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Final Balance
Stephen Black - 2015
What lies on the other side and what will it be like? This mind expanding story takes you on a supernatural journey through the Afterworld in a quest for truth and understanding about what resides in our own soul and in the souls of others. Even more importantly - What is our ultimate destiny?While FINAL BALANCE can easily be read as a standalone work, it's actually follow-on from my first book, THE ZOO: An Allegorical Adventure. In the first book, a major metropolitan city was utterly destroyed and reduced to an uninhabited state of rubble, abandoned and desolate for all eternity. That book explored the behaviors seen by a society and its leadership and the extreme consequences of the actions the characters took. FINAL BALANCE goes well beyond the original work with an entirely different setting and experience for the reader. In the new book, Dan Alexander, the central character from THE ZOO, travels on a supernatural journey through the Afterworld exploring the ultimate consequences of his earthly existence. Both books, FINAL BALANCE and THE ZOO, go beyond conventional boundaries. In a fictional and entertaining way, they provide a social commentary that resonates with our times. At the core, both books aim to enlighten others about the personal and material consequences associated with the decisions taken by society and its leadership.
Elissa Blue
T.K. Perry - 2017
Now she has a short window of time to migrate to the Mating Mountain, find a husband, and get back down the impassable cliffs before she loses her ability to fly forever. If she doesn’t succeed, she’ll be stranded as a servant in the Old Castle for the rest of her life. And if she doesn’t choose her man wisely, she might be just as miserable.
As Witch Would Have It
Mara Webb - 2020
Weeks. Months. Years. When real life gets too hard Chelsea decides to fly back to Pendle Island, a place she has not been since she was born. She’s looking forward to a vacation, but when she arrives, she’s quickly thrown into mayhem. Her Great Aunt Griselda has died, and Chelsea is needed at the funeral. She’s barely halfway through a stack of breakfast pancakes when her cousin Lizzy drops another bombshell. Chelsea is a witch, and her Great Aunt didn’t just die. She was murdered. Things go from bad to worse when Chelsea and her cousin start to follow the breadcrumbs. Her Great Aunt had been an infamous miser and hated by just about everyone on Pendle Island. Witches don’t get much more wicked than Griselda. After an ancient legal loophole leaves Chelsea as the sole heir of Griselda’s estate, she suddenly finds herself in charge of a haunted house on a hill, home to a mad pirate ghost, a talking cat, and a burly lumberjack with a curious secret. If that wasn’t enough, she’s got a dreamy sheriff to contend with, and a silver-tongued lawyer who is as charming as he is cunning. It’s a lot to process, especially when Chelsea learns about a family curse dangling over her head. The last thing she wants is to end up like her man-eater mother, but it seems she can’t help attracting attention… With a curse to run from, a murder to solve, and a needy cat to please, Chelsea finds her plate fills up very quickly. There’s also the small matter of avoiding death and learning magic, but that’s easy enough. Right? As Witch Would Have It is the first book in the Wicked Witches of Pendle Island mystery series. It’s fast, funny, and may contain a sassy animal or two.
The Alchemist's Daughter
Mary Lawrence - 2015
. . .Bianca Goddard employs her knowledge of herbs and medicinal plants to concoct remedies for the disease-riddled poor in London’s squalid Southwark slum. But when her friend Jolyn comes to her complaining of severe stomach pains, Bianca’s prescription seems to kill her on the spot. Recovering from her shock, Bianca suspects Jolyn may have been poisoned before coming to her—but the local constable is not so easily convinced.To clear her name and keep her neck free of the gallows, Bianca must apply her knowledge of the healing arts to deduce exactly how her friend was murdered and by whom—before she herself falls victim to a similar fate.
Impala
Andrew Diamond - 2016
Someone is eavesdropping on his WiFi, watching him at the funeral, waiting in the alley. By the time he finds out why, all the FBI can tell him is that he’s in more trouble than he understands. It seems an old friend has bequeathed him one last gift before departing this earth: digital clues to the location of a stolen fortune. As his enemies close in from all sides to recover the money he can’t even find, Russ begins to understand that none of the clues are what they seem, and that the only way to find the money is to unravel the mysteries of his friend’s paranoid and slightly deranged mind.
Lucky's Beach
Shelley Noble - 2020
Julie also plans to use the time to figure out why her perfectly planned life has gone terribly amiss. They've barely hit the road when a frantic call from Julie's mother hijacks their best laid plans. Uncle Tony "Lucky" Costa is missing. Always entertaining, often irresponsible, never reliable, Uncle Lucky was a favorite with her friends. For Julie, for whom he'd been a sometimes surrogate father, not so much.Her mother wants them to take a "teeny" detour to look for the irascible retired surfer. Julie makes excuses. After all, she was the one who decided she never wanted to see Lucky again. Overruled in this as she is in much of her life, Julie and her friends detour to Lucky's latest scheme, Lucky's Beach Bar and Grill. They find it tucked away in a quaint coastal town on the Delaware coast. With a crescent beach of white sand, large waves, plenty of tanned young men, a lively night life, it's a perfect beach getaway.Beth and Aggie see good times ahead, Julie is determined to get through it as quickly as possible. But that will change as she gets to know Lucky's friends and confidantes. The taciturn bartender, the loyal housekeeper, the local fortune teller, the whole town shares a determination to protect him. But from what?Soon Julie and her friends are swept up in an effort to save the town's--and Lucky's-- most closely guarded secret. And Julie begins to see her uncle in a new light.Julie Barlow has a few things to learn about life--and love--and sacrifice. Her lesson begins this summer at Lucky's Beach.
Lucifer's Game
Cristina Loggia - 2021
Cordelia Olivieri is a young, determined hotel owner desperate to escape Mussolini’s racial persecution. But as Fascist leaders gather in Rome, Cordelia is suddenly surrounded by the world’s most ruthless and powerful commanders.In an effort to keep her Jewish heritage a secret and secure safe passage out of Italy, Cordelia forms a dangerous alliance with the British army who want to push the Axis out of North Africa once and for all.Going undercover, Cordelia begins obtaining and leaking military intelligence to a British agent, hoping the intel will secure her freedom. But the more Cordelia uncovers, the greater the risks – especially for one handsome German Afrika Korps officer.How far must Cordelia go to protect her identity and secure passage out of Rome?Spies, military secrets, and a personal crusade for freedom… don’t miss this utterly gripping World War II thriller.
Ultimate Power: A Thriller
Stephen W. Frey - 2018
is the youngest hedge-fund manager to make partner at a powerful investment bank on Wall Street. His career is soaring, and his financial future is secured. But with fortune comes a high price.Just as Falcon thought life couldn’t get better, his niece Claire is kidnapped—yet her abductors have no interest in money. They want information. In exchange for Claire’s safe return, Falcon must dig deep into his firm’s affairs, uncovering secrets worse than he could ever imagine.He discovers a conspiracy tied to the US government—a rogue faction is manipulating the American people to establish a new order. Now facing impossible odds and a plot that goes all the way up to the nation’s leaders, Falcon must find a way to save not only his family but also his country.
Lady of a Thousand Treasures
Sandra Byrd - 2018
But with her father’s passing and her uncle’s decline into dementia, the family business is at risk. In the Victorian era, unmarried Eleanor cannot run Sheffield Brothers alone.The death of a longtime client, Baron Lydney, offers an unexpected complication when Eleanor is appointed the temporary trustee of the baron’s legendary collection. She must choose whether to donate the priceless treasures to a museum or allow them to pass to the baron’s only living son, Harry—the man who broke Eleanor’s heart.Eleanor distrusts the baron’s motives and her own ability to be unbiased regarding Harry’s future. Harry claims to still love her and Eleanor yearns to believe him, but his mysterious comments and actions fuel her doubts. When she learns an Italian beauty accompanied him on his return to England, her lingering hope for a future with Harry dims.With the threat of debtor’s prison closing in, Eleanor knows that donating the baron’s collection would win her favor among potential clients, saving Sheffield Brothers. But the more time she spends with Harry, the more her faith in him grows. Might Harry be worthy of his inheritance, and her heart, after all? As pressures mount and time runs out, Eleanor must decide whom she can trust—who in her life is false or true, brass or gold—and what is meant to be treasured.
Viper Wine
Hermione Eyre - 2014
Plump cheeks, dilated pupils, and a heightened sense of pleasure are the first signs that they have been drinking a potent new beauty tonic, Viper Wine, distilled and discreetly dispensed by the physician Lancelot Choice.Famed beauty Venetia Stanley is so extravagantly dazzling she has inspired Ben Jonson to poetry and Van Dyck to painting, provoking adoration and emulation from the masses. But now she is married and her “mid-climacteric” approaches, all that adoration has curdled to scrutiny, and she fears her powers are waning. Her devoted husband, Sir Kenelm Digby – alchemist, explorer, philosopher, courtier, and time-traveller – believes he has the means to cure wounds from a distance, but he so loves his wife that he will not make her a beauty tonic, convinced she has no need of it. From the whispering court at Whitehall, to the charlatan physicians of Eastcheap, here is a marriage in crisis, and a country on the brink of civil war. The novel takes us backstage at a glittering Inigo Jones court masque, inside a dour Puritan community, and into the Countess of Arundel's snail closet. We see a lost Rubens altarpiece and peer into Venetia’s black-wet obsidian scrying mirror. Based on real events, Viper Wine is 1632 rendered in Pop Art prose; a place to find alchemy, David Bowie, recipes for seventeenth-century beauty potions, a Borgesian unfinished library and a submarine that sails beneath the Thames.
The Forest, Part 1 of 2
Edward Rutherfurd - 2000
. . A sprawling tome that combines fact with fiction and covers 900 years in the history of New Forest, a 100,000-acre woodland in southern England . . . Rutherfurd sketches the histories of six fictional families, ranging from aristocrats to peasants, who have lived in the forest for generations. . . . But the real success is in how Rutherfurd paints his picture of the wooded enclave with images of treachery and violence, as well as magic and beauty.”–The New York Post
Lady in Waiting
Marie Tremayne - 2018
What she doesn't expect is to find herself engaged to the vile Baron Rutherford as a means of salvaging her family's reputation. Determined not to be chained to a man she loathes, Clara slips out of Essex and sheds her identity: she becomes Helen, maid at the Earl of Ashworth’s country estate. After all, below stairs is the last place anyone would think to look for an heiress...He wants to forget his past...William, Lord Ashworth, is attempting to rebuild his life after the devastating accident that claimed the lives of his entire family, save his beloved sister and niece. Haunted by memories of what was and determined to live up to the title he never expected to inherit, William doesn’t have time for love. What he needs is a noble and accomplished wife, one who can further the Ashworth line and keep the family name untarnished...Together, can they find the perfect future?From their first encounter, the attraction between them is undeniable. But Clara knows William is falling for Helen, a woman who doesn’t even exist. The question is, if she reveals the truth about her identity, can she trust the broken William to forgive her lie and stand by her side when scandal—and the baron—inevitably follow her to his door?
Sister Stardust
Jane GreenJane Green
In her twenties, and already a famous model and actress, she moved from London to a palace in Marrakesh, with her husband Paul Getty, the famous oil heir. There she presided over a swirling ex-pat scene filled with music, art, free love and a counterculture taking root across the world. When Claire arrives in London from her small town, she never expects to cross paths with a woman as magnetic as Talitha Getty. Yearning for the adventure and independence, she's swept off to Marrakesh, where the two become kindred spirits. But beneath Talitha's glamourous facade lurks a darkness few can understand. As their friendship blossoms and the two grow closer, the realities of Talitha's precarious existence set off a chain of dangerous events that could alter Claire's life forever.
A Tropical Frontier: Tales of Old Florida
Tim RobinsonTim Robinson - 2011
While great cities were springing up ih in places with names such as St. Louis, Denver, and San Francisco, the lower peninsula of Florida endured. Here, the panther, the alligator, and the bald eagle remained safe from the restless, meddlesome hands of civilization, continuing as they had for eons past. Renegade Indians, pirates, hurricanes, and man-eating animals – not to mention poisonous snakes and bloodthirsty hordes of mosquitoes – reigned supreme. It took a certain kind of person to boldly venture into such an inhospitable environment, a place where a man had only himself and his family upon which to depend. It took men and women with not only vision, but backbone and grit, people like the MacLeods, Dawsons, and Hackensaws, true pioneers who confronted whatever came their way, together, as a family. From shipwrecks, to Indian uprisings, to buried treasure; from blockade runners, to murderous beach tramps, and the sad, lonely life of the solitary beachcomber, Tales of Old Florida takes the reader back to a singular time and place that will never be seen again. Above all, Tales of Old Florida is an epic saga of survival and prosperity, love and love lost, and most importantly, the power of the human spirit to prevail.
The Insurmountable Edge
Thomas H. GoodfellowThomas H. Goodfellow - 2020
Top employees of a U.S. defense contractor dying at an alarming rate. A cryptic message sent by a strange, secretive source warns the contractor’s products have been corrupted and could be used against the U.S. Armed Forces.They all seem to be connected. But how?Only two men on earth are capable of putting it all together and those men are Jack Wilder and Jeff Bradshaw, two of the greatest special operations forces soldiers who have ever lived.There's a problem though. Jack and Jeff are off-duty at Jack’s ranch while Jeff tries to recover from a severe case of post-traumatic stress disorder. Jack's seventeen-year-old ward, a hellcat named Adelaide, is also on the ranch. Nothing seems more impossible than getting the three of them to leave their safe commune. But then, a mysterious blue Maybach shows up at the ranch. The Maybach's visit sends Adelaide, Jack and Jeff off on a dangerous trail of murder and intrigue as they confront the insurmountable edge.“Thomas H. Goodfellow’s timely political thriller The Insurmountable Edge imagines a world in which the US and China move close to open warfare.” - Benjamin Welton, ForewordReviews.com