Book picks similar to
The Golden Key by Cathleen Townsend


historical-fiction
hope-giving
love-it
ad-high-fantasy

The Almost Good Witch


Erin Huss - 2020
    Cursed with eternal life because of a hex gone wrong many centuries ago, Abigail spent her days exacting revenge on those she found to be the vilest of humans, from evil dictators to shoppers who didn't return their grocery carts. The line between good and annoying may have gotten blurred over the years. Sick of spending immortality frozen at the age of twenty-five, Abigail does the only thing she can--turn herself into the Supernatural Crimes Department. Now she's a member of Dark Magic Anonymous with a three year probation and a parole officer who is annoyingly powerful and more annoyingly cute. Oh, and she's traded in her broomstick for a Prius. After centuries of being evil, Abigail struggles with entering the workforce and being good. But that pesky probation means one slip up will result in a life sentence. She's not about to let that happen, and things are going well until her boss turns up dead with all evidence pointing to her. Will Abigail be able to maintain her new good witch ways while she hunts a killer, or will she slip up and spend the rest of forever behind bars?★Recipe Included★

Kismet


K.A. Poe - 2014
    Sometimes you get what you ask for.Sixteen-year-old Madison Banner had the perfect life: a good home, great friends, and loving parents. Everything was normal, until she overheard that she had been adopted.After confronting her parents, Madison was left with more questions than what had been answered. Rules were set. She would be told the truth after she graduated -- two years.As Madison pries into the secrets of her heritage, she discovers more than she ever bargained for. Strange things begin to happen. Dreams of a mysterious nightly visitor seem all too real. A power within her awakens. There was more handed down through her DNA than dark hair and purple eyes. She has been given a destiny, whether she wanted it or not.Kismet is the first novel in the follow-up-series to K.A. Poe’s Nevermore, but can be read as a stand-alone series. This novel is approximately 70,000 words in length (340 pages).

Dragon Games: The Legion Academy


Marisa Claire - 2019
    The call is so powerful that no one can resist. The only way to stop the calling is to trek up the treacherous Drakken Peak to confront your destiny.Dima Marren is a simple peasant from the small village of Pithe in the Darkken Empire. Her life was never meant to amount to anything, until she hears the Call of the Dragons. Honor and wealth await, if she can survive what’s to come.If chosen, riders must attend the Legion Academy and take part in the deadly Dragon Games--a brutal competition designed to cull the weak.On her quest, Dima meets Arlen, a gorgeous, but infuriating Noble Rider who reveals the truth about the academy and games. Despite hating one another, they will need each other to survive what's to come.If she can trust him, the truth will change everything.

Now & Grim: A Grimlock Family Short


Amanda M. Lee - 2018
    All of that flies out the window when his girlfriend Maya insists on a double date with her brother and his sister. And, to make matters worse, she picks the activity … and it’s a Shakespeare in the Park event. Culture and the Grimlocks? Uh-oh. In short order, Cillian finds himself saddled with his drunk sister, his girlfriend’s intense brother, and a murder that didn’t show up on the reaper list. Oh, it also happened in public, and there are suspects around every corner. Unsure where to turn, Cillian calls his father and it’s up to the Grimlock family to solve the murder, track down the errant soul, and somehow keep his sister Aisling from causing his father to explode. So, basically, it’s a normal summer night … as long as no one gets hurt in the process, that is. Note: This is a 28,000-word short set in the Aisling Grimlock world. It’s set in the past so it can be read at any time.

Broken Dreams


Traci Hunter Abramson - 2021
    Now a coach, her father Gordon is living his dreams through the skaters he trains—until Maggie is forced to deliver heartbreaking news: her mother’s battle against cancer will be a losing one. Shattered, her father loses his dreams in an instant—his beloved wife and his will to coach. Left to pick up the pieces, a devastated Maggie finds herself relying on the steadfast support of her childhood best friend, Lance Whitmore. Despite the fact that Maggie has never seen Lance as more than a friend, his heart has always been hers. Lance does what he can to help Maggie work through her grief, and soon their friendship blossoms into love. But when distance threatens their relationship, Maggie is torn between building a life with the man she loves and helping her broken father rebuild his life.

Tor


Zoe Chant - 2022
    And Tor already had her inside before he remembered what she was going to see.His brother and sister had frozen in mid-argument, both with handfuls of their dad's fur as they tried to tug him back to wakefulness or at least out of the kitchen."Is that ...?" Bernie began. She blinked and rubbed her eyes.It was possible to pass off a werewolf as a dog, but there was absolutely no mistaking a polar bear for anything else.There was a polar bear lying in the middle of the kitchen. A very large, very shaggy bear. And Tor's brother and sister were both frozen in the act of trying to pick it up."Oh, hi!" Inga said, very brightly. She dropped her double handful of Stieg's ruff, allowing his head to clunk to the floor—his tongue was lolling out now—and strode forward with a hand held out. There were long white strands of polar bear fur all over her shirt. "You must be Tor's mate—uh—friend! Hi! I'm Tor's sister. I'm Inga. What's your name?"Bernie kept trying to peer around her, where Eren had given up trying to shake the bear awake and instead delivered a swift kick to his backside. The bear grunted, rolled over, and started snoring."I, uh, I'm Bernie," said Bernie. "Is your—um—is your bear all right?""He's drunk," Eren said darkly.Tor could have pushed him through the trap door at that moment."Your ... bear is drunk," Bernie said.Compared to this, even trying to deal with a demon cat destroying her curtains, her backseat, and everything else she owned seemed halfway normal.Jump into a brand new series from Zoe Chant, featuring a beautiful, magical shifter town, a sexy, protective hero with a chaotic polar bear family, a tough heroine picking up the pieces of her shattered heart, a maybe-haunted lighthouse ... and a cat only his owner could love.

In the Night Wood


Dale Bailey - 2018
    Failed father, failed husband, and failed scholar, Charles hopes to put his life back together with a biography of Caedmon Hollow, the long-dead author of a legendary Victorian children's book, In the Night Wood. But soon after settling into Hollow's remote Yorkshire home, Charles learns that the past isn't dead. In the neighboring village, Charles meets a woman he might have loved, a child who could have been his own lost daughter, and the ghost of a self he thought he'd put behind him. And in the primeval forest surrounding Caedmon Hollow's ancestral home, an ancient power is stirring. The horned figure of a long-forgotten king haunts Charles Hayden's dreams. And every morning the fringe of darkling trees presses closer. Soon enough, Charles will venture into the night wood. Soon enough he'll learn that the darkness under the trees is but a shadow of the darkness that waits inside us all.

Prosper's Demon


K.J. Parker - 2020
    But they don’t die, and we do. Equilibrium.The unnamed and morally questionable narrator is an exorcist with great follow-through and few doubts. His methods aren’t delicate but they’re undeniably effective: he’ll get the demon out — he just doesn’t particularly care what happens to the person.Prosper of Schanz is a man of science, determined to raise the world’s first philosopher-king, reared according to the purest principles. Too bad he’s demonically possessed.

Minetta Lane


A. Robert Allen
    He struggles to find the strength and courage to survive in his new surroundings, which are governed by an unusual race-based code. Bodee’s circle of family and friends help him successfully manage some initial tests of his perseverance, but when he finds himself alone and confronted with an overwhelming challenge, he isn’t sure he’s up to the task. Stand and fight or cut and run? Running is what he knows. Running is what will keep him safe. Will Bodee find the courage to fight, or will he simply do what he has always done? Pick up a copy to find out. MINETTA LANE, the third volume in A. Robert Allen’s Slavery and Beyond series, is a stand-alone novel that continues the broad themes of the first two volumes, Failed Moments and A Wave From Mama.

The Witches of the Blue Well


Paula Brackston - 2012
    But when famine and hardship come to their village, will Ceri be able to harness her magic to save herself and her sister, or will her power bring about the destruction of all that she loves? With her signature enchanting style, Paula Brackston has penned an enthralling story set in the world of her newest novel The Winter Witch.In addition to the short story, THE WITCHES OF THE BLUE WELL, this also contains a letter from the author, Paula Brackston, on writing THE WINTER WITCH, an excerpt from “Welsh Folk Lore: a Collection of the Folk-Tales and Legends of North Wales,” an authentic publication by the Reverend Elias Owen, from 1886, on witchcraft in Wales, and an excerpt from THE WINTER WITCH, a beautiful and moving novel coming from St. Martin’s Press in February.

If the Cursed Shoe Fits


Nyx Halliwell - 2020
    Oh my!When it comes to magic powers, I hit the oddball lottery. All I have to do is step into people’s shoes and—poof—I instantly learn all the most private things about them, those things they most desperately want to hide from the world.Naturally, when a woman turns up dead wearing an actress’s very famous—and very cursed—glass slippers, everyone looks to me for answers.I just want to sell soap and candles with my sisters in our family’s shop, but turns out nobody is willing to let me off the hook that easily. And that hook includes going undercover at a swanky ball with the deceased spoiled prince of a son.Will donning my party dress and stepping into these cursed shoes lead me down the right path, or will I wind up tumbling headfirst into my grave?

Tales Around the Jack O'Lantern II: A Mary O'Reilly Short Story


Terri Reid - 2015
    Set twelve years before Mary moves to Freeport, this novelette is the second in the "Tales" series and offers six unique ghost stories that will leave you checking over your shoulder just to make sure no one “uninvited” is in the room with you. Happy Halloween!

Finally Home


Deborah Raney - 2016
    As if life couldn’t get any more complicated for Brian, he is assigned a beautiful, sassy physical therapist who just happens to be an outspoken war protestor. Kathy Nowlin has lived her life with passion, but her passions for her career and her strong feelings about the war collide in the person of Brian Lowe. Can these two searching souls ever find common ground? Set against the nostalgic backdrop of bell-bottoms, Volkswagen Beetles, tie-dye, and rock and roll, the darker rumblings of the Vietnam War era cast their shadow as Raney's novella explores timeless questions of life, love, and faith.

The Foot Soldier


Mark Rubinstein - 2013
    The Foot Soldier brings you to the hell of jungle combat. Close your eyes and this novella takes you there. It conveys the terror and brutality of jungle warfare and their effect on the American riflemen--those who bore the greatest burden. It's every bit as compelling as The Things They Carried.

Waking Kate


Sarah Addison Allen - 2013
    One sticky summer day as Kate is waiting for her husband to come home from his bicycle shop, she spots her distinguished neighbor returning from his last day of work after six decades at Atlanta's oldest men's clothing store. Over a cup of butter coffee, he tells Kate a story of love and heartbreak that makes her remember her past, question her present, and wonder what the future will bring. A magical story on its own, Waking Kate is also a short fiction tie-in to Allen's 2014 bestseller Lost Lake.