From bestselling author of Little Birds, Hannah Lee Kidder's Starlight touches your heart before taking a bite with twelve pitch-dark fantasy, horror, and contemporary short stories.

    to a major scandal, they are desperate to show they’ve reformed. Who better to present their redemption to the world than a country vicar with a reputation for being annoyingly good? Reverend Tom Goodman is ousted from his job as a country vicar for allowing a homeless family to stay in the church hall. Meanwhile, a major bank is trying to rescue its image after the latest in a long string of financial scandals. It seems like the perfect match and Goodman is hastily appointed as the bank’s new C.E.O. All they have to do now, is promote him as the new face of Shadeys Bank whilst at the same time, keeping him away from the day-to-day business of dubious banking. However, Tom Goodman has other ideas. He’s not going to be satisfied with being used as an empty puppet for a PR stunt. Unfortunately for Shadeys, Tom is planning on actually making a difference. And so begins an epic battle of wills. The might of a multi-billion pound bank versus a seemingly naïve country vicar. No contest. “Yes Minister meets The Vicar of Dibley.”

    

    So when her boss cuts her wages and takes on his neice Anita to share commissions with her, it's quite a blow. And that is just the start of her ordeal as her friends fall away and her world unravels.

    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.

    Lights are dimmed. The musical is about to begin. As the beautiful princess descends on stage, the mythical creatures from her kingdom come alive. Flickers of brilliant colours blaze across as mesmerizing music pulsates from one corner of the theatre to the other. A fairy tale is about to unfold... As young children, we often come across things that stay in our hearts forever. For Appu, it is a fairy tale about a beautiful princess.He lives with her in a world filled with the magical creatures from her kingdom until the real world beckons. A reluctant Appu steps into it as a striking young man and struggles to find his place. What follows is an evocative tale of love and loss, friendship and betrayal, as the story travels through the snow-peaked mountains of Arunachal to the golden deserts of Jaisalmer, the tulip gardens of Holland to the lush greens of Kerala. Does Appu find what he had set out for? The answer lies in Rafflesia - The Banished Princess because in her story, lay his!

    Gradually it seems possible that there is a link between an ancient treasure that Robert's father spent many years searching for and the tragic events surrounding Alex's grandmother during the Second World War.But the beautiful tranquillity of the island is deceptive. Suddenly Alex vanishes, and Robert is embroiled in a desperate search, for the woman and for the solution that had evaded his father. To find the truth he must come to understand his own past and learn to face the troubled relationships that have dominated his life.Atmospheric, tense and compelling, this blend of classical myth with ancient and recent history creates a memorable and thrilling novel.

    Entwhistle may look like your sweet, old granny...but things happen to her: she's caught up in the witness protection program, stuck in an elevator with an assortment of strangers, her house is burglarized and her dog is kidnapped. But Mrs. Entwhistle is dauntless; she didn't get to be a fesity seventy-eight by wimping out. Come join her on her porch swing, meet her best friend, Maxine, and her dog, Roger. Maxine will probably offer you a bowl of her homemade soup. Sit a while. Come back when you can.

    They unlock opportunities for wealth and travel, but also create incredible chaos--uprooting populations and blighting landscapes. Work on or around the rails leads to unwelcome discoveries and, in light of the Mythos, dire implications in the spread of the rail system as a whole. A certain path to uncovering unwelcome truths about the universe is to venture beyond our own "placid island of ignorance" and encounter foreign cultures. The Orient Express serves as the perfect vehicle for such excursions, designed as a bridge between West and East. Movement into mystery forms the central action for many stories in this volume. The only limitation placed upon writers for this collection was that their works somehow involve the Orient Express and the Mythos. The last warning whistle has blown, and we are getting underway. Have your tickets at the ready and settle in for a journey across unexpected landscapes to a destination that--well, we'll just let you see for yourself when you arrive. We promise this though: murder will be the least of your problems on this trip aboard the Orient Express!

    A girl sins and expects a thunder to strike her. Two grown up souls in the rain. The twist of heart of a heartbreak motel’s founder. A doctor prescribes daily dose of “I love you”s to cure Alzheimer. A boy gets hit by Ugg boots multiple times. A chocolate prince turns to ice. The ocean girl and her secret meetings with the desert boys mother.

    Released as one of a limited number of digital shorts released to celebrate the publication of Jeffrey Archer’s magnificent seventh short-story collection, Tell Tale. Taken from And Thereby Hangs a Tale, Jeffrey Archer's magnificent sixth collection of short stories, The Luck of the Irish is a captivating, witty and entertaining short read. Liam Casey is an enterprising young estate agent from Cork and while on holiday in Majorca he meets a fellow Irishman, Patrick O’Donovan, who offers him the opportunity to join him permanently on the island as a partner in his real estate business. Liam hastily accepts, but it is only when Patrick meets his untimely demise does the business take-off. Liam has one last project to complete; a deal that will make him rich beyond his wildest dreams, so long as everything goes to plan . . .

    Three soldiers.One Farm.Thousands of stenches.This won't end well...

    When there were still people around to talk to, I would introduce myself as a drinker with a writing problem. It sounded witty at the time, and certainly got a smile once in a while from the ladies. None of that matters now. There are no people left to read my books, and nobody left to listen to my attempts at wit. Now it's just me, sitting in my house on the hill, watching the undead rampage through what we humans once called our world. I sometimes wonder why I still live when those much younger, stronger, smarter and fitter than me perished. Maybe it's just dumb luck. But maybe I am being left alive for a purpose. Nobody may have cared much for my novel, but maybe this is what I was meant to write. Maybe this is what I was meant to be. The chronicler of the undead. This is my story.

    After a night out with his girlfriend in one of the country's remote provinces, he wakes to find himself in a pitch-black coffin—and quickly running out of oxygen. With only his cell phone and his own wits to rely on, it's a race against time to escape the claustrophobic death trap. SIX BULLETS The end of civilization arrived in the form of a giant asteroid thirteen months ago. For Burt James, a survivalist, it was not a complete surprise. He'd spent much of his adult life prepping for such a catastrophe. Consequently, while the majority of the population scoured the post-apocalyptic landscape for water and food, regressing into primitive killers, he bunkered down in his fortified hilltop home in a small town in the middle of the Australian Outback. But now he's out of food and down to his last six bullets, and he will have to make the most difficult choice of his life. THE MAILMAN Los Angeles, 1985. Never was the motto sex, drugs, and rock n’ roll more apt than the scene on the legendary Sunset Strip with the arrival of the underground Hollywood glam bands. While Mick Freeman, a record executive with a major label, works tirelessly to sign five toxic rockers whom he believes might flip the entire music world on its head, his wife, Jade, spends her days bored and alone at home, struggling with a midlife crisis that threatens to topple their twenty-year marriage. And then she meets the new mailman. Young and handsome, he sweeps her off her feet—straight into a nightmare the likes of which she could never have imagined. RE-ROLL In the near future, breathtakingly humanoid robots called Mechs are for sale, and they're designed to fulfill whatever role you want: husband, wife, best friend, slave. Manufacturers allow new owners one free "roll" to randomly determine their Mech's three leading characteristics. But as everybody knows, scoring your ideal traits is a crapshoot, though you can always re-roll—at a price.