Almost Always


Bobbi Reed - 2012
    . .Enter Cecelia—a pregnant teenager who needs a family for her baby. Fate has placed her at the table behind Eva and John.Now Eva has a chance—a chance to give her daughter, Shelly, the one thing Shelly desperately wants. But nothing is ever as easy as it seems.Because sometimes daughters are not born to us—they are gifted by desperate teenagers—or seated behind us at Bob Evans . . .

Wish You Were Gone


Kieran Scott - 2022
    Emma Walsh has finally worked up the courage to confront her husband James about his drinking—his alcoholic rages, his blackouts, and the fear his behavior has created for her and their two kids. But James never shows up to meet her as planned, and all her righteous words go unsaid. And unsaid they remain, because the next time Emma sees James, his body lies crumpled amidst the wreckage of his flashy car, which has been smashed to its final resting place halfway through the back wall of their suburban house’s roomy garage. In the aftermath of the fatal crash, Emma and her teenage children begin to embrace life without James’s looming, volcanic presence. Buoyed by the support of her two closest friends, she struggles to deal with her grief, complicated by the knowledge that her husband’s legacy as an upstanding business owner and family man shines only because so many people, for so long, were so willing to keep his secrets—secrets that twist into new and unexpected shapes as the mysterious details of his last day of life begin to come to light. A sinister and suspenseful domestic thriller, lauded as “stylish” by Publishers Weekly and “delicious” by Booklist, Wish You Were Gone will keep you guessing “until not just the last page, but the last paragraph” (Chandler Baker, New York Times bestselling author).

Derelict: A Novella


Todd Travis - 2016
    But when she and her all-female crew answer a mysterious distress call during a tropical storm, they stumble across an abandoned yacht worth millions. It seems like a dream come true, the Lotto, the Big Ticket to all their dreams... Until they discover what's waiting for them inside the ship... DERELICT A horror novella by Todd Travis

American Static


Tom Pitts - 2017
    When a mysterious stranger named Quinn offers a hand in exchange for help reuniting with his daughter in San Francisco, Steven gets in the car and begins a journey from which there is no return.Quinn has an agenda all his own and he’s unleashing vengeance at each stop along his path. With a coked-up sadist ex-cop chasing Quinn, and two mismatched small town cops chasing the ex-cop, Steven is unaware of the violent tempest brewing. Corrupt cops and death-dealing gangsters manipulate the maze each of them must navigate to get to the one thing they’re all after: Teresa, the girl holding the secret that will rip open a decades-old scandal and scorch San Francisco’s City Hall.Steven finds Teresa homeless and strung out as their pursuers close in and bodies begin to pile high on the Bay Area’s back streets. Hand in hand Steven and Teresa lead the mad parade of desperate men to edge of the void.American Static is a fast paced crime thriller with a mystery woven in. It’s played out against the backdrop of Northern California’s wine country, Oakland’s mean streets, and San Francisco’s peaks and alleys, written by one of its favorite sons, a man who knows the underbelly of the city like no one else. American Static’s prose has been compared to Elmore Leonard, Richard Price, and Don Winslow.Advance Praise for American Static:“American Static is a stunning achievement and nobody could have written it but Tom Pitts. Pitts ain't just the real deal: he set the mold for what the real deal is, and the rest of us are just plastic copies.” —Benjamin Whitmer, author of Pike and Cry Father.“American Static grabs you by the collar and drags you through a dirty, dangerous tour of San Francisco. Tom Pitts serves up noir just the way you want it—dark, relentless, and inevitable.” —Rob Hart author of New Yorked, City of Rose, and South Village.“American Static is a remarkable novel, a ride with brilliant twists and turns and a relentless momentum, racing to an ending both unavoidable and unexpected.” —Steve Weddle, author of Country Hardball.“American Static is a hot dose of pure adrenaline that will leave you gasping for breath and begging for more.” —Owen Laukkanen, author of The Forgotten Girls.

When Mountains Sing


Stacy Monson - 2019
    A medical crisis reveals a 30-year-old secret that turns everything she’s known and believed upside down, unraveling her dreams and her identity.In search of answers, she follows a trail from Minnesota to Colorado and discovers more unwelcome secrets even as she falls in love with the majestic beauty of the Rocky Mountains, and a wilderness camp leader who shares the greatest secret of all.Knowing her life can never go back to what it was, she must make decisions that will impact far more than just her future.

When Light is Like Water


Molly McCloskey - 2017
    She falls in love with an Irishman, marries him, and settles down in a place whose codes she struggles to crack. And then, in the course of a single hot summer, she embarks on an affair that breaks her marriage and sets her life on a new course.After years working in war zones around the world, and in the immediate aftermath of her mother's death, Alice finds herself back in Ireland and contemplating the forces that led her to put down roots and then tear them up again. What drew her to her husband, and what pulled her away? Was her husband strangely complicit in the affair? Was she always under surveillance by friends and neighbours who knew more than they let on?When Light is Like Water is at once a gripping story of passion and ambivalence and a profound meditation on the things that matter most: the definition of love, the value of family and the meaning of home.

To Leave a Memory


Pat Dunlap Evans - 2015
    The clever dialogue, surprising humor and the poignant ending will make you feel like the characters of the Ward family are just like your own.To Leave a Memory -- The StoryWhen history professor Andrew Ward ignores his wife Lizzy's premonition that something will happen if he allows their son to go out one stormy night, tragedy strikes. Andrew is too anguished to admit he was wrong and, over the years, he and Lizzy drift into avoidance.Forgotten in the marital divide, young daughter Jane can't forgive her brother's death. Nor can Andrew's brother Thomas, an arrogant millionaire and a perpetual prickle in Andrew's side.When Lizzy decides to leave, Jane -- who is now a tech guru and mother of three -- urges her mother to repair her marriage. Oblivious to the women's plans, Andrew hides in his office, trying to write a grand apologia to atone for his heartbreaking error. But when a second tragedy strikes, each family member faces a difficult choice. And Andrew must find the way to leave a memory.

Lies, Lies, Lies


Adele Parks - 2019
    They’re a happy little family of three.So what if Simon drinks a bit too much sometimes—Daisy’s used to it. She knows he’s just letting off steam. Until one night at a party things spiral horribly out of control. And their happy little family of three will never be the same again.In Lies, Lies, Lies, #1 Sunday Times bestselling author Adele Parks explores the darkest corners of a relationship in free fall in a mesmerizing tale of marriage and secrets.Don't miss Woman Last Seen from #1 Sunday Times bestselling author Adele Parks!  Looking for more? Check out these other thrilling reads from Adele Parks:I Invited Her InJust My Luck

Come Monday


Mari Carr - 2009
    Now he’s willing to break all the rules, offering sweet punishments and sweeter rewards. His sexual authority slowly strips away some of her precious control.But that’s the one thing Keira’s not ready to relinquish…Come Monday is the first book in New York Times bestselling author Mari Carr’s Wild Irish series.

Jam Butties and a Pan of Scouse


Maggie Clarke - 2017
    The story covers Maggie Clarke's upbringing in the tenements close to the docks, the River Mersey and the Leeds and Liverpool Canal: an area notorious for having the worst slums in Britain, yet the closest community as well.At the tender age of 11, Maggie Clarke finds herself the matriarch of the family when her Irish mother runs off with another man. Leaving school at 14 to work at a local factory putting sticks into lollies, she is determined to make a better life for herself and her family - before starting her own family with her childhood sweetheart, who she marries at 19 after 'falling in the family way'. She has one night of married life with her husband before he is sent to India with the Navy and is devastated when she never hears from him again, presuming him a casualty of the war that is raging at home and abroad. Another tragedy strikes when Maggie's brother Tommy is also claimed by the war, leaving her father inconsolable, but Maggie knows life has to go on and falls in love with Joseph, an Irish settler who she has 8 children with. But her happiness is short-lived as her first husband suddenly appears out of the blue demanding a divorce, and her new husband drinks away what little money they have, returning in fits of rage that leave Maggie and her children hungry and afraid. Many times she is only able to feed her brood by the kindness of neighbours putting a 'pan of scouse' on the range for her, or feeding her kids jam butties to help out. Maggie's story sweeps across the changing face of Liverpool, from its squalid dock streets, the tenement blocks and cobbled roads to the decline of the docklands, new council housing, the rise of the Mersey beat, the Beatles and the energy and passion of a city that is home to a cast of colourful characters with the resilience to withstand the heartbreak and hardships that only the poorest can know.

Joy School / Until The Real Thing Comes Along


Elizabeth Berg - 2005
    Unable to fit in at school, she forges alliances where she can: with her housekeeper, with a pimply fellow misfit named Cynthia, and with the gorgeous Taylor, who gets her kicks out of shoplifting. Most frustrating of all is Katie's imperfect friendship with the proprietor of a local gas station, a handsome 23-year-old who shares her love of checkers but doesn't return her crush. With humour and an eye for telling detail, Berg conveys the way each uncompromising element of Katie's life ultimately offers her more than she had anticipated.Until The Real Thing Comes AlongPatty Murphy is facing that pivotal point in a woman's life when her biological clock ticks as insistently as a beating heart. Will she find Mr Right and start a family? But Patty is in love - with a man who is not only attractive and financially sound, but sensitive and warmhearted. There's just one small problem: He is also gay. Against her better judgment, and pleas from family and friends, Patty refuses to give up on Ethan. Every man she dates ultimately leaves her aching for the gentle comfort and intimacy she shares with him. But even as she throws eligible bachelors to the wayside to spend yet another platonic night with Ethan, Patty longs more and more for the consolation of loving and being loved. In the meantime she must content herself with waiting - until the real thing comes along . . .

A Rosie Life In Italy 2: What Have We Done?


Rosie Meleady - 2021
    Well, that is what Rosie did.Buying the house was an accident. She only went out for bananas.Rosie embarks on renovating her 22 room ‘new’ home in Italy with a non-negotiable move-in date of Christmas Eve.Surrounded by a cast of interesting characters, the Irish woman learns the Italian way of life and house renovating in the country she wants to call home. But when the project manager goes AWOL, non-Italian speaking Rosie has no option but to take control with the help of a translation app.With no heating, windows disappearing, mystery holes in the garden, water flooding down the stairs, a pandemic destroyed business and with a move-in date that seems more laughable than doable, Rosie begins to question if she was crazy to follow through on her fabulous midlife crisis dream of renovating a villa in Italy.

The House We Called Home


Jenny Oliver - 2018
    Except this summer, things feel a little different…Stella’s father is nowhere to be seen, yet her mother – in suspiciously new Per Una jeans – seems curiously unfazed by his absence, and more eager to talk about her mysterious dog-walking buddy Mitch.Stella’s sister Amy has returned home with a new boyfriend she can barely stand and a secret to hide, and Stella’s husband Jack has something he wants to get off his chest too. Even Frank Sinatra, the dog, has a guilty air about him.This summer, change is in the air for the Whitethorns…Warm, funny and gloriously feel-good, this is the perfect summer read for fans of Veronica Henry and Milly Johnson.

The Elyrian


D.P. Rowell - 2018
    But when he discovers a mysterious stone on his grandfather’s ancient Earth ship, he’s forced to confront the lies he was raised to believe.Not only are they real, they’re taking over the world one wicked deed at a time. Now only one thing can stop them. The Emerson Stone.Ace is faced with a choice. Run and hide? Or risk everything at one last chance to save Yutara.

Chasing Alexander: A Marine's Journey Across Iraq and Afghanistan


Christopher Martin - 2021
    From his difficulty at boot camp to his disappointing deployment to Iraq, Martin fears he may never follow in Alexander's footsteps.Then, after a strategy change, Martin and his unit arrive in Marjah, "the bleeding ulcer" of Afghanistan. There he faces heat, fleas, and a hidden enemy. As the casualties mount, Martin struggles to control his emotions and his newfound sense of power. Chasing Alexander looks unflinchingly at the seductive side of war, and its awful consequences.