Book picks similar to
Bitter Sweet by Mason N. Forbes


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You'll Be the Death of Me


Karen M. McManus - 2021
    Now all they have in common is Carlton High and the beginning of a very bad day.Type A Ivy lost a student council election to the class clown, and now she has to face the school, humiliated. Heartthrob Mateo is burned out--he's been working two jobs since his family's business failed. And outsider Cal just got stood up.... again.So when Cal pulls into campus late for class and runs into Ivy and Mateo, it seems like the perfect opportunity to turn a bad day around. They'll ditch and go into the city. Just the three of them, like old times. Except they've barely left the parking lot before they run out of things to say...Until they spot another Carlton High student skipping school--and follow him to the scene of his own murder. In one chance move, their day turns from dull to deadly. And it's about to get worse.It turns out Ivy, Mateo, and Cal still have some things in common. They all have a connection to the dead kid. And they're all hiding something.Now they're all wondering--could it be that their chance reconnection wasn't by chance after all?From the author of One of Us Is Lying comes a brand-new pulse-pounding thriller. It's Ferris Bueller's Day Off with murder when three old friends relive an epic ditch day, and it goes horribly--and fatally--wrong.

Cold Black Earth


Sam Reaves - 2015
    But after the horrors of war and a painful divorce, the only place where she can rebuild is the town she once escaped.At home, however, there is little comfort. Her brother, still reeling from his wife’s suicide, struggles to run the family farm and handle a hell-raising son. Rachel’s arrival also draws a pair of rival suitors: her brother’s handsome friend and a rough-hewn sheriff’s deputy who pined for her in high school. Romance is the last thing on Rachel’s mind, but a little comfort would be nice—except for the complications.When a deranged killer escapes from a local prison, the far-flung farmsteads go on high alert—especially when the bodies start turning up. And in a county where the miles outnumber the people, it soon becomes clear that the madman is close behind Rachel.

The Cuckoo's Gift


Anne Steinberg - 2014
    Her last visit here was twelve years ago when, through whispering mangroves, past flocks of exotic birds, skirting bobcat trails and precious mounds of turtle eggs, four children played in this earthly paradise – as explorers, naturalists, boat-builders... and eventually, as lovers. Over the intervening years, Carrie has tried to forget those summer idylls and the children who were her friends – Phoebe, who believed herself to be a mermaid, her aloof older brother Bradley, and Tristan, son of the Native American wisewoman, Tanta. Now two of them are dead and gone. In the cemetery, however, there is only one grave; in Tanta’s backyard, a mourning cradle hangs, stuffed with black raven feathers; and over at Bud’s Landing lives a small boy who has mysteriously been struck dumb. Legend says that pirates buried treasure on a sister island, but here on Sanibel, where a great storm is gathering, Carries is about to unearth some treasure of her own.

Lies That Bind Us


Andrew Hart - 2018
    She’s flying to Crete to reunite with friends she met there five years ago and relive an idyllic vacation. Basking in the warmth of the sun, the azure sea, and the aura of antiquity, she can once again pretend—for a little while—that she belongs. Her ex-boyfriend Marcus will be among them, but even he doesn’t know the secrets she keeps hidden behind a veil of lies. None of them really know her, and that’s only part of the problem.Then again, how well does she know them?When Jan awakens in utter darkness, chained to a wall, a manacle around her wrist, her echoing screams only give her a sense of how small her cell is. As she desperately tries to reconstruct what happened and determine who is holding her prisoner, dread covers despair like a hand clamped over her mouth. Because, like the Minotaur in the labyrinth in Greek myth, her captor will be coming back for her, and all the lies will catch up to her…

Another Chance


Annie Dobbs - 2017
     Stacy Brighton left her hometown on the coast of Maine ten years ago for bigger and better things and never looked back. But when her father dies unexpectedly, she’s forced to return. She won’t spend a minute longer than she has to, though. That town is full of bad memories and she doesn’t want to see any of the people she left behind, especially not Reid Callahan. Reid Callahan never wanted anything more than to live his life in Rocky Point. He loves the simple, small-town life and has proudly grown his small lobstering business into one of the premier restaurants in the area. He’s made a good life for himself but something seems to be missing. And when Stacy comes back to town, he knows exactly what it is. Too bad Stacy has no intention of staying… or does she? Even their growing attraction might not be enough to soothe old wounds and when their worst fears take root, one of them may have to sacrifice everything they thought they wanted in order to give their hearts another chance.

The Cowboy's Hope (A Second Chance Romance Novel)


Aubrey Michelle - 2017
    One will. A marriage and a baby, or we lose everything. I’d taken care of Ben Winston during his final days, and was there for him when his own family deserted him so why did he punish me during the reading of his will? The lawyer said that I have to marry his grandson, Curt, within three months of the reading of the will for the two of us to inherit half of the land. After that, we have to have a baby within one year to secure the other half of the estate; if we don’t, we both lose everything to charity. He was my first kiss. My first boyfriend. My first….everything. We both need the money for different reasons so we decide to play house just long enough to get what we both need, and then we can divorce, right? The problem is, I never thought Curt Winston could make me fall in love with him all over again. I should’ve known he’d play for keeps, especially once I was carrying his baby. The Cowboy's Hope is a full-length second chance romance novel. It contains sexy scenes, no cheating, and a happily ever after. For a limited time, I've included FREE bonus content for your enjoyment!

More Short Fuses (Four Free Short Stories)


Stephen Leather - 2014
     The short stories are: Rules of Engagement (where Spider Shepherd has to help a friend who is in serious trouble with the police), The Constituency Meeting (where a group of old folks decide to commit a murder), Ghost Kids (where a holidaymaker takes more home from Thailand than he expected) and Massage Therapy (where the massage skills of a Thai masseuse change a man's life forever). There are also tasters of five of his bestselling novels, including Hard Landing, The Stretch and The Tunnel Rats. Stephen Leather is one of the UK’s most successful thriller writers, an eBook and Sunday Times bestseller and author of the critically acclaimed Dan “Spider’ Shepherd series and the Jack Nightingale supernatural detective novels. Before becoming a novelist he was a journalist for more than ten years on newspapers such as The Times, the Daily Mirror, the Glasgow Herald, the Daily Mail and the South China Morning Post in Hong Kong. He is one of the country’s most successful eBook authors and his eBooks have topped the Amazon Kindle charts in the UK and the US. In 2011 alone he sold more than 500,000 eBooks and was voted by The Bookseller magazine as one of the 100 most influential people in the UK publishing world. Born in Manchester, he began writing full time in 1992. His bestsellers have been translated into fifteen languages. He has also written for television shows such as London’s Burning, The Knock and the BBC’s Murder in Mind series and two of his books, The Stretch and The Bombmaker, were filmed for TV. You can find out more from his website www.stephenleather.com and you can follow him on Twitter at twitter.com/stephenleather

The Sacred Cipher


Terry Brennan - 2009
    The enigma of the scroll's contents will send Bohannon and his team ricocheting around the world, drawing the heat of both Jewish and Muslim militaries, and bringing the Middle East to the brink of nuclear war in this heart-pounding adventure of historical proportions. The Sacred Cipher is a riveting, fact-based tale of mystery and suspense.

The Fixer


Rex Carpenter - 2014
    His clients call him a fixer. His enemies, a hitman for hire. For the right price, he’ll fix your problem. A call comes in. A meeting in a bar. A contract is agreed upon. But when the contract is for killing a US Senator, Bannister’s problems are just beginning. Worst of all, JC thinks he’s being set up. But the why and the who is just out of his reach. Bannister must find out who is behind the double-cross, complete the contract and satisfy his very powerful client before his solution changes the political future of the country. Or gets him and his entire team killed. The Fixer is an explosive new thriller series by Rex Carpenter that will keep you on the edge of your seat until the last body drops. WARNING: The Fixer is for mature audiences. It contains strong language and violence. If it was a movie, it would be rated R. If it was on TV, it would be on cable. If it was an album it’d have a Parental... you get the picture.

Alice's Summertime Adventure


Suzanne Jenkins - 2013
    She’s just beaten cancer and is suddenly unsure of what her next move should be. Looking back on where she’s been and what the future may hold, she knows she needs to make a big change in her life. Then her car dies on the highway after an argument with her daughter. Dave, a stranger on a motorcycle, pulls along side her and saves the day. He offers Alice a chance at adventure. She jumps on it, much to the dismay of her children. The adventure starts a chain of events that will have Alice and her children, as well as Dave questioning every aspect of their lives. There will be a few casualties along the way, a lot of anger, life changes and a few shocking surprises. Alice’s Summertime Adventure is the story of an average American family as they struggle with dilemmas we all have, and making choices that aren’t for everyone.

Thirteen for Dinner


Denise Daisy - 2013
    But it’s Averie who needs rescuing when all hell begins to break loose. Averie Cooke has never set foot on the old Faulkner plantation. The macabre history surrounding it is what keeps her away; not to mention everyone says the place is haunted. A hundred and fifty years ago Lunar Wilson was hung there. His lifeless body dangled in the breeze along with the gray Spanish moss. Later that same night, the petite southern belle, Emily Faulkner wrapped a thick rope around her delicate neck and joined her lover in the afterlife. Legend says all hell broke loose after that. Unaware that their only daughter was hanging dead up in the cupola, Emily’s parents continued on with their festivities, gorging themselves on prime rib, and guzzling expensive wine. They were pretty drunk by the time the Wilson boys burst inside the house slinging their hatchets, vindicating their brother’s murder. They decapitated James Faulkner, his socialite wife, Elizabeth and dismembered all eleven dinner guest. The massacre was the bloodiest ever recorded. So why does Averie agree to attend a dinner party in the same mansion where the massacre took place? She needs the money that’s why. But, she gets much more than a paycheck when she and another mysterious guest transports back to the year 1859, exactly one month before the gruesome event. Things go from bad to worse when she discovers the only way back home is to stop the murders. But can she put her fears aside long enough to change the past and find life in the place she fears the most?Thirteen for Dinner is a page turning thriller that will have you on the edge of your seat one minute, laughing out loud the next, and crying while you contemplate the meaning of life. Dealing with issues such as racism, slavery, hatred, and fear you’ll discover the only weapon that has the power to damage them all is love.

Shell House


Gayle Eileen Curtis - 2012
    I am a child killer. That is a reference to me that is true and unchanging. I don’t even know who I am. I know that I am a part of your society and I am a product of my circumstances and surroundings, but I am socially invisible, even though I am infamous. People become lost under their labels; wife, mother, father, sister… I am entrenched under mine.''I suppose I should have started by saying that as you read this I have no care whether you like me or not. I’m not telling you this story for any other reason than I want to expel it from myself. I am undecided about what I think of most of it and I have no regard for what you or anyone thinks of me either way. My name is Harry Rochester. My arrogance, when I began writing this, caused me to assume you knew who I was, seeing as you are, after all, reading it.'Two separate diaries of two separate lives, both having experienced years filled with guilt, loneliness and isolation. Harry Rochester, an eighty-year-old retired Barrister, begins a diary about his life, in an attempt to make sense of his regrets and the abandonment of his daughter over forty years ago. As their lives run in parallel, Gabrielle also begins a diary about her own life, in order to make sense of her catastrophic actions and the bridges that were broken with her family many years ago. They make contact with one another, and try to entwine their stories in order to put the past behind them. But the unravelling of their separate lives reveals events and misunderstandings unknown to either of them.Harry and Gabrielle desperately try and make up for all the lost years, with the threat of time running out on them both. Gayle Curtis, in a novel reminiscent of the great Thomas H. Cook, gives us two psychological portraits of a father and daughter caught up in their own guilt and emotional pain, trying to make sense of the actions and the circumstances that led to their lonely separation

Depth of Field


Audrey Claire - 2014
    She's decided after working as a forensic photographer for the NYPD and loving a man who ended up causing her to be suspected of murder, she needed a drastic change. Makayla opens her little photography studio right on Main Street and is happily shooting scenes of festivals, family annual photos, and some business promotional arrangements. She's even getting her own glamor shot together so she can create an online profile for a dating site. Unfortunately, the pain and fear of the past comes flooding back when she arrives at her shop to find the body of the local loan officer. Now Makayla has to figure out who in her idyllic new town is a murderer and if her photos, found dumped all over the body, hold the clue.

After Anna


Alex Lake - 2015
    A girl is missing. Five years old, taken from outside her school. She has vanished, traceless. The police are at a loss; her parents are beyond grief. Their daughter is lost forever, perhaps dead, perhaps enslaved. But the biggest mystery is yet to come: one week after she was abducted, their daughter is returned. She has no memory of where she has been. And this, for her mother, is just the beginning of the nightmare.

Walk Into Silence


Susan McBride - 2016
    Did she simply run off, or is something darker at play?When Patrick Dielman shows up at Detective Jo Larsen’s desk insisting that his wife, Jenny, is missing, Jo wonders if it’s a case of a bored housewife running away.But as she digs deeper into Jenny’s life, Jo learns that Dielman keeps a stranglehold on the family finances, down to the last nickel, and that Jenny’s first marriage dissolved following the death of her young son. By all accounts—including her doctor’s—she never recovered from the loss. Between a controlling husband, a tragic past, and a callous ex-husband, Jo can’t be sure if she should suspect foul play or accept that the woman may have wanted to disappear.For Jo, whose own demons are shadowing her every step, finding Jenny becomes more than the typical protect-and-serve.