Lottery-winning surfer Danny Teakwell seems to be living the life, but he's been hiding a terrible secret, punishing himself for two decades. Now he's hit rock bottom. So he thinks. The ghosts from his past show up at the reunion, launching him on a mayhem-filled race through the Sunshine State to save a missing woman, and his soul. The odds aren't good. He has three days and his only allies are a pill-popping lawyer, crusty barkeep, and seven-year-old embalming expert. Heart and dark humor combine with page-turning action and plot surprises that will keep you guessing.

    Laura a married woman. They are are unrelated, but have something in common: they're dying. Each finds Steven, a strange man living in a ratty inner-city apartment. Steven can heal... but healing comes with a price. As there is no up without down, there can be no healing without payment.Part of the collection "What Tangled Webs" by Dan Dillard, in e-book and paperback.

    But when my niece sends me on an errand, I might just find the woman of my dreams.Naomi: I might be a pro at baking unicorn cakes, but I'm definitely not one when it comes to talking to handsome customers. Besides, it's not like I have a chance with Blaise, anyway.Sometimes fate needs a little help. Welcome to the files of the Zaftig Dating Agency, where alpha men find the curvy women of their dreams!Each book in the series is a complete, standalone story.This is a sweet but sexy short story romance, complete with insta-love and a guaranteed happily-ever-after. If you’re looking for an escape from everyday life with an alpha older man and the curvy BBW younger woman that he loves, this is the book for you!

    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.

    2.) The scariest things imaginable are not those that can kill you, but those you can live through. And probably the most prominent: 3.) The most horrible possibility is not what could happen to you, but what you could become – I became a killer.” ~Hope Wellman Brief Description:Hope Wellman has a childhood full of horrific memories, a bone chilling recurring nightmare, and a persistent paranoid sense of being followed that she would rather keep repressed. Is evil reaching from beyond the grave to capture the tattered remnants of her soul once and for all, is it only a machination of her disturbed mind, or is there something happening more sinister than even she can imagine? Attending the funeral of her abuser is the first step in putting her life back together as she is about to turn twenty-one. She struggles with the fact she never told anyone what happened to her, and that the grave they are mourning over is empty. She'd find it a lot easier to move on and believe in the future if he were in the box, ready to be covered with dirt. She fears the last thread of her sanity has snapped when she sees Lucas everywhere she turns, and can't escape a recurring nightmare. Is her tormentor alive, or is she imagining it? Is her dream triggered by past fears or is it a prediction of the future?From the Author: I am a survivor of abuse. It changed me. I closed myself off. It changed the way I saw myself. It changed the way I thought others saw me. It changed my outlook on the whole world. It changed the way I let people treat me, and had a snowball effect on my life. I married an abusive man. I divorced an abusive man. I finally broke the cycle. Most of all, I wanted to express how important it is to encourage the discussion of abuse. In my book, as in my life, silence is the enemy. Three Rules was written as fiction in order to make it an enjoyable read, but, much of the thought processes, feelings and reactions are real. However, there are no gory detailed scenes. It was written with sincere respect and sensitivity for the reader while trying to convey the honest and realistic feelings of an abuse survivor. ~ Marie

    But while the selected poems in this volume may focus upon loss and grief, they also reflect solace, respite, and joy.  A goodbye is an opportunity for kindness, for forgiveness, for intimacy, and ultimately for love and a deepening acceptance of life as it is rather than what it was. Goodbyes can be poignant, sorrowful, sometimes a relief, and—now and then—even an occasion for joy.  They are always transitions that, when embraced, can be the door to a new life both for ourselves and for others. In this inspiring and consoling volume, Housden encourages readers to embrace poetry as a way of enabling us to better see and appreciate the beauty of the world around and within us.

    From the story about a beautiful young woman who shows up thirsty in the bathtub of the Frangipani Hotel in Saigon many years after her first sighting there, to a young woman in Houston who befriends an old Vietnamese man she discovers naked behind a dumpster, to a truck driver asked to drive a young man with an unnamed ailment home to die, to the story of two American sisters sent to Vietnam to visit their elderly grandmother who is not what she appears to be, these stories blend the old world with the new while providing a new angle of insight into the after-effects of the war on a generation of displaced Vietnamese immigrants as well as those who remained in Vietnam.

    This book is guaranteed to horrify you in the best way possible. Open it up, turn the page, and take a journey to a world consumed with mystery in madness.

    The police like the wife for the crime. The D.A. likes Robin as an accessory-after-the-fact. Robin, though she feels sympathy for the widow and her young son, likes running with her dog and hanging out with her teddy-bear boyfriend, but she is a young attorney in need of work. The case promises to be the case of her career right up to the moment when everything goes ballistic.

    Mostly those kind of folks ain’t worth knowing." Nolan Parker rides into Mustang City looking for grazing land of his own. With money in his pocket, he’s in town to buy a ranch.Then he saves a boy's dog from a killer. Now he finds himself embroiled in the beginnings of a range war, battling the hired gunmen of a ruthless rancher. He must make a decision. Stay and fight, or cut and run. Because of a Dog, is a drama of honor, love, hate, and death—a stirring tale of the old west that will keep you engrossed to the very end.

    Where men stood tall and lived rough. But that West is no more. In its place Shann Ray finds washedup basketball players, businessmen hiding addictions, and women fighting the inexplicable violence that wells up in these men. A son struggles to accept his father’s apologies after surviving a childhood of beatings. Two men seek empty basketball hoops on a snowy night, hoping to relive past glory. A bull rider skips town and rides herd on an unruly mob of passengers as he searches for a thief on a train threading through Montana’s Rocky Mountains. In these stories, Ray grapples with the terrible hurt we inflict on those we love, and finds that reconciliation, if far off, is at least possible. The debut of a writer who is out to redefine the contours of the American West, American Masculine is a deeply felt and fiercely written ode to the country we left behind.

    The lines are now so blurred, no one knows who the real enemy is anymore.Reeling from the terrorist attack that killed her father, Lorna lurches through an inebriated adolescence until she finds redemption in a young soldier called Danny. However, her dream of a stable life is shattered when Danny is called to serve in war overseas.Danny is lost in the desert. Most of his unit is dead – victims, it would seem, of a brutal ambush. With their equipment destroyed and food running out, the small band of men stumble through the sand and shadows, desperate to find salvation. As their hope fades, they begin to turn on each other, until finally it becomes clear that only the truly monstrous will survive.Brown creates a compelling and gripping experience alternating between the soldier and home narrative. Cleverly employing letters and unique voices we are drawn completely into the raw desert while being left with a thought-provoking and graphic view of modern warfare.What Reviewers and Readers Say:'Beautifully written, smart and punchy'. Sam Mills, author of The Quiddity of Will Self'A memorable and moving portrait of the futility of 21st century conflict'. Benjamin Myers, author of Pig Iron and Beastings

     Ben is everything I could want in a man. But I locked up my heart and threw away the key a long time ago. Now, he’s assigned to guard me during my prosecution of a violent criminal. Will his disarming charm and intense blue eyes finally force me to go after what I never thought I could want again? Ben She held me at arm’s length, but something in her eyes drew me closer. Was it possible that she understood my pain? When the man she was prosecuting threatened her, My instincts went into overdrive. No one messes with what’s mine. And that’s what Liz is. Mine.

    It has been significantly updated as part of the Fuzed Trilogy. Please see Fuzed Trilogy: IMPACT.

    The first novel, The Sins of the Fathers, appeared in 1975, and A Drop of the Hard Stuff - the 17th and most recent - was published in 2011. Over the years Scudder has also been featured in 11 short works of fiction. The Merciful Angel of Death is the fifth of these; it frst appeared in 1993 in The New Mystery, Jerome Charyn's anthology of stories by members of the International Association of Crime Writers.The story was written during the depth of the AIDS epidemic, and reflects its time.The Merciful Angel of Death is included in The Night and the Music, my collection of all 11 Matthew Scudder short stories, available for Kindle or in handsome trade paperback form.