamers, The Gamers: Dorkness Rising, and The Gamers: Hands of Fate).