Strange Nervous Laughter


Bridget McNulty - 2007
    You'll not find six more remarkable characters: a cashier-turned motivational speaker, an undertaker with a toenail fetish, a girl wrapped in dreams, a man who communicates with whales, a garbage man with a peculiar sense of smell, and a Guinness Book of World Records representative.

A Taste of Peace (Malibu #1)


J.J. Sorel - 2021
    Lachlan Peace’s true passion in life is music and surfing. He also can’t take his eyes off his new admin assistant, Miranda Flowers.Miranda can’t believe her luck she’s finally landed a well-paying job working for Peace at his sprawling Malibu estate. Dazzled by the opulence of her new workplace, which boasts a private beach amongst other fine trappings, Miranda thinks she’s won a celestial lottery. One of her more pleasant tasks, missing from the job description, involves accompanying her handsome boss to lavish balls as his pretend date. Miranda soon discovers that her unfriendly and very demanding manager has her sights on Lachlan Peace, with whom the CFO shares a complicated history. When this scheming manager notices that Miranda has caught the eye of the man that she’s determined to marry she hatches a plan to force his hand.Although the obstacles come thick and fast, there’s only one thing Lachlan Peace is certain about: he’s crazy about Miranda. But can Miranda compete with her sly and crafty manager, who has something over Lachlan? And will Miranda and Lachlan’s off-the-charts chemistry survive the SEC, the mob, and the sharp claws of a dangerously ambitious woman?

Short Stories


W. Somerset Maugham - 1985
    In acclaimed stories such as 'Rain', 'The Letter', 'The Vessel of Wrath' and 'The Alien Corn', Maugham illustrates his wry perception of human weakness and his genius for evoking compelling drama and an acute sense of time and place.

Merry Bloody Christmas


Ellie Scott - 2018
    A chocoholic grizzly bear, a talking Christmas tree, mince pie overdoses and a very bloody murder. Will poor old Saint Nick make it out alive? Sad, strange, funny and gruesome, this overlapping, multi-genre collection of tales has a little something for every reader. Curl up with a mulled wine and some fictional festive misery, and discover what Father Christmas really likes to drink when he wriggles down your chimney. Spoiler: it isn’t milk.

Two For Three Farthings


Mary Jane Staples - 1990
    Slightly against his better judgement he took them in, fed them cocoa, and put them to sleep in his bed. A few days later he found that - somehow - he had become the unofficial guardian of Horace and Ethel. It was him, the orphanage, or separation for the gutsy little pair who would have to be farmed out to anyone who would take them, and Jim felt a sudden affinity for the two cheeky cockney kids. The first thing he had to do was find fresh lodgings for them all.Miss Rebecca Pilgrim was a woman of strict Victorian principles, eminently respectable, and determined to keep her privacy intact. She had reckoned without her new lodgers - Horace, Ethel and, above all, the irrepressible Jim Cooper. And thus began the humanizing of Miss Pilgrim, who turned out to be younger, prettier, and far gentler than any of them had suspected.

Fade


Robert Cormier - 1988
    But his “gift” soon shows him shocking secrets and drives him toward a chilling act.“Imagine what might happen if Holden Caufield stepped into H. G. Wells’ The Invisible Man, and you’ll have an idea how good Fade is. . . . I was absolutely riveted.”—Stephen King

The Mind Game


Norman Spinrad - 1980
    The Movement-was it the greatest con of all time, or the last true religion? A chilling novel about the evil of cults.