But everything changes when Abbie is twelve and their emotional, spirited mother casts them into a crisis for which no one is prepared. Six years later the Morris family have rebuilt their lives, and when Abbie and Beatie, Abbie's adored elder sister, set off for the county fair, the world seems a good place. But their new-found happiness is not to last. A chance encounter with Louis, a personable, handsome stranger, leads to tragedy and has repercussions that threaten to destroy Abbie's peace of mind for ever. Abbie struggles to forget what happened that night, to get on with her life, but when she meets charming, honourable Arthur - and re-encounters Louis - it becomes clear that she might never recover from the night they stayed so long at the fair...

    Whether it was riding Rooting King to another Melbourne Cup victory, commentating the Olympics or hobnobbing with the country's upper crust, Rampaging Roy Slaven has lived an extraordinary life.But even some of the greatest men come from humble beginnings. Before he shot to fame as Australia's most talented sportsman, he was just another kid in Lithgow, trying to avoid Brother Connell's strap and garner the attention of Susan Morgan from the local Catholic girls school.Blessed follows one year in the life of the boy who would become Rampaging Roy Slaven, a boy who, even at the age of fifteen, knew he was destined for greatness but had to get through high school first.

    The discovery that the death of her sister, Jamie, was not an accident makes her question all she’s known about herself and her past.Traveling back home to Lyrebird Hill, Ruby begins to remember the year that has been forever blocked in her memory . . . Snatches of her childhood with beautiful Jamie, and Ruby’s only friendship with the boy from the next property, a troubled foster kid.Then Ruby uncovers a cache of ancient letters from a long-lost relative, Brenna Magavin, written from her cell in a Tasmanian gaol where she is imprisoned for murder. As she reads, Ruby discovers that her family line is littered with tragedy and violence.Slowly, the gaps in Ruby’s memory come to her. And as she pieces together the shards of truth, what she finally discovers will shock her to the core – about what happened to Jamie that fateful day, and how she died.A thrilling tale about family secrets and trusting yourself...

    . . until you get there.For generations Bronwyn Eddings's family has thrived in the legal profession and a position at their prestigious firm is hers by right. Only problem is: she does not want it.Her best friend Claudia has always dreamed of being a lawyer, but tragedy struck and she took up the reins of her father's vineyard instead. It was supposed to be temporary . . . now there's no end in sight.Bronwyn wants Claudia's life so badly. Claudia can't imagine anything better than Bronwyn's job. So the friends hatch a crazy plan to swap places.Both are determined to be the person they always thought they could never be. But achieving your dreams isn't easy – and falling in love with the men who oppose them is not a good idea . . .

    What more could you need?? But Millie isn?t sure that Tom, her mum?s boyfriend, is right about that. A new town, a school project due, an enemy called Tayla, a boy with the initials RH and Tom himself?. It?s all too much even for an interesting girl like Millie. But as her father says, change is needed, and sometimes it?s the biggest changes that make us who we are. Millie and the Night Heron is a gentle, lyrical and moving tale from award-winning author Catherine Bateson which reminds us all to stop and remember the important things in life.

    A prickling sensation crawls up her arms, her heart rate speeds up. ‘Found who?’ she asks, slowly, carefully, deliberately. ‘They found Daniel.’ Six years ago Megan waits at the school gates for her six-year-old son, Daniel. As children come and go, the playground emptying, panic bubbles inside her. Daniel is nowhere to be found. According to his teacher, Daniel’s father, Greg, has picked up his son. Except Greg and Megan are no longer together. After years of being controlled by her cruel husband, Megan has finally found the courage to divorce him. Hands trembling, she dials his number, but the line is dead. Six years later Megan is feeding baby daughter, Evie, when she gets the call she has dreamt about for years. Daniel has walked into a police station in a remote town just a few miles away. Her son is alive – and he’s coming home. But their joyful family reunion does not go to plan. His room may have been frozen in time, with his Cookie Monster poster and stack of Lego under the bed, but Daniel is no longer the sweet little boy Megan remembers. Cold and distant, Daniel is grieving the death of his father, blaming Megan for his loss and rejecting his family. And as Megan struggles to connect with the son she no longer recognises as her own, she begins to realise that Daniel has a secret. A secret that could destroy their family and put them in terrible danger. A heartbreaking, emotional drama about a family in turmoil, with a jaw-dropping twist that will blow you away. Fans of Jodi Picoult, Liane Moriarty and Lisa Wingate – this moving and poignant novel is for you.

    She tries to make sense of her mother's brooding, and her father's violent moods. She worships her big brother, Dunc, but when he goes missing, she's terrified it's her fault. The bush and the birds and the endless beach are her only salvation, apart from her teacher, Miss Taylor. Sylvie is a charming narrator with a big heart and a sharp eye for the comic moment. In the tradition of Anne Tyler, The Lost Child is a beautifully written story about family and identity and growing up. It's about what happens when the the world can never be the same again. 'An assured and bittersweet coming-of-age tale.' Books+Publishing

    Seventeen-year-old Maddie Bright embarks on the voyage of a lifetime when she's chosen to serve on the cross-continent tour of His Royal Highness, the dashing Edward, Prince of Wales. Life on the royal train is luxurious beyond her dreams, and the glamorous, good-hearted friends she makes--with their romantic histories and rivalries--crack open her world. But glamour often hides all manner of sins.Decades later, Maddie lives in a ramshackle house in Brisbane, whiling away the days with television news and her devoted, if drunken, next door neighbor. When a London journalist struggling with her own romantic entanglements begins asking Maddie questions about her relationship to the famous and reclusive author M.A. Bright, she's taken back to the glamorous days of the royal tour--and to the secrets she's kept for all of these years.

    The hood raised her, but she's determined to let her humbled spirit take her out of it. Living a normal life is only a choice that she's made, however. Unlike Gianni, her mother, Tommy, is a bigger queen pin than any king pin in Tallahassee Florida and in the down south area. She takes care of Gianni and her two kids with no problems. Tommy could easily give Gianni the salon and big house that Gianni has always dreamed of, but Gianni wants to accomplish her goals on her own. Due to her mother being in and out of Federal Prison, Gianni reminds herself that she has two kids to think about, and she can not and will never leave her kids behind, like Tommy did her. Instead, Gianni allows her baby's father, Lamont, to take care of her and her kids. She feels he owes her that much, due to all the pain he's caused her. However, dealing with him has caused nothing but heartache, distraction and drama. After finding out about the third child that he could possibly have on her, she finally decides to stray away from him and focus on she and her kids. She meets a handsome and wealthy man by the name of Kreed at her mother's house during Tommy's known 'gambling day'. Kreed is a different breed, and though Gianni only wants friends so that she can do a little living, Kreed is hard to shake. He has that smart, hood, and smooth demeanor that Gianni admires. Being surrounded by drugs and a lot of money didn't mean a thing to Kreed. He loves his legal businesses and he enjoys living his life the right way. He's feeling Gianni just as much as she's feeling him, but he when Lamont finds out that there's a new man in town who's stole Gianni's heart, he makes she and her kids life a living hell. Which causes Kreed to bring out his old vicious ways! Tumultuous drama starts to unfold, and it will be up to Gianni to get everything in line to save what she has with Kreed.

    However, with his and Taylor's wedding just weeks away, he wants to adopt Reese so she'll be his daughter not only in his heart but also in the eyes of the world. Unfortunately, a single letter from Reese's biological mother in prison sends Jordan King, a man who believes he might be Reese’s father, to Taylor's door and puts his plan in jeopardy.A Billionaire's Love is the fifteenth book in USA Today best selling author Christina Tetreault’s The Sherbrookes of Newport Series. While it can easily be read as a standalone story, you'll likely enjoy reading the other books, too.

    A young African boy, the son of one of her clients, has been murdered in a dingy back alley. Stella, in her forties and running low on empathy, heads into the night to comfort the grieving mother. But when she gets there, she makes a discovery that has the potential to uncover something terrible from her past — something she thought she'd gotten away with.Then Stella's neighbour Tania mysteriously vanishes. When Stella learns that Tania is the heir to a billion-dollar mining empire, Stella realises her glamorous young friend might have had more up her sleeve than just a perfectly toned arm. Who is behind her disappearance?Enlisting the help of her friend, Senior Constable Phuong Nguyen, Stella's investigation draws her further and further into a dark world of drug dealers, sociopaths, and killers, such as the enigmatic Mr Funsail, whose name makes even hardened criminals run for cover.One thing is clear: Stella needs to find answers fast — before the people she's looking for find her instead.Set in the bustling, multicultural innerwest of Melbourne, Good Money reveals a daring and exciting new voice in Australian crime fiction.

    candidate in archaeology, arrives on the ancient Scottish island of Findnar. After years of estrangement from her father, himself an archaeologist who recently died, Freya has come to find out what she can about his work. As she reads through his research notes, she sees he learned a great deal about the Viking and Christian history of the island. But what he found only scratches the surface of the discoveries Freya is about to make.In 800 A.D. a Pictish girl named Signy loses her entire family during a Viking raid. She is taken in by the surviving members of the Christian community on Findnar, but when she falls deeply in love with a Viking boy, she is cast out. She eventually becomes a nun and finds herself at the center of the clash between the island’s three religious cultures. The tragedy of her story is that, in the end, she must choose among her adopted faith, her native religion, and the man she loves.Centuries apart, Freya and Signy are each on the verge of life-changing events that will bring present-day and Viking-era Scotland together. The Island House plunges the reader into a past that never dies and a love that reaches out across a thousand years.

    Chickamauga is also a virtuoso exploration of the power of concision in lyric poetry--a testament to the flexible music of the long line Wright has made his own. As a reviewer in Library Journal noted: "Wright is one of those rare and gifted poets who can turn thought into music. Following his self-prescribed regimen of purgatio, illuminato, and contemplatio, Wright spins one lovely lyric after another on such elemental subjects as sky, trees, birds, months, and seasons. But the real subject is the thinking process itself and the mysterious alchemy of language: 'The world is a language we never quite understand.'"

    Almost teenagers, they already know some things are better left unsaid.Then a newcomer arrived in the Wimmera. Fab reckoned he was a secret agent and he and Ben staked him out. Up close, the man's shoulders were wide and the veins in his arms stuck out, blue and green. His hands were enormous, red and knotty. He looked strong. Maybe even stronger than Fab's dad. Neither realised the shadow this man would cast over both their lives.Twenty years later, Fab is still stuck in town, going nowhere but hoping for somewhere better. Then a body is found in the river, and Fab can't ignore the past any more.

    He is an Australian engineer living in Paris, in Italy for a round of meetings; she is a translator, normally resident in Turin. The food and wine are delicious, the spring evening wonderful, and as perhaps can only happen between perfect strangers aware that they will never meet again, the conversation becomes intimate and intense, full of thoughts and stories, risk, speculation and wonder. She has questions of a kind she can ask of no one else. He finds, as the wine flows, delicious dishes come and go, and the velvet night deepens, that he doesn’t have as many answers as he might have thought he had. As the conversation unfolds, the reader is treated to Brooks’ effortless reflections on culture, philosophy, language, history, art, desire and, most importantly, love. Not to mention his evocative and mouth-watering descriptions of Italian food!Together, Brooks’ whimsy, the romantic exotica of the Italian setting and the protagonists’ intimate stories and confessions make for a wonderfully entertaining read that effortlessly balances substance with style.‘The idea of the novel had me salivating long before I held the pages in my hand … This is a book for lovers of ideas, of good conversation, of impossible loves — and for those intellectuals who enjoy having heated arguments in cafes.’ Bookseller + Publisher