Book picks similar to
Too Close for Comfort by Brooke Hastings
80s
inheritance
nutty-relative
pretence
Shifting and Bewitching
Carrie de Croix - 2016
Instead she gets adopted by a demon kitten, discovers a talent for making water obey her every command, and ends up watching over a handsome stranger in the hospital. And that's all before noon on a Tuesday.When her boss turns up dead, it's up to Sadie to solve the mysteries swirling around the town of Enchanted Shores. Why? Because she might be the next victim--and the ability to command water might mean she's a witch.Magic. Mayhem. Maybe even true love. And it all starts with a kitten, a plumbing calamity, and a trip to the beach.
Platitudes: & the New Black Aesthetic
Trey Ellis - 1988
Dewayne Wellington, a failing black experimental novelist, and Isshee Ayam, a radical feminist author, collaborate on Dewayne's latest sexist comedy. Alternately telling the story about the coming of age of Earle and Dorothy-two black middle-class teenagers, sex-starved in New York City-the battling writers sneak ever, and dangerously, closer to reconciling their literary disputes. This edition of Platitudes also includes "The New Black Aesthetic," a groundbreaking essay by Ellis that appeared in the journal Callaloo.
Thirty Day Affair
Maureen Child - 2007
His one-month commitment feels like solitary confinement-- until a snowstorm traps him with lovely Keira Sanders. Suddenly a thirty-day affair sounds like just the thing to pass the time--if Keira agrees to his no-ties arrangement.
WIllow's Worth
Kimberly Grist - 2020
She loves the wide-open countryside, where she rides and trains animals. With her twenty-first birthday approaching, her family pressures her to return to the city and take up the lavish lifestyle her uncle has planned for her. But another option piques her curiosity –a matchmaking agency’s recommendation that she begin correspondence with a handsome farmer.Hardworking, twenty-seven-year-old, Leo Weaver, is a man of many talents. He’s helped his father develop a successful farm. Loyal to Carrie town, he volunteers as a deputy sheriff. But handsome and charming, Leo’s become the target of several well-meaning ladies in the community who have submitted his name for a new matchmaking venture.Willow craves the outdoors. Leo loves community life and wants to live in town. Can a matchmaking agency really help two independent people realize the opposing desires of their hearts?
The Neon Bible
John Kennedy Toole - 1989
David's voice is perfectly calibrated, disarmingly funny, sad, shrewd, gathering force from page to page with an emotional directness that never lapses into sentimentality. Through it we share his awkward, painful, universally recognizable encounter with first love, we participate in boy evangelist Bobbie Lee Taylor's revival, we meet the pious, bigoted townspeople. From the opening lines of The Neon Bible, David is fully alive, naive yet sharply observant, drawing us into his world through the sure artistry of John Kennedy Toole.John Kennedy Toole, who won a posthumous Pulitzer Prize for his best-selling comic masterpiece A Confederacy of Dunces, wrote The Neon Bible for a literary contest at the age of sixteen. The manuscript languished in a drawer and became the subject of a legal battle among Toole's heirs. It was only in 1989, thirty-five years after it was written and twenty years after Toole's suicide at thirty-one, that this amazingly accomplished and evocative novel was freed for publication.
Amy and Jordan
Mark Beyer - 2004
Mark Beyer was breathing delirious, heartbreaking, otherworldly life into it by means of Amy and Jordan. Obviously, you weren’t reading New York Press. But I sure was. Voraciously. Back in 1989, when I discovered that Beyer’s strips were appearing regularly in this new “alternative weekly” paper, I quickly became hooked, and a thought seized me: I had to clip and save them–they were exquisite poems of urban despair, dreamy and nightmarish. I was already a fan of Beyer’s talent based on his book Agony (Pantheon, 1988), but these new strips revealed, week by week, a whole new dimension to his work–an ingenious reinvention of panel-design that redefined what a comic strip could be. As with Peanuts, it helps to try and picture these in the context which they first appeared in order to appreciate just how profoundly they emerged from anything else on the newspaper page. Even the “outré” NYP ads and listings which often ran alongside them were hopelessly dull by comparison. One of its most impressive aspects was the way Form served the Content–no matter how eccentric the layout got, it somehow never confused the narrative. And what narrative: it was as if Candide had been transported to the East Village and split in two like an amoeba and holed up in a squat on Avenue C. Along with giant bugs from outer space. So I did clip and save them, and put them into an envelope, which was then placed in a shoebox with a lot of other envelopes (receipts, receipts!), which was shoved to the back of the closet of my sixth-floor walk-up studio apartment, which I moved out of three years later and in the process I unwittingly threw them all away. Which frankly is just the sort of thing that Amy and Jordan would do. Drat. “Oh well,” I thought, once I’d realized it, “at some point someone will collect and publish them, and I’ll get them back that way.” And that was that. Fast forward more than ten years, to the spring of 2002. During a panel of cartoonists I was chairing in Philadelphia, a member of the audience asked what Mark was working on and where he was. No one seemed to know. The discussion was transcribed and published in The Comics Journal that summer, and in the fall Mark contacted me with the best possible news: He’d read the panel transcript and wanted to publish again. And the Amy and Jordan strips had never been comprehensively collected. So now, as an editor, I was able to grant my own wish. Amy and Jordan ran from 1988 through early 1996. After that, Beyer put cartooning aside to pursue other projects. This book signals his return to the realm of comics, which he says he wants to start making again. We can only hope he does. For now, I’m just thankful I finally have my Amy and Jordan collection back. –Chip Kidd, NYC, 10/03
Thomas Jefferson: A Man Divided | The Life and Legacy of Thomas Jefferson
David R. Miller - 2016
Yet his greatest accomplishments--the Louisiana Purchase, the First Barbary War, the Lewis and Clark expedition--almost all came in his first term in office. His second term saw a sharp reversal of fortunes, as catastrophe engulfed the nation and Jefferson slunk out of office, never to play a role in public affairs again. While always giving a great man his due, this new biography explores the darker side of Jefferson's political legacy, examining how the flaws in both his personality and ideology led the nation to the brink of war and dissolution. It tells how Jefferson tossed aside legal norms in his pursuit of rival judges and his own vice president, and how his 1807 Embargo Act devastated the national economy, heightened section divisions, and made a subsequent war with Great Britain all but inevitable. Only when we understand the damage that Jefferson did to America, as well as his many achievements, can we begin to grapple with the complex legacy of our nation's most complex president. Read Your Book Now Your book will be instantly and automatically delivered to your Kindle device, smartphone, tablet, and computer. FREE Bonus Book Buy Jefferson: A Man Divided now and receive instant access to your free book. Money Back Guarantee If you start reading our book and are not completely satisfied with your purchase, simply return it to Amazon within 7 days for a full refund. Go to Your Account -> Manage Your Content and Devices -> Find the Book -> Return for Full Refund. Buy Now and Read the True Story of Thomas Jefferson... Thank you in advance for buying our book. We know you'll love it!
Mistletoe and Holly
Janet Dailey - 1982
But that was before she met the new neighbor...handsome Tagg Williams. As the holidays heat up, Leslie finds herself in an awkward dance of attraction with Tagg, mesmerized by his warm smile and strong embrace -- and charmed by his sweet daughter, Holly. The more time they spend together, the more it feels like home...But even as her passion deepens, Leslie knows she will have to choose between the ghosts of her past and the once-in-a-lifetime chance to give herself and her heart to Tagg -- forever. In a captivating novel filled with Christmas magic, Janet Dailey proves once again why she is one of the best-loved storytellers of our time.
Murderers In California: The Unforgettable True Stories of Compulsive Serial Killers On the West Coast (Murderers Everywhere Book 2)
Ryan Becker - 2020
You don’t have to wait for the paycheck; you take it. You don’t have to look for pleasure; you take it.The people who populate these pages have found all the shadows in the sun-drenched state of California. They have leaped from nameless victim to nameless victim.Each killer’s only challenge was finding a spot to hide the leftover bones. Grisly, browned bones sometimes covered with muscles that looked like meat jerky occasionally turned up in backyards, discarded moldy rugs, or grime-smudged garbage bins. But as long as their victims had wallets and IDs, killers could make a living if they chose to. Of course, if one had a cause to fight for, more planning might be involved… not too elaborate… not too memorable… just efficient.This book covers famous and not-so-famous murderers, but the deaths they dealt to their victims were just as deadly, gruesome, and fatal. It didn’t matter to these soulless murderers whether death came to their anguished victims by knife, gun, bayonet, or bare hands.
Read on and discover the stories behind the lingering silent sounds of those who no longer walk above ground in California—a state meant for its beauty, beaches, and bright sun.
Bright Lights, Big City
Jay McInerney - 1984
The novel follows a young man, living in Manhattan as if he owned it, through nightclubs, fashion shows, editorial offices, and loft parties as he attempts to outstrip mortality and the recurring approach of dawn. With nothing but goodwill, controlled substances, and wit to sustain him in this anti-quest, he runs until he reaches his reckoning point, where he is forced to acknowledge loss and, possibly, to rediscover his better instincts. This remarkable novel of youth and New York remains one of the most beloved, imitated, and iconic novels in America.
Honor Bound
Erin St. Claire - 1986
But was he a troublemaker who aroused dissidence among Arizona's Native Americans...or a hero who'd gone to prison for a crime he hadn't committed? It didn't really matter now, since Lucas Greywolf had taken her hostage. He was going home to the reservation of his birth, honor bound to pay last respects to his dying grandfather. And Aislinn was his ticket home.Through their journey across the hot Arizona desert, Aislinn was alternately intrigued and infuriated by this rebel with a cause. This defiant, determined man made no secret of his hatred for her kind: the Anglos who betrayed his people.Yet among his people, Aislinn saw another side to Lucas Greywolf as she was swept into a world where sacred tradition clashed with despair and poverty, where family, heritage, and honor was all that remained. Transformed by his world, by his strength, by her growing love for this complicated, proud man, she gave in to her heart's demands, knowing that Lucas would soon return to prison. Neither anticipated the gift he'd leave behind.Honor Bound is a classic romance that explores the myriad emotions that drive men and women to find each other--to cross the boundaries of fear, uncertainty, even hate, to explore the uncharted territory of love.
Ghost Dance
Carole Maso - 1986
Like the poetry-mother in this debut novel, Maso works to ensure her readers understand and come to accept sorrow as a knowable and tactile presence. Narrating a family story through the voice of a young writer whose mother has recently been killed, Maso invites readers to experience firsthand both women's love and courage, capabilties of imagination, their persistence of memory, and generosity of spirit.It is this same generosity that allows readers the transformative intimacy Ghost Dance has to offer. Like her artist-protagonists, Maso's subject as well as medium is language, and she is brave and dangerous in her command of it. She abandons traditional narrative forms in favor of a shaped communication resembling Beckett and rivalling his evocative skill. Immersed in dilated and intense prose, the readers view is a privilege one, riding the crest of clear expression as it navigates the tangled terrain of loss and desperate sorrow.
His Mistress by Blackmail (Harlequin Presents)
Maya Blake - 2018
The first rule of blackmail?
Always stay in control
Ruthless Alexandros Christofides will stop at nothing to recover a precious family heirloom—including using delectable dancer Sage Woods as bait! But his plan to blackmail her into compliance unravels when he discovers just how quickly their attraction ignites! Now Xandro’s in danger of forgetting his own rules—because in this game of seduction, there can only be one winner…
The Really Short Poems
A.R. Ammons - 1991
. . . Ammons makes you laugh and forces you to think hard about the way humans relate to natural phenomena and to themselves. From such simple, short expression emerge complex, often confounding ideas. New readers of poetry as well as those with an active interest in lyric verse will love this volume.”—Booklist