Etta's Fast House is the hottest nightclub this side of Chicago. The city's fastest-talking street hustlers rub elbows here with the rich and famous, and anyone with enough cash in their wallet can drink like a king and dance the night away. Life is good- until a stranger named Baltimore Floyd strolls into town...Handsome and charming, Baltimore is a hustler with a penchant for stirring up trouble. Everyone adores him, including Etta Adams, the matron of Ms. Etta's Fast House. But before he can imagine settling down with one woman, Baltimore is up for a little action, which is how he hooks up with a corrupt cop's wife. In the blink of an eye, Baltimore finds himself on trial for a crime he didn't commit. Now, to keep him from hanging, the patrons of Ms. Etta's Fast House will need to heal their heartache and come together before the world beyond the Ville's borders tears them apart...

    At 25 she begins to unearth secrets about family, friends, her past, and her altered reality in this journey through truth and forgiveness.

    She gets anxious about running out of ball bearings; about snakes sneaking in through the pipes; about making meaningful conversation on New Year’s Eve. Married life, she realizes, is an unpredictable saga even when you know exactly how loud your husband snores every night—and she wouldn’t have it any other way. In this crisp collection of essays, Bombeck shows off the irresistible style that made her one of America’s favorite humorists for more than three decades. When she sharpens her wit, no family member is sacred and no self-help fad is safe.

    From her well-remembered New Yorker essays about the financial demands of big-city ambition and the ethereal, strangely old-fashioned allure of cyber relationships to her dazzlingly hilarious riff in Harper's about musical passions that give way to middle-brow paraphernalia, Daum delves into the center of things while closely examining the detritus that spills out along the way. She speaks to questions at the root of the contemporary experience, from the search for authenticity and interpersonal connection in a society defined by consumerism and media; to the disenchantment of working in a "glamour profession"; to the catastrophic effects of living among New York City's terminal hipsters. With precision and well-balanced irony, Daum implicates herself as readily as she does the targets that fascinate and horrify her. In a review of The KGB Bar Reader, in which Daphne Merkin singled out Daum's essay about the inability to mourn a friend's death, Merkin wrote: "It's brutally quick, the way this happens, this falling in love with a writer's style. Daum's story hooked me by the second line. Hmm, I thought, this is a writer worth suspending my routines for."

    Country music superstar Reba McEntire describes her Oklahoma childhood as a member of a cattle ranching family, her early days as a performer, her award-winning musical achievements, the tragic loss of her eight band members, and her marriages.

    The good life wasn't handed to him on a silver platter, though. Growing up in the Cleveland ghetto, his father was shot by a drug addict, he worked the streets to help his sister through college, and he made his fair share of enemies along the way.Yet not even his tough upbringing prepared him for the mysterious DVD that showed up on his doorstep, its contents revealing an explicit sexual encounter between his wife and another man, whose face was purposely blurred. Sierra's betrayal is heart wrenching, and Denmark's on the warpath to find out the identity of the man behind it. One thing's sure: It's someone close to him.Suddenly everyone is suspect, especially his two best buddies, and he'll stop at nothing to exact his revenge-even if it means sleeping with their wives to get it. But when Denmark takes justice into his own hands, he discovers a truth even more shocking than his wife's infidelity. . . .In this gritty revenge tale, Freddie Lee Johnson III takes us into the mind of a man consumed with grief and rage. Full of jump-off-the-page characters and fast-paced drama, Other Men's Wives is an explosive ride fueled by love, lust, and deceit.

    But when she makes a mistake that puts her future in jeopardy, she faces an impossible choice: defy her family or deny her dream. The only way to fix the mess she’s created is to enlist the help of her neighbor, Levi, the apprentice of her family’s greatest enemy. And if Rayne gets caught crossing the divided property lines, the consequences will be irreparable.Levi Harding has never forgotten the August night he shared with Rayne when they were teens—or the way she later rejected him. Despite his warring instincts, he can’t ignore her plea for help or the spark that’s ignited between them. But now, as wildfires bear down on their town and family secrets are revealed, their newfound alliance might just go up in smoke.

    The last time readers encountered the good Rev. Theophilus Simmons, he was a newlywed and the pastor of a modest-sized congregation in Memphis. Now he's the father of three and running a congregation in St. Louis. His best friend, Rev. Eddie Tate, is now with a fast growing church in Chicago, but he is getting real frustrated with the way things are run in the Gospel United Church. Marcel Brown and his father, Ernest, along with Sonny Washington and Bishop Larsen Giles have had two decades to perfect their slimy methods of "tapping" church funds and other misdeeds. Now they've found a secret weapon that will allow them to make fast money and accomplish what they failed to do 20 years ago--buy off enough power to dominate the entire denomination, put their cronies in key spots, and ransack the church like it is the spoils of war. It won't be long before the two opposing sides face off..."church-folk" style.

    No crowded shops, no corny office parties, no fruitcakes, no unwanted presents. That's just what Luther and Nora Krank have in mind when they decide that, just this once, they'll skip the holiday altogether. Theirs will be the only house on the street without a rooftop Frosty the snowman; they won't be hosting their annual Christmas Eve bash; they aren't even going to have a tree. They won't need one, because come December 25 they're setting sail on a Caribbean cruise. But, as this weary couple is about to discover, skipping Christmas brings enormous consequences - and isn't half as easy as they'd imagined.A classic tale for modern times, Skipping Christmas offers a hilarious look at the chaos and frenzy that has become part of our holiday tradition.

    . .Fashion photographer Jada Diamond Tanner may have her pick of fine men, but no one has captured her heart like gorgeous financial advisor Wellington Jones. From their first embrace, Jada knows he is the soulmate she has waited for. But while the love she shares with Wellington is exhilarating, Jada faces challenges she never imagined--from a beautiful rival, hungry for love, and from Wellington's overbearing socialite mother, who believes Jada will never fit into her circle. Forced to make difficult choices, Jada learns painful lessons about trust and commitment. . .and discovers the courage to celebrate each day, with or without the man she loves.

    After being married to their careers instead of each other for ten years, "Ace" and Lynette Bowers ended their marriage.  Four years later however, it seems as though their love never ended - to both of their surprise and denial.  Sheila Rushmore is Ace's current girlfriend and a woman who is used to getting what she wants - except Ace's commitment to marriage.  When Sheila realizes Lynette may be the cause, she launches a plan to play the hand of God, instead of allowing God to bring the love they all desire in His way.

    Ever loyal to her mother, and adoring of her beautiful, restless, married sister Adele, Lita works hard to keep the family together as she attempts to establish her own life. But when Adele falls in love with Lucien Faure -- a smooth operator with "the devil's good looks" and a decades-old score to settle with Helen -- Lita unveils her mother's mysterious past to confront the Du Champs' long-buried secrets. Now, Lita finds she has one last and desperate chance to save the future of those she loves. Award-winning author Jervey Tervalon draws from his own heritage -- and the twisting family story that has lived and breathed inside him his whole life -- to create a spellbindingly luminous novel of passion, murder, and vengeance.

    What was this great political enterprise all about? Who were these people who are considered the philosophical, spiritual, and moral ancestors of our nation? What Vowell discovers is something far different from what their uptight shoe-buckles-and-corn reputation might suggest. The people she finds are highly literate, deeply principled, and surprisingly feisty. Their story is filled with pamphlet feuds, witty courtroom dramas, and bloody vengeance. Along the way she asks:Was Massachusetts Bay Colony governor John Winthrop a communitarian, Christlike Christian, or conformity's tyrannical enforcer? Yes! Was Rhode Island's architect Roger Williams America's founding freak or the father of the First Amendment? Same difference. What does it take to get that jezebel Anne Hutchinson to shut up? A hatchet. What was the Puritans' pet name for the Pope? The Great Whore of Babylon. Sarah Vowell's special brand of armchair history makes the bizarre and esoteric fascinatingly relevant and fun. She takes us from the modern-day reenactment of an Indian massacre to the Mohegan Sun casino, from old-timey Puritan poetry, where "righteousness" is rhymed with "wilderness," to a Mayflower-themed waterslide. Throughout The Wordy Shipmates is rich in historical fact, humorous insight, and social commentary by one of America's most celebrated voices. Thou shalt enjoy it.

    A chef. An interior decorator. A landscape architect, as well as a gardener. I’ve been a painter. A furniture restorer. A personal shopper. A veterinarian’s assistant and sometimes the veterinarian.... An accountant, a banker, and on occasion, a broker. I’ve been a beautician. A map. A psychic. Santa Claus. The Tooth Fairy. The T.V. Guide. A movie reviewer. An angel. God....For a long time I have felt like I inadvertently got my master’s in How to Take Care of Everybody Except Yourself and then a Ph.D. in How to Pretend Like You Don’t Mind. But I do mind." Since Terry McMillan’s breakout novel Waiting to Exhale surged onto the bestseller lists, critics and readers alike have been captivated by her irreverent, hilarious, pitch-perfect tales of women’s lives and contemporary issues. With The Interruption of Everything, her sixth novel, McMillan takes on the fault lines of midlife and family life, reminds us once again of the redeeming power of friendship, and turns her eye toward the dilemma of how a woman starts to put her own needs higher on the to-do list while not shortchanging everyone else.Marilyn Grimes, wife and mother of three, has made a career of deferring her dreams to build a suburban California home and lifestyle with her husband, Leon. She troubleshoots for her grown kids, cares for her live-in mother-in-law, Arthurine (and elderly poodle, Snuffy); keeps tabs on her girlfriends Paulette and Bunny and her own aging mother and foster sister—all the while holding down a part-time job. But at forty-four, Marilyn’s got too much on her plate and nothing to feed her passion. She feels like she’s about ready to jump. She’s just not sure where.Highly entertaining, deeply human, a page-turner full of heart and soul, The Interruption of Everything is vintage Terry McMillan—and a triumphant testament to the fact that the detour is the path, and living life "by the numbers" never quite adds up.

    Too much love, too much attention, and had too many big dreams.   It was how she ended up abandoning her two daughters, Connie and Reesy to chase after a man and the promise of a dream life.   But Charlotte never anticipated how her world would be irrevocably changed.  Now, twenty-seven years later, her whole world shifts yet again with a letter from one of her daughters.  And the past is about to bust wide open.   Reesy has always been obsessed with something.  Obsessed with finding her birth mother. Obsessed with her sister’s life. Obsessed with her own adopted daughter never finding out that Reesy is really her aunt.  With a neglected husband, who is unknowingly drifting further and further away, a sister who is trying to escape her well-meaning clutches, and a daughter becoming more and more curious about her true parentage, finding the mother she always dreamed about seems to be an answered prayer to Reesy.  That is until Reesy is brought crashing back to earth to find that her perfect life is in tattered pieces.Connie has always expected too little. Too little from the man she’s been living with for years. Too little from her modest jewelry business.  And too little from her relationships, or lack thereof, with her daughter, mother and sister. And too little from herself.  Until she discovers she is pregnant again and decides that this time she is keeping her baby, sending her life and her relationship into a tailspin.  And rediscovering the mother who left them behind is the last thing she wants.  Thrown back together again, in a maelstrom of shocking truths, Charlotte, Reesy and Connie will discover on their journey to forgiveness and redemption that you just might have to sin first in order to be saved.