On a rare, sober day he begins a casual search through college yearbooks and yellowed courthouse records in hopes of finding the one who got away. Instead, an unrecorded codicil suggests their one union was fruitful and reveals a possible heir to an old-moneyed family used to scams and scammers making claims against the estate. After run-ins with a cabal of bankers, lawyers, in-laws, outlaws, and even the F.A.A. Cape begins to put the pieces of the puzzle together...

    As the book opens, he is driving along a dark road when he is distracted by what seems to be a flight of arrows. He crashes into a ravine and suffers horrible burns over much of his body. As he recovers in a burn ward, undergoing the tortures of the damned, he awaits the day when he can leave the hospital and commit carefully planned suicide—for he is now a monster in appearance as well as in soul. A beautiful and compelling, but clearly unhinged, sculptress of gargoyles by the name of Marianne Engel appears at the foot of his bed and insists that they were once lovers in medieval Germany. In her telling, he was a badly injured mercenary and she was a nun and scribe in the famed monastery of Engelthal who nursed him back to health. As she spins their tale in Scheherazade fashion and relates equally mesmerizing stories of deathless love in Japan, Iceland, Italy, and England, he finds himself drawn back to life—and, finally, in love.He is released into Marianne's care and takes up residence in her huge stone house. But all is not well. For one thing, the pull of his past sins becomes ever more powerful as the morphine he is prescribed becomes ever more addictive. For another, Marianne receives word from God that she has only twenty-seven sculptures left to complete—and her time on earth will be finished.

    At nineteen, Mary Boulton has just become a widow—and her husband's killer. As bloodhounds track her frantic race toward the mountains, she is tormented by mad visions and by the knowledge that her two ruthless brothers-in-law are in pursuit, determined to avenge their younger brother's death. Responding to little more than the primitive fight for life, the widow retreats ever deeper into the wilderness—and into the wilds of her own mind—encountering an unforgettable cast of eccentrics along the way. With the stunning prose and captivating mood of great works like Charles Frazier's Cold Mountain or early Cormac McCarthy, Gil Adamson's intoxicating debut novel weds a brilliant literary style to the gripping tale of one woman's desperate escape.

    But headstrong, passionate Laura wants more, and when she takes a leap of faith and applies to the Columbia Journalism School, her world is cracked wide open. As her studies take her all over the city, she finds herself drawn to Greenwich Village's new bohemia, where she discovers the Heterodoxy Club--a radical, all-female group in which women are encouraged to loudly share their opinions on suffrage, birth control, and women's rights. Soon, Laura finds herself questioning her traditional role as wife and mother. But when valuable books are stolen back at the library, threatening the home and institution she loves, she's forced to confront her shifting priorities head on . . . and may just lose everything in the process.Eighty years later, in 1993, Sadie Donovan struggles with the legacy of her grandmother, the famous essayist Laura Lyons, especially after she's wrangled her dream job as a curator at the New York Public Library. But the job quickly becomes a nightmare when rare manuscripts, notes, and books for the exhibit Sadie's running begin disappearing from the library's famous Berg Collection. Determined to save both the exhibit and her career, the typically risk-adverse Sadie teams up with a private security expert to uncover the culprit. However, things unexpectedly become personal when the investigation leads Sadie to some unwelcome truths about her own family heritage--truths that shed new light on the biggest tragedy in the library's history.

    From dawn until dusk, these ladies work the looms, but the thrill of independence, change in their pockets, and friendships formed along the way mostly make the backbreaking labor worthwhile. In fact, Hiram Fiske, the steely-eyed titan of industry, has banked on that. But the working conditions are becoming increasingly dangerous and after one too many accidents, Alice finds herself unexpectedly acting as an emissary to address the factory workers' mounting list of grievances.After traveling to the Fiske family's Beacon Hill mansion, Alice enters a world she's never even dared to dream about: exquisite silk gowns, sumptuous dinners, grand sitting parlors, and uniformed maids operating with an invisible efficiency. Of course, there's also a chilliness in the air as Alice presents her case. But with her wide, intelligent eyes and rosy-hued cheeks, Alice manages to capture the attention of Hiram's eldest son, the handsome and reserved Samuel Fiske.Their chemistry is undeniable, soon progressing from mutual respect and shy flirtation into an unforgettable romance. But when Alice's best friend, Lovey, is found strangled in a field, Alice and Samuel are torn between loyalty to "their kind" and a chance for true love.

    But when he dies on their wedding night, she finds herself a penniless widow. Her only legacy is Brooke House, a Gothic revival manor in the wilds of the Hudson River Valley. However, the eerie mansion comes with two tenants. One is a hostile ghost. The second, and far worse, is former violinist Roderick Brooke--the most insolent, dangerous, maddeningly gorgeous man she's ever met.As Sybil and Roderick engage in a battle of wills--and wits--she finds herself increasingly drawn to him despite her growing suspicion that there is a connection between him and the spirit that haunts Brooke House. But soon an even greater threat arises: the mysterious queen of local society, Mrs. Lavinia Dove. For reasons that Sybil can't imagine, Mrs. Dove is determined to have Brooke House and Roderick for herself... if necessary, by deadly means.

    Eliana is his whole world and for someone his age, the burden is immense. You see, Eliana is being stalked. Stalked by a madman who wants nothing more than to see her dead. The madman knows things that no one should know and sees things that no one should see. He tells them if they say a word to anyone, they will both die. And Luke can’t let that happen. Eliana’s past is catching up with her and Luke must do anything to save her. Anything.

    Loath to draw negative publicity to the school, a bastion of European wealth and glamour, officials quickly dismiss the incident as an accident, but questions remain: Was it a suicide attempt? Or was Cressida pushed? It was no secret that she had a selfish streak and had earned as many enemies as allies in her tenure at the school. For her best friend, scholarship student Kersti Kuusk, the lingering questions surrounding Cressida's fall continue to nag long after she leaves the Lycée.Kersti marries and becomes a bestselling writer, but never stops wondering about Cressida's obsession with the Helvetian Society—a secret club banned years before their arrival at the school—and a pair of its members who were expelled. When Kersti is invited as a guest to the Lycée's 100th Anniversary, she begins probing the cover-up, unearthing a frightening underbelly of lies and abuse at the prestigious establishment. And in one portentous moment, Kersti makes a decision that will connect her to Cressida forever and raise the stakes dangerously high in her own desire to solve the mystery and redeem her past.An unputdownable read as clever as it is compelling, The Finishing School offers a riveting glimpse into a privileged, rarefied world in which nothing is as it appears.

    Cathryn finds Lieutenant Jake Pennington the most aggravating, maddening man she has ever met...a man Cathryn soon admits she is in no hurry to see leave. But fate has other plans for her in a world she is ill prepared to enter. She descends into a place where love and betrayal go hand and hand, where greed and treachery are second nature, but moreover the threat her father believes he has sent her is awaiting her arrival. When fate tears her apart from her Lieutenant, Cathryn finds herself desolate and alone. Soon, Cathryn makes fateful decisions that will send her back to her home. A home far different than the one she left. A war rages. Soon, she discovers her life is in danger and the only one that can save her is the one who left her heartbroken. Author's Note: This book was previously published with Whiskey Creek Press as The Judas Kiss and The Promise under the Tides of Charleston Series.

    Despite Strickland claiming he has no criminal connections, there are clear signs his involvement in organized crime runs deep.When the case receives national attention, the underbelly of power in LA is thrown into the limelight. Madison fights desperately to find the one piece of evidence that will prove his client’s innocence.But where’s there’s power, there’s danger. The further Madison digs for the truth, the more he puts his life at risk.In a case full of twists and turns, Madison confronts one of the most difficult challenges of his career.Will justice triumph?Or will the power of LA’s dark forces send Madison to an early grave?

    Descendent from the Roman Empire, they pervade every level of society, and are now in a race with our own government to retrieve an ancient artifact thought to have been lost forever.Caught in the middle is archaeology professor James Acton, relentlessly hunted by the elite Delta Force, under orders to stop at nothing to possess what he has found, and the Triarii, equally determined to prevent the discovery from falling into the wrong hands.With his students and friends dying around him, Acton flees to find the one person who might be able to help him, but little does he know he may actually be racing directly into the hands of an organization he knows nothing about…

    It's a weak truce at first, bound only by an arranged engagement between Anne MacGregor and Niall Campbell-the heirs of the feuding families.While Niall wrestles with his suspicions about a traitor in his clan, Anne's actions do not go unnoticed. And as accusations of witchcraft abound, the strong and sometimes callous Campbell heir must fight for Anne's safety among disconcerted clan members. Meanwhile his own safety in threatened with the ever-present threat of someone who wants him dead.Will Niall discover the traitor's identity in time? Can Anne find a way to fit into her new surroundings? Will the two learn to love each other despite the conflict? With a perfect mix of a burgeoning romance and thrilling suspense, this book is historical fiction at its best.

    For readers of The Imposter Bride, The Cellist of Sarajevo, Sarah's Key by Tatiana de Rosnay, and The Red Violin.Helene Giroux arrives alone in St. Homais on a winter day. She wears good city clothes and drives an elegant car, and everything she owns is in a small trunk in the back seat. In the local church she finds a fine old piano, a Molnar, and she knows just how fine it is, for her family had manufactured these pianos before the Great War. Then her mother's death and war forces her to abandon her former life. The story moves back and forth in time as Helene, settling into a simple life, playing the piano for church choir, recalls the extraordinary events that brought her to this place. They include the early loss of her soldier husband and the reappearance of an old suitor who rescues her and her daughter, when she is most desperate; the journeys that very few women of her time could even imagine, into the forests of Indochina in search of ancient treasures and finally, and fatefully, to the Canadian north. When the town policeman confronts her, past and present suddenly converge and she must face an episode that she had thought had been left behind forever.

    When she meets two suitors who fit perfectly into her namesake’s myth, Amba cannot help but feel that fate is teasing her. Salwa, respectful to a fault, pledges to honor and protect Amba, no matter what. Bhisma, a sophisticated, European-trained doctor, offers her sensual pleasures and a world of ideas. But military coups and religious disputes make 1960s Indonesia a place of uncertainty, and the chaos strengthens Amba’s pursuit of freedom. The more Amba does to claim her own story, the better she understands her inextricable bonds to history, myth, and love. Revised edition: This edition of The Question of Red includes editorial revisions.

     That’s the delicious underpinning of this sprawling, exuberant, generous-spirited cozy mystery series with a yummy side of international adventure. A little bit chick lit, a touch of cozy mystery, a whole lot of humor, romance, suspense—all in one box set! These two books continue the adventures of the five lawyer sisters that started with Blackbird Fly. On to The Girl in the Empty Dress, Give Him the Ooh-la-la, and The Things We Said Today... (also available in box sets) to these two stories that follow Merle Bennett's journey from the US to France, with her French boyfriend, Pascal. THE FRENCHMAN Ooh-la-la, who doesn't love a Frenchman? Merle Bennett goes back to France -- and her Frenchman -- in this fifth installment of the Bennett Sisters mysteries. Sure that La Belle France will cure all her ills, and help her write a novel about the French Revolution, she sets out to prove her theory correct. Pascal, her Frenchman, scoffs at this. As a policeman he knows France is pretty to look at but not all that pretty under the surface. While Merle writes and renovates her stone cottage, Pascal encounters an old enemy, a man he put in prison years before. When Pascal disappears Merle isn't sure if their relationship is over, or something terrible has happened. A soupçon of danger, a brush with 'madame guillotine,' and the quirky characters of the French countryside, all collide in this installment of the Bennett Sisters Mysteries, set in la belle France-- where, obviously, wine, sunshine, sunflowers, and Frenchmen cure all ills. Or do they? ODETTE AND THE GREAT FEAR A Gothic Romance by 'Merle Bennett' Deep in the French countryside-- as the country reels through rebellion, beheadings, and starvation-- a goat-herder named Odette is trying to survive. Just that-- survival is on her mind. Since she marched to Versailles with a group of Parisian women to protest the high prices of wheat, her life has spun out of control. She's fled the capital for the countryside. But what will happen to her? Can she stay in the Dordogne where the kindly farmers have taken pity on her? 'Odette and the Great Fear' is a novella from the novel, 'The Frenchman,' by Lise McClendon. Merle Bennett, the main character, is writing a novel. Here the story is fleshed out, characters come into focus, and outcomes are decided. Will Odette and her handsome stranger find each other? How did the Count get his horrible scar? Will the villagers burn out the nobles for good? All these delicious details, mixed with a terrifying and exhilarating time in history, make 'Odette and the Great Fear' a quick but intriguing read. Next up in the series is 'Blame it on Paris,' Bennett Sisters Mystery #8, after the Sister's French Cookbook, filled with delicious recipes inspired by the series. Get the cookbook for free by signing up for the newsletter at the author's website: LiseMcClendon.com - I hope you enjoy the books.