It's 1854 and eleven-year-old Bones is a slave on a Virginia plantation. When she finds her name in the slave-record book, she rips it out, rolls it up, and sets it free, corked inside a bottle alongside the carved peach pit heart her long-lost father made for her. Across the Atlantic on the Isle of Wight, motherless Lady Bess Kent and her sister discover Bones's bottle half-buried on the beach. Leaving Bones's name where it began and keeping the peach pit heart for herself, Bess hides her mother's pearl-encrusted cross necklace in the bottles so her scheming stepmother, Elsie, can't sell it off like she's done with other family heirlooms. When Harry, a local stonemason's son, takes the fall for Elsie's thefts, Bess works with her seafaring friend, Chap, to help him escape. She gives the bottle to Harry and tells him to sell the cross. Back across the Atlantic in Boston, Mary Margaret Casey and her father are at the docks when Mary Margaret spies something shiny. Her father fishes it out of the water, and they use the cross to pay for a much needed doctor's visit for Mary Margaret's ailing sister. As Bess did, Mary Margaret leaves Bones's name where it belongs. An epilogue returns briefly to each girl, completing the circle of the three unexpectedly interconnected lives.

    "I shall find a way to get free." "Free!" he shouted. "You are here, with us now. You can forget about your father and your sister, or anybody else you may have known. You belong to no nation but this nation. Put him back where he was and don't feed him. Tomorrow we shall talk again about freedom!"

    I shall keep it hidden, and it will be mine alone and I shall say whatever I like. So that on days and nights like this it will be company of a sort.... So begins the journal of Elizabeth Pepys, wife of the celebrated diarist Samuel. Theirs is a love match, marred only by their failure to have a child and their struggle for advancement from a state of poverty. But Sam's star is rising and their prosperity increases, only for their relationship almost to founder because of his infidelities.... This is a story of a passionate, if pain-fraught marriage, of a gloriously rich and robust period in our history and a woman's passage through the defining years of her life in which her search to draw significance from her existence is punctuated by the everyday urgencies of living. At times jauntily acerbic, at others movingly elegiac, this is a portrait of a tumultuous relationship and era that, in its sharp-edged concerns and emotions, is utterly compelling.

    The call that comes in the predawn stillness of a warm Los Angeles night shocks Ariel Gold awake. A friend has been blinded. The assualt on Laya is brutal, the result tragic, the method insidious. The LAPD thinks it's a case of product tampering, with the unlucky Laya a random victim. Ariel's not so sure. As a correspondent for the TV newsmagazine Open File, she is in a unique position to satisfy her doubts. As a friend, she won't quit until she has. But the claims of friendship, Ariel soon finds out, can prove complicated -- and dangerous....

    

    After all, it's 1825 and this is the land of opportunity!

     In TUESDAY NIGHTS, boxer Michael Cunningham is more interested in building his fortune than finding a wife, but made a promise he would marry by his twenty-eighth birthday. Reminded of the deadline by his sister, Michael realizes he has much to do in the three weeks he has if he’s to propose to Olivia—or she’ll become his sister’s governess! With no time for courtship, banns, or wedding planning, his sister insists Michael ruin Olivia! Despite feeling affection for Michael since the day he rescued her from a rake, Olivia is still shocked—and ruined!—when he climbs into her bed. Once they're married, Michael is sure Olivia despises him, while she is sure he wandered into the wrong bedchamber that fateful Tuesday night. Will a week be enough time for Michael to court Olivia, to convince her of his affections? Or will he regret his last-minute efforts to keep his promise? Only time will tell… When Clarinda married the Earl of Norwick, she thought she was marrying the Fitzwilliam twin who courted her. But it was David's identical twin brother Daniel, the spare heir, who captured her heart with pink roses and delectable kisses. So when the rakish David made her his countess, the embittered Daniel left London to run the earl's estates in Sussex. With David's sudden death comes a reunion of the star-crossed lovers—and Clarinda's randy mother-in-law. Clarinda thinks Daniel despises her for being a fortune hunter—and because she's pregnant with what might be an heir to the earldom. Daniel knows Clarinda despises him, but can't remember what caused the row they had when they last spoke. Meanwhile, David's ghost is paying nocturnal visits to Clarinda while annoying Daniel with instructions to pursue his widow and pleas to discover who caused his untimely death. Who can be in mourning when twin brothers are causing so much trouble? Or is two times the romance worth a bit of sibling rivalry? Twins double the fun in THE WIDOWED COUNTESS. When Lady Julia and her friend Samantha notice an especially handsome groom from their vantage point of a second-story bedchamber window in Mayfield House, they decide the man would make the perfect gentleman. Julia accepts Samantha's challenge to transform the man in time for a ball. Little do they know Alistair Comber is already a gentleman. The estranged second son of an earl works in service in order to make good on a promise he made to a fellow soldier while he was an officer in the British Army. Alistair agrees to Julia's request that he learn how to bow, dance and dress like a gentleman in time for her mother's ball. After all, how hard can it be when MY FAIR GROOM is already a gentleman? How hard indeed!

    Determined to liberate five quirky, ragtag orphans not likely to be adopted by caring people, they vowed the children would not end up as they had fourteen years ago. Back then, Merry and Polly and the two boys adopted with them from that orphan train worked as slaves. They received little food, substandard living quarters, and insufficient clothing to protect against the cold winters. Mary and Polly’s children love their new home and family at the sisters’ Mockingbird boarding house. The rescue idea appears to have been a great success—until the supervisor from the Children’s Protection Society arrives. Single women are not allowed to adopt. Merry and Polly each has five days to find a suitable husband who won’t steal her share of the boarding house. Two award winning and bestselling authors conspired to bring readers these two heartwarming stories, A Family For Merry and A Family For Polly in the duet, Orphan Train Brides. In addition to Orphan Train Brides, the authors have in their future projects a duet about the two brothers, Bart and Newton Bird.(The two novellas in Orphan Train Brides are expanded from previous inclusion in the Under A Mulberry Moon anthology.)

     “I climbed into this book and lived its plot. I read it at every spare moment.” Margaret “Beautifully written and engaging.” Ratana 1895, SCOTLAND Emma Greig is almost fourteen when her father announces she will be sent to be a maid at Bonnybrae Farm. She has never left her village so she is terrified of the change, especially when she realises she must learn to milk cows. PERFECT FOR FANS OF NADINE DORRIES, GLENDA YOUNG, DILLY COURT OR SHEILA NEWBERRY. Emma goes to work for the Sinclair family. Maggie Sinclair, the oldest of the Sinclair children, is kind and gentle. Her brothers, Jim and William, are friendly and tease Emma, but their mother offers no welcome. Mrs Sinclair is a proud woman with a secret in her past which has left her bitter and without compassion. She is angry when friendship blossoms between a mere maid and her own family. As the bond between Emma and her son strengthens, she dismisses Emma without notice or a reference. And William is banished from the farm he loves and sent away to Yorkshire to make his own way in the world. WILL THIS DESTROY THEIR LIVES AND BURGEONING ROMANCE? DISCOVER A ROMANTIC AND HEART-WARMING TALE ALSO BY GWEN KIRKWOOD SINCLAIR FAMILY SAGA SERIES Book 1: Moorland Mist Book 2: Moorend Farm

    

    Oaklayne Plantation is in ruins, a stark reflection of the condition of a once prosperous country and her families who have been torn apart by war. Was anything gained by the deaths of so many Americans? Is all hope for restoration gone?The Reconstruction Era is an often overlooked, but politically charged time in American history. Oaklayne, The Reconstruction presents an engaging mix of heart rending tragedy, sabotage, murder, corruption and intrigue, together with humor, romance, joy, faith, hope and love. Come along with General Adam Layne as he walks the tumultuous road toward rebuilding his live, his family, his childhood home and his country in this historically accurate portrayal of a man who refuses to accept meaningless loss.

    Army as a two-tour helicopter pilot in Vietnam. It is a true-life story of a pilot who fought for freedom and often his very life. Vietnams Saga is also a story about the meaning of life. Standing back from his war experience, Stan reflects on his ever-present faith and how it carried him through this challenging period of his life. Originally written as a legacy to Stan Corvin’s family- something that will be passed down for many generations-Vietnam Saga is now an opportunity for you to share in the legacy and the personal recollections, memories, thoughts, fears and shed tears of a decorated and dedicated American military pilot. The book also contains numerous photos.

    She has a pretty face and a sweet, grateful heart, and she's a wonder with small children. But when she nearly loses her nanny position at Pendleton Hall over a false accusation, she is sentenced to the laundry, where the endless, backbreaking work promises her no future. What were these false accusations? Can she prove her innocence?A fellow servant introduces Cassie to The Matrimonial Times. Cassie jumps at the idea of finding a husband and home of her own as a mail-order bride. Soon she is writing to Jake Everly, a Nebraska rancher, intrigued by his large extended family and small town lifestyle. Did she overreact, or did she make the right decision?When Jake proposes marriage, Cassie gratefully accepts. But while she waits for him to send the funds for her trip West, a tragic accident leaves her forever physically and emotionally scarred. What was the accident? Will Jake still want her as his wife after what happened to her?While Cassie is traveling to Nebraska, she meets a man named Zach Wright. He is going to Nebraska too, with his little nephew Samuel. When Cassie offers to help him with the toddler, Zach gratefully accepts, and watches in awe as the child instantly takes to her. Is this enough to make Zach fall in love with Cassie?Zach is prepared for life as a minister and carpenter in Nebraska, but he needs someone to help him care for his adopted little boy. Cassie longs for a family and a home, but wonders if anyone can love her now. What will happen with the arrangement between Jake and Cassie? Are love and happiness meant for Cassie, Zach, Jake, and Samuel?