But this year, as winter approaches, Wilkie is increasingly depressed and withdrawn. At her wit's end, Jenny persuades him to visit Key West, the Last Resort. Within weeks of their arrival Jenny not only has a part-time job but is becoming involved with assorted local characters, including Gerry, an ex-beatnik poet, and Lee, the dramatically attractive manager of a women-only guesthouse. Wilkie, meanwhile, is planning his own "accidental" death by drowning--a task that turns out to be more difficult than he thought--and trying to avoid the attentions of a breathless young female fan.

    Wandering there, she uncovers, in the ruins of a log cabin, the writings of a young woman who lived more than a hundred years before. Into Alyson's story Merilyn Simonds weaves the moving tale of Margaret MacBayne, who, with her family, left behind hardship in a seaside Scottish town in the hope of building a new home in the Canadian wilderness. Margaret, an expert on herbs, contemplates revenge when her brothers rob her of her happiness. When Alyson too suffers great loss, she must decide if retribution is worth the price. Taut and uplifting, sensuous and astute, The Holding is psychologically complex and beautifully rendered. Simonds brings us an intimate journey of discovery into the things we keep most guarded, whose truths often lie in unexpected places.

    The first eight books in the series, now in one box set.THE LAST KINGDOM, THE PALE HORSEMAN, THE LORDS OF THE NORTH, SWORD SONG, THE BURNING LAND, DEATH OF KINGS, THE PAGAN LORD, THE EMPTY THRONE.Uhtred, born into Saxon aristocracy in ninth-century Northumbria is orphaned at ten. He is captured and adopted by a Dane and taught the Viking ways. Yet Uhtred's fate is indissolubly bound up with Alfred, King of Wessex, who rules over the only English kingdom to survive the Danish assault.The Last Kingdom is an epic series from the master of historical fiction, that tells the tale of Alfred the Great, his descendants, and the Viking enemies they face. The struggle between the English and the Danes and the strife between Christianity and paganism is the background to this outstanding series of how England was made – and very nearly lost.

    Although she wins fame and fortune, Mei-li seeks a truer spirituality, and embarks on a pilgrimage that takes her to the death-soaked Europe of the First World War, to a utopian commune in the Santa Cruz Mountains in the 1920s, to the Depression-era migrant work camps and cannery strikes, and finally to the Napa State Hospital, where she finds wisdom and peace among the outcasts of the asylum.Mei-li’s modern-day epic is grounded in the history of Northern California in the first half of the twentieth century and peopled by comrades of many classes and cultures and by lovers both male and female. Yet her central odyssey remains one of inner discovery.In Confessions of Madame Psyche, Dorothy Bryant has created a character who is so honest in her search for truth, growth, and spiritual understanding that this quest becomes inherent to her survival.

    It is the story of his life which encompasses love, dedication, eccentricity, friendship and overall his discovery of his true love and also the anguish of losing it due to his obstinacy and self-centeredness. It is a repertoire of moments coated with velvetiness of love and bruised by the thorns of betrayal. It highlights the situations which ultimately turns him into a devil, who wants to annihilate the whole world with his impiety, consequences being the least he cares about; and eventually loses his happiness, identity and even himself in this process.I could neither speak in words, nor could ever write it downThe loneliness, the emptiness your absence left behind....Those moments spent in the warmth of your cuddleStill linger in a cruel heart...... in a guilty mind!!!Whenever I dream, I see you so tranquilCan I trace the reason of my going away and getting back never?If by closing my eyes I see you happy sweetheart,I promise I shall close my eyes FOREVER!

    Theirs is an art that can alter Reality, a secret Gift passed down for generations and always used for the good of the kingdom. But now the most talented of the Grijalvas has decided to use his power for his own dark intentions--with results more devastating than anyone could imagine!

    Fiction - Sequel to "How Green Was My Valley"

    Sarah will help Major Storrington, confined to a wheelchair by the tank accident that finished a promising military career, to research and write the family history of the Storringtons, an armaments dynasty. She will also serve as governess to his small son.To her dismay, Sarah finds the ménage at Maidenshall, the great Victorian mansion built on the site of a nunnery, a decidedly uneasy one:* Bored, diversion-starved Cressida increasingly seeks escape in her London fashion career and, perhaps, in the arms of other men;* Adolphus Storrington is a lonely, distracted child who spends most of his waking hours in the company of a fantasy playmate;* The Major, handsome, powerful and restive in his wheelchair prison, alternates between bursts of creative energy and outbursts of frustrated rage at his family, servants, and Sarah, who is falling in love with him;* And Henrietta Galloway, the nonagenarian retainer who wanders about Maidenshall unsettling everyone she meets with ramblings about days long past.When Sarah discovers two Edwardian-era diaries, she slowly unravels the mystery of a passionate betrayal of a previous governess and the master of Maidenshall.

    In fact, he now spends his days crashing funerals for the free food and insight into the Great Beyond. Then he meets Rosamond, a nun playing hooky from the Holy Orders. Hayden is smitten the instant her heavy silver cross smacks him in the face when she leaps up to do the wave at a ball game. Luckily, Rosamond has picked the right person to teach her how to live . . . and to love—because nobody does both better than Hayden MacBride.However, Rosamond’s years in the convent have not prepared her for the oddball characters of Hayden’s world. There’s his ever-fretful, vigilant daughter, Diana, the “Dutchess o’ the Sidelong Glance”; his sweet grandson Joey, struggling to break free of his mother’s overprotective embrace; Hayden’s bagpipe-blowing cronies; the Greyfriars Gang; neighbor Bobbie Anne, a “working girl” full of good advice and tender mercies; and Hank, the sexy architect contemplating the priesthood—a big mistake in Hayden’s book. For Hayden thinks that Hank should be married to his daughter and raising Joey. And he has an elaborate plan to make Hank see things his way. . . .In an uproariously funny novel of love, laughter, and one man’s final call at the riotous watering hole called life, Laura Pedersen proves that miracles are all around us—when we open our eyes and our hearts to embrace them.

    His friend, Steven Turner is the Brooklyn-born local reporter who will bear witness to the city's successes and failures. Between them come Jack's beautiful fiancee Anne--an artist with secrets of her own - and his undisciplined brother Harris, hired by Jack to remove the suspicious barrels of waste from Lakeland's broken heart.As the town struggles to find a new identity, these four characters must find their way through their own unexpected transformations and along the way attempt to answer the questions that plague us all: what is the price of loyalty, filialty, goodness and love?

    Achsa is a lonely, passionate and precocious fourteen-year-old. Isolated at school by her intelligence and disfigurement, troubled at home by the undercurrents in her parents' relationship, she finds comfort and inspiration in the tunes and rhythms she hears on her radio. Hearing a recording by an unknown 20-year-old country singer named Elvis Presley, she fires off a fan letter, telling him she knows he's going to be a star.

    He is content with his role in the city, proud of his barracks, and in awe of his owner, the sour Master Horne. Life, by Grog’s reckoning, is good.Then an enigmatic churchwoman enters his life, and Grog finds himself swept from the city which has been his entire world, to travel and learn amid as strange a group as he has ever seen. He knows nothing of the group’s mission, just that his skills are necessary and the quest is ‘a good thing’. But slowly, on this strange journey of both distance and spirit, Grog learns of the goal his new employer pursues, and its role in a troubled world. More importantly, he learns the value, and price, of freedom, and neither aspect is anything like what he imagined.A fast-paced fantasy novel by the author of the popular Dream series (and eighteen other novels), Grog takes the reader on a journey through an embattled Empire and a world in which things are seldom as simple as one expects.

    Hiding in the jungle with the last of the unsubjugated Inca, Haylli transcribes his memoirs from quipus –the Inca’s writing system of knotted string– into Spanish with the help of a captured priest. Beginning with a childhood of privilege and a youth spent as a fugitive from Imperial justice, through a successful career as the Inca’s most powerful bureaucrat, to an old age spent in the ruin of his life’s work, Haylli was present at all the important moments of his people. Through his words he hopes their story will be remembered. Fans of historical fiction can look forward to an epic family saga covering more than seventy years to include almost everything we know happened between the zenith and nadir of Inca power. More than two-thirds of the characters are based on real people, and every corner of the empire is visited over the course of the narrator’s life: The plot has court intrigue, forbidden loves, triumphs, tragedies, rivalries, heroes, monsters, coups, civil wars, prophecies, plagues, treasures, sex and violence –all before the conquistadors arrive to change everything forevermore.

    It is a widely read piece of Gujarati literature.The supernovel was written over a period of 15 years, with the first volume being published in 1887 and the fourth one in 1902.The focus of the novel is on two Gujarati Brahmin families. The family of Lakshminandan is settled in Bombay, and is very wealthy. Saraswatichandra, the brilliant scholar-to-be, is born to Lakshminandan and Chandralakshmi. He has a dazzling career to look forward to as he is steeped in Sanskrit and English classics, is a barrister by qualification and has tried his hand successfully at his father's business. The other family is that of Vidyachatur, the highly knowledgeable prime minister of the court of King Maniraj of kingdom of Ratnanagari. To him and his wife, Gunasundari, the lady of tremendous qualities, are born two daughters, Kumudsundari (the elder) and Kusumsundari. Saraswatichandra's mother dies, and Lakshminandan remarries. The step-mother, Guman, is a scheming woman and she treats her step-son with suspicion and dislike. Meanwhile, Saraswatichandra and Kumudsundari are engaged to be married, subsequent to which they exchange letters and fall in love without having seen each other; he, charmed with Kumud's tenderness and similar likes and she, taken in by his vast knowledge and excellent qualities.Things reach a head in Saraswatichandra's home when he realizes that even his father suspects him of having an interest only in the family wealth and he decides to renounce his home. His best friend, Chandrakant, tries his best to prevent his friend from carrying out this terrible vow. But Saraswatichandra is not amenable to argument, and he leaves, thus not only renouncing home and wealth, but also leaving young Kumud in the lurch. He proceeds by sea to Suvarnapur. By the time he reaches there, Kumud has already been married off to Pramad-dhan, the wayward son of Buddhidhan, the man who is slated to become prime minister of Suvarnapur.And thus, we come to the third family. Buddhidhan is a Bania (vaaNiyaa) and has a sharp intelligence and political sense, by which he manages to overturn the reign of Suvarnapur's ruler, Jadsinh, and his administrators, Dushtrai and Shathrai. His own Rajput friend, Bhoopsinh, becomes king and Buddhidhan, his prime minister. Saraswatichandra stays at Buddhidhan's place calling himself Navinchandra, and watches all this political activity with interest. Inevitably, he comes into contact a few times with Kumud, the daughter-in-law of the house. Love for each other ignites again, and a lowly companion of the daughter of the house takes advantage of this and incites Pramad-dhan against his wife.On the day Buddhidhan gets the prime minister's post, Saraswatichandra leaves his house due to the tensions that contact with Kumud is causing them both and leaves without a destination in mind. Meanwhile, Kumud is also on her way in a palanquin and accompanied by guards, to see her mother in Manoharpuri. Saraswatichandra's is attacked by bandits and they leave him injured in a forest. An attack on Kumud is also planned by the bandits. Kumud's grandfather, Maanchatur, manage to foil the bandits' plans, capture their leader, but then, Kumud, fearing shame and infamy, jumps into the Subhadra river. Everybody assumes her dead.Saraswatichandra, meanwhile, is rescued by a group of ascetics and taken to their ashram on the nearby mountains of Sundargiri. Here, Saraswatichandra impresses the head monk, Vishnudas, by his breadth of knowledge and eventually makes him name him as his successor to the post of head monk. Kumud also survives and her unconscious body is caught by a lady ascetic, Chandraavali. This group takes Kumud to Vishnudas' ashram and both she and Saraswatichandra come to know of each other's presence there.The ashram ascetics realize the facts of the past life of these two, and try their best to reunite them. In this attempt, they take them both to an isolated cave on the peak of Chiranjeevshrung. Here, spending four days and nights together, they undergo a mystical experience and they realise their goal of life. Ratnanagari's police and detectives find out where Saraswatichandra and Kumud are, and eventually, his entire family talk to Vishnudas about getting the two 'back into the world', and convince the two about the same. However, there is no consensus on the marriage of Kumud to Saraswatichandra. Kumud on the other hand tries to convince saras to marry Kusum (kumud's sister). The story ends with Saraswatichandra marrying Kusum.This is the plot of the novel described in the briefest possible manner, without conveying even an iota of the emotions, the tension, the idealism of some characters and the pragmatism of others, the sheer vicissitudes of life in these three families after Saraswatichandra renounced home.

    But in Lewis Percy, she performs a remarkable leap of imaginative empathy in her portrayal of a man torn between the reassuring cloister of the library and the alluring but terrifying world of the senses, a world populated by women who persist in bewildering him.