She recycles, obeys the water restrictions, she is even polite to telemarketers. as a mother, wife, daughter and nurse, Helen is used to putting everyone's needs before her own. But it only takes one momentary lapse of concentration to shatter her life forever.There was no momentary lapse for Gemma. Her customary recklessness leaves her pregnant, alone and estranged from her family with her one-promising advertising career in tatters.So when Gemma barges unceremoniously into Helen's life, things will never be the same again for either of them. Two very different women who have one thing in common - their lives have fallen short of their expectations. But is fate offering them a second chance?

     For the contestants, this publicity gimmick represents a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity for a fresh start, a chance to break records, and to prove themselves in an unlikely test of endurance. It pits the patience of an elderly night watchman against the youthful vigor and carefully cultivated stamina of a high school track-and-field star. It sets a single mother who spends her life on her feet against a down-on-his-luck Mensa member who tells anyone who will listen that he's got the whole thing figured out. As the days and nights unavoidably carry on -- and big talk and clever strategies backfire -- the contestants' true colors come through in unexpected twists. At once lyrical and suspenseful, and by turns poignant and hilarious, Show of Hands and its all-too-human characters are ultimately unforgettable.

    With the help of David Tushingham, he has adapted Salman Rushdie's classic children's novel, Haroun and the Sea of Stories for the stage. Set in an exotic eastern landscape peopled by magicians and fantastic talking animals, Rushdie's novel inhabits the same imaginative space as Gulliver's Travels, Alice in Wonderland and The Wizard of Oz. Haroun sets out on an adventure to restore the poisoned source of the sea of stories. On the way he encounters many foes, intent on draining the sea of all its storytelling powers.

    One secret. Will they be able to keep it under wraps?It was a stormy evening in 1920s London. When newly qualified almoner, Alice, stepped into the home of Charlotte, a terrified teenager who had just given birth out of wedlock, she did not expect to make a pact that would change her life forever. Thrown into secrecy after an unexpected turn, Alice was determined to keep bewildered Charlotte and her newborn baby safe. But when a threatening note appeared, she realised that Charlotte may need more protection than she first thought. But from who?Based on extensive research into the archive material held at the London Metropolitan Archives, and enriched with lively social history and excerpts from newspaper articles, LETTERS FROM ALICE is a gripping and deeply moving tale, which brings the colourful world of 1920s London to life. Full of grit, mystery and hope, it will have readers enthralled from the very first page.

    • Stories beyond the digest and tidbits you may not know • The book's impact and its important to read • And more! What other readers are saying: "You can read it before you read the novel or after you read it as a supplement to the actual book." "Very concise and helpful for our Book Club." "It is full of story information, interesting facts about the novel and the author as well." "This overview gave me an idea of what the book covers. From it, I have been able to decide whether or not to purchase the book." "The Digest helped clarify the historical background. Beautifully written and deeply moving." Our promise: Reader’s Companions bring you immaculate study materials on literature at exceptionally low prices that do not compromise on quality. These are supplementary materials and does not contain any text or summary of the book. 100% satisfaction guaranteed.

    Hope and humanity confront cold reality in three intricately connected stories: Hortense yearns for a new life away from rural Jamaica, Gilbert dreams of becoming a lawyer, and Queenie longs to escape her Lincolnshire roots.Helen Edmundson’s stage adaptation of Andrea Levy's novel traces the tangled history of Jamaica and the UK throughout the Second World War until 1948 – the year HMT Empire Windrush docked at Tilbury.

    

    

    She visited China for the first time in 1987 and found it just as her mother had said: "As soon as my feet touched China, I became Chinese".

    Purchase includes a free trial membership in the publisher's book club where you can select from more than a million books without charge. Chapters: First Among Sequels, the Eyre Affair, Lost in a Good Book, the Well of Lost Plots, Something Rotten, the Big Over Easy, the Fourth Bear, Shades of Grey 1: the Road to High Saffron. Source: Wikipedia. Free updates online. Not illustrated. Excerpt: First Among Sequels is an alternate history, comic fantasy novel by the British author Jasper Fforde. It is the fifth Thursday Next novel, first published on 5 July 2007 in the UK, and on 24 July 2007 in the USA. The novel follows the continuing adventures of Thursday Next in her fictional version of Swindon and in the BookWorld, and is the first of a new four-part Nextian series. The title was originally announced, at the end of Fforde's novel The Fourth Bear, as The War of the Words. In order to save the future, undercover SpecOps investigator Thursday Next attempts to convince her son Friday to join the ChronoGuard. To complicate matters, she'll have to deal with renegade apprentices, ruthless corporations, and a sting operation from the Cheese Enforcement Agency. The title First Among Sequels was met with stiff resistance from Fforde's publishers because it had 'sequel' in the title, and it was felt that telegraphing the 'sequelness' of the book might be a bad move. It was decided, however, to capitalise on the fact that this was a series - a sort of 'Have you discovered Thursday Next yet?' approach to marketing. First Among Sequels is the first part of a new four-part Thursday Next series, which is reported to be continued with One of our Thursdays is Missing in 2009. The title is a parody of First Among Equals, which is the title of a best-selling Jeffrey Archer novel, but also comes from the English translation of the Latin phrase primus inter pares. It is traditionally used to describe the position...More: http: //booksllc.net/?id=602795

     8 Golden Charms. One Man’s Journey of Discovery. “[A] charming, unforgettable story.” – Harper’s BazaarHaving been married for over 40 years, 69-year-old Arthur Pepper is mourning the loss of his wife. On the anniversary of her death, he finally musters the courage to go through her possessions, and happens upon a charm bracelet that he has never seen before.What follows is a surprising adventure that takes Arthur from London to Paris and India in an epic quest to find out the truth about his wife’s secret life before they met, a journey that leads him to find healing, self-discovery, and love in the most unexpected of places.

    A sense of peril and wartime shortages have reached even the small town of Fort Benton, Montana, where 13-ear-old Ben Colby is growing up. Ben is in love for the first time, with Ellie Beck, a high-school beauty who is three years older than Ben. But that's not the only dilemma Ben is facing. When he learns that one of his mother's old boyfriend has moved to town, he worries about what that might mean for his parents' seemingly shaking marriage. Everyone is nearly frantic about the polio epidemic that is raging through the town. In the midst of all this, Ben tries to befriend a stray sheepdog that no one has ever been able to win over - a dog that remain fiercely loyal to its previous master.Reminiscent of A River Runs through It and Montana 1948, Cold Train Coming capture the essence of a simpler time in American history, a setting in which a boy struggles to understand a looming adult world that is overwhelming and mysterious. Filled with humor and emotion, Cold Train Coming is a nostalgic, coming-of-age story that will take you back to the bittersweet days of adolescence, when summer was endless, first love was both thrilling and frustrating, and the future was as exciting as it was uncertain.

    First US publication for the Scottish Spence.Neil McGraw is a lad in Glasgow, an only child, the son of a dour undertaker permanently embittered by his wife's death during childbirth. Whenever the boy misbehaves, he's locked in the basement among the coffins, so it's not surprising he asks every body: What happens when you die? Against his will, he finds himself learning the trade. This is less gloomy than it sounds. The story moves at a good clip as the resilient Neil experiments with drinking and dating.The crisis comes when his dad finds him and his girl making out in a coffin. Soon, it's Neil's turn to lock his old man, dead drunk, into the basement, before hightailing it to the London of the Swinging '60s. A friendly queer, Abe Morris, offers him a crash pad, no strings attached, where Neil finds drugs, straight sex, and Zen. The party ends when Abe, stoned, is killed in traffic and Spence abandons conventional narrative to send Neil hopscotching around the world before depositing him, 15 years later, beside the funeral pyres of the Ganges. Here, he gets very sick but is rescued by a vision in a sari: Lila, a Londoner, back home for her father's funeral. The two fall in love and marry, lickety-split, before Neil is summoned back to Glasgow. His father has died, leaving him the business, which Neil gives a hippie twist, producing brightly painted coffins in unusual shapes, with Lila a business partner.The mood is light and buoyant, but novelistic concerns (what makes Lila tick? why do the couple decide not to have kids?) are shelved in favor of a scrapbook of original last rites, seasoned with Eastern mysticism. There's an appealing freshness to Spence's writing; too bad he gives up on credible plotting and characterization.

    The women are now in their seventies and time is rendering its Accounts Payable: arthritis, cataracts, forgetfulness, and departures.From the dawn of the new millennium - at which the anti-Christ unaccountably fails to appear, despite evangelist Gayle's predictions - Peggy soldiers on through new upheavals, including her ex-husband Vern's Alzheimer's diagnosis, and the death of one of her live-in friends. Then, on a clear blue day in September 2001, the US Air Force scrambles too late to save America from four hostile attacks, and for the first time Peggy wonders if being a USAF wife - the constant worry about your husband, the faraway postings in Alaska, Norfolk, Siberia, the lack of control over your own life - was worth it.You're getting very negative in your old age, Peggy Dewey, says Lois. Sure it was worthwhile. Leastways we're not speaking Russky. And besides, we had some fun. Didn't we have some fun?

    Her obsession with the case intensifies with the abduction of her five-year old son. Ben Orton, an ex-SAS soldier metes out revenge on former members of the IRA who murdered his brother and are released as part of the Good Friday agreement. Living in a secluded location in Scotland, a stranger approaches Orton and blackmails him into joining The Disciples of Retribution, a select band of vigilantes. The abductors of the children share an unusual fantasy, their frightening and abnormal behaviour provoking punishment for the youngsters. Hush Little Children, a tale of revenge and indignity, will frighten and captivate you.