The narrator of this tale, simply known as "N.," is a teaching assistant who falls in love with one of his students, Margaret Towne. Though his love is reciprocated, it comes with a caveat. For Maggie declares she is "cursed." Undaunted by her admission, N. wants to marry her, so Maggie takes him home to meet her family. But it doesn't take long for N. to realize that something very strange is afoot in Margarettown; for Maggie's family consists of a handful of women -- of varying ages -- each of whom carries a name derived from that of his beloved.Zevin's novel takes several unusual turns as she leads readers on a survey of the many forms of love. Ultimately, the tale is revealed as a kind of diary, which N. has written for his daughter. But the narration changes midstream, and Maggie gets a chance to tell her side of the story before handing it off to the couple's unborn children. In Margarettown, Zevin ingeniously demonstrates the challenges faced by an enduring love, during which time the beloved changes, only to become a conglomeration of many different personas. (Fall 2005 Selection)

    Then, Gan Tang came out and stirred up the storm.As a descendant of Li Hui, Zhou Fei grew up in the bandit village and had never seen the world outside until Xie Yun appeared.The world outside was in grim and grave situation and the previously carefree young people were entangled in a catastrophe. The secret sealed for twenty years was about to be revealed."

    This book looks at the realities of raising kids, as the author shares her own personal experiences of when things occasionally go wrong.

    Louis, Ladue. When the big front door opens at the French chateau style house, she comes face to face with the elusive and amazingly handsome billionaire Adam Pernoud, head of a family of seven brothers who lost their parents years earlier, and have no one but each other.From the time he lays eyes on Mae, Adam's head is turned. He, in typical male fashion doesn't quite know what to do about it. His brothers notice, and tease him mercilessly all while pursuing their passions: engineering and hockey. They love hockey so much, that in their very own frat boys' paradise, they built themselves a hockey rink on the back part of the estate. Mae walks into this world unawares, and works to organize their lives.The very first weekend of her employment with the Pernouds, Mae finds herself snowed in at the estate where she and Adam get to know each other. He explains his philosophy regarding being rich - with all that money comes a lot of responsibility - and she decides that his wealth is just too much for her, a hang-up from growing up under a domineering mother's thumb. Spooked, she withdraws, and Adam is left to figure out why. After a week, they have it out in the most important room in any American household - the kitchen.Then, as happens in the American midwest, a bolt of lightning splits a tree and almost kills Mae, driving her into Adam's arms and bed.

     Ava Giordano never stood a chance. After a big break-up, she finally got her life together, but the past still looms in her not so distant future. Master Chief Special Warfare Officer Cody Dalton of SEAL team Alpha has always been the ultimate fan of one-night stands. But one glimpse of Ava has him rethinking everything. It's love at first sight, but now their feelings will be put to the test. One train. One meeting by chance. One hour to get it right. When danger surrounds them, does Dalton have what it takes to protect Ava?

    

    With a couple of friends and her job as a waitress at El Burro, she's ready to live life to the fullest. However, one night turns her world upside down when she stumbles upon an underground compound full of vampires. Realizing her life is no longer in her hands, Lea's in for more than she's bargined for.For interest in werewolves, check out Sienna in The Shifter's Touch by Misty Traven, also from the Midnight Desires series.Book 2 for Lea coming out September 2012

    But they lost touch and her dreams of a lasting love died. Now that she's back, Kaitlyn won't risk her heart again. But fate has other plans. She and Connor reconnect and he realizes the pendant makes her a target. As a government agent, Connor is conflicted between his duty protecting Kaitlyn and feelings he never got over. As the two race to find a centuries' old treasure, they discover first loves aren't easily forgotten.

    Like the radio series, but with added jokes, extra bits of story, additional dimensions to characters and masses more paper. Unless you're reading it as an e-book in which case... masses more digital information bits.Bleak Expectations recounts the remarkable adventures of young Pip Bin as he tries to repair his destroyed family and distinctly damaged life, aided by his best friend Harry Biscuit and definitely not aided by his cruel and ironically named guardian Mr Gently Benevolent and his accomplices, the fearsome Hardthrasher siblings.Weep! As Pip is sent to Britain's nastiest boarding school, St Bastard's.Gasp! As the true extent of his despicable guardian's plan becomes clear.Worry! As our hero is committed to the Workhouse, where he meets the hideous poverty-punishments of the treadmill, the grindstone and the painwheel.Sigh! As Pip finds love with London's most eligible frail beauty, Miss Flora Dies-Early.Find a tenterhook and sit on it!Grim circumstances, mistaken identities, unlikely inheritances, nightmarish court cases, ridiculous names, convenient coincidences to resolve plot problems, over-sentimental death scenes and lots and lots of adjectives: Bleak Expectations is the novel Charles Dickens might have written after drinking far too much gin.

    Talented and ambitious, the trio found a small theater company that enjoys unexpected early success. Then, one fateful evening, Luke meets Nina Jacobs, a dynamic and emotionally damaged actress he cannot forget, even after she drifts into a marriage with a manipulative theater producer.As Luke becomes a highly sought after playwright, he stumbles in love, caught in two triangles where love requited and unrequited, friendship, and art will clash with terrible consequences for all involved.Fallout is an elegantly crafted novel whose characters struggle to escape the various cataclysms of their respective pasts. Falling in love convinces us we are the pawns of the gods; Fallout brings us firmly into the psyche of romantic love-its sickness and its ecstasy.

    Criticised by her outwardly perfect mother, dearly loved by her father, she’s the ‘Queen of Low Self-Esteem’. Finding herself suddenly immersed in a world of glitz and glamour, where nothing is quite as it seems, will she finally realise ... ... ‘It’s what’s inside that counts’?

    Since then, award-winning author Jia Pingwa’s vivid portrayal of contemporary China’s social and economic transformation has become a classic, viewed by critics and scholars of Chinese literature as one of the most important novels of the twentieth century. Howard Goldblatt’s deft translation now gives English-speaking readers their first chance to enjoy this masterpiece of social satire by one of China’s most provocative writers. While eroticism, exoticism, and esoteric minutiae—the “pornography” that earned the opprobrium of Chinese officials—pervade Ruined City, this tale of a famous contemporary writer’s sexual and legal imbroglios is an incisive portrait of politics and culture in a rapidly changing China. In a narrative that ranges from political allegory to parody, Jia Pingwa tracks his antihero Zhuang Zhidie through progressively more involved and inevitably disappointing sexual liaisons. Set in a modern metropolis rife with power politics, corruption, and capitalist schemes, the novel evokes an unrequited romantic longing for China’s premodern, rural past, even as unfolding events caution against the trap of nostalgia. Amid comedy and chaos, the author subtly injects his concerns about the place of intellectual seriousness, censorship, and artistic integrity in the changing conditions of Chinese society. Rich with detailed description and vivid imagery, Ruined City transports readers into a world abounding with the absurdities and harshness of modern life.

    Will Isadora follow her dreams, or save her family…?1798, EnglandIsadora Alvescot has always dreamed of becoming a famous actress on the stage.But when her beloved papa suddenly dies, her family’s future is thrown into turmoil.With no immediate male heir, the family estate has been bequeathed to a distant relative – a viscount named Lord Roborough.And now Isadora is being pressured to consider matrimony.When Lord Roborough arrives, Isadora is desperate to do all she can to find out his intentions and determine whether he is a friend or a foe…Will he allow her family to remain living on the estate? Will Isadora still be free to pursue her dreams of acting?Or will she be forced to bend her will to another and become a wife?

    BECCA On a sunny day in Chapel Hill, North Carolina, eight-year-old Becca Burke was struck by lightning. No one believed her—not her philandering father or her drunk, love-sick mother—not even when her watch kept losing time and a spooky halo of light appeared overhead in photographs. Becca was struck again when she was sixteen. She survived, but over time she would learn that outsmarting lightning was the least of her concerns. BUCKLEY In rural Arkansas, Buckley R. Pitank’s world seemed plagued by disaster. Ashamed but protective of his obese mother, fearful of his scathing grandmother, and always running from bullies (including his pseudo-evangelical stepfather), he needed a miracle to set him free. At thirteen years old, Buckley witnessed a lightning strike that would change everything. Now an art student in New York City, Becca Burke is a gifted but tortured painter who strives to recapture the intensity of her lightning-strike memories on canvas. On the night of her first gallery opening, a stranger appears and is captivated by her art. Who is this odd young man with whom she shares a mysterious connection? When Buckley and Becca finally meet, neither is prepared for the charge of emotions—or for the perilous event that will bring them even closer to one another, and to the families they’ve been running from for as long as they can remember. Crackling with atmosphere and eccentric characters, The Handbook for Lightning Strike Survivors explores the magic of nature and the power of redemption in a novel as beautiful and unpredictable as lightning itself.

    . . A beautiful, searing book that leaves an indelible presence in the mind." --Patricia Hampl, author of "The Florist's Daughter "Will Kiehn is seemingly destined for life as a humble farmer in the Midwest when, having felt a call from God, he travels to the vast North China Plain in the early twentieth-century. There he is surprised by love and weds a strong and determined fellow missionary, Katherine. They soon find themselves witnesses to the crumbling of a more than two-thousand-year-old dynasty that plunges the country into decades of civil war. As the couple works to improve the lives of the people of Kuang P'ing Ch'eng-- City of Tranquil Light, a place they come to love--and face incredible hardship, will their faith and relationship be enough to sustain them?Told through Will and Katherine's alternating viewpoints--and inspired by the lives of the author's maternal grandparents--"City of Tranquil Light" is a tender and elegiac portrait of a young marriage set against the backdrop of the shifting face of a beautiful but torn nation. A deeply spiritual book, it shows how those who work to teach others often have the most to learn, and is further evidence that Bo Caldwell writes "vividly and with great historical perspective" ("San Jose Mercury News").